or other “gunfree” zone, there will be far more casualties than 8 dead and 9 wounded. The main reason it wasn’t a hell of a lot worse was that a STUDENT opened up with his hand gun and then an off duty IDF soldier who lived next door and was allowed to take home his M-16, came quickly to help. Wasn’t it jack0 that earlier claimed off duty soldiers couldn’t be trusted with weapons? And that armed students would be too dangerous?

There must be all sorts of deadly civilian shootings in Israel that get covered up.

the pedophiles would have to duck?  Unless, of course, they were otherwise occupied?

Hey, what about the power of prayer?  Sure would hope for a quick payoff in THAT instance, would you not?  But ya figure, you're in a seminary, if anyplace is directly wired into the godhead, that place ought to be one.

Not to excuse the Pally here, as this is another in a depressing long line of indefensible acts, but i'm curious as to what type of seminarians are packing heat on a regular basis.

Aad hey, is it possible that the words   "seminary"  and "semen" have the same root in Latin?  Hmmm, is that a seminal thought?

And that could give rise to an ironic twist on the old trope :  the abbot of the seminary asks the acolytes and adepts : "is that a gun under your cossock or are you just really happy to see me?"

ever learned to READ!  

If you go to the MCAGTC 29 Palms website, you will notice that checkin instructions require all Sgts & below living on base to check all weapons into the armory.

Now if you want to take that as the marines not trusting people with weapons, that's up to you.  Of course the Marines couldn't possibly know anything about it, just as you couldn't possibly know how to read.

Just the person I want armed to the teeth - one who can't FUCKING READ!!

Don't let facts bother ya!  You have your imagination!   That and a case of grenades, what else could a little girl need!!

It seems the Marines (and I'm assuming other U.S. military branches) do just that.

Until now, you had seemed fairly well behaved the last few days. What happened? Did you lose your bus pass and not make it to Walgreens this week.

illiteracy sometimes rouses the zombie drill instructor from his past.

That's OK with Jack0 - he lets the zombie beat them up as they so richly deserve, while he chills with a beer in another parallel world.

Clinical studies show that the best cure for illiteracy and many other results of laziness is to slap the perp/s until their attention is focused.

Best results are never perfect.  There are hominids in the MN woods who can never be taught to read, or for that matter, they can't be taught shit.

Learn to fuckin read, pal!  Saves a lot of work!

in an interesting contrast, all males of military age in Switzerland are obligated to keep their weapons at home, and in a well-maintainedg condition.  Every year  [until the age of 46?], Swiss males are obligated, as part of their reserve duty, to requalify in the use of said weapons.  A very civilized country, i'd retire there if that was possible.

how germane this is to the US is questionable, as i rarely see news flashes re disgrunted Swiss going postal [or is it posten?] and wiping out a score of fellow citizens.

-- Modified on 3/8/2008 1:29:52 PM

"""i rarely see news flashes re disgrunted Swiss going postal [or is it posten?] and wiping out a score of fellow citizens.""""

hmmm, everyone's packing and yet no mass shootings....what do you think that means????

it's not in their culture?????

soooooooooo, maybe it's not the guns...

how popular is gansta-rap?

Yo Sven, ya muthafucka

Just because I wasn't explicit as to where the mistrust rests? I always knew it is with the Marine Corps and not you. Do you really think that I’m going to go on a rant like this based on my perception of YOUR mistrust of Marines?

Like I said. Get your bus pass renewed and quickly.

it does at times prove top be a nice distracionary technique.

Namely, taking focus away from the fact that armed citzens saved lives...

and very interesting that they don't have a uniform language, but four (4) of them.

That might shake tallslim's ideas, if not his resolve.

I think every history and nation is unique, and nothing transplants perfectly.

That said, nobody I know is gonna miss Tookie (Williams), and we clean missed our chance with Charlie Manson.

I suspect that people may need to be given room to police their own.   You could probably walk into any AME church, and find more hostility and radical solutions to gangstas than you would here, because that's where they have most impact.

What might be interesting would be a public debate between Bill COsby and Al Sharpton.  Then toss in Dave Chapelle and Oprah.

once again, ya gotta read.

Yes, armed citizens may have saved lives.  Much more clearly, other armed citizens took lives.

What impresses me most is that the least temperate, least logical folks are the ones who are most adamant that they need to be armed.

There are points to be made each way, and IMHO, focused attention is probably the best answer, ie, give the dealers a financial incentive to consider closely who they are selling weapons to.   I would hope they know their neighbors better than the govt does.

it would be interesting to consider ways of attaching liability to sellers. kinda like bars that serve till ya puke.

i still like my idea of doing the to parole board members, but i digress...

Courtesy of their own governments.

with some actuary figuring the odds that it will be involved in an unlawful shooting, depending on the type of weapon, the dealer, etc.

So everybody that sells that weapon looks more carefully at exactly what they are selling, and to whom.

You might be willing to sell some types of weapons (a 410) some places (Wyoming) cheaper than others (Uzis in compton) - depending on who you are selling to (a HS teacher or the kid he sent off to juvy).

And if that weapon gets used illegally, the insurance pays off the victims.  Better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

If a weapon is uninsured, that's easy - states have dealt with uninsured funds and assigned risks for a long time.

are you advocating a universal draft?

Actually, that may not be such a bad idea, but the military does not like it because it's socialistic - that is, you have to invest in training kids - both technically and morally - and patch up their bodies - for 2 years before they start to pay off, and then you wind up discharging them.  A universal draft would wind up being a CCC.   Still, not an entirely stupid idea.

BUT Somehow you manage to evade the point that none of these folks are getting the same results we do.  I think THAT might qualify as stupid.

would be envisioning a poll of insurance money...

kinda like sharks like chum...

fact of the matter is, as RWU makes clear, the problems are far more societal.

course, no one like having to take fuckin responibility,

whatcha say to an insurance pool on gansta rap to pay for mugged grandma and broken windows in da hood????

workers' comp, where lawyers actually resolve many more cases for much less money, and of course the various socialistic insurance programs spread risk.

The 1st problem with a social approach is of course that you first need to be a socialist.   The 2nd problem is that they are incredibly more espensive to manage, because of the way remote connections between cause and effect.

It sounds to me as if some of you fellas are just sad you're not swiss, or swedes or whatever, and of course you could work on that if you wanted.   I'm happy enough to be 'murican, TY!!

So, how many AME churches and midwest insurance companies do you think you could get behind a connection between gangsta rap and mugged grammies?   CA does in fact have a lamed victims' restitution fund, but it's socialistic, and does not come from any particular group of presumed perps.

But fixing broken windows is way too socialistic for me.  Let's see if we can keep enough kids alive that they can fix their own windows if they grow up literate enough to read the instructions, eh?

don't fuckin badmouth them.

"don't fuckin badmouth them."

I've no idea where you get that. My comment was about top level command decisions. Don't tell me you've never had questions about their ideas. Can you tell us where the decision to prevent even NCOs from keeping as little as side arms at hand 24/7? When prohibited off base or at off base personal quarters I'm surmising it's justification originates at least in part with our Posse Comitatus Act.


-- Modified on 3/8/2008 9:51:15 PM

but I'm guessing it has everything to do with command experience and not much to do with any statute.  It doesn't apply off base - that is the county sheriff's problem.

BK, this Swiss requirement pertains mainly to the automatic rifles they are expected to use in their military service, but i imagine the same applies to sidearms as well.

But they are not actually packing -- the Swiss are free to tote their weapons around with impunity only for the purpose of going to and fro official military stuff.  They can't take it with them on a country drive to pick off pesty and ungrateful gastarbeiters who have overstayed their lukewarm welcome, if that's what you're thinking.  I don't think the Swiss are allowed to carry their sidearms in public except under the same restrictive conditions.

Yeah, it ain't the guns, it's the people.  But I don't think gangsat rap causes people to engage in drive-by shootings.  It's more likely the other way around -- people more likely to engage in drive by shootings are more likely to listen to gangsta rap.  [Just as drug-addled, depressed white teenagers likely to blow their brains out are more likely to listen to thrash metal, intead of thrash metal causing those unfortunate susicidal acts].

Yep, it's the culture.  And it's a bunch of other things too.

If i ever manage to acquire the wherewithal to retire to Switzerland, i'll take this up frequently with Johann and Hans and Urs.

I'm talking about NCO and lower taking home (off base) an M-16. And then keeping it once they are discharged, while remaining a part of some kind of new reservist program. This is what happens in several other countries.

and a PAO is going to keep their mouth shut about that.   If you got them drunk, they wouldn't know any more about it than anybody else.  Politically, it's so far from reality that you could talk to the Chairman of the JCS and get nothing but guesses.

As it stands now, I don't know any service that will let people take their service weapons off base except in the course of duty.  


There are lots of good arguments for a universal reserve program.  A couple against it are the cost of training (as I have pointed out), and the other is that there are lots of folks like BenD, and even worse.   Universal military service - at the rates we pay - is just another tax on able-bodied (and able-minded) men.   The people that make out are the very ones who don't respect and won't pay for that.

and so exactly why did you send me down that path?

It WAS you and not one of your alter-egos.

you were the one who talked about the Posse comitatus stuff.

The PAO might talk about local issues.  They won't talk politics or law.

Your noon post of 3/10 shifted the gears.

-- Modified on 3/10/2008 9:16:11 PM