Princeton woman, 77, escorts armed intruder from home at gunpoint

[TPaine7]

By Diana Graettinger
BDN Staff
MACHIAS, Maine — A 77-year-old Princeton woman faced down a man armed with a sawed-off shotgun and sent him running after she pointed her own gun at him, according to court documents.

Source: http://www.bangordailynews.com/detail/108501.html

I for one, realize that this story must be fiction:

1) It is impossible to use a gun to successfully defend against an armed assailant--the bad guys always win.
2) A gun in the home is 75,000 times more likely to be used against you than to be used defensively. This woman would have died several thousands of times before this single defensive use, even if she beat the odds considerably.
3) If she had gotten a shot off before the felon killed her, it would have missed him and killed her daughter (or a neighborhood kid, or a puppy or a kitten or a butterfly...).

I can't imagine why news organizations--and even court documents--lie like that.

[sailor65]

1. I wish there was a DUzy alert button!!

Good one!

[krispos42]

64. Send a PM to "JeffR" with the link in it n/t

[sailor65]

89. Done, thanks! n/t

[Turbineguy]

2. This guy should give up his life of crime

he has no talent for it.

[Tim01]

7. Maybe the robber discovered he is not a murderer. No complaint from me.

He should study safe cracking maybe.

[villager]

3. KC Shooting Victim, 15, declared brain dead

http://blogs.kansascity.com/crime_scene/2009/06/kc-shooting-victim-15-declared-brain-dead.html

Since we're reporting the day's gun news...

[Hoopla Phil]

5. Stomping on a D.U. members thread again. Tisk Tisk.

[villager]

8. just pointing out the absurdity of these threads...

But glad you have your school marm-ish "tsk tsks" all oiled up and ready to go! :hi:

[Hoopla Phil]

12. Start you own thread then. It is in very bad taste to stomp on a persons thread.

And against D.U. rules.

[jgraz]

18. Yes, please don't post anything undermining the central point of the OP

:eyes:

[Hoopla Phil]

22. You can argue the merits of the O.P. but it is against D.U. rules

to do this type of action.

[jgraz]

24. So alert and see what happens

My bet is that the post stays right where it is. villager's making a valid point, e.g. anecdotal evidence ain't worth shit.

[Deadric Damodred]

33. You're right...

...anecdotal evidence isn't worth shit. The OP doesn't prove anything on the pro-gun side, and neither does your sob, cry-me-a-river, story.

[jgraz]

36. It's not my story, but thanks for playing

Maybe you should just stick to violent threats about people taking your guns. That seems about your speed.

[Deadric Damodred]

37. You've already been shut down...

...over you're accussation of any "violent threats". Everybody, especially the mods, have read what I typed and saw there were no threats at all, or they would have removed them. I've never recieved any phone calls or knocks on my door, and it's not going to happen no matter how much you dislike my discussions. You may not like what I type, but that doesn't give you the right to change the definition of a "threat", or to use your Brady "Scary Sounding Words" Speak "violent threats". Maybe you're entire side should stick to just scampering about and whining that you all are losing; that seems about your speed.

[jgraz]

41. Ah, so you're just a harmless blowhard.

Nice to know how seriously we can take anything you say. Thanks for the tip.

[Deadric Damodred]

42. That's ok...

...I don't take anything your side has to say seriously. We're the ones winning, so who care's what you think? I hope it bugs the piss out of you that people, as we speak, are out at gunstores and gunshows purchasing "evil black rifles", and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. What is it you call people that are losing...

[jgraz]

43. No, really, we get it. Blowhard.

No need for further demonstrations. The point has been driven home.

[friendly_iconoclast]

50. He's familiar with the "Reality Distortion Field", thanks to a former employer

Apparently, he's also familiar with the term ipse dixit.

[Hoopla Phil]

58. If it's not your story then why do you continue to take up for it?

[Hoopla Phil]

57. My, why thank you for you unsolicited input. I'll give it the do consideration it deserves.

[jgraz]

59. Looks like the mods gave your alert the *due* consideration it deserved

Perhaps they didn't like your grammar.

[Hoopla Phil]

60. Perhaps you are not entirely correct on your assumptions. LOL!

[gorfle]

73. Anecdotal evidence does do one thing.

Anecdotal evidence disproves assertions that "event X never happens".

For example, have seen anecdotal evidence refute several claims made here on DU, such as:

Firearms of no use in defense against a criminal who "gets the drop" on their victim.

Women won't shoot an attacker they know.

Etc., etc.

[iverglas]

100. Ah, you know what all that gets you.

I'm not supposed to post it here, accurate assessment though it is, so you'll have to click to get the results.

http://www.fstdt.com/winace/pics/index.htm#strawman

(jgraz, if you haven't seen it - you'll like it)

[gorfle]

104. Here's what it gets you.

Apparently it gets you a bleating Iverglas.

http://www.fstdt.com/winace/pics/index.htm#broken_record

[SteveM]

135. Anecdotal stuff is poor evidence; I see gun controllers using it all the time (nt)

[friendly_iconoclast]

48. Like the nuts with pictures of aborted fetuses, he's doing "God's Work"

You know, the ones that scream at people and try to prevent them from entering clinics....

It's just too important to be constrained by man's rules.

Saving innocent lives, dontcha know?

[iverglas]

49. Really? Do elaborate.

What exactly are the points of similarity here?

Please, something other than some bizarro characterization that you think can be applied to both situations.

One person posts on an internet board where nothing important happens and in no way impedes anyone else's use of the service, another accosts individuals in person and attempts to interfere with their access to a medical service of enormous import in their lives.

Like that. Only maybe actually showing a similarity.

[friendly_iconoclast]

52. Wot, *you're* not familiar with the fetus fetishists?

The ones that like to drive around in vans covered with enlarged, graphic (sometimes 'shopped) medical photos?

And hand out glossies in front of clinics?

They, too, are absolutely convinced they are saving lives by their actions, and do not care about earthly
(or DU, as the case may be) rules.

Sometimes, they hold rallies in front, and bellow invective through a megaphone.

Like I said, nuts.

[iverglas]

53. a reasonable person

would have expected that you would read my post before clicking that "reply" button.

We reasonable people are doomed to disappointment every day of our lives.

[Hoopla Phil]

61. Like THIS reasonable person

watched the video linked before hitting the reply button? LOL

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=118&topic_id=230616&mesg_id=230651

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

31. By posting an absurd thread of your own.

[Adsos Letter]

4. Now that's what I call a real escort service!

[Tim01]

6. WOW! 77 year old woman wins. What Sam Colt said was true.

YOU GO GRANDMA! YEAH!

[jgraz]

9. Not bad... could use a little more stuffing around the shoulders

[TPaine7]

16. I suppose some poor souls need the sarcasm tag.

You're probably the protégé of our resident sophist, who also likes to post picture like that.

Take it literally, if you must.

[jgraz]

17. You were using sarcasm to make a serious point

Or was your actual point that one lucky old lady in no way justifies our insane gun policies?

:shrug:

[Statistical]

25. No let me correct it

hundreds of thousands of civilians (including old lady) preventing crime justifies our sane gun policies!

Fixed it for you.

[jgraz]

26. prove it.

No credible study has ever shown the kind of numbers you're asserting.

We have over 30,000 confirmed gun deaths a year in this country. 12,000 of them are suicides. Show me a study that proves that 30,000 lives/year have actually been saved through individual ownership of firearms.

[Statistical]

27. Who said anything about deaths.

It is possible the lady in the OP wouldn't have been killed she however would have been a victim of violent crime.
Most rape victims are not killed but they still have their lives shattered.

Estimates for DGU Defensive Gun Uses range from 800,000 to 3 million.
http://www.guncite.com/kleckandgertztable1.html
http://www.ncjrs.org/pdffiles/165476.pdf

Even if we take the 800,000 number that is a substantial reduction in number of violent crime victims.
There are 1.7 million violent crimes last year and only 18,000 homicides. 99% of violent crimes do not end in death but they are still traumatic and result in bodily injury, financial loss and fear.

Firearms in the hands of civilians kill more criminals that the Police do.

[jgraz]

28. The Kleck study has been thoroughly debunked

His methodology was basically to call people and ask them if they ever used their guns for self-defense. This method produced a laughable 2.5 MILLION DGUs (Defensive Gun Uses) per year.

Someone should use the same methodology for gun control: "Hello, have you ever wanted to shoot someone but were unable to because you didn't have a gun?"

How many POGUs (Potential Offensive Gun Uses) do you think they'd come up with?



Of course, all of this is ignores the real issue: if Kleck is actually correct and people need to use firearms 2.5 MILLION times per year (you have to say it with the Dr. Evil voice), then we have a HUGE problem with firearm availability to criminals.

[Statistical]

29. First thing we agree on "then we have a HUGE problem with firearm availability to criminals."

We absolutely do.

Your "solutions" though seem to be to take guns away from law abiding and somehow that will make crime go away.

Estimates on number of street guns run from 40 million to 120 million.

Police remove about 300K or so per year.


Assuming you completely banned all firearms (violation of 2nd.
Then removed every single legal firearm (which is impossible and likely would require a violation of the 4th and 5th).
Now finally lets make another crazy assumption that EVERY SINGLE law abiding gun owner hands over their guns.

This is about best case impossible scenario for gun control.
There would still be 40-120 million street guns in the hands of criminals.

Even if the Police cracked down and began removing 2 million guns from circulation a year (a 1000% increase over current efforts) it would take decades to dry up the supply.
All that time criminals would know civilians have no method to defend themselves.

Also currently thousands of metric tons of drugs flow across our borders. There is very little smuggling of guns INTO the country because there currently is a large supply.

If guns were more valuable due to scarcity. I am sure criminals could easily smuggle a million or so guns into the country if the economics makes sense or they simply would build them here (marijuana farms, meth labs).

So 40-120 million guns
-2 million per year (police removal)
+1 million per year (smuggling, illegal production)

So in about 40-120 years the gun supply should be exhausted.

Removing guns from law abiding citizens doesn't work. You have to suspend all disbelief to think it somehow does.

Violent Crime rate in UK is higher than before they banned guns and now HIGHER than the US.
Criminals armed with gun or knife, or bat are fairly certain they have the citizen outmatched.

[jgraz]

30. You have no idea what my solutions are

You simply assume that since I'm not rabidly pro-gun I must be in favor of 100% confiscation.


My focus has always been the gun manufacturers. Assuming we accept your numbers for the moment, those 40-120 million street guns had to come from somewhere. Nobody is making guns in their back yards.

The gun corporations caused this mess. And they should be held responsible for it.

Of course, that will never happen as long as the NRA and their butt monkeys in Congress keep sticking up for them.


Your UK crime statistics are meaningless unless you specifically list the crimes you're counting. Remember, the UK counts theft as a violent crime, and most of the rise in that category is the result of teenagers stealing mobile phones (something that did not exist when UK gun laws were passed) And, of course, the per-capita homicide rate of the US remains 4 times that of the UK.

[spin]

40. O.K. how would you regulate gun manufacturers? ...

Would you tell them to stop manufacturing of firearms commonly used by criminals? Which are also used by honest citizens for legal purposes, including self defense.

Would you tell them to stop manufacturing semi-auto firearms as they might find their way to Mexico even though they were legally sold in the United States? This would do little good to solve Mexico's problem, even if there is some truth that many of the criminal guns in Mexico come from the states. Better and cheaper firearms can be smuggled into Mexico from the south.

Would you just limit the number of firearms they could make in a year? Which would only result in an increase in the demand for these firearms with an enormous increase in price, which is called supply and demand. This would also increase the price of used firearms. The end result would be that the poor would be unable to own firearms for self defense. (But then that has been the history of gun control as the elite class wants to be the only people owning firearms.)

Would you favor allowing law suits against gun manufacturers for the illegal use of their product? This would effectively put firearm manufacturers out of businesses, or raise the cost of the firearms to the point that only the very rich and elite could afford them. Remember that if a firearm manufacturer produces an unsafe firearm, they can be sued.

I may be wrong and you may present a logical argument for your position. Until you do, and if it is indeed a valid argument, I will view your statement as merely a back door approach to stopping or severely limiting the number of new firearms manufactured each year.

But since there already are at least 235,000,000 firearms owned by civilians in the states, even if firearm manufacturers were told tomorrow to cease producing their product, your approach would do little good to address the problem of firearm related crime and violence in our society.

True, it would stop the increase in the number of firearms legally produced in this country. However, it would also result in a black market for firearms smuggled in form other countries. And, as I pointed out above the increase in the value of firearms would price the poor and the lower middle class out of firearm ownership. While this would be great for the rich and the elite classes, it would be detrimental to those who are rapidly becoming feudal slaves.

Perhaps you can logically address what I see as the serious problems with your ideas. If so, I'm interested.

[jgraz]

56. step 1: repeal the PLCAA

Lawsuits have been a powerful instrument against other criminal corporations. If the gun makers had to answer in civil court for their actions, you can bet they'd clean up their acts quickly.

This would effectively put firearm manufacturers out of businesses

Only if they lose the lawsuits. If the suite are "frivolous", as they allege, they should not only prevail but they should be able to recover legal costs.

On the other hand, if the suits have merit, these guys are in real trouble. My position is: sucks to be them. And sucks to be the NRA who's spent decades excusing their behavior.

Let's start there. Let's see if the gun corporations take any reasonable action to curb the illegal use of their products. If that doesn't work, we can try more direct government regulation.

[spin]

62. The cost of defending against "frivolous" law suits...

would put them out of business.

I happen to agree with this statement, although I'm sure you disagree.

"Big city mayors conceived these lawsuits to try and litigate American gun manufacturers - who President Roosevelt referred to as "the arsenal of democracy" - out of business," said Chris W. Cox, NRA chief lobbyist.

In 2000, New York City, Washington, D.C. and several individual plaintiffs sued gun manufacturers, based on the idea that although they manufactured a legal product, forcing them to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in legal fees just to prove their innocence in court would drive them into bankruptcy. In addition to being based on a bogus legal theory, these lawsuits endangered American armed forces and law enforcement. During congressional debate over the PLCAA, the Department of Defense agreed with the NRA that bankrupting U.S. gun makers and making us dependent on foreign countries like France, Russia or China for small arms is a threat to America's domestic and international security.
http://www.guntrustlawyer.com/2009/03/nyc-lawsuit-against-americas-f.html

It was, however, a brilliantly conceived idea to force gun manufacturers out of business and had it been successful, it would have been a back door method to achieve goals that the anti-gun forces were not able to accomplish by straight forward legislation. Nice try.

Your idea that the gun manufacturers should be able to recover legal costs for frivolous lawsuits does deserve merit, however such cases can take years to resolve and few if any gun manufacturers would be able to afford the legal fees incurred during the process.

You suggest Let's see if the gun corporations take any reasonable action to curb the illegal use of their products. If that doesn't work, we can try more direct government regulation.

What type of action should they take? Should they compile extensive records on every dealer and how many firearms sold by a dealer were used in crime? Should they perhaps hire people to act as undercover agents to attempt to purchase weapons illegally from dealers?

Remember that the firearms industry is already tightly regulated by the ATF. Perhaps more blame should be focused on this Federal agency for failing to stop the illegal distribution of firearms.

I often wonder if those who oppose firearms hope that current laws are poorly enforced. This would enable an effort to pass even more laws which would also be poorly enforced.

The end game being an attempt to register and eventually confiscate all firearms from citizens.

[jgraz]

63. Yep, I think you've covered every industry talking point.

The frivolous lawsuit claim is interesting coming from an industry that was actually *losing* cases on their merits before the PLCAA came into effect. One would assume that defendants don't tend to lose too many frivolous lawsuits.

Guns don't make themselves. They are produced by companies that know very well the legal market for their products and exactly how many units they need to produce to meet demand. Yet, somehow, enough guns get produced each year to supply not only the saturated legal market, but the criminal market as well. I'd like to know how that happens, and I think the discovery phase of a lawsuit would be a great way to find out.

If enough legal pressure is brought to bear, they gun industry may even drop their indefensible opposition to registration. This would not only help law enforcement track firearms used in crimes, it would also make it very difficult for the gun industry to hide their overproduction for the black market.

You can keep pushing your "registration equals confiscation" canard (you don't actually believe that, do you?), but the more you resist simple tracking of weapons, the more likely it is that some mother of a dead teenager is going to find a way through the web of legal obstacles the gun makers have erected and get a public nuisance suit before a jury. And then it *is* very likely that you'll see some American gun makers go out of business.

And whose fault will that be?

[Statistical]

71. Registration has led to confiscation.

You can incorrectly call it a canard but it HAS led to confiscation in CA and in other countries.

It isn't gun manufacturers are who are against it. Gun OWNERS are against it.

The gun industry despite your assumptions is a relatively tiny industry. The motorcycle industry is larger, the baby products industry is larger.

The lobby groups are made up of GUN OWNERS.
4 million in NRA, about 2 million more in others (SAF, GOA, JPFO, etc).

I will never support registration and neither will the majority of gun owners.
I will make sure every one of my elected officials KNOW absolutely that any registration scheme will cost them a vote and funding.

[jgraz]

78. I'm fine with you not supporting registration

Eventually, the pro-gun crowd will lose, because your position is simply not sustainable. By looking completely dogmatic and unreasonable, you make it more likely that sensible restrictions will be put in place sooner.

It won't happen tomorrow, or next year, but eventually those reactionary troglodytes on the SCOTUS are going to die. And it's likely that their replacements will be appointed by a liberal Democrat who has no love for gun rights.

You also know that the generational trends are against you. The younger the voter, the more likely they are to favor stronger gun restrictions. Those votes politicians are so afraid of losing aren't going to be around in 10 or 20 years. And you can be sure there will be a lot less sympathy for gun owners if they continue their hardline positions.

[Statistical]

84. Keep telling yourself that.

17 years ago 78% of people supported MORE gun control. We actually have less now yet only 49% support MORE gun control.
Why?

People are waking up to the idea that gun control doesn't work. Britain & Australia have higher violent crime.

Most Americans aren't even aware that the police have no duty to protect. I have opened many eyes with that single point.

Lastly Heller will change the way the 2nd is taught in future generations. Like it or not but until overturned the 2nd guarantees and individual right to bear arms.

I saw a poster in a middle school on the bill of rights. I went to look at it expecting it to say something about militias or some other nonesense. It said something like "people have the right to own and use firearms".

It floored me. Schools tend to be a bastion of anti-gun support. It wasn't a handmade poster either (by a pro-gun teacher) but rather a mass produced poster by Scholastic or one of those educational resource companies.

Also the numbers are more politically powerful for pro-gun group.
Many pro-gun voters consider gun rights to be a top issue.
Pro-gun voters tend to be better informed on the issues and better organized.
The NRA alone has 4 million members and since gun owners tend to associate with other gun owners information (proganda is you want to call it that) reaches far further than 4 million people.

No gun-control group has that kind of reach & scope.

[jgraz]

95. This was taken before the latest round of mass shootings

And after 8 years of "be afraid" politics.

Your position is simply not sustainable, unless Republican ideology wins out overall. And you don't want that, do you?

[Tim01]

96. Pro gun opinions are still gaining.

The Assault Weapons Ban has caused a huge number of people who didn't care to become pro-gun rights.We are seeing the results now as new people buy guns and push for carry permits in their states.

[X_Digger]

97. Here's one _after_ recent shootings..

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/08/gun.control.poll/index.html

"Now, a recent poll reveals a sudden drop -- only 39 percent of Americans now favor stricter gun laws, according to a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll.

eta:

"Your position is simply not sustainable, unless Republican ideology wins out overall. And you don't want that, do you?"

Nice attempt at forced teaming, ya got there. My opinion (and that of an increasing number of democratic pols) is that gun ownership is a liberal position.

[jgraz]

101. Not the same poll. Do they have a trend line for their polling?

And, as always, we still have a tiny minority favoring less strict gun laws.

[Statistical]

105. Who said anything about less strict?

In VA I have no problem with most of the current gun laws.
I have CCW, open carry, no registration, no licenses, no permits (other than for CCW).
No restrictions on magazine capacities, aproved guns, no "may infringe laws, no limits on personal ownership.

Actually I wouldn't mind a few specific "stricter" ones (like NICS access for private sales) but oppose increased "gun control" in general.

As do MOST Americans.

As far as this "recent mass shootings canard" like there were no mass shootings in 2007, 2006, 2005 etc.

Despite that those wanting more gun control fell every year. Even the largest mass shooting, VT = less gun control after that.

Gun control is a reactionary policy with a basis in racism (supported to allow defenseless blacks and before that to prevent immigrants from getting guns) and classism (supported by union busters).

To call gun control "progressive" is laughable.

[jgraz]

111. So you favor the CA assault weapons ban and the Chicago handgun ban?

All current gun laws.


And it's not so much that gun control advocacy is, by definition, progressive. It's just that most pro-gun advocacy is incredibly *regressive*. The entire vision of a fully-armed society is based on the assumption the we will never do anything to address the underlying causes of crime and that the American people will need to remain armed to the teeth in perpetuity. That's a truly sickening vision for our future.


I'll leave the discussion of racism for the next time this forum celebrates a white property owner shooting a person of color. :eyes:

[Statistical]

113. It is possible to leave citizens armed AND do something about the underlying issue

I'll leave the discussion of racism for the next time this forum celebrates a white property owner shooting a person of color.

Sad attempt at race baiting. I would say the forum is happy to see a person (of any race) not become a victim (of any race).
To assume racism where none exists are you sure it isn't some form of projection or transference?

As far as CA & Chicago go my point was that I doubt Gallup advised the person of all of the restrictive laws in all states.

Most people are totally unaware of any ban in CA or Chicago unless they happen to live in CA or Chicago.
Most VA residents would likely say "same rules" because they aren't aware of the situation in every location of the country.


Until the 2nd is incorporated it is a states right issue and I don't think it is my business to tell CA or Chicago on how to pass laws.

If/when the 2nd is incorporated then they become in violation of the BofR and it becomes more than just a gun control issue to me.

[jgraz]

116. Please don't race bait and then complain when I respond

The pro-gun folks LOVE to play the race card about fear of armed black men. Yet they HATE it when you point out the inherent racism of many pro-gun arguments.

Are you seriously saying that fear of black-on-white crime plays no part in pro-gun sentiments in this country? Are you saying that most racists are also pro-gun-control?

I'd love to see you try to support those positions.


As far as CA & Chicago go my point was that I doubt Gallup advised the person of all of the restrictive laws in all states.

Gallup didn't furnish any information on gun laws either way. That's why I'd love to see a more comprehensive study with more targeted questions.

[Statistical]

119. I didn't say that either way.

I said gun control has its roots in racism.
The first gun control laws prevented ownership from immigrants in NYC.
Guns control was also used to ensure only the private armies of the wealthy (Pinkertons) were the only people armed in Union busting.
Later racism was the main motivator to prevent blacks from being able to defend themselves.

So it is historical fact that the basis and purpose of early gun control was to control and subjegate unwanted classes & races of people.

Today it is more classism.
Excessive fees, procedures, and limited access ("may issue") hurt the poor. The rich, the powerful, and the politically connected will always have firearms or "security companies" that have access they can employ.

Classic example would be Rosie O'Donnell admitted she employs private security that uses firearms. She is not for any legislation that would make that illegal. She has a right to be protected.

Gun control ensures that self defense is something that is bought. I believe self defense is a human right. That includes humans of all races.

[X_Digger]

107. No trend line, but do you see..

.. any upticks around shootings in the gallup poll? (Assuming your contention that it makes a difference that the gallup poll was pre-april shootings is plausible.)

Looks like an uptick between '99-'00 and '04, but the general trend is down. Be interesting to see Gallup's next poll.

[Statistical]

110. Any uptick quickly faded

Also in January 2007 57% supported stricter gun control.
The largest mass shooting (VT) ever happened 3 months later.
By Oct 2008 (the next data point) support had dropped to an ALL TIME LOW of 49%.

Americans are waking up to the shrill rhetoric the antis have cried for the last 3 decades.

They said the AWB would lower crime - it didn't.
They said the AWB expiring would increase police deaths - it didn't.
They said instant background checks (vs. 5 day Brady check) would increase crime - it didn't.
They said "shall issue" CCW would lead to blood in the streets - it didn't.

More states have no registration.
More states have no ownership license.
More states allow CCW.
More states are "shall issue" than "may issue/may infringe".
CCW can carry in more location.
There are more gun, more gun owners, and more CCW permits.

Still crime has gone DOWN, homicide rate has gone DOWN, accidental deaths have gone DOWN!

Virtually every claim the antis have made in last 30 years has been wrong.
Despite more liberal gun laws we have lower violent crime & lower murder than the 30 years ago.


Chicago gun ban hasn't shown any noticeable drop in crime.
DC gun ban showed no noticeable drop in crime.
CA AWB has showned no noticeable drop in crime.

Gun Control DOESN'T WORK! That is what more & more Americans are realizing.

[gorfle]

76. On suing firearm manufacturers.

Everyone can plainly see that the idea of suing firearm manufacturers is just a backdoor way of trying to get rid of firearms.

Every firearm manufacturer sells only and directly to federally licensed retail outlets. If there is any malfeasance in who firearms are sold to it rests with the federally licensed dealers, which are regulated and inspected by the BATFE. So if you want to sue someone for improper oversight over who firearms get sold to, I'd suggest suing the BATFE.

Registration is a prerequisite to confiscation. The whole point of the second amendment is to have an armed citizenry able to replace or at least counter federal infantry forces. If you give that same federal government a list of all firearm owners it will severely cripple their ability to fulfill this role. Obviously any federal government on the verge of having an armed rebellion on its hands is going to seek quite rapidly to get rid of the arms of its opposition. This is exactly what the British attempted to do at the start of the American Revolution, and, as a post this week described, it is exactly what happened in Bosnia prior to ethnic cleansing exercises.

Anonymous firearm ownership is essential. I have detailed several times a plan that would provide for background checks for all firearm purchases and still preserve this anonymity.

[Statistical]

86. History supports that concept over and over and over.

Govts murderered 170 million of their own citizens in the 20th century.

1.7 million a year for a century.

1.7 MILLION!

In every instance of wholesale killing of citizens gun confiscation took place and prior to that "gun control to protect the people".

http://www.jpfo.org/filegen-a-m/deathgc.htm#chart

That isn't to say it would happen in the US but no anti can honestly say it won't happen.

[spin]

83. If firearm manufacturers have this crystal ball...

that tells them exactly how many "units they need to meet demand", then the ball must have software problems.

My son in laws Christmas present, a Ruger .380 acp pistol was on back order for so many months that it became his Christmas and birthday present.

I'm sure that the firearms manufacturers were caught off guard by the skyrocketing demand brought on by Obama's campaign and his election and the occasional anti-gun quotes of some of his administration and liberal members of Congress.

This trend started in 2008.

USA Buys Enough Guns in 3 Months to Outfit the Entire Chinese and Indian Army
Law abiding US citizens bought on average 3,177,256 guns every 3 months in 2008.

****snip****

You also bought 1,529,635,000 rounds of ammunition in just the month of December 2008. Yeah that is right, that is Billion with a “B”. This number takes no accounting of reloading or reloaded ammunition.

This is an evaluation of overall firearms and ammunition purchases based on low end numbers per Federal NIC instacheck data base Statistics. The numbers presented are only PART of the overall numbers of arms and ammunition that have been sold. The actual numbers are much higher.
http://www.ammoland.com/2009/04/22/usa-buys-enough-guns-in-3-months-to-outfit-the-entire-chinese-and-indian-army/

Firearms and ammo are still flying off the shelf in 2009.

And of course I believe that registration = confiscation.

Even in the United States, registration has been used to outlaw and confiscate firearms. In New York City, a registration system enacted in 1967 for long guns, was used in the early 1990s to confiscate lawfully owned semiautomatic rifles and shotguns. (Same source as previous paragraph) The New York City Council banned firearms that had been classified by the city as "assault weapons." This was done despite the testimony of Police Commissioner Lee Brown that no registered "assault weapon" had been used in a violent crime in the city. The 2,340 New Yorkers who had registered their firearms were notified that these firearms had to be surrendered, rendered inoperable, or taken out of the city. (NRA/ILA Fact Sheet: Firearms Registration: New York City's Lesson)

More recently, California revoked a grace period for the registration of certain rifles (SKS Sporters) and declared that any such weapons registered during that period were illegal. (California Penal Code, Chapter 2.3, Roberti-Ross Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989 section 12281(f) ) In addition, California has prohibited certain semi-automatic long-rifles and pistols. Those guns currently owned, must be registered, and upon the death of the owner, either surrendered or moved out of state. (FAQ #13 from the California DOJ Firearms Division Page)
http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_registration.html

It's hard to convince gun owners of the value of any registration scheme when they can remember how such programs have been exploited by gun grabbing politicians in the past.

True, I have "covered every industry talking point". And you have done a good job of presenting the Brady Campaign's agenda.

[Statistical]

87. You too?

My son in laws Christmas present, a Ruger .380 acp pistol was on back order for so many months that it became his Christmas and birthday present.

I waited 5 months for my Ruger LCP.

[spin]

90. Yes, I believe we also waited 5 months..

the next trick is getting enough ammo to practice with for my son in law to gain proficiency with the weapon.

We got one box with the weapon and a week ago the store called us to say two more boxes had arrived. That totals 60 rounds, barely enough to check the weapon out.

[Statistical]

93. Yeah .380 is pretty tought to come by. Harder to get than 9mm or even .45 n/t

[krispos42]

65. What action would they be answering for, exactly?

A firearms wholesale distributor placed an order with them, and they filled it. Wow, look at the criminal activity!



Companies that manufacture guns don't sell directly to the public; they sell to licensed firearms dealers (wholesale and retail). Ergo, there is no liability for illegal use of their product.

"Only if they lose the lawsuits." Yeah, the lawsuits that take years or decade to resolve? And the legal fees would run how many thousands of dollars per hour? Remember, the anti-gun sides doesn't want a decision or justice, they want to empty out the coffers of the defendent and drive them out of business without a court decision.

Sure, if the company is still standing in 12 years, they can sue for their legal fees, if the anti-gun group that brought up the lawsuit had any assets left. Unlike a gun company, which has millions of dollars in physical assets (machinery, raw material, patents, and buildings), the anti-gun group is just some rented office space, a phone bank, and furniture.


"Let's start there. Let's see if the gun corporations take any reasonable action to curb the illegal use of their products. If that doesn't work, we can try more direct government regulation."

Like what? Stop filling orders? "Gee, that wholesaler is buying a lot of Product X. Let's stop selling Product X to them!"

[DissedByBush]

134. I still don't get it

You make a product. It works exactly as advertised.

You get sued for making a defective product. Huh?

The most idiotic lack of logic is required to sue gun manufacturers.

It is the manufacturer's responsibility to sell to or through licensed dealers. It is the dealer's responsibility to perform the appropriate checks and comply with the law. It is the buyer's responsibility to comply with the law after that.

Where does even the remotest tort against the manufacturer logically exist?

Suits don't have to have merit. They show a photo of a dead kid to the jury and it's all over. Forget the felon who shot him. You know, the one who bought a gun from the back of a van or from a shady dealer who should have had his license pulled years ago. Can't go after them. They don't have money. Somehow it's the manufacturer's fault?

Curb the illegal use of your product?

We need autopilot in cars to prevent hit-and-runs or I get to sue GM if I get hit by a Chevy?

Ridiculous.

[X_Digger]

32. Tellingly, you ignore the NCJRS report..

"Applying those restrictions leaves 19 NSPOF respondents (0.8 percent of the sample), representing 1.5 million defensive users. This estimate is directly comparable to the well-known estimate of Kleck and Gertz, shown in the last column of exhibit 7. While the NSPOF estimate is smaller, it is statistically plausible that the difference is due to sampling error. Inclusion of multiple DGUs reported by half of the 19 NSPOF respondents increases the estimate to 4.7 million DGUs."

[jgraz]

34. They use the same flawed methodology

And, unsurprisingly, they get the same results.

Do we determine the number of robberies in the US through phone survey? The number of murders?

We should be able to sample police reports for instances of DGU. After all, if someone pulls a gun yet *doesn't* feel the need to involve the police, it couldn't have been a particularly "life-threatening" situation, now could it?

[X_Digger]

39. Oh ho, now we get to the meat..

It isn't a "real" crime unless someone calls the cops.

Feel the same way about rape?

[jgraz]

45. Yes, that's exactly the most ridiculous interpretation of my post that anyone could imagine

And no, you don't win a prize.

[Statistical]

44. Do you throw out crime victimization survey too?

Number of reproted rapes in the CVS is generally TRIPLES the rapes reported to the police (i.e number in FBI's Unified Crime Report.

Then again I guess all those women are just making up rapes? Or they weren't really "life threatening".

Of course life threatening is a canard also. You can be a victim of violent crime and your life very be in danger.

[TPaine7]

46. I'm really interested in the answer to this question.

My basic understanding is that the history of anti-gun scholars' thought went like this:

1) surveys are good tools in criminology, just like in other fields
2) surveys were used to measure DGUs
3) surveys gave "wrong" answers
4) surveys were done by anti-gun scholars and still didn't give right answers
5) surveys were rejected as a means of measuring DGUs

The issue here is that surveys give the right results (higher rape rates are what is expected). So since rape rates match expectations, we should accept the results (and I agree based on what I know). But will jgraz agree or be consistent with his argument against DGU numbers?

Interesting.

[jgraz]

47. This isn't rape. It's a self-reported DGU

You do understand the difference, don't you?

Rape often invokes shame, so it's likely to be underreported. DGUs invoke pride, so they're likely to be over-reported.

Either way, no one has ever demonstrated that a phone survey is an accurate method of measuring DGUs. In fact, many of Kleck's numbers suggest just the opposite.

[TPaine7]

51. Sure.

I follow your intuition and even share it partially. But things are a little more complicated than you portray them, IMO.

For example, why would a woman want to share her rape in a survey? As another example, IIRC Kleck says that in a surprising number of reported DGUs victims didn't appear heroic. Maybe they ran and hid, only using the gun when cornered. Or maybe they got knocked around a bit before accessing it. Maybe they were shaking with fear.

Additionally, has anyone ever demonstrated that a survey is an accurate method of measuring rapes? If not, does that shake your faith in rape statistics? Or does that particular criticism only apply to DGUs?

[jgraz]

54. Holy shit. I think we almost agree.

The real problem is that Kleck's methodology cannot be verified by independent means. And most attempts to correlate his results with other data do not hold up. For example, his numbers suggest a frequency of justifiable homicides that is around 10x the documented rate (quoting from memory).

With rape statistics, there are many ways to gather them. You can use official crime reports, victim surveys, perpetrator surveys and healthcare provider surveys. These data can be used to reinforce (or refute) each other.

Even with all the data, most rape studies admit the deficiencies with self-reporting -- especially the strong dependence on the ways the questions are worded. Kleck admits no such deficiencies, even though his results are not in sync with any of the other surveys he cites.

Kleck also is hardly an unbiased researcher. Read his study ( http://www.guncite.com/gcdgklec.html ) and you can easily suss out what his point of view is. It's hard to imagine a rape researcher having such a strong stake in the data coming out one way or another. And that stake can have a huge effect on the results of the survey -- you only need to look at Republican vs Democratic issue polling to see that.


Of course the biggest problem with Kleck's survey is it tells us nothing of value. He doesn't even attempt to compare DGUs with other means of deterring crime. DGUs are naturally going to be prevalent in the US because guns are prevalent in the US. But we have no way of knowing how many of the alleged DGU crimes could have been deterred through other means.

[Euromutt]

68. Oh, what a hoot!

Truly amazing, how you're so certain the methodology was flawed when you couldn't even describe it accurately!

Also, it absolutely takes the cake that when a different group, using the same methodology, replicates the results of the first study, you cite that as evidence that both studies were flawed. Scientists consider replicability of a study to be the best available evidence of its validity, but not you, jrgaz, noooo. To you, it's evidence of flawed groupthink. Argumentation worthy of a Creationist!

Do we determine the number of robberies in the US through phone survey?

Among other things, yes. It's called the NCVS.

The number of murders?

That's a bit trickier, since murder victims tend not to answer the phone. On the other hand, murders tend to leave a corpus delicti in a very literal sense, which makes them easier to measure than incidents that rely primarily on somebody's statement to determine what actually happened.

After all, if someone pulls a gun yet *doesn't* feel the need to involve the police, it couldn't have been a particularly "life-threatening" situation, now could it?

Speculation, coupled with argument from incredulity.

Thin gravy at best.

[jgraz]

70. One study got 80,000, the other got 2.5 MILLION

I don't know what field of science you work in, but in my field we don't call that "replication" -- unless, of course, your only goal was to say "Hoo, dawg, that there's a lotta gun use. I get we can keep ours!"


"Do we determine the number of robberies in the US through phone survey?"
Among other things, yes. It's called the NCVS.

Sophistry at its finest. Tell me, what were Kleck's "other things" that he used to independently verify his results?

[Statistical]

72. The studies were over a 25 year period.

It is possible the rate changed as firearm ownership exploded and laws regarding CCW become more mainstream.

Also the studies asked different questions:
Some asked did you use a firearm in the last year? Some asked ever? Some asked did you use a firearm to prevent a crime? Some asked did you use a firearm to prevent bodily injury?

Please show me 2 studies in the same year that had divergent results.

[jgraz]

75. Study 1: 80,000. Study 2: 2.5 MILLION

No experienced statistician accepts study 2 without independent verification. Again, it fits with your wishful thinking so you want it to be true. But it isn't.

[Statistical]

77. Study 1: "millions killed in sword attacks" published 1430.

Study 2: "less than 100 people killed in sword attacks" published 2009.

IMPOSSIBLEZ!!!! Must be the sword lobby.

How is it possible.

Once again you intentionally skip over the fact that the 2 studies were not at the same time, nor did they ask the same question.


Is Obama a good president? 60% yes.
Is Obama the best president ever and the Constitution should be changed in order for him to be King for life? 1% yes.

The poll must be flawed. Somewhere between 1% & 60% say Obama is good.

[jgraz]

79. You'd better ice your groin after that stretch

Or did I miss the part where the studies separated by 600 years?

[Statistical]

81. Still they are seperated by a period of time (glad you finally admit that)

A period of time when laws concering self defense, keeping loaded weapons, and carrying weapons have become much more liberal.

Law abiding citizens have better access to firearms, getting training is more socially accepted, laws protect the lawful use of firearms in self defense, more people are carrying firearms.....

despite that you can't accept that the numbers would change?

Also you completely ignored the issue that the surveys asked different questions. Kleck even points out a major reason for the study was issues with previous studies (limited geography, poor wording of questions, asking about a lifetime vs defined period of time).

[jgraz]

82. It's not about just accepting that numbers will change

It's about accepting that numbers will change wildly (31x) AND not be supported by any corroborating evidence. In a study conducted by a pro-gun zealot.

Hmm... now what could possibly be wrong with that? :eyes:

[Statistical]

88. Only one study is that low 14 OTHERS have a much smaller range.

Did you ever consider the 80K is an outlier or was flawed?

The majority of DGU studies were not by "gun zealots" they were by the govt, the media (same media that calls any rifle an ASSAULT WEAPON) and by universities. Not exactly NRA boosters.

The NCVS reached an 80,000 number by not asking about guns.

Yeah that is right you can look at the survey there is not a single question about using a firearm to defend yourself.

Instead they ask the respondent to state anything they did to end the attack.

Couple problems there.
Without a yes or no response people often won't volunteer most information.
Second the person taking the survey has identified themselves as working for the govt.

Not a HUGE leap to realize some people wouldn't volunteer information to govt agents about their use of firearms.
Some may not have reported the crime.
Some may not be sure what they did was lawful (maybe it is but they aren't aware of their rights).
Some may not want to provide detailed information to a govt agent.

Also the NCVS doesn't ask any followup questions. If someone responds with "my neighbor scared the burgular off" there is no followup "how". in which case they may explain "he came out with a shotgun and the man ran off".

If/when the NCVS has questions like the following then we can talk about the validity of the NCVS:
#) Did you use a weapon to defend yourself from this crime? Yes/No
#a) Please select the weapon used a) handgun, b)rifle, c)shotgun, etc.

[jgraz]

91. 6850 DGUs per day. 285 per hour

According to Kleck: every hour of every day, 285 law-abiding private citizens use a legal firearm to prevent crime. Does that seem even remotely credible to you?

[Statistical]

92. 30,684 violent & property crimes REPORTED each day (per the FBI)

Does that sound "credible"?

That is just reported. Crime victimization survey shows crime is substantially under reported by as much as 50%.
So 60,000 crimes violent or property crimes EVERY SINGLE DAY. It can't be credible.

Does that sound even remotely credible that every SECOND 42 violent or property crimes occur.

42 EVERY SECOND. Oh noes.

There are 80 million gun owners (approximately). So 6850 is < 0.01%. So yeah I think it is possible that every day one out of 11,000 gun owners prevent or end a crime via the use of firearm (anything from a threat "I have a gun", to a show of force, to actual lethal force.

One out of 11,000 doesn't seem that hard to believe.

[jgraz]

94. Please provide a link if you want to have a discussion

Note how many people are responding to my posts. If you want to have a good faith debate, please don't make me verify both your and my stats.

[Statistical]

103. The FBI

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/data/table_01.html

UCR shows 11.2 million violent & property crimes in 2007 (latest year available).
That works out to 30,684 REPORTED crimes per day.

These are the categories of crime (unlike possession & dealing of drug, embezzling, fraud, etc) in which a gun owner is most likely to be able to stop via a DGU.

[iverglas]

98. you keep leaving out my favourite bits :(

Of course, what does contradict the ludicrous 2,000,000 figure is he seems not to have noticed that the respondents who reported over 15% of those incidents believed that someone would probably have died had they not used a firearm to avert the crime/death.

There would have been THREE HUNDRED THOUSAND more homicides during the time period than there were, if that were the case. (There are actually, very roughly, about 15,000 homicides a year in the US.)

What do people here like to say about how some people don't like facts, and "just feel" things?

All those people who "just felt" that someone would have died if they hadn't pulled out their pistols.


2.5 million "defensive gun uses" a year.

How many people actually are victims of officially recorded crimes every year? This table:
http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/uscrime.htm
seems to tell us that in the US in 2006 there were 11,401,313 crimes against the person + crimes against property in the US in 2006:
- 1,417,745 person
- 9,983,568 property.

And somebody wants us to believe that there might have been another million or two had people not been flashing or firing firearms?

The property offences shown there aren't the kind generally committed when the victims are even in the vicinity -- theft, burglary, vehicle theft. If people are there, they tend to fall into the "robbery" category, and get included in the violent/against the person numbers.

But who knows? Maybe a whole lot of those "defensive" firearms uses were by people who wandered out to their garage and found someone fixing to steal their lawn mower. They pulled up their T-shirt, pointed at the pistol in their pants, and the would-be thief slunk off.

I dunno. I just can't think of much to say. There are about 1.5 million crimes of violence officially recorded in a year in the US, and somebody wants me to believe that that many crimes, or half that many, or even half again as many, were averted by somebody doing something with a firearm.

My perennial question:
Are people who tote firearms around, or keep them in the front hallway at home, just really really unlucky? They get targeted by criminals at rates that are multiples of what ordinary people experience?

The mind just doesn't stop boggling.

What Kleck didn't use to verify his results was reality.

[jgraz]

102. Sorry, there are too many things wrong with that study to keep up

Here's another one. Kleck's study was performed in 1993. In 94, the NIJ published a report saying that there were 44 million gun owners in the US. (http://www.ncjrs.gov/txtfiles/165476.txt)

That means that, every year, a gun owner has about a 6% chance of using their gun to prevent a crime. Sounds small, no?

Well, if you apply that probability over 10 years, a gun owner has a 44% chance of using their gun to prevent a crime ( 1 - ( (1 - 2.5/44) ** 10 ) = ~0.44 )

And if you apply the probability over 20 years, a gun owner has almost a 70% chance of using their gun to prevent a crime ( 1 - ( (1 - 2.5/44) ** 20 ) = ~0.69 )

And, assuming someone bought their first gun at 18, a lifetime gun owner (let's say, 50 years) has a 95% chance of using their gun to prevent a crime. ( 1 - ( (1 - 2.5/44) ** 50 ) = ~0.95 )


Have we ever seen a survey showing that 95% of lifetime gun owners have used their weapon to prevent a crime? :crazy:

[Statistical]

108. 44 million gun owners doesn't mean 44 million people with access to a gun.

44 million gun owners = 44 million households with access to a legally owned firearm.

Per the census (2000) there are an average of 2.57 person per household.

So 44 million gun owning households = 113 million persons with access to firearms. We can't just discount for underage as that implies that someone underage couldn't use a firearm. Even if we discount 30% to account for people incapable of using a firearm in a household with firearms that still leaves 80 million or so.

Of course the funny thing about NIJ is that is was a phone survey. I thought they were all bogus.

Now there are also felons who own firearms who could use them to defend themselves. Not that I am advocating felons owning firearms but felons are sometimes victims of crime themselves. I doubt many would indicate that to a govt survey. So the pool of potential firearm uses is even larger.

run your numbers again on a pool of 120-150 million people who have access (legal or not) to firearms.

[jgraz]

115. OK, so households with a gun have a 95% chance of a DGU. Does that make any more sense?

I gave you the formula; you could just as well have run those numbers yourself (just paste into google).

Even using your figure of 80 million, the numbers still don't add up.

1 - ( (1 - 2.5/80) ** 50 = ~0.80

That's a 80% chance that someone with access to a firearm will use it to prevent a crime over the course of their adult life. Using 120 million, it's 65%. At 150, it's 57%

Do any of those numbers strike you as credible?



Feel free to play around with the formula yourself. For those playing the home game, here's how I arrived at the numbers:

1. 2.5 == millions of DGUs per year, according to Kleck


2. 80 == millions of gun owners, according to Statistical ("gun owner" == shorthand for those who have a firearm in the household)


3. 2.5/80 == probability that a gun owner will have a DGU in a year.


4. 1 - 2.5/80 == probability that a gun owner will NOT have a DGU in a given year


5. (1 - 2.5/80) ** 50 == probability that a gun owner will NOT have a DGU in 50 years (#4 taken to the 50th power)


6. 1 - (((1 - 2.5/80) ** 50) == probability that a gun owner WILL have a DGU in 50 years

[TPaine7]

117. You do realize that you would have to survey them all right before death?

Have we ever seen a survey showing that 95% of lifetime gun owners have used their weapon to prevent a crime?

Surveying a 30yo would skew the data (unless she was scheduled for a fatal accident right after the survey).

[jgraz]

118. The numbers I ran maxed out at 50 years. 68 is hardly "right before death".

It's the number of years that determine the probability, not how close someone is to death.

You don't think we could find a reasonable sample of people who have owned guns for 50 years? Do you believe they would have a 95% likelihood of reporting a personal DGU?

[TPaine7]

121. Hmmm.

That's a 80% chance that someone with access to a firearm will use it to prevent a crime over the course of their adult life.

I went by your words; I didn't crank any numbers. As I see it, adult life ends with death.

You don't think we could find a reasonable sample of people who have owned guns for 50 years?

Probably. It would involve some work.

Do you believe they would have a 95% likelihood of reporting a personal DGU?

Maybe, but I would guess a smaller number.

During a significant portion of their adult lives, gun laws will have been much more severe than they are now--especially with regards to CCW. You will agree with me that CCW greatly increases the likelihood of a DGU, right?

Number of gun owners, CCW, social acceptability of gun ownership, rights awareness and other factors are all moving targets. The study you suggest would not account for any of this movement (all in the direction of more DGUs in recent decades). Like an average speed for an accelerating car, it sheds little light on steady-state speed.

I know we probably differ on the usefulness of CCW in personal protection, but would it shock you if the average person had a few threats that legally justified a DGU over the course of 50 years (as a rate)? Also some people have guns because they are at a high risk to need them for DGUs. Those people would tend to have multiple DGUs.

It would not shock me if the numbers from your proposed study were in the range of 50 to 70%, even considering the above.

[jgraz]

122. Whatever the answer, a simple measure of DGUs is not helpful

It's basically the "if you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail" syndrome. If someone is carrying a concealed weapon, there is a higher likelihood that they will use the weapon instead of exploring other options for preventing the crime (e.g. calling the police).

Here are the truly interesting questions about DGUs:

• How many reported DGU incidents actually required a weapon for a positive outcome?


• How many attempted DGUs resulted in an escalation of the crime (e.g. a dead or wounded gun owner instead of merely a robbed gun owner)?


• How often did the presence of a weapon result in a more violent outcome for the aggressor (e.g. dead or wounded instead of merely deterred)?


• How many OGUs (offensive gun uses) or AGUs (accidental gun uses) resulted from the same access to these firearms?

These are difficult questions to answer but without this information, even an accurate survey of DGUs tells us very little.

[Statistical]

123. The citizen shouldn't have to "explore" other options at the benefit of the criminal.

Even the process of "exploring" puts the law abiding in further danger.

Average police response time is 7 minutes for priority call.

there is a higher likelihood that they will use the weapon instead of exploring other options for preventing the crime (e.g. calling the police)

The reverse is someone deprived of a firearm is more likely to use an inferior method to prevent a crime like calling the police.

If the person CHOOSES that to not own a firearm and therefore be dependent on police response it is one thing. If the govt forces them to rely on the Police and then enforces a standard that the police have "no duty to protect" that is negligent.

Given that currently:
1) established law protects govt agents that do NOT protect citizens even in cases of negligence it it unacceptable to deprive citizens of the RKBA and thus rely on the govt that doesn't have to protect them.

2) even if you overturned #1 the number of LEO would need to be substantially increased to provide even a similar level of protection that a personal firearm provides.

How about you work on #1 & #2 and then talk about gun control that only affects the law abiding?

[jgraz]

124. Once again, simply saying something does not make it true

I'll ignore your strawiest of strawmen characterization of my statements and get right to business:

the number of LEO would need to be substantially increased to provide even a similar level of protection that a personal firearm provides.

Unless you can answer the questions I posed, you have no idea what level of protection a personal firearm provides.

[Statistical]

125. To take something away YOU need to prove it.

Personal ownership of firearms exist, to change public opinion it would be your sides goal to prove they are less effective than calling the Police.

I believe a firearm provides more immediate protection and even if I am wrong I am not going to surrender my arms because you "think" I should. Now if your PROVE it and that PROOF is credible then maybe.

I notice you just ignored that the govt has upheld the "police have no duty to protect".

The prerequisites for eliminating personal ownership would be:
1) repeal the 2nd
2) prove that Police provide an equal level of protection as personal firearms
3) obligate the govt to protect citizens.

As of right now you are 0 for 3.

Get working. I am the one fine with the status quo so I can just wait you out. Remember? You are the one trying to change things.

[jgraz]

126. Is there something flimsier than a straw man? Jello-man?... Air-man?

Vacuum-man?

Really, it's not polite to masturbate in public. If you want to have an actual discussion, read what I wrote and respond to it.

[Statistical]

127. Jello notwithstanding you are still 0 for 3.

Time is a wasting. I am happy with the status quo. Likely the 2nd will be incorporated this fall. All forms of gun bans rendered unconstitutional.

Obama has put guns for far on the backburner the issue is getting cold. Reid is against the AWB and has no interest wasting time on a topic a divisive and useless as gun control.

Must be sad to see the issue not even picked up with overwhelming Democratic majorities. If you can't do it now you can't do it ever. Why can't you do it? Public opinion. Most people don't care and among those that do the pro-guns outnumber the antis substantially.

0 for 3 jgraz and without proof it isn't going to get better.

[jgraz]

130. Throwing the gun after you're out of bullets, eh?

Reverting to the "fuck you, we're winning" non-argument? Not exactly inspiring confidence in your command of the facts.

[TPaine7]

128. The odds of "calling the police" actually "preventing the crime" are not much better

than the odds of winning the lottery.

I won't dig up police response times--I trust your intuition on this. How likely do you think police are to arrive in time to stop a shooting? A stabbing? A simple robbery (as opposed to emptying a house or breaking open a safe)? A rape? A kidnapping?

I agree that the felon's knowledge that his victim has called the police may deter a crime. May. But if he calculates that he has 5-7 minutes to stab his victim and disappear, I'd say he can be very confident of his escape--hence little to no deterrence. And it takes a lot less than 1 minute to open a person's jugular.

And what if the guy coming at you with a knife won't give you a time out to dial 911? Suppose he's not a gentleman?

[jgraz]

129. You don't really know how often a call to police deters crime.

That kind of statement borders on pro-vigilante spin. In any case, calling the police is just one of many options that someone could consider besides a pulling a gun.

Remember, your hypotheticals are not the only type of DGU that gets counted. They also count the drunk who's peeing on your car and then gets belligerent when you ask him to stop (true story). If one or both combatants are carrying a firearm, things could get ugly pretty quickly.

That's the problem. We can all think of examples of self-defense that are pretty cut-and-dried and some that are impenetrably ambiguous. Many DGUs are not examples of self-defense at all (car break-ins, etc). Until we have better, more specific data, these studies will simply be Rorschach tests for either side.

[TPaine7]

131. I guess you missed the distinction my post draws between

"prevent"--your word--and "deter." You're right, I don't know how often a call to the police deters a crime--my point was that it is almost impossible for a call to the police to "prevent" a crime. It's not spin of any kind, it's fact. Fact I daresay you agree with, since you haven't ventured your own counter estimate.

Remember, your hypotheticals are not the only type of DGU that gets counted. They also count the drunk who's peeing on your car and then gets belligerent when you ask him to stop (true story). If one or both combatants are carrying a firearm, things could get ugly pretty quickly.

I hardly see how that matters. Let's say a 5ft 2in, 120lb man (1.6m, 54kg) sees a 6ft 4in, 300lb man (1.9m, 136kg) peeing on his car. He says "hey, stop peeing on my car!" He doesn't approach too closely, aware that the other man is in possession of a deadly weapon--his body. I assume that we're agreed he's within his rights so far.

If the idiot attacks him and "things get ugly" it is not because the drunk pissed on his car, it's because the drunk committed the crime of deadly assault. The smaller man has freedom of speech, property rights, and the right to self-defense. And personally, I agree with the "stand your ground" laws. If a belligerent thug attacks him for verbally asserting his legitimate rights, why should he thereby lose his right to be in a place he otherwise has a perfect right to be in? That means that the dregs of society have more rights--by virtue of their thuggishness--than ordinary citizens.

If the larger man is shot in this scenario, it is because he chose to assault someone for exercising his rights. It is not because he peed on someone's car.

[jgraz]

133. Hey, it's not like I missed the distinction between "50 years" and "just prior to death"

Not naming any names...

You continue to stack the deck in all of your scenarios. When I said the drunk story was true, I meant it actually happened. It was after bar closing time and I'm walking to my car. There's a guy taking a leak on the front bumper. I say something like "do you mind?" and he tells me to fuck off. Then he makes a racial crack about my date (we were a mixed race couple and had been putting up with bullshit from frat boys all night). He was bigger than me, but also a lot drunker, so the ensuing "encounter" was pretty short.

This happened late at night in the lower floor of a parking garage. If I'd had a gun, I could have just as easily shot the guy and said "I feared for my life". It was Wisconsin, late 80s, so I doubt there were any cameras. Assuming my date backs me up, I walk.

Are you saying nothing like that ever happens?

[Statistical]

106. Maybe in Canada

The property offenses shown there aren't the kind generally committed when the victims are even in the vicinity -- theft, burglary, vehicle theft. If people are there, they tend to fall into the "robbery" category, and get included in the violent/against the person numbers.

This is simply untrue.

Theft of a motor vehicle is a property crime. Now there may be assault charges depending on the situation but it is a property crime.

Robber is a specific subclass of theft which involves someone stealing directly from ones person. It is categorized separately due to the face to face nature and the higher risk of violent outcome.

A situation where someone confronts a thief in his front lawn attempting to break into his car, shows a firearm and the thief leaves would be auto theft not robbery.

A situation where someone breaks into a garage and a lady is reading emails and fires a shot and the thief leaves would be burglary.


So the idea that DGU can't happen in "property crimes" is not true.

[iverglas]

109. perhaps you didn't understand what you read

I said:

The property offenses shown there aren't the kind generally committed when the victims are even in the vicinity -- theft, burglary, vehicle theft. If people are there, they tend to fall into the "robbery" category, and get included in the violent/against the person numbers.


You said:

This is simply untrue.

Theft of a motor vehicle is a property crime. Now there may be assault charges depending on the situation but it is a property crime.


Now, what is simply untrue?

You said exactly the same thing I said -- the property offences listed where I was referring to are NOT generally committed when the victim is in the vicinity. That is WHY they are categorized as property crimes. If a theft is committed from the victim, i.e. not from the victim's garage when the victim is on vacation or from business premises after hours, it is a robbery. Robbery is a crime against the person. Theft from a garage when nobody is home is a property crime.


I said:

If people are there, they tend to fall into the "robbery" category, and get included in the violent/against the person numbers.

You said:

Robber is a specific subclass of theft which involves someone stealing directly from ones person. It is categorized separately due to the face to face nature and the higher risk of violent outcome.

Duh. What did you actually think I was saying?

If someone accosts you on the street and threatens violence and demands your money, that is robbery.

If someone breaks into your home and threatens violence and demands your VCR, that is robbery.

If someone opens your car door and threatens violence and demands your car, that is robbery.


It's really wise to start from the assumption that the person you are talking to is not stupid, and has not said a stupid thing. You can sometimes avoid looking stupid yourself, that way.


A situation where someone confronts a thief in his front lawn attempting to break into his car, shows a firearm and the thief leaves would be auto theft not robbery.

A situation where someone breaks into a garage and a lady is reading emails and fires a shot and the thief leaves would be burglary.

So the idea that DGU can't happen in "property crimes" is not true.

Well, let's say that the idea doesn't coincide with your allegations.

I wonder whether old Gary Kleck has some facts to back anything up.

I wonder how many of the 15% who were convinced someone would have got killed if they hadn't done something with a gun were defending their lawn mowers from garage burglars?

Since, if they had just left well enough alone, the crime itself would have involved no risk to anyone's life or limb, that really would put a whole new slant on the thing, wouldn't it?

Someone probably would have died if they hadn't had their gun, but if they hadn't had their gun, the situation would not have arisen.

Because IF THEY WERE PRESENT when the theft attempt was made, it was ROBBERY, not a property crime. Creating a situation in which somebody "probably" would have died, by taking action to avert a property crime, and then escaping that probability by doing something with a gun, and telling Gary Kleck how you used your gun to prevent a death ... well, I'm sure you can see my eyes rolling from here.

[Statistical]

112. Once again NOT TRUE

If a theft is committed from the victim, i.e. not from the victim's garage when the victim is on vacation or from business premises after hours, it is a robbery. Robbery is a crime against the person. Theft from a garage when nobody is home is a property crime.

No stealing something from a house when house is occupied is burglary unless force is used.
Stealing a car from front yard when people are home is auto theft once again unless force is used.

Robbery is stealing DIRECTLY FROM SOMEONE'S PERSON or stealing by USE OF FORCE.
Vicinity has NOTHING to do with the statutes.

You can be present at a burglary, vandalism, auto theft, person property theft, or arson.

If you are home, someone unlawfully enters the home, uses no physical force against you, takes an item NOT on your person and leaves that is BURGLARY not a ROBBERY and hence per the FBI a property crime. In VA if they carry a firearm (even if not used) it becomes ROBBERY that is why most burglars are not armed in the US.

Because IF THEY WERE PRESENT when the theft attempt was made, it was ROBBERY, not a property crime. Creating a situation in which somebody "probably" would have died, by taking action to avert a property crime, and then escaping that probability by doing something with a gun, and telling Gary Kleck how you used your gun to prevent a death ... well, I'm sure you can see my eyes rolling from here.

Again maybe in Canada. In the US robbery is theft from ones person or via the use of force. Since you often say you wouldn't stop someone from committing a felony it is unlikely you will be the victim of a robbery but you may be the victim of auto theft or burglary.

[iverglas]

114. look up your laws, 'k?

In the US robbery is theft from ones person or via the use of force.

Or threats. Force OR THREATS.

If someone walks into your home uninvited and picks up your VCR, will you likely keep watching the now-blank screen? Is someone likely to do that WITHOUT FIRST threatening to harm you if you attempt to interfere?

Yeesh.

Yes, if someone breaks into your basement while you are watching TV and you don't realize until a week later that your laundry is gone, that's a burglary. Yes indeed.


I'm betting that your robbery statutes actually look a fair bit like mine:

Robbery

343. Every one commits robbery who

(a) steals, and for the purpose of extorting whatever is stolen or to prevent or overcome resistance to the stealing, uses violence or threats of violence to a person or property;

(b) steals from any person and, at the time he steals or immediately before or immediately thereafter, wounds, beats, strikes or uses any personal violence to that person;

(c) assaults any person with intent to steal from him; or

(d) steals from any person while armed with an offensive weapon or imitation thereof.

The bit you want to direct your attention to is (a).

If you want to continue claiming otherwise, feel free to bring a statute to the table.


html fixed

[Euromutt]

66. No, it hasn't; not even close

There's been a lot of speculation, there's been a lot of people who've said "well, 2.5 million, that can't be right," but nobody's ever actually produced a shred of evidence that the Kleck/Gertz study was incorrect.

Your criticism suffers from the flaw most criticisms of the Kleck/Gertz study do, namely ignorance (possibly wilful) of the actual methodology.

His methodology was basically to call people and ask them if they ever used their guns for self-defense. This method produced a laughable 2.5 MILLION DGUs (Defensive Gun Uses) per year.

No. Not even close to an honest or accurate representation of the methodology.

I'll let Kleck and Gertz explain it themselves:

<...> a respondent who wanted to falsely report a nonexistent DGU could not qualify as having had such an experience merely by saying "Yes." Rather, respondents had to provide as many as nineteen internally consistent responses covering the details of the alleged incident. In short, to sustain a false DGU claim, RS had to do a good deal of agile mental work, and stay on the phone even longer. On the other hand, all it took to yield a false negative was for a DGU-involved R to speak a single inaccurate syllable: "No." The point is not that false positives were impossible, but rather that it was far harder to provide a false positive than a false negative.

Consider also the context in which H<emenway> imagines all these false reports to have occurred. Randomly selected people were called unexpectedly, and questioned rapidly by total strangers, for no more than fifteen minutes, with one question immediately following another. There was no prolonged opportunity to invent a nonexistent event, rehearse inaccurate details, or to otherwise get an false story straight. RS providing a false positive had to be not only dishonest but very quick-witted as well.

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology (Northwestern), 87 (1997): 1446, reproduced here: http://www.saf.org/LawReviews/KleckAndGertz2.htm
Emphasis in bold mine.

The "nineteen internally consistent responses" had to describe an event in which a confrontation took place, and the other person displayed intent of committing a burglary or violent crime, and the respondent had to describe displaying, threatening with, or discharging the firearm (not merely having it on their person on somewhere in the house). It should also be noted that the Kleck/Gertz study had the largest sampling size of any study into DGUs, larger too than the subsequent Ludwig/Cook study commissioned by the NIJ (http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/165476.pdf) which came up with an estimate of 1.5 million DGUs annually.

I've seen the Kleck/Gertz study "discredited" by people citing examples of responses, such as:
- R hears noise at a downstairs window in the night, does not actually see anyone outside, shouts "I've got a gun!" and noise stops.
- R is in his car, pulled up at a stop sign. A man walks up close to R's car, R draws weapon and points it at man, who runs.
The dishonest part of citing these responses is that, while they are indeed examples of responses given to the survey-takers, they were discarded as not meeting the criteria for being counted as a DGU. They are not examples of what Kleck and Gertz considered to a DGU.

[TPaine7]

67. He's had some of his criticisms addressed before.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=118x194443#195088

He had no response then, but I guess he still holds all the same views, unmodified in the slightest.

[Euromutt]

69. Staying true to form, then

After all, that's how jgraz responds to all evidence that he's wrong. Ignore it, pretend it didn't happen, parrot the same bullshit in the next thread.

[jgraz]

74. Yes, apparently unlike you I work for a living and sometimes can't keep up with dozens of responses

No, I hadn't seen Tpain's response before. I wish I had, because whatever stats class he took in college, his professor obviously never used multivariate analysis in any real application.

It's called a "sanity check". Subgroup results may have reduced predictive value, but they can be used to dismiss a result if they're wildly inaccurate. In this case, the subgroup predictions were off by 100x (not 10x as I said before, but that would have been enough of a red flag).

This is especially troubling if the tested result is strongly correlative to your main premise (e.g DGUs and justifiable homicides), as opposed to TPain's schoolbook example of political party and handedness.

For example, let's say you're doing multivariate testing on internet traffic and you come up with an ad click-through rate of 3%. From past data, you know that this should lead to approximately 1000 visits to the product's "buy now" page. Instead you get 10. Your first reaction is never "well, multivariate analysis is not reliable for subgroups". No, it's "shit, we fucked up", and you go back and examine your methodology.


Wow, thanks for pointing out this response, cuz it made me think through the implications again. Now I'm convinced Kleck's results are garbage. They're only pointed to because they support his-- and every other pro-gun advocate's -- wishful thinking.

[Statistical]

80. Even if there is an issue your conclusion can't be supported.

Wow, thanks for pointing out this response, cuz it made me think through the implications again. Now I'm convinced Kleck's results are garbage. They're only pointed to because they support his-- and every other pro-gun advocate's -- wishful thinking.

The 80K is an outlier there has been no study before or after having that low of a result. Somehow however you reach the conclusion that it is correct and Klecks results (and 13 others) are wrong. Kleck was pro-gun but the majority of the studies before were done by universities and not backed by "pro-gun" groups yet reached similar conclusions. You dismiss all 13 of them and cling to the 80K result as accurate.

Isn't THAT wishful thinking?

Based on info provided all you can really say is that the evidence doesn't let us accurately say the number of DGU.

It would be like the number of rapes being 120,000 per year and supported by a wide variety of studies. Then I publish a study saying only 200 rapes in a year. Would you use that as evidence that the 120,000 number is incorrect? Would you not even consider the 200 number is the WRONG ONE?

You complain:
They're only pointed to because they support his-- and every other pro-gun advocate's -- wishful thinking.

Then you dismiss them because it refutes your -- and every other anti-gun advocate's -- wishful thinking.

How intellectually honest.

[jgraz]

85. My only conclusion is that there is no conclusion

We don't yet have accurate data on the number and (more importantly) the usefulness of private-citizen DGUs. I'd love it if there *were* reliable data, but there isn't.

The 80K is an outlier there has been no study before or after having that low of a result. Somehow however you reach the conclusion that it is correct and Klecks results (and 13 others) are wrong. Kleck was pro-gun but the majority of the studies before were done by universities and not backed by "pro-gun" groups yet reached similar conclusions. You dismiss all 13 of them and cling to the 80K result as accurate.

NONE of the studies agree! Their estimates ranges from 80,000 to 3.6 million DGUs and Kleck himself dismisses all of them as inaccurate.

I've said repeatedly that no result is supported by strong evidence. The difference with the Kleck study is that there's strong evidence to dismiss the results, including his own stated bias.

Would you accept a DGU survey commissioned by Sarah Brady?



Then you dismiss them because it refutes your -- and every other anti-gun advocate's -- wishful thinking.

I've provided plenty of support on this thread for my point of view. If you'd like to address the specific points I've made, have at it.

[iverglas]

99. funny, eh?

He's had some of his criticisms addressed before.


And in the same thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=118&topic_id=194443&mesg_id=194868

I've just never ever had any of that addressed. So I've repeated it in this thread. I wonder what will happen.

[jgraz]

120. I'm sure TPaine is just formulating a response

After all, you know how he hates it when people ignore contradicting arguments.

[TPaine7]

132. Just for you, jgraz

It didn't seem to merit response--and I recall having the same thought the first time I read it. But just for you, jgraz:

..."approximately 2.5 million legitimate defensive gun uses take place a year".

....

How many people actually are victims of officially recorded crimes every year? This table:
http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/uscrime.htm
seems to tell us that there were 11,401,313 crimes against the person + crimes against property in the US in 2006 -- 1,417,745 person, 9,983,568 property.

Ok, 11,401,313 crimes officially reported.

And somebody wants us to believe that there might have been another million or two had people not been flashing or firing firearms?

Another million or two officially recorded crimes? Not really.

Issue 1: Apples and oranges.

The property offences shown there aren't the kind generally committed when the victims are even in the vicinity -- theft, burglary, vehicle theft.

OK.

If people are there, they tend to fall into the "robbery" category, and get included in the violent/against the person numbers.

I don't think so. If a man takes off sick the day robbers decide to break in, and chases them off with a shotgun they have not committed a crime against the person. The shotgun helped to ensure that they didn't. That doesn't work in any circumstance where the person intended a property crime and was chased off by an conspicuously armed property owner.

I dunno. I just can't think of much to say. There are about 1.5 million crimes of violence officially recorded in a year in the US, and somebody wants me to believe that that many crimes, or half that many, or even half again as many, were averted by somebody doing something with a firearm.

Frankly, I don't think that any level of evidence will suffice to make iverglas believe anything she doesn't want to believe about DGUs.

Damned if I can find the bit I'm actually looking for -- the number of people who engaged in "defensive gun use" who believed that a death would probably have resulted if they had not done something with a gun. It was some multiple of the number of homicides that actually occur in the US in a year -- leading us to conclude that perhaps having a gun handy somehow increases one's risk of being murdered.

This "conclusion" is asinine. It is either extreme intellectual dishonesty, extreme bias, or both. Of course the data would show that, even if collected by an omniscient, infallible observer. Thugs often put their victims in fear of their lives so that they can obtain their objectives. Think about a few crimes:

1) Carjacking
2) Rape
3) Armed robbery

If the felon could get to give him what he wanted without putting you in fear of your life (or at least in fear of serious bodily injury) there would be no crime. It wouldn't be a carjacking; it would be a car borrowing or the generous gift of a car. It wouldn't be rape; it would be seduction. It wouldn't be armed robbery; it would be panhandling.

Those aren't crimes. They wouldn't show up on official records. They wouldn't show up in surveys. They wouldn't even show up on our omniscient, infallible observer's crime records.

Now in some people's thinking, the fact that most of the people who are put in legitimate, rational fear for their lives aren't actually killed is very significant in indicating proper gun policy. I disagree.

Let us say that only 1 in 20 of those people was correct that they would have been killed without their DGU. Let us say that Joe Blow is one of those people. He is cornered by two thugs with knives who ask for his wallet and watch. He judges the situation and determines that he can defend himself with his concealed weapon. Should he give them his wallet? Odds are, they won't hurt him if he pays the "thug tax."

Let's change the picture slightly, but not the odds. Let's say that a felon has an innocent person tied up. He has a special revolver with 20 cylinders, and he is playing a game of Russian roulette. He has been going around "playing" with lots of people; Joe Blow has read the stories and knows how this psychopath works. He uses one bullet, puts the gun to the terrified victim's head, counts down, and pulls the trigger one time and one time only. The vast majority of victims survive with only psychic scars.

Anyway, Joe Blow is armed and has a very clear shot at the psychopath's head. He is absolutely certain he can destroy the his brain and leave the victim untouched. The thug is counting down--3, 2,... Should Joe pull the trigger? Or should he endanger the innocent person out of regard for the psychopath's safety? Do you think it a moral imperative to preserve the life of the felon at the 5% possible expense of the innocent victims life?

I absolutely don't.

[votingupstart]

55. go grandma nt

[zipplewrath]

10. The guys a nutjob

1) your entire response is a strawman
2) The guy was a nut job
3) They were lucky
4) I'm not sure I'd hold this up as an example of anything done much right.

[X_Digger]

11. Have you really not seen..

.. the posts here in the gungeon claiming all of the above? (minus the hyperbole)

[zipplewrath]

13. No

I see them suggesting that those kinds of things are the more probable.

Really, read the story. It hardly reads as any kind of guidebook for the proper use of weapons, or their effectiveness. I mean, they walked the guy to the door, let him go WITH HIS GUN and shut the door behind them. The guy broke into the home and sat around with the first victim and drank wine. Then the second victim shows up and the two victims go into the kitchen and discuss the situation while the nutjob sits in the other room. She then takes out her gun (from somewhere, it isn't exactly clear where) and walks around behind the guy, sitting in the chair and asks him to leave. The guy never stole anything (except in essence the wine) and just told some tall tales. When the cops go to the guys house, they try to get him to come to the door. They wait around for a while and then "catch" him when he comes outside to take a smoke break.

I mean, come on, this story isn't an example for anything, except for not being a friggin' idiot on either side of the gun.

[X_Digger]

15. Considering that 90%

of all defensive uses of a gun don't involve shots being fired, I'd say this is probably more typical than the sensational tales of gunplay that normally make the news.

[zipplewrath]

19. God I hope not

I mean, I understand that in open situations a gun may not be fired and the person merely leaves the scene. Trespass and B&E kind of situations come to mind. But "escort them to the door"? Please tell me that's not what's going on out there.

[X_Digger]

20. She talked her way out of a bad situation..

then called the cops. First rule of confrontations (armed or not)- don't get into confrontations.

[zipplewrath]

21. Um, she threatened

She pointed a gun at him and told him to leave. Sounds pretty confrontational to me.

[X_Digger]

23. Escalation of force..

Talking obviously didn't get him to leave, and from the sound of it, a physical confrontation wouldn't have ended well. Appropriate force to remove the threat, then notify police.

What, would have had them call the cops with him there and potentially incite a hostage crisis?

Any outcome that results in the victims not harmed is preferable, and the perpetrator not harmed is a bonus.

[zipplewrath]

35. Disarm

I would have AT LEAST disarmed him.

[X_Digger]

38. I probably would have, too..

.. but the mom was probably more worried about her daughter than anything else.

Without being in her shoes, I can't know what I'd do.

[proteus_lives]

14. Great!

Your list is LOL funny.

Go grandma! She defended herself and her home!

Good thing she had her coach gun with her!

[SteveM]

136. Oh! how the gun-controllers hate it when someone defends herself with a gun (nt)