TexasCHLforum.com

http://www.washingtontimes.com/commenta ... -3818r.htm

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I do not recomend clicking on the link to read, because there is ironically something very distracting to the right of the articles print...

So I'll copy it here for you to read...

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The gun culture
By Alex Gerber
May 13, 2007


April 16, the day the worst peacetime shooting in American history took place at Virginia Tech, will not be soon forgotten. But normalcy is slowly returning. The prayers and condolences have ended, the tragedy is no longer Page One news, classes have been resumed and the flag at the headquarters of the National Rifle Association (NRA) in Virginia no longer flies at half mast.
The issue of gun control in our country will apparently again be glossed over. The presidential candidates, chiefly interested in votes, have mostly avoided the subject, and Virginia continues to allow the purchase of only one gun per month -- no deterrent for Seung-hui Cho.
Ours is a country, unique among industrialized societies, that has become insensitive to murder. How else to explain the "American gun culture" that tolerates some 14,000 firearm murders, including 400 children, in 2005 -- the last year statistics are available? Guns are easily purchased despite laws about waiting periods and background checks. The Seung-hui Cho story indicates the restrictions posed by the 1968 Gun Control Act are enforced only in the breach. Firearm murder rates 100 times higher in the United States than, for example, in Britain or Japan, are stark evidence our gun control laws are a joke.
What is not a joke is the absurd contention of the NRA gunslingers that if the Virginia Tech students had been armed there would have been far fewer victims. When would this powerful gun lobby have our students start arming themselves -- at the high school or college level or in kindergarten? No civilized nation legitimizes packing a pistol while attending school.
Repeated polls have shown the majority of our citizens favor much tougher gun control laws. Some states have actually passed such stringent laws, but their effect has been watered down by the lax laws of their neighboring states.
Gun control is obviously in the domain of federal rather than individual state jurisdiction. President Clinton attempted gun control in 1994 when he banned military type assault weapons that have no sane civilian use, but President Bush allowed this modest gun control measure to lapse in 2004.
Early detection and treatment of the mentally ill is important but is not an adequate answer to firearm shootings gone amok. Mental health specialists are far outnumbered by the mentally disturbed and depressed youth of our country.
The debate over gun control is dominated by the interpretation of the Second Amendment to our Constitution -- widely acclaimed as "the finest document ever devised by man." In the one-sentence Second Amendment, "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right to keep and bear arms should not be infringed," the key word is security, but not the kind of security that is now relevant to our nation.
As voiced in the Federalist Papers, the Second Amendment was concerned with the tyrannical kingdoms overseas, which would be "speedily overturned" were the people allowed to bear arms -- an "advantage the nation would possess -- and serve as a barrier to the despotism of the Old World."
By today's standards, crime was no problem in the largely rural New World whose inhabitants seldom locked their doors. Aside from rifles for hunting, firearms played a minor role in everyday life. Unknown in Colonial days were rival gangs engaged in drive-by shootings, drug-related homicide, road rage gunfire and, certainly, students shooting other students.
The Second Amendment was not remotely related to the type of violence nightly displayed on TV but rather a reflection of the political climate in Europe at the time. Our Founding Fathers were so wary of a central government that they proposed only a small standing army outnumbered 20-to-1 by a civilian militia. Clearly; their well-warranted fears are not germane today.

Alex Gerber, a clinical professor of surgery, emeritus, at the University of Southern California, is a former health care consultant to the White House and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I should have warned,but I figure most will get the jist and the ignorance of a professor "emeritus"...

Don't they have drugs for delusional people??

Dan

Just google the authors name. He makes it up as he goes and is completely ignorant of the facts.

HighVelocity wrote:Just google the authors name. He makes it up as he goes and is completely ignorant of the facts.

The guy's what I would term a "hard leftist".

And I love the people like him who quote a "firearms murder rate", and then compare us to countries like Japan where there aren't any guns.

That's like comparing our "astronaut death rate" to that of some small tribe of stone age people living in the Brazillian rain forest.

BTW, did you know that if you add the homicide and suicide rate together, America combined rate is similar to that of Japan and the other industrialized countries (who mostly have very few guns in the hands of the public)? He sure doesn't.

And in response to calls to allow concealed carry on campus, he says that "no civilized nation legitimizes packing a pistol while at school".

I guess he's never heard of Isreal, or doesn't consider it to be a civilized nation, or the Isrealis to be civilized people.

As far as homicides where the victims are children, not only does he get the numbers wrong (his number of 400 for 2005 seems far too low), but he neglects to mention that homicides for those under 14 and for 14-17 year olds have been declining from their early 90's peaks.

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/homicide/t ... agetab.htm

And all during that decline, concealed carry has been spreading across the nation.

I found this in about 5 minutes of surfing. Of course, I am not,"a clinical professor of surgery, emeritus, at the University of Southern California".

Thank God!

I searched the referenced page for a way to post a comment or a rebuttal; nothing was apparent.

And in response to calls to allow concealed carry on campus, he says that "no civilized nation legitimizes packing a pistol while at school".

I guess he's never heard of Isreal, or doesn't consider it to be a civilized nation, or the Isrealis to be civilized people.

Or Utah...

frankie_the_yankee wrote:And in response to calls to allow concealed carry on campus, he says that "no civilized nation legitimizes packing a pistol while at school".

I guess he's never heard of Isreal, or doesn't consider it to be a civilized nation, or the Isrealis to be civilized people.

Anybody know of a pro RKBA Jewish activist with enough media attention to publicly discredit his statement?

Where's Jackie Mason when you need him?

Since the doctor is qualified to comment on gun control because of his years in the medical profession, I will be sure to go to my gunsmith the next time I need an operation.

This is just another great, yet ironic shot across our bow, using the same ole tried and true emotionally based, less than factual nonsense that has worked in the past...

KD5NRH wrote:

frankie_the_yankee wrote:And in response to calls to allow concealed carry on campus, he says that "no civilized nation legitimizes packing a pistol while at school".

I guess he's never heard of Isreal, or doesn't consider it to be a civilized nation, or the Isrealis to be civilized people.

Anybody know of a pro RKBA Jewish activist with enough media attention to publicly discredit his statement?

Where's Jackie Mason when you need him?

Rabbi Shlomo Yaffe wrote a great piece about Virginia Tech; and he's a Rabbi in the middle of CT.

http://www.chabad.org/library/article.asp?AID=508130
He also wrote a great missive that the JPFO quotes from:
http://www.jpfo.org/yaffe1.htm

He's the first one that immidately comes to mind.
Unfortunately, there's really no well known politically active Jews that are well known outside of the Jewish community that I can think of.

KD5NRH wrote:

frankie_the_yankee wrote:And in response to calls to allow concealed carry on campus, he says that "no civilized nation legitimizes packing a pistol while at school".

I guess he's never heard of Isreal, or doesn't consider it to be a civilized nation, or the Isrealis to be civilized people.

Anybody know of a pro RKBA Jewish activist with enough media attention to publicly discredit his statement?

Where's Jackie Mason when you need him?

For all we know, this guy might be Jewish himself - and pathetically ignorant.

I wonder what Justin Moon thinks of this piece.

- Jim

nuparadigm wrote:I searched the referenced page for a way to post a comment or a rebuttal; nothing was apparent.

Of course not, the Washington Times does not welcome intelligent discourse.

Doesn't "emeritus" mean out of merit in latin, or in other words, without merit?

jimlongley wrote:

nuparadigm wrote:I searched the referenced page for a way to post a comment or a rebuttal; nothing was apparent.

Of course not, the Washington Times does not welcome intelligent discourse.

Doesn't "emeritus" mean out of merit in latin, or in other words, without merit?

Basically, when applied to a Professor it usually means that the person has retired from that post. Basically it's an honorary thing so that someone who retires still gets to keep their "title".

Wikipedia wrote: The word originated in the mid-18th century from Latin as the past participle of emereri meaning to "earn one's discharge by service". Emereri itself is a compound of the prefix e- (a variant of ex-) meaning "out of or from" and merēre meaning "earn".

Picking on just one small part of his diatribe, I, personally, get a kick out of his comment that "rival gangs" were unknown in colonial days. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

Many hundreds were killed and kidnapped in French, English, and Indian raids throughout the colonial era, and that sure sounds like prototypical street gangs and drive by warfare. I should know, my family was involved.

Lots of interesting things in the history of the colonial era, all of which Gerber seems to have forgotten (can you say concentration camps?). Are we sure his name is not really Bellesiles?