Tuesday, May 07, 2019
If Brains Were Gunpowder
Tomi Lahren loves to pretend she can match wits with people when it's obvious she's completely out of her depth as soon as she leaves her safe space at DumFux News.
"In other words, gun control reduced mass shootings without hindering legitimate gun ownership."
Even though gun ownership may be up, the restrictions put in place in Australia have seemingly helped reduce the number of gun deaths in that nation.
Following a mass shooting tragedy in 1996 where 35 people were murdered in a single incident, Australian government leaders — which included a coalition of left- and right-leaning lawmakers — sought to make rules concerning gun ownership stricter.
The new set of laws passed in the aftermath of that mass shooting required 28-day waiting periods for anyone wanting to purchase a gun. It also created new licensing requirements for individuals to own weapons, and banned outright automatic and semiautomatic guns.
And yes, it included a gun buyback program, in which the nation bought more than 600,000 guns from owners and destroyed them, The Atlantic reported.
How did it all turn out? The results speak for themselves. From 1996 to 2016, the rate of gun deaths in Australia dropped by more than 63 percent, according to GunPolicy.org.
Much of that drop took place soon after the gun reforms were passed: within two years of the mass shooting and implementation of the new rules, gun deaths were down by 40 percent in 1998.
Eric Swalwell has proposed a full ban on "assault weapons" along with a buy-back program.
Ms Lahren bites back:
Swalwell retorts:
And Tomi takes the bait:
Enter Mr Edward T Hardy, commentator UK/US:
"In other words, gun control reduced mass shootings without hindering legitimate gun ownership."
Even though gun ownership may be up, the restrictions put in place in Australia have seemingly helped reduce the number of gun deaths in that nation.
Following a mass shooting tragedy in 1996 where 35 people were murdered in a single incident, Australian government leaders — which included a coalition of left- and right-leaning lawmakers — sought to make rules concerning gun ownership stricter.
The new set of laws passed in the aftermath of that mass shooting required 28-day waiting periods for anyone wanting to purchase a gun. It also created new licensing requirements for individuals to own weapons, and banned outright automatic and semiautomatic guns.
And yes, it included a gun buyback program, in which the nation bought more than 600,000 guns from owners and destroyed them, The Atlantic reported.
How did it all turn out? The results speak for themselves. From 1996 to 2016, the rate of gun deaths in Australia dropped by more than 63 percent, according to GunPolicy.org.
Much of that drop took place soon after the gun reforms were passed: within two years of the mass shooting and implementation of the new rules, gun deaths were down by 40 percent in 1998.
Monday, May 06, 2019
In The Age Of Poe
Poe's Law: Without a clear indicator of the author's intent, it is impossible to create a parody of extreme views so obviously exaggerated that it cannot be mistaken by some readers for a sincere expression of the parodied views.
This kinda thing is popping up more often.
An American started a fake news website to see how ridiculous a story had to be before Donald Trump supporters realised it was untrue – and ended up concluding that some of them would believe absolutely anything.
This kinda thing is popping up more often.
Despite aiming to write stories no-one would believe, James McDaniel found Trump supporters who believed that Barack Obama had been plotting a coup from a secret bunker near the White House, and that the British singer Adele had demanded he be jailed for such treachery.
They believed that Obama had tweeted “Trump must be removed as president by any means necessary”, and when one commenter, ‘Truthseeker’, dared suggest the story ‘Obama ran paedophile ring out of White House’ might possibly be fake, he was told: “Really “Truthseeker” if you had ANY clue of the truth, you’d KNOW that Wikileaks hasn’t published ONE thing that has been false. So please use your own mind. Stop listening to MSM [mainstream media] and realize what the TRUTH really is.”
Another commenter, ‘Mary’, said caustically: “Truthseeker? Really … but the truth is bothering you?”
She then – apparently without irony – posted a link to the now notorious ‘Pizzagate’ fake news story, about an alleged Democratic child sex ring in a Washington pizza parlour, which had prompted one credulous reader to walk into the restaurant with a semi-automatic rifle and open fire.
Mr McDaniel, 28, who is based in Costa Rica and works for an American nutrition company, said that within two weeks of him starting his website undergroundnewsreport.com, it had received more than one million visitors, and hundreds and thousands of likes and shares on Facebook.
He followed ‘Obama ran paedophile ring out of White House’ with a fake story about Wikileakspublishing an email in which Hillary Clintonsupposedly urged the then president to restrict his child abuse to ‘the pizza arrangement’.
Despite the obvious reference to Pizzagate, Trump supporters responded by urging Julian Assange to reveal all his Clinton information immediately - because otherwise Democrats might distract the American people with “fake news”.
Government Is Deadly
The death penalty is a really thorny issue. First, I think I can say definitively there are people in the world we just don't need; people we're better off without - Saddam Hussein, Charlie Manson, Celine Dion come to mind, but we know that too often we're killing the wrong people.
New and emerging forensic techniques have turned up false convictions all over the place, and the death penalty being a permanent "solution" makes it kinda hard to say, "Oops - dang, I guess we got that one wrong" and go on to whatever's next.
The fact that we keep trying to find "more humane ways" of killing people only points up the fact that we're working maybe a little too hard to rationalize our attempts to substitute retribution for justice.
"...we are some real motherfuckers" is the big takeaway in this John Oliver piece:
Sunday, May 05, 2019
Today's Tweet
Feel the burn.
Translation: “I’m the only one who’s allowed to finish in second place and be declared the winner.” https://t.co/9OQmpDbN2p— Tim O'Brien (@TimOBrien) May 5, 2019
Saturday, May 04, 2019
Today's Tweet
On endless loop - letting the gloriousness wash over me like a cleansing spring rain.
Lindsey Graham: "Trump is a fucking idiot." Wow, GOP truth bomb. Did not expect. /s #BarrLied pic.twitter.com/oe7oV7KYJn— Oliver Willis (@owillis) May 1, 2019
A Simple Request
...or maybe we could call it a love note on behalf of our little experiment in self-government.
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