🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1993Mar30.194734.28926@clsi.COM> kevin@clsi.com writes:
>> Murder isn't violence? :)
>
>Murder:   1. to kill (a human being) unlawfully and with premeditated malice
>          2. to slaughter in a brutal manner
>
>Violence: 1. exertion of physical force so as to injure or abuse
>          2. injury by or as if by distortion, infringement, or profanation
>
>=> murder need not be violent.

Come on, Kevin, how many street thugs out there give their victims a cup
of Hemlock and sit around talking philosophy until the peacefully expire?
Murder is the taking of another person's life against their will.  In my
opinion, even the gentlest poisoning is violent and profane.

>> I'll be the first to admit that deadly weapons are a mixed blessing.  Yet,
>> somehow, the media don't report the good side of it.  For instance, they
>> were all over that restaurant in Texas, where the jerk shot all those
>> people (Luby's?).  But you didn't hear a WORD a couple months later, when
>> a customer with a license to carry in Alabama saved about 20 people from
>> armed robbers...
>
>The armed robbers may not have hurt anyone anyway.

I reported more details in a post which Marcus read and replied to already.
The good guy hid under a table, with the intention of waiting 'til the
crooks left and then freeing the hostages from the freezer OR intervening
if they began to be executed.  It was only when he was discovered hiding
that he started shooting.

>> No.  I support existing laws that prohibit the insane from owning guns.  I
>> do think the current waiting periods should be replaced with an instant
>> check, by states that currently have waiting periods.
>
>You may not find out he is insane until he uses the gun. Most of the people 
>who have "gone crazy" with guns would have been considered (clinically) sane.

I'd say you're looking at it backwards.  EVERYONE has a right to the
instruments of effective self defense until they prove a danger to them-
selves or others.  Also, I believe that those "sane" people who have
gone crazy with guns usually would be prohibited from owning guns due to
previous criminal offenses.  Purdy, the nut from the Stockton scoolyard
who started the Assault Weapon crackdown, had a record of felonies plea-
bargained down to misdemeanors.  The goof who shot Reagan had (a few
years earlier) tried to board a plane with a gun (staking Carter at the
time).

Personally, I'd say that a lot of crime in society today occurs because
the cops are more interested in busting pot smokers than muggers/robbers...
and violent criminals are not (figuratively speaking) nailed to the wall,
the first time.

>> On the contrary, I think that anyone who abuses their firearms rights
>> should be dealt with VERY sternly.
>
>- but not prevented.

Show me a way to restrict the rights of FUTURE criminals/nuts, without
restricting the rights of good people unduly. :)

>> Or would you treat such a criminal as a desperate victim of society? :)
>
>Some are.

I just don't buy that.  People HAVE to take responsibility for their
lives/acts!  when california was getting ready to execute Harris last
year, people were saying that he was a victim of society and a violent
alcoholic of a father.  Hell, I empathize with him, my dad was an heavy
drinker too; not NEARLY so bad but no picnic either.  Harris would have
 my sympathy, except that I feel more for the innocent people he killed.

      don