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In the main, TTAG’s Armed Intelligentsia can’t stand MikeB302000. The pro-gun control blogger’s comments never fail to raise readers’ collective hackles and bring my FLAME DELETED stamp to the fore. But I’m glad the American expatriate frequents this blog. However infrequently, Mikebunchofnumbers (as he’s not-so-affectionately called) provides genuine insight into how opponents of firearms freedom think. So deep breath everyone. You’re not going to change MikeB’s mind any more than you’ll get him to date Michal Idan (who looks a little chilly to me). Just pause for a moment and consider what MikeB302000 has to say underneath The Gun Free Zones: It’s Time to Stop the Madness. Because he’s saying what millions of Americans are thinking but not saying . . .

What you don’t get, or pretend not to, is we’re not worried about the criminals, we’re worried about you lawful gun owners. Most of the mass shootings have been done by guys just like you, people who owned their guns legally and had never been convicted of a felony. Add to that the domestic abuse and suicides and basically everything that’s not gang and drug related, and you can see the problem – too many guns in the hands of unfit gun owners. Unless we raise the bar on who can qualify for gun ownership, it’ll just keep getting worse. The more guns there are the more trouble we have.

Good point, and one we’ve made before. Americans don’t really care about criminals—armed or otherwise—because our crime rate is so low. Especially for people who don’t live in gang-infested areas. For them, violent crime is practically non-existent.

Not to put too fine a point on it, “gun crime” is not about them. That kind of “gun violence” is “out there.” Somewhere. Away. Put some more cops on the problem. What else can we do? And again, really, who cares?

Now when someone shoots up an elementary school, murdering 20 children at point blank range, in a suburban (white?) setting, SOMETHING MUST BE DONE!

These aren’t criminals! They’re madmen! They clear background checks! What can you do about it besides banning assault weapons? And even if that doesn’t do anything, let’s do it anyway and hope for the best! SOMETHING MUST BE DONE!

What’s that you say about the Second Amendment and defense against tyranny? What’s tyranny? Kids are being slaughtered! SOMETHING MUST BE DONE.

That, dear reader, is what we’re up against. As MikeB302000 so eloquently illustrates.

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206 COMMENTS

  1. Dear lord… those eyes! How could you say she looks chilly when those eyes could very well be the source of global warming?

        • You whine that the AI always resorts to personal attacks against you but it ‘s perfectly fine for you to engage in such against RF. A little consistency please.

        • Face it, women ARE sex objects. Denying that fact it denying simple biology, just as denying that criminals exist and want to do major harm to you and your family is denying simple reality.

          Teach your daughters what is healthy, what is respectful and what to look for in those who would seek to enjoin them – don’t hide the ugly of the world from them.

        • Oh, teach our daughters all that good shit and meantime hang pin-ups on the garage wall (or on the blog). That will help them with their self-esteem, body-image problems and self worth.

        • Mike, your really are a strange effeminate fellow. You dream less of being John Wayne like and more like the transvestite dude in the ‘Crying Game’. Between your views on firearms and (clothed) babe pictures, your a walking advertisement for those low T commercials.

  2. Since the overwhelming majority of US subjects want guns banned, why doesnt Obama just declare the 2nd amendment null and void?

    • Because he doesn’t have that power, per the same constitution. This isn’t Venezuela smart guy.

      And where do you come up with overwhelming anyway. Half of all homes in the US have a gun in them.

      • Being flippant never goes out of style, however my point is made, this is the very same dogma that the anti gun crowd is preaching, since Obama won the election he know speaks for all and His will be done.

        Hopefully the backlash from this continued Marxist dogma from the “progressives” is as vociferous on the streets as on the hallowed inteweb.

      • If you mean the right exists with or without the 2nd Amendment’s presence, I agree. It’s purpose is to keep government from disarming the people and making them their… how should I put this… slaves, by violating that right any way they can. (Yikes!)

    • Where are you getting this misinformation? If “the overwhelming majority of US subjects want guns banned”, which would mean 60% or more, why did The US virtually sell out of guns, ammo, and those Devil Magazines (30 rounds, no pictures), in just about a month or so? If you can’t come up with facts to support your arguments, well, just conger them up. This is why I hate liars. They distort peoples reality with falsehoods to justify their agenda. Words cannot express the loathing I have for such beings.

      And if the author of the comment above, may his name never be mentioned (no not Robert), is more afraid of the gangs than law abiding citizens, then I can understand how he received that head injury during his last colonoscopy. If guns and crime are caused by gun availability and high per capita private ownership, explain Sweden to me.

      Luckily this troll will enjoy his 1st Amendment rights, while trying to eliminate the protection of that right to freely speak out. What a flaming idiot.

      • You talkin to me? Huh? You talkin to me?

        I have been forwarding the RKBA agenda possibly before you picked up your first gun.

        Loosen your belt and learn to perceive sarcasm. I am not a “troll” but am adept at using the verbiage of the usurpers to make a point.

      • Honestly i wish i could conjure up as many magazines and boxes of ammo as the lies flying around….. oh wait if i did that i would need fort knox sized or larger storage facility lol

    • Overwhelming majority in US want guns banned? You are either a secular jew, athiest, anti-American libtard…..or someone just trying to get a rise.
      I will just assume the latter.

  3. Doesn’t MikeB live in Italy? He does know that Italy, except for mandatory registration and a ban on some military calibers /nomenclature (5.56 NATO no, .223 Remington OK), has pretty lax firearms laws? Semi-Auto’s are no problem. I think his time would be better spent fighting this on his homefront if he’s so concerned.

    • I just moved back from Italy after living there for over 13 years. I can assure you that the laws are very much more lax over there. No such thing as an assault gun or Short Barrel Rifle. But…and here is where I think we can change. They have a register of firearms not at a national level, but at a local level. Also, in order for you to buy a firearm you need a Firearm Purchase ID card, similar to what they have in NJ. The first person to sign off on you is your personal physician. He has to state that you have no issues that would prevent you from owning a gun. Then and most importantly you need to demonstrate that you’ve either 1 served in the military, or 2 passed a state sanctioned firearms course. Other than that you are GTG!

      • The training can be accomplished if it were reinstated in school as a mandatory course, just like hunter safety. You have a diploma with the class being passed to graduate, your trained!

        Then again, Italy doesnt have the 2A, and they have a little better mental health care system do they not?

        The implementation of gun control there didnt result in reduced murders or violence, so where is the proof gun control of the law abiding ever does reduce violence by the felons & crazies?

        Their legal system is different as well, more Napoleonic law where you have to prove your innocence to the jury, not the other way around.

        Do they have the right of no self incrimination?

        Do they have multiple drug cartels supplying $53 billion on drugs just through the Mexican border each year?

        What is the diversity of their population?

        We know they have a well establish mafia prescence! Funny how the crime rate in those areas controlled by the 4 different mafioso families is above our national average.

      • I still don’t understand why anything Mikeb says surprises anyone here at TTAG. He gets the luxury of posting on here as just another person, basically anonymous. He needs to be exposed for who he really is and his agenda. We need to be better at knowing our enemies. Even though I can’t stand Mikeb and he is an idiot I do have to give him credit. He does his research and he knows his enemies. He probably reads this site along with other pro gun sites religiously. He gets to see what we are talking about, what our next move may be. That gives him the advantage to counter it with lies and disinformation to all his lemmings on CSGV and his blogspot. We could learn a few things from this guy.

        • according to the time stamp on mikeyb’s comment he’s 3 hours ahead of me on the west coast. That means he’s commenting from the eastern US, not Italy. So where does Mike Beard live? New York?

        • Okay, then who are you? Do you live in the U.S.? Are you actually affiliated with the group CSGV? Just be honest and lt us know who you are.

  4. So Mikeynumbers is saying as long as the gangs stay in the ghetto or trailer parks or barrio, we don’t care? But if there is a chance a previously law abiding person may break the law and kill people in the burbs, we must register our guns so the gov’t can confiscate everyone’s guns when more laws don’t solve anything.

    Well pound sand into any orifice you choose mikeynumbers. Tens of millions of gun owners have committed no crimes and I am one of them.

    • No, that’s not what I’m saying at all. I’m saying that anyone who thinks the gun control folks believe gun-free zone signs will stop bad guys is either lying or an idiot. It’s the same with the nonsense about bad guys don’t obey the laws, as if we think they do. We aren’t that stupid, believe it or not.

      You know what happens at gun-free zone schools? They have an almost total absence of teachers or janitors or admin workers going berserk and shooting up the joint.

      • I don’t know where to start…

        You presume that someone who is inclined to murder will stop at the edge of a “gun free zone” and say to themselves, “Oh my, I can’t go in here with my gun and shoot the place up, they might slap a felony on me!”

        Cesare Beccaria put it best:

        “THE laws of this nature, are those which forbid to wear arms, disarming those only who are not disposed to commit the crime which the laws mean to prevent. Can it be supposed, that those who have the courage to violate the most sacred laws of humanity, and the most important of the code, will respect the less considerable and arbitrary injunctions, the violation of which is so easy, and of so little comparative importance? Does not the execution of this law deprive the subject of that personal liberty, so dear to mankind and to the wise legislator; and does it not subject the innocent to all the disagreeable circumstances that should only fall on the guilty? It certainly makes the situation of the assaulted worse, and the assailants better, and rather encourages than prevents murder, as it requires less courage to attack armed than unarmed persons.”

      • So your saying that teachers, admin staff and janitors are a logical choice for concealed carry in a school as long it’s their choice? No, I don’t suppose you are.

        I know that you and other anti-gunners are not stupid. I don’t understand your thought process at all. I believe that the last solution that should be considered is any that restricts the rights of law abiding citizens.

        The primary reason for the 2A is for citizens to protect themselves from gov’t. The first thing the Crown attempted was to remove the colonials access to firearms. History has shown that people that were forbidden to own arms eventually lived in a totalitarian regime. If the currently proposed legislation should pass, violent crime with and without guns would not be reduced. Next would be more calls for restrictions. It would be a matter of time, no more than a few decades, before the rest of the Constitution would be overtly ignored. I absolutely believe it would happen.

        All empires fall. I cannot let it happen while I am still alive.

      • So you are implying that the gun free zone is what makes them like this? If they weren’t designated a gun free zone then we would have janitors, teachers, and admin workers shooting up schools on a regular basis? Wow, it’s a good thing they have those signs posted up or I may have never made it this far in life.

      • I love this argument Mikeb. We cannot trust teachers and janitors to be armed because they are seething cauldrons of rage and could go berserk at any moment. And if they had a firearm on their side, they would kill dozens. But we do trust them to behave themselves and leave their firearms at home.

        What you are saying is that you expect teachers and janitors to break rules about murder but you expect them to follow rules to leave their guns at home. Which is it? Do you or do you not expect teachers and janitors to follow rules?

      • Thank you Mike. You are the perfect example of the “know it all, better than you, so I am qualifed to run your life” modern liberal (which is actually a perversion of that term, in the classical sense). A better label would be Neo-Fascist, and I dont mean it as a put-down, or a pejorative- but a historical reminder of how that seems to work in the short-term, but fails in the long-term. Think Nazi Germany, Italy under Mussolini, the Soviet Union, Red China, Cuba, and Venezuala, and Community Organizer in the Alinsky model.

        I’d like to believe you are open to facts, and that you are operating in good faith, but your own words here convict you. Please do come back as often as you like- its good practice for us to recognize who we need to quickly identify as not being worth the effort, so we can focus on others who really do have the ability to confront their beliefs, however misguided, when presented with facts and civil discourse.

      • So we can all thus infer that, when gun-free school zones were nonexistent, berserk teachers, janitors, and admin workers shooting up the joints were a regular thing? Odd, I just don’t remember that happening. Nor does anyone else. What I DO know is, with the establishment of gun-free zones of all kinds, instances of berserkers (who were not generally teachers, janitors, or admin workers, for that matter) shooting up the joints with impunity have increased rapidly.

        H’mmm. . . Apparently, you ARE that stupid.

      • The worst school massacre in US history occurred in Bath, Michigan in 1927. Without guns, but with explosives. Accomplished by a disgruntled former school board member, that had access to the school for a year in order to plant the dynamite. By your logic, all they needed to do to prevent that murderous rampage was post some “boom-boom free zone” signs and all would have been well.

        Thank you for giving us a glimpse of the statists’ gun- grabbing logic.

      • Mike… Almost ALL schools have a complete lack of ANYONE going berserk and shooting up the joint, despite double the amount of privately held arms in the last decade. School shootings, while terrible, are anomalies.

        If skyrocketing increases in concealed carry numbers are not equaling skyrocketing increases in gun crime, what would it hurt to at least give CHL holder faculty in schools the OPTION of a fighting chance? Because as it stands unless they just get lucky and either get away or successfully hide, they currently have NO fighting chance nor do their students.

      • MikeB: “You know what happens at gun-free zone schools? They have an almost total absence of teachers or janitors or admin workers going berserk and shooting up the joint.”

        Indeed, they don’t. Wouldn’t it be interesting, since you bring that up, to figure out the percentage of teachers, janitors and admin workers that also happen to be be firearms owners?

        Then again, I doubt it would make a difference to you. The agenda has been set, the numbers either support your argument (and then you use them) or they detract (and then you will attack the numbers or the source). It would be tragic (for your argument) if everyday, there was an almost total absence of armed school employess shooting anyone.

        Byt the way, while I reused part of your sentence for effect, the “almost total” language did not go unnoticed.

  5. You can’t ignore these people and expect this to go away. As RF points out, he’s needed here to display what we’re up against. We need to use this resource to its fullest.

    • Cody,

      MikeB is not here to display anything, he’s a troll. If RF wants to display what we’re up against he’ll do what he does with nearly every other article of coverage, include quotes by gun-grabbers or link to anti-gun articles posted by third parties.

      I would be dollars to doughnuts the only reason that RF posted this is to stop the inane flood of spam MikeB has doubtless been sending him for the last few weeks. Basically RF caved, or to phrase it more bombastically he gave in to the (cyber/intellectual) terrorist’s demands. MikeB is and always has been a troll, nothing more. He just wants to piss other people off to feed his narcissism because that’s how he gets off.

      Honestly I’m incredibly disappointed that RF has once again inflicted that moron on all of us.

  6. Its actually quite chilling to consider that these people have absolutely no qualms about demonizing millions and millions of THEIR FELLOW AMERICAN CITIZENS to get their way.

    There is a very good reason for the ease with which they vilify my wife and daughters, your mother, your uncle, my friends, et al: they simply do not see themselves as FELLOW CITIZENS. They see themselves as superior to “those” people that co-habit this country with them. And as a result they have the inherent right to make decisions about our lives for us. Understand it isn’t just about guns, its about cars, its about food, its about where you live, the water you drink, every aspect of your life will be better when they are empowered to run it for you. Its not guns, its control of lives.

    They honestly believe that they have the superiority to decide what rights I have and don’t have. But I would ask them this: if you have the power to take away my rights because you think them harmful, what are you going to say when someone takes away yours — and make no mistake, they will. There is always one of you superior types superior to even you.

    • “Political tags — such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth — are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former are idealists acting from highest motives for the greatest good of the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious and lacking in altruism. But they are more comfortable neighbors than the other sort.”

      ― Robert A. Heinlein

      • “Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
        C. S. Lewis

    • I think you really nailed it. That feeling of smug superiority is what drives them. They want everyone to engage in discourse, and analyze everything. Form focus groups, and feasability studies. Just as long as you see it their (much more informed, educated, and superior) way. Stupid little fly-over people, get with the program. Or go to the re-education camps.

      • Not just any superiority, a belief in MORAL superiority is from whence the smugness and absolute certainty of the rightness of their cause comes. As with any religious fanaticism, their beliefs cannot be swayed.

    • It’s no more smug superiority than you guys have yourselves. You want some restrictions. You don’t want violent felons to buy guns legally or criminally insane individuals. How about 9-year-olds, isn’t it ok to restrict their rights?

      All we’re saying on my side is we should raise the bar as to who actually qualifies to own guns. And, equally important, we should do better at holding gun owners responsible when they misuse their right.

      • Raise the bar a little? The same argument would be used when the crime didn’t drop like you wanted. Raise the bar again? Still crime would not drop like you want. Each time the bar was raised would be more restrictions. Sooner rather than later registration would lead to confiscation and freedom would be gone completely. You know, for the good of the public.

      • Mike, you continually engage in strawman arguments, and persist in putting words in peoples mouths. The existing federal and state laws already require background checks for handguns that presumably preclude felons and those adjudicated as mentally incompetent as being ineligible. The problem is the lawbreakers, and the nut-cases dont follow the law, so making it even more restrictive, is only further depriving the law-abiding of their constitutional right to self-defense.

        No one has said 9 year olds should have guns- they are already prohibited from owning guns. So thats just a strawman you put up, to then knock down, to presumeably prove your faulty point, which is what- that “we” gun owners dont want restrictions. Thats a circular argument that fails on the face of your own statement.

        Really, did you go to college, take any courses in logic, or writing, or critical thinking, or are you just deliberately being dense?

        You arent doing yourself any favors here, Sir.

        • “The existing federal and state laws already require background checks for handguns that presumably preclude felons and those adjudicated as mentally incompetent as being ineligible.”

          What? Are you talking about ONLY IF they go to an FFL gun dealer?

      • Mikeb, as someone else said, you’ve made a strawman argument. You think you are better than us, and that you have the right and responsibility to run our lives. We may or may not think we are better than you, but we do not wish to run your life. If you choose to never buy a gun in your life, not a one of us will complain. I personally do not want to run anyone’s life. If, in the future, I someday am a father, I may make decisions about how my family and my children will live, but that in no way equates to determining the lives of copetent, law abiding adults.

        • One problem is you’re not all competent and law abiding. Another one is you can’t read my mind and you have no idea whether I feel superior to you or not.

        • …so because he is not “all competent and all law abiding” 100% of the time you are justified to believe that you should protect him from himself? LOL.

      • That’s NOT all you’re saying. In my experience with you, you have advocated for massive firearms registration (which canada decided was both too costly and ineffective) and door to door random checks of law abiding citizens. You have also stated that it would be ideal for the government to have all civilian owned weapons locked up. Then when we want to shoot we can check them out then turn them back in. All of the above constituting absolute tyranny. So spare us the “we’re only suggesting some modest changes” bullsh1t. You are a liar.

        For the record, no one is stating that children should vote, or purchase guns, or drink. As for felons, if a particular criminal can’t be trusted with arms or other rights then he should never be set free.

        • That is a lie. You said all of those things. It is inconvenient to search the archives of the site but you called for all of those measures. You are a liar.

        • One of us is lyin’, and it ain’t me. I don’t think I ever said anything like the government should hold all the civilian guns. That sounds crazy. I write a lot every day but I doubt very seriously if I ever would have said such a thing.

          What I do say though is that half of you so-called lawful gun owners are unfit for various reasons and if my gun control ideas were implemented, you, the 50% would be disarmed. I have also said many times I have no problem with the rest.

      • “It’s no more smug superiority than you guys have yourselves”

        On this I actually agree with MikeB. The Armed Intelligentsia moniker, for instance, particularly rubs me the wrong way and stinks of superiority.

        The strident 2A, “what part of shall not be infringed didn’t you understand” types do come accross as holier than thou, know it alls. And if that is how a slef-proclaimed “gun nut” sees them, imagine how they come accross to gun-banners.

  7. Mikeyb is the best recruiter the NRA has. If this guy were to shut up and go away a lot of gun owners would relax and start thinking of other things than defending their gun tights. Mikeyb is vital to our cause.

      • Agreed Sanchanim! FLAME DELETED MikeyB# in his FLAME DELETED-FLAME DELETED face. FLAME DELETED his mom in her FLAME DELETED, for giving birth to such a FLAME DELETED FLAME DELETED FLAME DELETED…

        • Well!! What a FLAME DELETED FLAME DELETER you are!! How Flame Deleted!!
          LOL!! I know you are but what am I??!!

  8. What concerns me about the recent goings on is how media has been able to brand all gun owners as potential Lanzas. This is where i believe that the NRA continually fails, and at this point has no credibility with the non gun owning public. There needs to be a non NRA movement of public education of what gun ownership and gun rights are all about. To give focus on the 99.9999% of lawful gun owners and use which occurs every single day.

    • I agree. The NRA is basically good for is twisting legislative arms and they do a better than average job at it. Its power is not so much in the money, but, at the end of the day, it represents a lot of average folks who vote.

      The media is in the hands of the progressive elite and even if the NRA hired a more compelling and photogenic spokesperson, and retained the best Madison Avenue firm to fight the gross stereotypes of gun owners, it would be difficult punch through the walls that have been set up.

      In order to win the propaganda war we, as individuals, need to go around the gatekeepers. Writing a check to the NRA just won’t fix the problem. It will require joining local 2A groups, acting locally, calling your representatives, talking to your co-workers, friends and neighbors, leveraging the new mediums of communication like Facebook or Twitter, and showing up in force. Progressive types are great at this because, as the Heinlein post above articulates, they are true believers who like to meddle in other peoples lives for their own good or, you know, the children. Because a lot of us, but not all, tend to be the leave me alone and get off my lawn type, we are a real disadvantage when it comes to emulating progressive activism. Too bad. We’re just going to have to step outside our comfort zones.

      But it is not all doom and gloom. One of the the things progressives/communists do well is incrementalism. They like to boil the frog slowly. The current legislative regime being proposed post Sandy Hook is the chef holding the frog over the pot in one hand, knife in the other cook book on the counter, laughing like a mad man, while water boils over the rim of the pot on the stove. Simply put, they have showed us their hand. Unlike Obamacare, this is not some slow erosion of our rights that often seems inchoate and in some distant future. Guns are tangible. They want to take them. It tends to focus the mind of even the most low information voter who might have a pistol by the bedside.

      I know this may put me in a minority, but I think, in being so open about their intention to disarm us, the progressive left committed a strategic mistake.

  9. ” it’ll just keep getting worse”

    Really…FBI statistics show that violent crime and murder in the USA has been cut by over 50% in the last 20 years. Odd…

    I hear the Home Office in the UK reports that violent crime is at an all time high and oddly enough…gun crimes are up 26% for 2012. Odd…

  10. The core problem with MikeB’s statement are the numbers. Since MikeB isn’t concerned about criminals, let’s look at how many times a “law abiding citizen” murdered someone with a firearm. In 2011 an attacker with no previous criminal record used a firearm to murder somewhere in the neighborhood of 900 to 1800 people in the entire U.S. Of those murders, some number were domestic violence and the rest were revenge or random in nature. So gun control advocates want to seriously infringe on citizens’ rights to bear arms because they believe (mistakenly) that gun control will somehow stop those 900 to 1800 murders.

    Newsflash: gun control will not stop domestic violence because a scumbag that is determined to murder their spouse will easily succeed without guns. For example it isn’t hard to kill a person with a knife or club while they are sleeping. And as for the other random or revenge oriented murders, knives and clubs are yet again quite capable of achieving the desired outcome.

    Now consider how many people save lives with firearms throughout the entire U.S. every year. No one knows exactly what that number is. I do know this: armed citizens save a lot more than 900 to 1800 lives every year.

    • In case anyone wants to know about the numbers I posted …
      FBI Uniform Crime Reports tell us that attackers used a firearm to murder about 9000 people in the U.S. in 2011. Various sources also tell us that criminals involved in gangs and/or drug activity account for about 80% to 90% of those murders. Thus “law abiding citizens” account for at most 10% to 20%. That means a citizen with no previous criminal record would have used a firearm to commit about 900 to 1800 murders in the entire U.S. in 2011.

      • But wait! Haven’t you gotten the “if we save even one life it is worth it! How can you justify allowing the death of thousands of people every year? It’s insane!” crap yet? (To which the proper response is two fold: any weapon will do if no gun is available, and “how many more will die because there are no guns to protect them?”

        • Well I consider the CDC and FBI as reliable sources. Also according to DiFi those evil black rifles only account for 0.4% of gun related death. More people were killed by hammers, bat, or even fists.
          Thousands more die each year from cars, or doctors, but no one complains. This is people control plain and simple. Mexico has such high violent crime many states have simply stopped tracking it.

        • Here is another source Mikeb. The FBI’s 2011 Gang Threat Assessment states, “Gangs are responsible for an average of 48 percent of violent crime in most jurisdictions and up to 90 percent in several others.”
          http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2011/october/gangs_102011

          Please note that does not expressly include all drug dealing and distribution activities. While many gangs distribute and deal drugs, there are many others who distribute and deal drugs who are not part of any gang.

          My numbers are definitely in the ball park and quite reliable. What evidence do you have that the FBI data is wrong?

        • I suppose that also means that 52% of violent crime IS NOT gang related. In some specific areas it’s as low as 10%.

          With mass shootings, of course, it’s much higher. I’d say around 100% not gang related.

        • Good sources for what, Man – proving that there really is causation between more guns and less crime? I don’t think so. And besides, you weren’t referring to the FBI when you said “various sources,” were you?

        • Perhaps we should be a little careful about accusing people of cherry picking data, Mikey? I worry for you… because at some point the mega-powerful streams of your pure hypocrisy will cross over ghostbusters style and make your head explode…

          Don’t worry. I’m looking out for you dear friend:)

        • “Your “various sources” are cherry picked crap. Of course it fits your narrative, so it must be good.”

          says the charlatan that aligns his entire belief system on the faulty cherry picked data of very questionable sources.

          the irony of your statement is rich.

        • Why does Mikey always evade a direct question? Just answer the question what is a good source for crime data if not the official government agencies charged with reporting it? Still waiting for an answer that will never come. It’s like waiting for Godot.

        • “Just answer the question what is a good source for crime data if not the official government agencies charged with reporting it? ”

          ive been asking a similar question for MONTHS…still unanswered.

        • “You haven’t been asking anything for months, you sound like a crybaby. I answered already anyway.”

          no…you didnt.

          and yes, i have been asking that question from you since last fall. and you have remained as silent then as you are now.

          its all good though.

  11. I had an exchange with someone on their blog. She actually works as a city cop and a sheriff’s deputy as well as being a veteran. She stated that she ‘absolutely’ supports the second amendment BUT doesn’t think civilians should own black rifles.
    I advised that the word absolutely does not mean what she thinks it means and that she was a more equal pig, a reference to Animal Farm.
    Which she did . not . get . at . all.

    I have now realized the ignorance we are up against; the government – educated liberals are everywhere and are blind to reason.

    Let us all keep up the fight. Contact your reps again on Monday

  12. I frankly couldn’t care less what Mikeynazi is afraid of, what he thinks, or how he feels. He’s proven time and time again to to be unworthy of rational discourse or even consideration as a fully-fledged human being.

    For what it’s worth, criminals aren’t my biggest concern either. It’s you, mikey, creatures like your ilk whose only purpose in life is to control, oppress, and/or kill any you don’t agree with. Criminal deterrence is my secondary reason for owning guns. The primary reason is people like you and the evils you support.

    So, thank you mikey, for incessantly reminding true Americans why the 2A is so important, and who the real threats are.

    • Friendly advisory: As a matter of blog etiquette, the first person who drops the ‘nazi’-bomb loses and the argument is supposed to close. Go to your room and don’t come out until you’re sorry.

  13. This admission still doesn’t explain everything for me. MikeB and Diane Feinstein have access to the same statistics we do, and they’re not retarded. She KNOWS hammers, and sofas, and deer kill more people than “assault” rifles with their “high capacity” magazines. Is emotion really ruling the day over logic to this extent? Is it possible to be a well educated, “moral” person and not value a high degree of personal freedom that would include the right to bear arms without asking permission from a special caste?

    I know many people let emotion rule and think about the issue in a cursory way. But I think some of the “gun” controllers think they’ll be on the winning team when the population is controlled. You have to get inside the “progressive” mind. They know what’s best, you see. Ultimately, guns are a very important SYMBOL of self-determination. This is unacceptable to them. “Progressives” want to determine where you live, how you live, and how long you live. They want to manage everyone while enriching themselves. They see farther than us, you see, and so they must be at the top of the pyramid.

    Horace Mann, the author of modern tax funded education admitted all of this. Schools were “gardens” where you pruned children to worship the state so that we may have a utopia. This is ideology is the tip of the spear when it comes to “gun control”. As the cliche goes, “it’s about control”.

    • “Those who own the youth, own the future.”
      – Slogan of the German Young Pioneers

      You might like the book “Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe 1944 – 1956” by Anne Applebaum. She details how important it was for the communist party to destroy or subvert the institutions civil society in eastern block countries when Russia started its take over.

      Applebaum makes it clear that the Russian communists, who are not very different if at all than the US Progressives if you scratch below the surface and peer carefully, did not recognize anything existing outside the state, nor tolerate any institutions of authority outside of the state, which in Poland included, believe it or not, the YMCA. The need to control all explains the progressive animosity towards organized religion, the other little platoons of our daily life, free market economics, and, of course, gun owners who challenge the state’s monopoly on force. Like our progressives, the communist party were always careful to present a veneer of justification and legality for its actions, including bloodshed and terror, but, in the end, the justifications were nothing more than window dressing to grabbing more power.

      After the populations were disarmed, civil society restricted to party approved activities, institutions, like the media, subverted, and the NKVD secret police in place, the Iron Curtain fell.

      The problem with the US progressives, though, is that they have mistaken the ability to control the media narrative and ensure reelection by cultivating a permanent client class from the start of the Great Society onward for control over the US in general. The grab for guns is a classic totalitarian move and represents, in my opinion, both massive over reach and a strategic miscalculation.

  14. Why does he care if someone commits suicide?

    He wants to tell other people when they can and cannot die, of course. Another form of control.

    • I thought lefties supported “Right to Die” legislation?

      But only so long as they don’t use guns.

      • I lost my grandfather to a self-inflicted .45 shot. He shot himself clean through the chest (he was too weak at that point to lift that big gun to his head), but that wasn’t the injury that killed him. It was the kick-back cut on his hand that got infected with MRSA at the hospital, and led to a slow terrible death. I would have rather he had a euthanasia option.

  15. They’re not afraid of gun owners. They HATE gun owners. They view us as nothing but a bunch of dumb OFWGs.

    It’s bigotry. And when bigotry is practiced and promoted on a national scale, it’s fascism.

    • I remember what happened to a Fascist in Italy, the crowd after Mussolini and his henchmen & mistress were shot, were dragged around the streets, kicked, spit upon, beaten and then hung up by their feet for all to see.

      Such a fitting end, and of course very few die of natural causes!

    • Yes. MikeB said Most of the mass shootings have been done by guys just like you. Moi?! Typical, assume the premise with no supporting evidence.

      Destroying empathy is a propaganda technique. E.g. those ‘gun people’ aren’t like us. Ultimately ‘they’ aren’t people at all but something we can and should persecute. Consider the holocaust etc.

    • It goes both ways Blammo. There’s an intense mistrust, both ways. We can argue why we’re right and they’re wrong all day long, but it won’t help our cause. The best way I can visualize the situation is with dogs and sheep…

      Say you ran into a talking, disenchanted sheep dog in a bar. He’d probably have a lot of complaints about how dumb sheep are, and how frustrating it can be working with them. He’d probably go on about how insulting it can be that the sheep can’t recognize and respect the job that he does. To the sheep, he looks a lot like the wolves he protects them from. I think we could all sympathize with that.

      What I’ve gathered from observing Mikeynumbers is that the more we growl and show our teeth, and the more we nip at the sheep, the more we look like wolves, and the more confused the sheep become. I really think we need to appeal to the soft scared sheep in a different manner.

      I like the idea that was proposed in a different thread, it was about billboards with pictures of people who’s lives have been saved through defensive gun use. We need to do this nationally, stat.

      • Why not let the wolves have the sheep? Not like we need them. What do we possibly gain from protecting active opponents of liberty?

        • Well, the sheep aren’t really the problem. They’re useful. The problem is the wolves. Once you let them run roughshod over the sheep, they no longer run scared, hungry, and desperate. It gives them power.

        • Kermie- I agree with you. We are a nation of fear moregrens. We walk around being terrified of the person sitting next to us, it prevents us from being polite, and drives us to anger alot faster. Maybe a result of McCarthyism? I know America was a far different country in the 1950`s everyone was friendly, no one was aimlessly shot, and we fought out our problems with words, and fists if need be. The level of respect that we once had for each other is gone, and it`s hurting our culture. I believe that an armed population, is a safe population.. However, there should be a requirement of mental health before you are allowed to buy a weapon. I say legalize everything, but know who your selling to. If we ban certain items like extended magazines, full auto`s, and hollow point rounds then we are just creating a black market for such items and perpetuating crime. If you want something bad enough, you will get it. To be honest, the only reason I am against the checks on mental health before gun purchase, is that the government could get carried away with this. Lots of politicians hate the 2nd amendment. To give them a loophole this large is like giving them the ability to pick and choose who gets a weapon, regardless of mental health. It goes to far and would most certainly be abused.

        • Attention! Attention! Someone here is trying to get you to visit his blog again! Do not give in! Do not visit his blog! Do not give him the benefit of any web traffic! This from the same guy who makes outrageous claims then cites his own blog as a source! Be aware!

        • oh so i take it you will provide alternative statistics to Defensive Gun Uses? like what ive been asking from you for months now?

          “if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is”

        • Before you disparage my ideas too quickly, please remember that when talking about DGUs, it’s always an estimate. You guys actually claim to believe that 95% of them are the brandishing kind for which there is no record and no evidence except the word of the gun owner. That’s not statistics or proof, that’s just hearsay, or as I said, an estimate. In the same spirit, here’s my newest “proof.”

          http://mikeb302000.blogspot.it/2013/01/more-proof-that-dgu-claims-are.html

        • you still didn’t provide me with a credible alternative study for defensive gun uses…hilarious.

          Youre not the first anti-gunner ive asked for such information after they criticize existing statistics.

          hell, even duke university did the same thing you did. they shit on kleck and lott and failed to show everybody their “correct” version of annual defensive gun uses or at least point them in the right direction.

        • “Did you say an alternate “study?” You know it was only an estimate, right? And one which is based 95% on the word of the shooters themselves.”

          and im asking you to provide a credible, alternative to one that you think may be steered by the gun owners’ agenda.

          as usual, you completely avoid the question and have done so for quite a while now. your refusal to do this makes any real liberal nauseous. thanks to you, I cant help but think my tireless efforts to convince the more conservative people on here that “truth has a liberal bias” have been completely in vain.

        • There is no credible estimate, that’s the point. The lowest number I’ve seen is 65,000 and that’s as bad as the rest. Like all of them, it doesn’t consider the ones reported as defensive that were really offensive and in some cases, criminal. Remember where 95% of them are coming from?

        • “There is no credible estimate, that’s the point.”

          By who’s standards? I consider the FBI and DOJ comparatively credible compared to alternatives.

          and it must be easy to stand on the sidelines, throw shit everywhere at people’s work, then run away without offering your own work to counter theirs. That is as intellectually dishonest as one can get.

          ” The lowest number I’ve seen is 65,000 and that’s as bad as the rest. ”

          then what is it? you seem to have the answers as to what the “right” number is. Im not content with people shit smearing then not producing…

          You seem to think all estimations are “bad”. I get that. There also has to be a way to roughly measure the advantages and disadvantages of a particular issue. statistics can help with this so there has to be SOME estimation.

          “Like all of them, it doesn’t consider the ones reported as defensive that were really offensive and in some cases, criminal.”

          and that is purely speculation on your part. Ill give it to you nevertheless, but that doesnt discredit the fact that firearms are also used to protect lives rather than just unnecessarily murder out of malice. That is my entire point.

          Im not sure how you can disagree with that.

  16. In other words you can’t reason with an unreasonable person. Liberals are self centered emotional basket cases. Facts don’t matter, they only believe in their own hysteria.

  17. Antis aren’t basing their positions on principles, facts, or well-reasoned arguments. A very peculiar narrative ignites their nigh religious passion. Narratives are so strong because you only need 3-4 related events and faith to construct one.

  18. Seems I recall someone else letting the truth escape their lips. Oh yes, it was Senator Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH) in the 1994 AWB fight:

    “I don’t care about crime, I just want to get the guns.”

    Thankfully, Metzenbaum is now dead. He was an embarrassment of a Senator in so many ways, but his obsession with gun control was his defining issue.

  19. TTAG has a rather diverse group of people. Many here
    have spent years if not lifetimes in professions such as
    LE, EMS military and even academia. Probability says
    there are more than a few of us with not only college
    educations but advanced degrees even ph.Ds. These
    degrees can range from the liberal arts to hard sciences.
    Chances are some of us attended ivy league or upper
    echelon schools such as MIT or CalTech (GO Beavers!).

    But none of this matters to people like MikeB. The
    moment we support something he doesn’t like
    (or possibly even intellectually understand); we
    become nothing more than simpering apes, worthless
    to society. The MikeBs of the world see no choice
    but to become the benevolent dictators they view
    us as needing.

    This really isn’t idealism or ignorance. It’s elitism.
    And unfortunately, the people who think this way
    aren’t elites at anything. They are the life long
    Monday morning quarterbacks who have never
    played the game at all. Pathetic.

      • Bruno do you honestly, in your right mind think that her only opoitn to buy a gun was by a controlled licensed dealer? If a true gun dealer was not available she could have purchased one on the street. At least now there are some safety regulations in place to prevent some from getting weapons.

    • Not true at all. Sorry. I know you’d like that to be true, but it’s not. I take each person’s comments for what they say regardless of what credentials you might have. And, unlike some of you, I have not spent five minutes trying to research who any of you is. I take you at face value.

      • The irony in your retort is conformation of my
        statement. We are a diverse group of individuals
        but you treat us equally. Fine for some areas;
        not for others. Would you allow an English
        prof with a ph.D in literature design a nuclear
        reactor? No, it’s not their field of knowledge.
        As you’ve stated you’ve never looked into our
        credentials or history. How are so sure that
        you’re views are correct, and at the same time
        you’re not outclassed by anyone here? Elitism.

        Many contributors here have close family or
        themselves lived through total weapon control
        and communist “utopias” of the Soviets. Their
        experience makes them the experts, but still
        they’re wrong. Elitism. Some handle law
        enforcement at a state level, but their views
        are dismissed. Elitism. Others work in inner
        cities, but are dismissed when speaking about
        how bans hurt the poor. Elitism. You treat all
        here with equal disdain and never entertain
        the idea you might be wrong. Elitism.

        Pathetic.

  20. Violent crime is half of what it was 20 years ago, but the “sky is falling” media makes it seem like it’s twice what it used to be. And there are probably at least 30 million MORE guns now than 20 years ago.

  21. You are right: “THE MORE GUNS THERE ARE THE MORE TROUBLE (YOU) HAVE!”

    Long live the Constitutional Republic, the United States of America. The fight shall never be over. Let freedom ring throughout the world.

    Nous Defions
    De Oppresso Libre

  22. If someone said that they were afraid of black people living next door we would all (most of us anyway) call that person a racist. I am not one that normally compares prejudice against gun owners to bigotry but I think MB#s learned opinion captures the same irrational emotional response that drives bigoted behavior.

    I seem to be one of the last persons to elicit a real scolding from management in my personal disdain for our resident gun control expert so I am going to give a defense of why I treat him the way I do. Mikey is of the genus of modern bully that will throw his weight around and then run to the teacher when someone, to quote our President, “punches back twice as hard.” I say to him if you step into the arena man up and expect to receive equal punishment in return. I think Robert is a victim of what I call Friedman’s fallacy (after Milton Friedman). Professor Friedman was of the opinion that the opponents of free markets and liberty were people of good will who could be convinced by rational explanation of the superiority of a liberty based society. Friedman was wrong. Socialists and someone like Mikeb are not people of good will. If you treat them as such they will walk all over you. I welcome his views and his opinions but that doesn’t mean he deserves a free ride to spout his nonsense.

  23. “…because our crime rate is so low. Especially for people who don’t live in gang-infested areas. For them, violent crime is practically non-existent.”

    Perhaps for now. Lets make it so that the majority of us can’t get/own guns and lets see where the criminals start doing their “shopping.” How long before our violent crime rate will start to mirror England’s

  24. The issue is that people focus on the events that happen 0.00001% of the time. I am not sure what the clinical term is but people get stuck visualizing that the 0.00001% event will happen to them. That happens even though there are things that have a 20% of the time starring them in the face. For example, the number of people who still do not have a fire detector and CO detector.

    All the emotion and impending legislation is for the 0.00001% event because it is too scary to think about. This is the issue. How we became this way or if we have always been that way I have no idea.

  25. Of the 1.8 million concealed carry permits issued in Florida since 1987, only 168 have been revoked for use of a gun in a crime.

    Suicides? There are plenty of countries with higher suicide rates and much lower rates of gun ownership (they must have more bridges or something).

  26. I love how afraid ole michael michael motorcycle is to post in topics specifically about him. I guess he does know how horrible his “arguments” and “points” are.

  27. Robert – you called it . . . . MikeBnumbers is a R A C I S T. He can try to hide and claim he has minority friends or works with someone of a different background or even lets someone with brown or black skin clean his pool, but at the end of the day, he is no better than the RACISTS who argued denying Dred Scott his freedom because he was Black, instituted the Black Codes immediately after the Civil War, and promulgated the need for gun boards in the 1920’s to keep blacks migrating into the cities from getting a weapon. He can protest all he wants, and you can add FLAME DELETED, but he is a coward hiding behind the internet. A discussion on this topic with him is pointless until he acknowledges his racial animus.

  28. Mikeb feels rather than thinks. I’m willing to credit him with having his heart in the right place, although that’s a stretch, but he’s an illustration of what happens when thought doesn’t govern emotion.

    Do we feel the pain of innocent victims? Yes. Do we hate the evil that makes some people murder or injure others? Of course. But we also recognize that rashly passing laws isn’t the answer to those problems. We recognize that human nature can’t be entirely contained. We also recognize the fundamental need for basic liberties. That’s because we think as well as feel.

    • -I’m willing to credit him with having his heart in the right place…-

      He doesn’t. Like any anti, he only tries to put on the show that he has good intentions. A few times in the past year or so, he’s let his true outlook slip in some comments here, and he’s looking for nothing less than total control over everyone and the deaths of any who disagree with him. In other words, a typical anti.

  29. I like MikeyB and hope he never goes away. Everyone has a purpose in life, even if, like him, it’s only to show others how NOT to grow up to be. He’s a one-man,hour-long, intellectual bloopers reel.
    May his indefatigable illogic ever wave!

  30. So, what he is saying is that gun control is a war against the lower economic classes, as the wealthier are better protected? And that anyone using crime as an issue to promote gun control is a liar?

  31. Robert, I thought you weren’t supposed to do that anymore. Didn’t you tell us that the AI prevailed upon you to not post my stuff anymore? Or is it OK as long as there’s no link back to my evil blog?

    In any case I’m thrilled to be the center of attention once again on the number 1 gun blog in the world. Please notice how many comments are about me personally and not about what I say. I think that was the original complaint, wasn’t it?

    Those guys who disparage me personally instead of my gun control ideas know that what I say does make sense and they suspect that it would accomplish just what I say it would, which includes minimal interference to the truly lawful and responsible. But that’s where we part ways. Any inconvenience is too much. As a group you are the most self-centered and selfish bunch imaginable.

    • Mikeb302000 you are a racist.

      Now let’s think about that a little shall we……
      So the whole idea about gun control, because you feel so much of the crime is husbands to wives, or family members going at it correct? Gangs, and drive by shootings in urban low income areas really aren’t the issue?
      So your solution. Create an elite group who can or can not own a firearm. As such I am going to assume that it would also be expensive no? Lot’s of courses, in home safe inspections… Well you get the point.
      I live in a rural area but travel to the bay area on a daily basis. Your average white suburbia is actually a pretty safe place to live. So really the law abiding citizens who really need home protection live in urban, areas many of whom are poor no? I mean if we at minimum believe people have a right to protect themselves, that is kind of important.
      Now by your own admission you have stated in making gun ownership hard to get, which will mean it will be expensive, and also all sorts of other rationalized limitations, so no reason other than it looks good to you. It may or may not do a damn thing. Given how many millions of black rifles are already out there, and the fact many of those incidents in gun free zones were done by folks who stole their weapons, I feel you are grasping at straws.
      Now back to the racist thing. Ok so you have made having a firearm, if only to be within the home illegal or at least hard to get to defend yourself. Those that really need it are minorities and poor working class folks who can’t live in walled utopias with armed guards. So sir you are a racist for denying a fundamental right to people because of their ethnic, financial, or social status. Those people you are discriminating against are the ones facing the gangs and organized crime in this countries worst areas.
      How could you be so discriminatory against folks who need help?

      • Gun control as a whole is racist.

        Anyone else notice how its always the “evil” black rifles that get the most heat?

        Racism.

        • I say we paint all AR/AK/FAL/M1A etc…black rifles the color of the homosexual rainbow flag. True libtard diversity and an end to the problem…and debate.

        • Can y’all give that hole racist rant a rest already? While some gun control laws in the past were racist, in that they were aimed at preventing blacks from owning firearms while designed to not hinder whites, that is not the case anymore.

          The gun control laws put forward today, as misguided as they are, are race-neutral.

          Furthermore, there is no real evidence that their impact will be felt more by minorities than whites. How so? Well, if the argument is that more guns means less crime, then less guns would result in more crime *accross the board*. Criminals will naturally shift their attention to those now defenseless, those that were up that point able to defend their possessions and so are richer targets than the current victims.

    • Really? The self-centered and selfish bunch aren’t the ones who wish to endanger, oppress, and steal from lawful citizens in order to give themselves an illusion of safety to soothe their damaged psyches?

      Pathetic.

        • …and saves many more lives.

          your forgot that tidbit.

          but why let facts get in the way of good old fashioned agenda?

        • “The only way you can say that is to stick to the ridiculous lie that there are a million or more DGUs.”

          …or you can say that if there are X amount people killed per year by firearms (murder, suicide, accident) and a larger number than X are defensive gun uses, then the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, no?

          is that so difficult to understand?

        • That would be wonderful. Too bad it’s not true. I guess you’re one of the guys who keeps saying how much you hate my blog, but there are two posts over there today that talk about the big DGU lie. Read them, if you dare. Try to have an open mind.

        • “That would be wonderful. Too bad it’s not true.”

          oh really? well you certainly havent provided any evidence to support why that is not true. you are simply talking from your ass.

          your contention is simply borrowed from propagandaprofessor’s “more on defensive gun uses”, which puts DGU in the hundreds. absolutely hilarious. Yet propagandaprofessor’s “findings” remain in the ass end of the internet…

          “I guess you’re one of the guys who keeps saying how much you hate my blog, but there are two posts over there today that talk about the big DGU lie. Read them, if you dare. Try to have an open mind.”

          I already did and it seems that somebody else asked a similar question that i did. Let me repeat it, “if DGU numbers are bad, then how do you improve this number?”

        • You mean make them more accurate? I don’t know. What I do is use some common sense and take the estimates with a huge grain of salt.

          Common sense says that no one is going to admit having drawn their gun unnecessarily or prematurely. The question is how many of the reported incidents were like that.

          Likewise, no one is going to admit they shot at someone when they really didn’t have to.

          I try to take these things into consideration. You simply pretend they never happen.

        • Unlike valor at Iwo Jimma, common sense is an uncommon virtue. But not in the sense you would think.

          In my environment, when someone throws the words common sense around, it usually means someone failed to tell you what they wanted, yet chew your ass for failing to deliver it. Goes to show how misused that expression is.

          Point is, common sense if far from common. Common sense is certainly not universal. What we think of as common sense is derived from our experience and understanding of the world. After passage of time and socializing with like minded individuals (e.g. this forum, or MikeB’s circles), those experiences and understanding are so reinforced, eventually seeming so obvious to us that we project that onto all others. Naturally then, anyone expressing an idea contrary must be out of touch with reality, lacking “common sense”.

          It’s common sense that you will burn yourself on a hot stove, right? Not to a 2 year old American boy it’s not, and not simply because of age, but because of lack of exposure to burning items. Yet to a 2 year old Indonesian, not only is that self-evident (common sense), but he’ll light his kretek cigarette with the stove.

          In case my point is not obvious to both sides by now, let me spell it out. For either side to accept the other’s as “common sense”, a massive shift in experience and understanding must take place. Of a tectonic scale (wrong adjective, yet it’s the first thing that came to mind: slow, massive undertaking).

          But more importantly still, you must keep an open mind and be willing to “murder board” your thoughts, assumptions and even underlying values, and not just the opposing sides’. You must be willing to test your evidence as well as your hypothesis, as opposed to taking them as gospel.

  32. I want to thank MikeB for helping me make a choice. I live in NYS under a Ban and was going to buy another AR-15 after Christmas. I had $1300 in discretionary funds saved up for it. Events happened and I was priced out of the market. His posts made me think long and hard. So, I just took my $1300 and sent it to NRA-ILA,SAF,and our local NYRPA, ANONYMOUSLY! They don’t need to spend ANY of it sending me things. Take the money and use it to let me buy a new AR NEXT year!!!!

      • I really don’t care if you think it’s true or not.

        It’s my money and my choice to give it away or even burn it. I gave it away for a cause I believe in. I gave a total of $3500 last year to causes I believe in, some of them are even (gasp!) tax deductible. You actually gave me a push with your posts.

        Now, your suggestion that I make up a DGU story is just childish. I understand that TTAG has to actually look for an anti gun voice, so they allow you to post here. I’m okay with that. Here, in New York, I have dozens of choices that are more eloquent and better informed than you are.

  33. I got a little upset reading all the comments. Mikeynumbers seems to prefer to call us liars when we use numbers that disagree with him. How was I to know that the very next website I visited would have a better reply. I just hope it passes the flame detector.

    http://olegvolk.livejournal.com/1531337.html

    Of course, I have to give credit to the master photographer by pasting the link to his site.

  34. All lyin’, stealin’, cheatin’ criminal scumb@gs should be deported to Italy where, in the words of Carole King, “ain’t it good to know that you’ve got a friend.”

  35. I personally am just about the spitting image of what Mikeb and his friends view as the “medium-term” gun owner. I only own two guns a Winchester bolt-action single shot .22 rifle and a break-action shotgun. I cannot afford a handgun, and the chances of me being able to buy one in the near to medium term are very slim. I just MIGHT be able to buy a Mossin-Nagant in a few months if things break just right and the stars align. Because my Dad died when I was very young and my Mom grew up in an anti-gun home, I have never been hunting, and I’ve never been taught how to use a gun, aside from the class needed to get my hunting license once and three very short church activities that had guns IN MY LIFE. Until very recently, I bought the “common-sense” gun wisdom of his crowd. I’m also constantly derided by those (outside of at church,) around my for my position on this and other social and economic issues. I probably would be denied under Mike’s rule, because I have/had ADD, and used to take Ritalin. But other than that, imagine you children and/or grandchildren in my place. That’s what Mike wants. That is his vision of the future.

    • Silvartius,

      Let me take this opportunity to invite you to an Appleseed.

      It’s some of the best and least expensive training you can get.

      There’s probably one near you.

      Appleseedinfo.org

      Sean.

  36. Also, I`m so tired of hearing the arguemnt that more guns on the streets will make us all safer. For one thing, mentally unstable people like Loughner do not think logically to begin with. Mass murderers already know they are going to be killed, kill themselves, or end up in jail forever. They do not care and they don`t think rationally. Knowing there might be a dozen other gun owners in the crowd would not stop these guys. Come on, there are good arguemnts for your side, but this one is just silly. In fact, it`s very likely in a high panic situation like Tucson, a proliferation of guns would only make things worse. In the confusion of the moment, the one guy who had a gun in the crowd almost shot the wrong guy. Again, there`s a great scene in BFC where a roomful of smart, trained gun owners with fake guns were attacked by a man running in with a fake gun as part of an experiment. The guy killed half the room because even these well-trained adults panicked in a fake moment of crisis. So this arguemnt is just a bad one. Finally, there`s one population who would be less safe for sure with more guns children. It literally makes me nauseous whenever I listen to an arrogant gun owner talking about how they`ve taught their young children how to safely use guns. The problem inherent in this scenario is that you can`t train young children how to safely do anything. Kids are stupid and reckless and can`t appropriately assess risk and understand consequences. Their brains just aren`t capable of it. Sixteen year olds have to go through months of careful training to drive a car and are still the most dangerous drivers on the road. And yet we think telling a ten year old a few times that a gun is not a toy is going to keep him from using a gun as a toy when he finds it unlocked in mom and dad`s room? No amount of training is going to be sufficient to make a child be safe with a gun because their brains literally can`t compute that information yet. Careless gun owning parents put their children at risk. Period. Even more guns owners in society MIGHT make you marginally safer in the extremely unlikely event you are caught in a raging maniac`s gunfire. But in the meantime they are definitely increasing the risk for your kids. Again, I`m not saying that means we should ban guns. But the tidy smarmy retort that guns don`t kill people and we should just teach our kids how to be safe with guns neatly and irresponsibly overlooks a very very serious problem.

    • Kids are not as stupid as you think, and have you seen the simulation that TTAG did regarding school/university shootings?

    • “Also, I`m so tired of hearing the arguemnt that more guns on the streets will make us all safer.”

      and im so tired of hearing the argument that less guns everywhere makes us safer…

      “For one thing, mentally unstable people like Loughner do not think logically to begin with. Mass murderers already know they are going to be killed, kill themselves, or end up in jail forever. They do not care and they don`t think rationally.”

      which is why when the bullets start flying, the only way to stop them is to shoot them. if anybody has a better method, im all eyeballs.

      “Knowing there might be a dozen other gun owners in the crowd would not stop these guys. ”

      actually, if you study active shooter scenarios you will learn that any resistance applied, whether civilian or police, causes them to shoot themselves roughly 50% of the time (going by a NYPD statistic so take it for what it is). if your logic was true, we would see terminator-esque mass shootings at police stations…containing uniformed armed police officers with open carry holsters. we dont. therefore, criminals do not have mass shootings where armed individuals are commonplace.

      “Come on, there are good arguemnts for your side, but this one is just silly. :In fact, it`s very likely in a high panic situation like Tucson, a proliferation of guns would only make things worse. In the confusion of the moment, the one guy who had a gun in the crowd almost shot the wrong guy”

      but he didnt…so that means nothing in deciding whether for not firearms are a good counter against active shooters. Im not saying concealed carriers are the cats meow, but they are certainly a better alternative to completely disarmed societies in my opinion.

      “Again, there`s a great scene in BFC where a roomful of smart, trained gun owners…”

      citations?

      “Finally, there`s one population who would be less safe for sure with more guns children”

      oh…do it for the children! thats a fallacious argument if there ever was one. I dont agree. The answer to firearms is education, education. “just say no” works very poorly.

      “It literally makes me nauseous whenever I listen to an arrogant gun owner talking about how they`ve taught their young children how to safely use guns. The problem inherent in this scenario is that you can`t train young children how to safely do anything. Kids are stupid and reckless and can`t appropriately assess risk and understand consequences.”

      you sure are painting kids with a broad brush there. I dont agree. Just because you underestimate your kids and throw them in a isolated bubble doesnt mean i do. Its a amazing concept that seems to elude our modern society: teaching kids personal responsibility and GIVING them responsibility. So I take it your kids wont drive until they’re 18?

      “Careless gun owning parents put their children at risk. Period. Even more guns owners in society MIGHT make you marginally safer in the extremely unlikely event you are caught in a raging maniac`s gunfire.”

      i agree.

      “But in the meantime they are definitely increasing the risk for your kids. ”

      how so? that is any reason more than ever why you have a safe and you educate your children on firearms. its amazing what you can accomplish by going the extra mile and actually being a parent. if you cannot take the time to properly teach your kids, then dont have any.

      “Again, I`m not saying that means we should ban guns. But the tidy smarmy retort that guns don`t kill people and we should just teach our kids how to be safe with guns neatly and irresponsibly overlooks a very very serious problem.”

      keeping your children in the dark about serious problems is certainly not a solution. my kids knew not to play with firearms because that is what i taught them. parenting requires a lot more than just turning on the television and video games and dusting your hands off.

    • You repeat the false narrative that “…In the confusion of the moment, the one guy who had a gun in the crowd almost shot the wrong guy…” there was no almost. He drew his gun but the made the decision not to shoot because he was unsure of his target and was afraid of hitting a bystander. When Nick Meli approached the Clackamas mall shooter he also held his fire because of concerns of hitting an innocent person. In the Empire State shooting the two NYPD patrolmen approached the suspect who was not an immediate threat, opened fire on him in crowed area and wounded nine innocent bystanders. It isn’t armed civilians who are threat to you. It is poorly trained police officers who shoot the wrong people on a regular basis.

      I know I can go out to the range today and qualify under US Military, Department of Defense civilian and Intelligence Community standards but I seriously doubt that your average big city patrolman can.

  37. I believe stlgrony in the second ammendment in the Right to Bear Arms. I think that if Obama is so against gun rights that “he” should not be protected by guns. He is surrounded by body guards who all possess guns and they are for the specific purpose of protecting him. Isn’t that ironic that he wants to take away our rights to protect ourselves but he is able to be protected by “guns”? He should practice what he preaches and stand up for what he believes in, but instead he relies on a gun to protect him and his family. Just a thought!Thanks,Kisa Castleberry

  38. Just what I always never wanted! Another one of Mikey-B’s F***tarded opinions. There is always a “first” time for everything. A first time felony is no different.
    The argument made by most reasonable people in these situations is that there are these things called warning signs. And in almost every mass shooter case it comes to light after the fact that the perpetrator did display multiple “warning signs” and that their friends/family did nothing.
    Some of these people actually have been in trouble with the law before they go on their sprees but for whatever reasons they were able to have their convictions downgraded or otherwise kept from barring them from, among other things, owning guns or perhaps voting.

    The most recent case just provides us another example of how people like Mike have absolutely nothing of value to contribute either to any rational discussion on the matter of firearms ownership or quite frankly to society as a whole.

    Adam Lanza WAS in fact denied the ability to purchase a firearm(s) legally. This is what prompted him to murder his mother and steal her firearms. Saying that the system failed in this instance is, again frankly, asinine. Someone who seriously holds forth such an example as topical proves nothing save that they ought to be required by law to wear a nice helmet everywhere… for their own good of course.

    The above is an example of what millions of Americans are thinking but not saying. We don’t say it because it violates the whole “civil” portion of our nation’s civil political discourse. However I am making a special exception in this case since Robert apparently isn’t willing to enforce his previously stated ban on further “contributions” from TTAG’s resident Troll-in-chief.

    Criminals exist. The only way that we as a society can contribute to stopping future tragedies like Sandy Hook is to:

    A. Take responsibility for your own personal safety. You don’t have to be Billy-Badass but taking a few self defense classes along with owning and training with a firearm is going to exponentially improve your ability to stay alive should the worst happen.

    B. Turn off the television and work on those interpersonal skills. Most of the individuals in question would have benefited from having even a single person, be it parent, sibling or simply friend who had taken the time to listen to them talk. Furthermore having done so would have likely provided volumes of evidence as to their need for some serious talk-therapy.

    End of story. Anyone who says that “the law will save you, or that “mother government will kiss it and make everything better” is FOS.

  39. It is not about gun control, it is all about people control. The goverment cannot control us if we are armed, they want absolute control and power. The police in chicago admited that the hundreds of murders last year were 98% gang and drug related. Furthmore anyone who is 18 years old should have all the same rights and privledges as 21 year olds. They fight, bleed, and sometimes die for the same rights we all injoy.

    • That “people control” thing is total paranoid nonsense.

      You made a good point about Chicago, though. The extremely high percentage of gang and drug violence there is due to the strict gun control laws. If it weren’t for them, those ghetto crimes would be even more, plus you’d have a lot of the non-gang and non-drug violence which is almost completely lacking in Chi Town.

      • Philadelphia is a city who tried to implement chicago-style gun control and failed due to state premption laws. PA is also very pro-gun as a whole, and weapons are widely available to everyone including those in the city. The gang violence there is TERRIBLE, but by your logic it should be dramatically worse than Chicago. Except it isn’t. I have tried to find a listing of those cities which are leading the US in firearm-homicides but couldn’t. I am sure someone here can provide that. But unless I am mistaken Chicago is right at the top of that list. I’m not saying my native Philly is good, but shouldn’t it’s rate of gun homicides be dramatically higher given the easier availability of guns there?

        We don’t have a gun problem. We have a criminal gang and a culture problem. Violence between criminal organizations is driven by business and vendetta. If we take their guns, they will club each other to death. Accidental casualties may decrease if guns were magically erased, or they could increase across the board when criminals no longer fear the armed citizen. Either way it is academic because we are discussing a fictional scanario that will never happen.

        The importance of the right of all citizens to keep and bear arms transcends crime, statistics and national tragedies. Your short-sightedness and that of your ilk are one reason why civilizations fail. Shame on you.

        • We have a criminal and gang problem but we also have a gun availability problem. You desperately want to look at the one as a way of avoiding the other. Both need to be dealt with.

      • so those magical hands of the law deter gangs to any degree mikey? do they magically appear and prevent more crimes than what would otherwise occur?

        LOL.

  40. Mikey is many things, most of them distasteful, but he is his own man and not a troll. And you know what I think of Mikey.

    This person Jennifer is your classic troll. She comes fully equipped with a set of talking points and an empty head. She is probably part of the President’s social media based anti-gun propaganda campaign designed to sway the low information component of the electorate in favor of gun control. You can expect thousands of Jennifers to show up with the same talking points on pro, anti and non gun websites. She was probably sent here on the expectation that people who own guns are uneducated rednecks and neo nazis who will not give a rational rebuttal to her talking points. Then the gun control campaign will cherry pick the crazies and claim that they are representative of the gun culture as a whole.

    Pro-Second Amendment people and organizations need to be just as active in social media to counter these strawmen arguments. That means whenever you see one these threads on Facebook, twitter or a blog you need to provide information respectfully rebutting these posts.

  41. Mikey, I have asked before and am asking again…why do you, even as an expat, care about what goes on in the US?? Do you live here? If not then how does it affect you??
    If you live in Italy like has been mentioned on here before in various posts then what the hell do you care about us and our laws??
    US citizen or not if you do not reside in this country at this time then you, to use a cliche, have no dog in this hunt!!!
    If us law abiding citizens being armed scares you that much then get some help or stay in Italy or wherever you are residing and leave us alone to take care of Our Country!!
    You and I have had discussions before about background checks, mental health, etc etc, but I honestly don’t see or understand why you are so concerned about US law unless you live in the US at this time. Unless it is just to stir up trouble and instigate or harass people who own guns legally because they scare you so much!!!

    • I’m as American as anybody else. You may find it surprising but there are US citizens living in every major city in Europe, and the world I suppose. Many of them, perhaps most, are just like me, our families and friends live in The States. We ourselves and our children may live there in the future. Most of us do not blend in and become Italians or English or French, we remain Americans. We usually spend part of every year in the US even while living abroad.

      So, there are plenty of reasons why I’m affected by and interested in the gun debate. But, what’s the difference? I am interested. That should be enough for you. Trying to undermine my position because I live in a certain place is a cheap shot. If you had such a good argument you wouldn’t so readily resort to it.

    • Speedracer:

      The problem with your line of thought (“Do you live here? If not then how does it affect you??”) is that it opens the door to Peirs Morgan types.

      All US citizens should have a voice in US politics. Many expats are abroad not by choice (as in, they chose to move away from the US) but rather by circumstances, be it your servicemember stationed in Germany or Italy, or your businessman sent to Asia to grow a business. Some expats end up away for a long time, but as long as they are US citizens, they pay their taxes, and they have a say in how our country is run.

      • I will explain a little clearer!!
        Mikey, even tho an American Expat, seems to be bound and determined to aid the grabbers anyway he can to undermine and undercut our constitutional rights. Regardless of where he lives now he is still an American on that I agree to an extent!
        Yes I know there are Americans all over the world!! Lived in Germany for 5 yrs myself. But at no time did I try in any way, shape or form try to undermine our rights!!!
        Now even tho like I said before Mikey is an American I have issue with the fact that even though he is living in another country away from what has been happening here in the US he feels like we need to be scrutinized by Government Goons with a high powered microscope before we can exercise our Constitutional rights to keep and bear arms!!!
        A decision that he should have no say in unless he is here where he will be directly affected by the grabbers desires just like we are.
        Yes I know even overseas we pay our taxes, vote etc!! All part of our lives as Americans!!
        But this is much more serious than taxes and voting! Therefore the people that are living here need to have and should have the biggest say so in this fight! The dog he has in this fight is not near as big as the dog we have in this fight!!!
        Our military overseas worldwide have a bigger dog in the fight than Mikey because of the nature of their job, whether we agree with the reason or not.
        Come home Mikey and get your dog in this fight here and then you will have as much right as we have!!!
        Being in Italy the decisions made by our government in the next few months will not affect you near as much as us in the long or short term!!

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