Too bad most katanas these days are made for tourist souvenirs and aren’t particularly well made. Plus they are a bit overrated as swords go. As they are not made for thrusting they require much more energy expenditure to deal killing blows. For zombies you have to decapitate them with katana. With a european style sword you can thrust through the head with much less effort.
Shovels OTOH are real easy to find and just so damn versatile. Sometimes you need to dig some holes too.
Omar Mateen had connections to Pulse, it’s patrons and performers. He may also have been gay.
The best gloss I can put on the Howell situation is this:
tannerite can be used for (long range) target practice–set it up, in small quantities on a range,and fire at the target. If it’s a hit, it explodes, and you can tell that you’ve made an accurate shot.
And presumably, if you were in the mind to “practice” with tannerite at some isolated desert site-- preferably far from any sites of archaeological interest–you’d bring a lot of guns along.
Maybe he should get into a more sensible hobby such as model rocketry,
IIRC, in the novel World War Z, the armed forces developed a modified shovel for use against the undead. I don’t have my paperback handy or I’d find a quote, but I think it had one serrated edge as well as a spike for added offensive capability. The soldiers were very fond of those weapons.
The Spetznatz famously threw shovels, and normally I’d link to a video, but I don’t want to see any more NRA ads.
Maybe he should get into a more sensible hobby such as model rocketry,
4 tru. (Add “dat” for 6 chardedblardeblar.)
Man loses leg by shooting lawn mower full of explosives
“Playing Mythbusters” is a foolhardy endeavor.
Certainly fits my mental model of the average homophobe.
Man loses leg because 1) he was was waaaaay too close and 2) he created shrapnel instead of just enjoying an open air blast.
The phrase “play stupid games, win stupid prizes”, comes into play here.
If you hold on to an M-80 or put it inside of a coffee can and stand near by, or put a bottle rocket in your butt, you are going to have a bad time too.
Conventional gun powder makes a better improvised explosive as it is easier to find and you can light it with a traditional fuse. Dry Ice bombs can be lethal as well.
A couple of issues with regulating ammo rather than firearms:
Bolt-action, pump-action, single shot, and lever action rifles all use the same ammo as semi-automatic rifles. There are a slew of rifles (particularly lever-action) which use handgun ammo as well. Regulating ammo is a logical stance for someone who wants to get rid of all guns, but wouldn’t be a good approach for those people who only want semi-autos to be more strictly regulated.
Ammo hoarding is a thing among gun feteshists, particularly with the paranoid ones who read statements like yours and get scared. I have seen photos of private stockpiles with literally hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammo. Literally. Tightening ammo regulation isn’t going to affect the real nutjobs for quite some time.
ETA: I see now that you were just talking about jacking up the price of ammo, not necessarily regulating it more strictly. Sorry for my misreading.
I wish I had a good answer to this because I’ve experienced this bug. Selecting text and pressing the “quote” button would bring up the same info (post, user) regardless of what text I was quoting and from where. I manually edited the information in the tags to solve it, but then found it kept happening even in other threads. Closing my browser and reopening fixed it, so ultimately it’s not that big a problem.
I remember that part. They called it the “lobotomizer” or “lobo” for short.
Yep. It can hold a large capacity magazine and fires “intermediate” size ammo. It is no different from the AK-47 or AR-15 variants in most respects other than price. A Mini-14 is considered a “poor man’s assault rifle”. It is used frequently by SWAT teams for is capabilities, reliability and price. Anton Brevik used one when he ran amok in Norway.
Your example above still a bolt action. Even with a large capacity magazine, it takes far more effort to shoot at and kill 50 people at a clip as opposed to the AR-15. This is why one does not go by the “furniture” as a sign a rifle is an assault rifle. The definitions are much simpler. Semi-auto, intermediate cartridge, ammunition capacity potential greater than 10 shots.
Btw 19 of the 21 of the worst mass shooting incidents in America happened after the expiration of the 1994 Assault weapons ban. Of course if there were stronger laws keeping guns out of the hands of people with a documented history of domestic violence in Florida, then Manteen would not have been legally able to acquire or keep his arsenal. And Cthulhu only knows why the NRA opposed restricting access to guns for people on terrorism watch lists.
The ban did NOTHING other than make ARs even MORE desirable. You could still get a “Semi-auto, intermediate cartridge, ammunition capacity potential greater than 10 shots.” in nearly every state at a gun store. I know several people who got INTO ARs during the ban. They just had to put up with a rigid stock and other annoyances.
Further more, the “assault” rifle has been around since 1944. The AK since 1947. The AR since 1959. The larger caliber FAL since 1953, CETME since 1949, etc etc. You could order them in the mail to your home before 1968. Remember the 60s, right? Terrorism? Rampant sexism and racism? Assassinations? Hijackings? A war or two going on? Not exactly peaceful times. Yet mass shootings were even less common than today. So maybe availability isn’t the main factor here.
You mean a black list with little to no oversight, no one knows who is on it or why and is impossible to get removed from? Like the no-fly list that includes small children? The ones that the ACLU has said "as many as 35 percent of the nominations to the network of watchlists are outdated and tens of thousands of names were placed on lists without an adequate factual basis. "
“A bloated, opaque watchlisting system is neither fair nor effective. A system in which innocent people languish on blacklists indefinitely, with their rights curtailed and their names sullied, is at odds with our Constitution and values.” - NRA - Er no wait, that was the ACLU too.
Actually guns by mail were more or less a dead issue after 1963 when Lee Harvey Oswald got his Italian bolt action rifle that way. No you could no get AK’s too easily in this country or in the West in general prior to the end of the Cold War. Foreign terrorists in the 60s didn’t have to get their guns from civilian sources. Russia was delivering millions of them to anyone claiming to be “fighting for the people’s revolution”. Your average domestic terrorist had to make do with shotguns, hunting rifles and whatever could be stolen from military sources. I can imagine how much worse Charles Whitman’s mayhem would have been if he had access to assault rifles.
We wouldn’t want people whom law enforcement considers a risk for terrorist activity to be denied access to firearms. Right? You are telling me the NRA and the ACLU are working together here?
[quote=“Mangochin, post:400, topic:79594”]
I can imagine how much worse Charles Whitman’s mayhem would have been if he had access to assault rifles.[/quote]
You missed my point. 1968 was the year the big gun control act was passed. Of course if you look at the murder rate per capita, it stated going up in the 70s, having no affect on the murder rate. Ironically the murder rate of 2014 is lower than it was in 1963 when you could mail order a Colt SP-1 Sporter. Homicide Rate (per 100,000), 1950–2014
Whitman had access to them. Sure, the AK was harder to find in the US, but the AR-15 wasn’t. And past the 60s, the 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s there were many designs besides the AR-15. Pre 1986 you could buy an actual NEW full auto if you went through an ATF check. Few people did because of the cost, but it was there.
My point was that availability with less restrictions has been around for decades through even more turbulent times. Availability isn’t the reason for an increase in mass shootings.
I think they both agree that the current watch list is poorly executed. I have read more than one BB article lamenting on how poorly put together it is, banning people who have similar names from flying and being accused of racial profiling. Sure I don’t want a terrorist able to buy guns or be on a plane with me. But I also don’t want innocent people stripped of their rights with out due process from a system that has no over-site, no transparency, etc. Who controls the list? How do people get on it? How do you get OFF it? You want them to stop this guy now, sure. But next month it will be out rage because an innocent Muslim is being unfairly targeted. Remember the over reaction and backlash from the kid who took apart a clock? That’s how you get on a watch list.
Perhaps, then, the sane thing to do would be to overhaul the watchlist oversight and administration process while also making it harder for people who are on it to get access to firearms. That way you address both concerns, instead of just doing nothing and letting two terrible problems fester.
I agree that a watch list if used properly could be useful. The ACLU is also calling for an overhaul.
