Texas DA slain in his home; had armed himself
Source: AP-Excite
By NOMAAN MERCHANT and NICHOLAS RICCARDI
KAUFMAN, Texas (AP) - Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland took no chances after one of his assistant prosecutors was gunned down two months ago. McLelland said he carried a gun everywhere he went and was extra careful when answering the door at his home.
"I'm ahead of everybody else because, basically, I'm a soldier," the 23-year Army veteran said in an interview less than two weeks ago.
On Saturday, he and his wife were found shot to death in their rural home just outside the town of Forney, about 20 miles from Dallas.
While investigators gave no motive for the killings, Forney Mayor Darren Rozell said: "It appears this was not a random act."
FULL story at link.
Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20130331/DA5CBPHG1.html
This undated photo taken from the Kaufman County, Texas, website shows Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland. McLelland and his wife were found killed in their house, Saturday, March 30, 2013, two months after one of his assistants was gunned down near their office, authorities said. (AP Photo/Kaufman County)
Veteran with a gun for protection and it still did him no good.
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Posteritatis
(18,807 posts)
longship
(40,416 posts)They said second amendment rights are to defend against a tyrannical government. Isn't this precisely what seems to be happening, from a kind of warped perspective? And why isn't anybody else connecting those dots.
Or am I just paranoid?
freshwest
(53,661 posts)I grew up hearing the rantings of the John Birch Society, KKK and Nazis, although not from any of my family or friends. I blame the Koch brothers, Bain, Murdoch and the rest for inciting this and giving it ideological cover. From what I recall, this was always part of the part to destabilize, start riots and civil war. Then they said they'd kill all of those who didn't go along with them and install their fascist regime. It was stated publicly and often in the fifties and sixties.
RKP5637
(67,102 posts)particularly to universities accepting their funding and teach the Koch way. I think many still don't get what's going on ... most you mention it to have the deer in the headlight look ... even university professors.
Newest Reality
(12,712 posts)The Kochs and their kind are well on their way to winning the game of, "who will be the lords of the new Fiefdom".
That's not yet a reality TV show, but give it time.
My odd speculation is that the GOP may be voluntarily deprecating itself on the National level because their obviousness is starting to distract from what is going on in the States and on local levels in many areas. They are not as necessary as they were and the current system is working well as it appears to.
It's like: "Oh see! They are making asses of themselves and showing their true colors as corporate shills and lackeys!" Meanwhile, the facade gives the impression that nothing drastic is going on and certain people feel that the currently "elected" spokes persons are kinder and more just so equitable democracy is prevailing.
Behind the scenes? Well, some mythical metaphors would probably sum that up best. The titans gather with their hosts of demons in a pit of blazing fire and dance with glee wearing leather boots spiked with glass and razor blades on countless human faces.
As they cackle and spasm while sprinkling salt on the thousands of cuts and pools of tears, the Arch-Demons Koch proclaim the next move while defecating on copies of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution.
It is a frabjous day in the designer cesspool boardrooms of flaming economic power and unholy greed where our dark, collective future is crafted and decided these days. The Fascist Goblins are weaving spells of insidious alliance as they conjure more private prison dungeons and enlist hoards of consumer zombies to man the police state. What magic, (disguised as technology) they wield with awesome machines that convey propaganda, fear and the force to back-up the grimoire of subjugation, with a smile and frequent flier miles ... "Would you like fries with your dystopia?"
I'm waiting for the mandatory policy handbook we will all get in place of the system that many faithfully still believe exists as anything more than a simulated tool to manipulate those who, by way of conditioning, circumstances and the rewards and punishments that make one question the idea of "free will", have internalized the system. That's heading for collective nervous breakdown for those of us who don't pull back and see how that works.
Despite my hyperbole and bad metaphors and the fact that nothing is new about this except for the carefully crafted illusion that something changed, let it be a warning that if we can't do anything, (insight into our own participation and views is doable) or we won't, I think my rambling could turn out to be downplaying the situation-at-hand.
RKP5637
(67,102 posts)freshwest
(53,661 posts)Multigenerational political influence by a very narrow special interest group is rare, but we're seeing it played out right now in front of us. A billionaire family - the Kochs - have gone from influencing my father's generation, to my generation, to my kids' generation - and very few Americans realize it. Daddy Koch - Fred - made his first millions palling around with Joe Stalin in the Soviet Union in the 1920s and 1930s. As the fascists rose to power in Europe in the 1930s, he was an enthusiastic supporter of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, who invented the word "fascist," meaning essentially the takeover of democratic governments by big business interests. Mussolini went so far as to dissolve the Italian parliament, and replace elected politicians with representatives of each district's largest corporations. Fred Koch and Mussolini both particularly hated the trade unionists and their sometimes allies, the communists. So after Mussolini, along with his ally Hitler, lost World War II against America, Fred Koch brought the anti-communist pro-business-running-goverment - what some would call "facist" - torch to America big time, helping start the John Birch Society.
Two of their biggest efforts are pretty well known. After the Supreme Court ruled, in 1954, in the Brown versus Board of Education case, that segregation in schools was unconstitutional, the John Birch Society put up billboards all across America calling for the impeachment of the Chief Justice of the Court, Earl Warren. Daddy Fred Koch was very concerned about the integration of our schools - in fact, he wrote, "The colored man looms large in the Communist plan to take over America." With JFK's election, Fred Koch's John Birch Society went off again - this time against JFK. Using rhetoric not that different from the "secret Muslim" plots the Tea Party promotes about Obama, in a 1963 speech Fred said that " infiltrate the highest offices of government in the U.S. until the President is a Communist, unknown to the rest of us.”
When JFK was scheduled to come to Dallas that year, the JBS distributed flyers saying, "Wanted, for Treason" all around the town two days before his arrival. On the day JFK was assassinated, large ads ran in the Dallas newspapers attacking Kennedy as being soft on Castro, among other things. That was my dad's generation. Daddy Koch died, and his sons Charles and David took over the family business of promoting the business and billionaire takeover of our American government.
They're doing it with a two-pronged attack. For people over forty, they're funding the Tea Party through a variety of groups, most notably Americans for Prosperity and Freedomworks. And for people under forty, they're funding Libertarian think tanks, like the Charles Koch Foundation (which was renamed as the Cato Institute), and the Reason Foundation, where David Koch is a trustee, which happily embraces a new generation of young people with the idea that "freedom" means the "freedom" to buy politicians and the "freedom" to pollute. For the young people, of course, the Libertarians throw in the "freedom" to smoke dope and hire a hooker, but those are just bones being cynically tossed to young potheads and young protoge's of Dick Morris.
But the Koch's have been inside the Libertarian movement from its beginning - 32 years ago this year, David Koch was the Libertarian Party's official candidate for Vice President of the United States. It's really pretty incredible, but it's all true. The main agenda of the Koch's John Birch Society was to enhance the power and control of our government by big business and billionaires, while fighting organized labor and people like me who were protesting the Vietnam War. The main agenda of the Koch's Tea Party is to get millionaires elected to Congress and have them cut taxes and regulations for Koch Industries and other polluting corporations, while fighting organized labor and people like me who were protesting the Iraq War.
And the main agenda of the Koch's Libertarians - again, funded and trained by the Koch Brothers - is to keep intact the power of big money over our government, cut taxes and regulations on billionaires and polluting industries, while fighting organized labor and people like me who are protesting the corporate takeover of the United States of America. Three generations of Americans, all duped by the same billionaire family. Three generations buying into the idea that "what's best for industry and billionaires is best for America" - and that government is our "enemy" rather than something that our nation's founders fought and died to create for all of "We The People" And, increasingly, it's not just the Koch family. The Walton family - whose combined wealth is greater than 40 percent of all Americans - funded a covert campaign to rename the estate tax as the "death tax" and lobbied so hard they got the estate tax eliminated entirely in 2010.
Senator Bernie Sanders pointed out yesterday that - so far - we know of 26 billionaires - worth over $146 billion - who have already "invested" or committed to invest over $561 million dollars in this election cycle - most of it to defeat Democrats who want to raise their taxes. The good news is that young people are waking up and realizing that the Libertarian hustle the billionaires are feeding them is just that - a hustle. Just like Tea Partiers are waking up to their having been had by billionaires who want to privatize their Social Security. Hopefully, soon, America will regain its sanity and we'll go back to viewing cranky billionaires the way my Dad's generation did - as Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower did - when Eisenhower referred to their ilk as "small in number and stupid" They're not stupid any more, and if we really value American traditions, we really must push back on this kind of power and influence in American politics.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/101744227
For all we know, this is what JFK was talking about before he was murdered. The JBS was after him and posted wanted for treason signs in Dallas the week that he was killed. The atmosphere had been made toxic. JFK served in WW2 and may have known about this family and their designs on doing what Roosevelt's VP Wallace said how American fascism could become reality:
"The really dangerous American fascist... is the man who wants to do in the United States in an American way what Hitler did in Germany in a Prussian way. The American fascist would prefer not to use violence.
His method is to poison the channels of public information. With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power...
They claim to be super-patriots, but they would destroy every liberty guaranteed by the Constitution. They demand free enterprise, but are the spokesmen for monopoly and vested interest.
Their final objective, toward which all their deceit is directed, is to capture political power so that, using the power of the state and the power of the market simultaneously, they may keep the common man in eternal subjection."
~ U.S. Vice President Henry A. Wallace, quoted in the New York Times, April 9, 1944
They are the force behind a lot of disinformation and hatred.
RKP5637
(67,102 posts)
dogknob
(2,431 posts)There have been a few in Mississippi and Colorado.
I was trying to come up with a Google/DuckDuckGo search to find the number of US politicians killed in 2013 and coming up empty. Nobody seems to be counting.
It would be interesting if somebody could come up with an actual number of assassinations and attempted assassinations on US public figures since the Gabby Giffords shooting.
Please don't give me some snarky RTFM response. I'm not a journalist and there are plenty here who claim to be...
Posteritatis
(18,807 posts)Paul E Ester
(952 posts)longship
(40,416 posts)
Paul E Ester
(952 posts)Paul E Ester
(952 posts)freshwest
(53,661 posts)The gangs are attempting to intimidate law enforcement. Some are said to be in hiding. Which means they won't be out protecting the public very well. To be an LEO, judge or DA is to wear a target on one's back.
SkyDaddy7
(6,045 posts)by the way they deal with the public these days...Judges, DA & Cops are all on the same team these days & that is a NO NO!! But who cares about the US Constitution.
If this turns out to be Nazis or some other Right Wing conspiracy then folks will have to come to grips what "fighting a tyrannical government looks like".
I am against violence but lets be honest both the far Right & the current Fascist like state of law enforcement in this country both use violence to get their way...So I would not be surprised if this just turns out to be an escalation in said violence.
pipoman
(16,038 posts)AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)So that he would have had no chance at all?
Do you want to take away firearms from law-abiding citizens? If so, that sounds like a Bloomberg talking point.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)I didn't say squat about taking away guns. I said a veteran with years of arms experience couldn't protect his home with a gun even in a higher state of alert.
But banning arms built for a military purpose (like the one supposedly that killed JFK) should be banned. Background checks for ALL. Rounds in a clip?
Your turn.
The 6.5 mm Carcano rifle owned by Lee Harvey Oswald
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)If you are not suggesting that it was futile for a "veteran with years of arms experience" to own a firearm for self-defense, why didn't you answer the questions.
Did you have a reason to say, "Veteran with a gun for protection and it still did him no good" except for that?
And what does a "6.5 mm Carcano rifle owned by Lee Harvey Oswald" have to do with anything?
Do you even know why a "6.5 mm Carcano rifle" was at the book depository? Do you know anything about serial numbers for Carcano rifles? Probably not. In any event, you statement about the "6.5 mm Carcano rifle owned by Lee Harvey Oswald" doesn't have anything to do with your post.
Now, I suppose that it is time for you to post some more foolish insults.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)If he had been successful....
I made no mention of taking arms away from anyone. Again I pointed out his training and being armed didn't help. Futile seems like the correct word. End of line.
No I don't know about the serial numbers. I'm not a gun nut. Just a gun owner tired of DUer's gone rouge on any form of reform.
Your the one that hijacked the thread by putting words in my mouth. Insult? Send it to a jury.
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/51162763/ns/msnbc-rachel_maddow_show/t/rachel-maddow-show-tuesday-march-th/
So, there`s lots going on in the world and lots to get it this hour, but we
begin tonight with this.
This is a piece of legislature introduced by John F. Kennedy when John F.
Kennedy was a senator from Massachusetts. We remember JFK now as a remark
remarkably young president, right? A fresh face, an outsider defeating the
old establishment guy, the vice president Richard Nixon.
But John F. Kennedy was not new to Washington when he won the White House.
He had been a congressman, first elected in 1946, then a senator elected
first in 1952 and reelected in 1958. And while he was a senator, in that
year that he was running for reelection in 1958, John F. Kennedy introduced
this legislature. It was a bill to ban the importing into the United
States of guns or ammunition that were originally manufactured for military
purposes. So, we are talking about foreign weapons made for foreign
military use being sold to civilians here in the United States.
Now, the most popular weapon like that at the time looked like this. It`s
an Italian rifle called a Carkano or it sometimes called a non-liquor
Carkano. This was the most popular foreign firearm, originally
manufactured for military purposes that was sold in the United States at
the time that John F. Kennedy introduced a bill that would have banned the
sale of this gun.
If you want to get a better look at this gun, here`s another view. The man
holding the rifle is in this photo is Lee Harvey Oswald who went on to kill
John F. Kennedy with that gun in 1963. Mr. Oswald bought that gun by mail
legally using a coupon he clipped out of the American rifleman magazine,
which is the magazine of the NRA. Lee Harvey Oswald was able to buy that
gun he used to kill the president because of the bill that JFK introduced
that would have banned the sale was defeated by the NRA. Oswald bought the
gun in March 1963. He killed President Kennedy with it in November of that
year. This year marks 50 years since the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
In the aftermath of his assassination, there was a great impetuous to
reform the laws around guns in this country. Gallup polling after the
president`s death in 1963 showed that more than 80 percent of the country
wanted Congress to enact the strictest gun restrictions possible.
But nothing happened. The new president, LBJ, tried mightily to get gun
reform passed in the wake of the JFK assassination, but they were not able
to get anything through Congress. Even after the assassination of the
president by a gun that was bought legally by his assassin that would not
have been legal to buy under that president`s own gun control proposal.
That apparently was not enough.
It was not until the president`s brother was also assassinated and Martin
Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968 than anything did finally get done
at the federal level. And even then, it was just barely which LBJ
announced bitterly upon passage of the bill that he did finally get
through.
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)Nobody put words in your mouth.
It's not true. Why isn't the truth good enough?
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)I said it didn't save the two of them. How that turns into taking guns away I have no idea. That was a BIG jump on your part.
The truth is in the article. He took extra steps with a gun and had years of training. It didn't matter.
Just for the record, you want no more restrictions of any kind on guns? (your big on control questions)
About 80% of the US population supports back ground checks for ALL guns sales in several polls.
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)Why should you be any different?
It was you who falsely equated the asking of questions for clarification as being equivalent to somehow being an assertion that you want to take guns away.
Maybe you protest too much. Maybe you are hypersenstive because that is your true motive.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)Your title: So "it still did him no good"? And logically his gun should have been taken away from him?
Your post: So that he would have had no chance at all?
Do you want to take away firearms from law-abiding citizens? If so, that sounds like a Bloomberg talking point.
Why? There is no logical jump from the guns will keep us safe (it didn't) to taking guns away.
Again I am a gun owner.
Since you spend so much time (about a post a day in the group) on gun control, what form of new controls do you favor? Any at all?
When Mark David Chapman wanted ti kill John Lennon, he couldn't buy ammo in the state of New York. So he went to Atlanta to get ammo from a friend. You know the rest. National laws are needed. A background check before he bought the gun (before he went to New York) would have shown he spent time in a mental institution.
Background checks for all. Even at gun shows. No sales to or transferring to convicted felons, convicted domestic abusers, etc.
I was the Crossroads Mall Santa on the evening of December 5th, 1993. The mall was packed. A gang shooting right outside the front door and in line of site of me took the life of Michael Campbell. I've seen first hand the terror of parents trying to keep their children safe in the panic that followed. Several were injured trying to get away from the shooting.
I work in Omaha. It has had gun registration and control since the 60's. My dad was a veteran and he had to register. Omaha too had a massacre on December 5, 2007 in case you forgot. He had a stolen (from his step father) Century WASP -10 with two 30 round mags taped together. Killed 9. Wounded 4.
Video:
GreenStormCloud
(12,072 posts)Do you actually think that JFK introduced that legislation as a gun control measure? LOL. It was a protectionist measure, to protect American gun manufacturers, especially those with factories in Massachusetts, such as Savage and Smith & Wesson.
Following WWII, with the defeat of the Japanese, Italian, and German armies there were tens of millions of high-quality bolt action rifles that could be imported and sold at very low prices. That was hurting American rifle makers. Kennedy was trying to protect American gun companies from cheap competition, not enact gun control.
If the Carcano had been banned, Oswald would have simply bought a different rifle. A lever action .30-30 with iron sights would have done just as well for his purpose.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)You don't believe in buy american. Who is the fool?
GreenStormCloud
(12,072 posts)I was simply pointing out that JFK was not trying to enact gun control as you imply, but he was trying to protect a vital industry. It is worth noting that anti-gunners recently tried to sue the American gun industry into oblivion.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)To support your version?
GreenStormCloud
(12,072 posts)Back then gun control wasn't an issue. Nobody was pushing it. I remember.
WWII had recently ended. I hope you don't need a link for that fact.
There were lots of imported army guns for sale - cheap, by mail. You don't need a link for that. You know that Oswald got his by mail.
Very cheap, high quality, foreign goods are always a threat to domestic manufactured goods, whether they are cars or guns. You don't need a link for that basic fact of economics, do you?
Several major gun manufactures were/are located in Massachusetts. Smith & Wesson, Savage are two I can think of immediately. There are others. Do you doubt that statement?
Given the above facts, and that JFK was from MA, it becomes obvious that his motive was protectionism, not gun control.
Elementary reasoning from known facts, Mr. Watson.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)Point taken.
randome
(34,845 posts)Unless someone sees danger lurking around every corner ala Jason Bourne and spends all their time at home in a state of high readiness, guns, for the most part, do NOT protect people.
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)(or people-controller wannabes) has claimed that the ownership of firearms provides protection in all circumstances.
Why do you need to use strawmen?
Why isn't the truth good enough?
booley
(3,855 posts)"The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,
Wayne LePierre
I mean you yourself seem to invoking a straw man.
But if we go to the idea that gun is "protection" that protection is very much dependent on the situation.
But why depend on guns when their record is so spotty?
etherealtruth
(22,165 posts)PROJECTION. That's the word.
stevenleser
(32,886 posts)guns provide protection in all circumstances. You changed his argument to that so you could beat it up.
NickB79
(19,233 posts)IE the most popular hunting rifles in the US? They're all based upon military rifles used in WWI and WWII.
Good luck with that.
Marengo
(3,477 posts)Other than an extra round for the Carcano's ammunition capacity and the en bloc magazine system I can't think of anything that would justify banning ownership of this over any other center fire bolt action sporting rifle.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)Maybe that's it?
You never did answer what if any new gun controls you favor?
Marengo
(3,477 posts)center fire, manually operated bolt action sporting rifles. Although the en bloc magazine system would provide some advantage in the time required to reload to full magazine capacity, this factor isn't significant as Oswald fired 3 rounds from the Carcano.
Is 3 rounds fired from a Carcano any worse than 3 rounds fired from a Remington 700?
That the Carcano was "military issue and imported" is irrelevant as an operational distinction.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)It was to protect jobs in MA.
Take your pick.
I don't see anybody in this thread that are pro-gun saying what new regulations they support.
Marengo
(3,477 posts)"I don't see anybody in this thread that are pro-gun saying what new regulations they support."
Only speaking for myself, but I have no intention of being sidetracked into this topic which is irrelevant to my attempt to understand why banning one mechanically equivalent firearm and not another is not arbitrary from a functionality perspective.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)That a trained veteran that took extra protection with a firearm and couldn't protect his house.
But you won't comment on laws that might take guns out of criminals hands. Very telling.
Marengo
(3,477 posts)Read into it what you wish, but your lack of a substantive answer my question may be construed as "very telling" as well.
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)I own 30 round magazines I will surrender VOLUNTARILY should they be banned. Note those would be covered by a grandfathered clause. Where I live doesn't even require registration BTW.
No answer on new controls tells your answer!
Marengo
(3,477 posts)As 3 rounds fired from a Carcano and 3 rounds fired from a Remington 700 (caliber not considered) are functionally equivalent, what is your justification for banning one and not the other?
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)Marengo
(3,477 posts)Guess what model of rifle that is based upon?
Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)Your point?
Marengo
(3,477 posts)Omaha Steve
(99,573 posts)Maybe you missed that. Bolt action rifles don't bother me. But a M-1 Garand with a large clip sure does. With the standard clip it is one of the best deer rifles.
I still don't hear you say if you favor ANY sort of gun control?
Marengo
(3,477 posts)seems rather arbitrary.
"Bolt action rifles don't bother me. But a M-1 Garand with a large clip sure does. With the standard clip it is one of the best deer rifles.
The "standard" clip for the M1 Garand has a capacity of 8 rounds. That's maximum capacity, and only 3 rounds more than most bolt action sporting rifles. 1, 2, & 5 round capacity clips are also available for target and hunting work.
greiner3
(5,214 posts)AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)kestrel91316
(51,666 posts)
napoleon_in_rags
(3,991 posts)I mean, the guy was facing death threats. He at least paid the extra $29.99 for the Xfinity (or any other) home monitoring service that have the video footage, of the intruders, right? The cost of a decent handgun would have bought him a couple years of it.
The point too many people are missing in the gun control debate is that gun ownership alone protects little, security is about brains more than brawn these days. Threats can come from unexpected directions.
Paul E Ester
(952 posts)napoleon_in_rags
(3,991 posts)That's actually a good price, I see one for $600
http://www.amazon.com/LTS-LTD08HTDK-8-Camera-Realtime-Security/dp/B002MUAO1Q
But yeah, sure. If you don't want your footage on somebody else's servers, that would be fine. Install the receiver in a concealed place, and let a couple trusted friends know where that place is just in case police need to find it if you are taken out. This should be part of a general defence strategy for anybody IMHO. The NRA tells you to buy guns, I advocate people invest in these.
Hekate
(90,633 posts)Not good for our country. It's what we expect from banana republics and tin-pot dictatorships.
Bucky
(53,986 posts)"Look, here's this one event. Having a gun didn't matter. Case closed." isn't an argument. It's avoiding an argument.
Besides, someone was out to murder this man. Someone bad. Regulating guns is about stopping incidental & unplanned gun violence. If we lived in a world without guns, this DA would still be dead. And so would his wife. How terrible this incident is. I hope the cops can run down the bastards who did this quickly.
brett_jv
(1,245 posts)It's the same invalid argument that gun rights advocates make when they take a random datapoint like, say, Newtown, and extrapolate that we shouldn't have background checks because they wouldn't have prevented that particular occurrence.
However, the statistics show that a given gun is somewhere between 5 and 20 times more likely to end up harming the gun owner or his family than it is to be ever be used in actual defense of one's home or person ... and although this particular instance does not appear to be a case where the owner's own gun was used against him or his family, this case still illustrates the point that owning guns to 'protect one's self' ... is pretty overrated as a 'solution'.
DallasNE
(7,402 posts)I read that the DA's door was kicked in so this attack would have caught him by surprise. Apparently he didn't have his gun stuck in his pants as he moved around his house so he was vulnerable to this type of surprise attack. My guess is that the killers quickly hid behind a piece of furniture expecting the DA to investigate and quickly got the drop on him when he investigated. Not sure why they didn't call 911 under the circumstances.
Phillip McCleod
(1,837 posts)
brett_jv
(1,245 posts)I think the point is still valid.
The only way that a gun makes a reasonably reliable self-defense tool is if you literally walk around with one, loaded, and in your hand at all times.
And seriously ... who wants to live like that? I know I don't. I'd much prefer a world (or at least a country) where guns just didn't f***ing exist at all.
I know, it's way too late for that now, but ... I sincerely wish we'd had the foresight 200 years ago to just ban the damn things outright, to have never made 100's of millions of them to begin with.
After all, there's dozens of perfectly civilized democracies, all over the world, where guns are extremely scarce if not outright illegal. That could've been us, had we played our cards right.
Too late now, I guess ... but now, we're stuck in a scenario where, in order to be REALLY safe, at all times, one would basically have to stay awake 24/7, with a loaded gun in their hand.
But then again ... it doesn't HAVE to be this way, forever more. At a certain point, we could certainly say 'NO MORE' ... and even without confiscation, over the course of many, many years ... become one of the many Nations of the world where gun violence is nearly unheard of, due to the scarcity of guns and/or ammo.
The question is ... will we ever have the collective will to take the steps needed to move in that direction?
Paladin
(28,246 posts)There are plenty of people who like living like that---armed at all times. These are the same people who weigh in with snotty comments about Newtown, Aurora, Virginia Tech, etc. being "gun-free zones," together with the (usually) unstated inference that the victims of those mass shootings consequently deserved what they got. That's the sick mindset which accounts for the Gun Enthusiasts' touchiness on this thread---the DA was known to be armed, but it didn't save him or his wife.
graham4anything
(11,464 posts)and after a 2nd amendment reinterpretation by a non-corrupt SCOTUS in the next 3-10 years,and then new laws
100% of all guns/bullets can be kept out of any street or anything accessed by any street
Things get a little easier once you understand that
100% of these things can be avoided doing what Benjamin Franklin said
"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure".
Matters little who shoots, who or why they do so
100% can be stopped.
With the proper response to the insanity of guns/bullets.
And don't let the NRA fool you thinking they won the issue with a temporary battle victory.
They have lost, and they know it.
The clock is ticking.
Too bad more and more will die til it happens.
The war on terror is being won.
The war on WMDs is being won.
Guns/bullets in the hands of private citizens are weapons of mass destruction.
And vigilante are the #1 terrorists.
Someone like Zimmerman need not be allowed to happen. What lunacy that people who are not qualified to be a cop or soldier, can have weapons in their hands only law enforcement or the US Military should have.
Sheesh, you couldn't get into the army if you had flat feet.
Any bozo going to a gun show can in seconds with no checks get guns/bullets in some states
and what idiot thinks that bringing a gun into a bar, getting drunk, then arguing who is better
the Red sox or the Yankees shoot each other?
BTW, in the wild wild west, the irony is, there were laws mandating NO GUNS/BULLETS in the streets.
That was in the wild wild west, and that is the society that the tea party people want.
Why anyone would want what the tea party wants is beyond me, especially here.
No gun ever saved anyone that a thiniing mind couldn't save instead
Whereas 35 people a day are killed by guns and 100s wounded, and 1000s of family members and friends affected
And whole industries have vanished because of guns- look at the woman's clinics in Kansas being vacated after the kind, meek Dr. Tiller was asssasssinated, then the killer housed and hidden for months afterward by the network of rightwing extremists that do things like this.
hack89
(39,171 posts)
Kolesar
(31,182 posts)He survived but has two projectiles stuck in his chest cavity.
Comrade_McKenzie
(2,526 posts)And there they were in all their glory.
What's the going rate for an NRA shill these days?
I'm currently unemployed.
alcibiades_mystery
(36,437 posts)They're an embarrassing pack of jerk-offs.
Blandocyte
(1,231 posts)Having a gun and veteran status didn't seem to do much for him besides make him feel safe and as if he could handle what might come along. No one wants to not feel safe or confident that they can handle threats to their safety.
I suppose it's the state of feeling safe and confident that we can handle what might come along that both lets us go forward without collapsing into a heap of anxiety and is what causes us to ignore the signs that a situation is turning dangerous.
Armed or not, we might need to rein in our "safe and confident" state sometimes, or evaluate the situation so that we can be sure it's not false confidence.
Prayers for him and the family. Tragic.
tabasco
(22,974 posts)I thought that's what the NRA said???
GreenStormCloud
(12,072 posts)Having a gun can give you a chance to fight back. He was at home. It is unlikely that he wore the gun on him while at home. The door was kicked in, indicating a sudden forceful entry. At that point it was too late to get his gun.
tabasco
(22,974 posts)Seems like this case is a counter-argument.
tammywammy
(26,582 posts)Heard tonight that they think it was 4 people, that it was well timed and executed very "professionally". This wasn't just a murder, it was a message and a very scary one at that.
I doubt he carried his gun with him at all times in his home.
Thank you.
tammywammy
(26,582 posts)Last night on the radio they said shot 20 times, but apparently that's changed to shot at 20 times.
tabasco
(22,974 posts)Thanks for the info.
R B Garr
(16,950 posts)that the individuals who shot the first DA would be found and brought to justice to the fullest extent of the law. As clips of him were played after his death, I couldn't help but think that the man was making himself more of a target and sounded clueless. He obviously didn't have much of an idea who he was dealing with. Just look at his quote from the article:
"I'm ahead of everybody else because, basically, I'm a soldier," the 23-year Army veteran said in an interview less than two weeks ago.
He obviously bought into the hype that being armed was making him ahead of everybody else without taking into consideration that someone might catch him by surprise and that 4 guys with guns >>>>>>>> 1 guy with a gun.
madville
(7,408 posts)This one had a better ending, the prosecuter and her husband both fired shots at the intruder who forced his way into their home. Doesn't say for sure if it was connected to the other prosecuters that have been targeted.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04/02/17575111-intruder-killed-while-breaking-into-colorado-prosecutors-home?lite
