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Not banned, but scheduled 4-5. (i.e. banned for most poor people.)

.

The National Library of Medicine (National Institutes of Health) lists bupropion as not being a controlled substance. .Here is a Justice Department's list of all controlled substances.. Bupropion, aka Wellbutrin, is nowhere to be found.

What freaks in prison do is of no consequence - they also try to shoot up with peanut butter if someone tells them it gives a sugar high and huff aerosols. It's simply not open to widespread abuse.

Get your drugs from a state that does not have a PDMP: http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.... Lots of mail-order pharmacies operate out of states that do not have a PDMP.

case in point http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/tls_notice.html

The DEA's MO on all drugs, beyond just marijuana, consists entirely of overhype. Have you ever looked at the schedules? Schedule I, which consists almost entirely of psychedelic drugs is described as such (hilarious emphasis added):

Schedule I drugs, substances, or chemicals are defined as drugs with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse. Schedule I drugs are the most dangerous drugs of all the drug schedules with potentially severe psychological or physical dependence. Some examples of Schedule I drugs are:

heroin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), marijuana (cannabis), 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (ecstasy), methaqualone, and peyote

Of course, Schedule II drugs are by far the most abused drugs, including things like prescription opiates, methamphetamine, cocaine, ritalin, etc. But Schedule II is described as having "less abuse potential than Schedule I drugs". It's BS all the way down.

Reference to coal-tar base synthesis of Morphine
"It was announced in 1973 that a team at the National Institutes of Health in the United States had developed a method for total synthesis of morphine, codeine, and thebaine using coal tar as a starting material. A shortage in codeine-hydrocodone class cough suppressants (all of which can be made from morphine in one or more steps, as well as from codeine or thebaine) was the initial reason for the research."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M...

However, on further research these steps may have been abandoned or subsidized with 'less expensive' means by importing Narcotic Raw Materials (NRM) from seven allowed countries, since NRMs may not be produced in America. The allowed countries are:
"Traditional suppliers India and Turkey must be the source of at least 80 percent of the United States' requirement for NRM. Five non- traditional supplier countries--France, Poland, Hungary, Australia, and Yugoslavia--may be the source of not more than 20 percent. "
http://www.deadiversion.usdoj....

From that paragon of information known to be false, but is believed by the editors to be true, regardless of the actual facts:

That's a weird preamble... The actual facts are pretty easy to find:

Description of schedules
excerpted (with exceptionally funny sentence in bold):

Schedule I drugs, substances, or chemicals are defined as drugs with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse. Schedule I drugs are the most dangerous drugs of all the drug schedules with potentially severe psychological or physical dependence. Some examples of Schedule I drugs are:

heroin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), marijuana (cannabis), 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (ecstasy), methaqualone, and peyote

Contents of schedules

It's not the cash-cow speed traps and Officer Dickweed hiding behind your neighbor's azaleas with a laser gun that I'm worried about. It's the mindless, shoot-first cops that are determined to become a leading cause of death to unarmed civilians despite supposedly safe weapons.

Maybe cops need a sensible, community-minded mission in a media friendly format? "Serve and Protect", maybe, or "We're tackling real criminals now instead of the harmless pot smokers".

We have plenty of reasons to hate cops, from racially-motivated shootings to blatant theft and rage murder, these incidents happen many thousands of times every year. If they want to change I'm all for it but in the meantime let me know where these trigger happy fuckers are so I can avoid them. I believe believe in personal safety, freedom to possess property and the inviolable rights of every human being. That's why I feel justified in helping highlight gang members with badges on Waze. Think of the children (AKA collateral damage) please folks.

You simply infer you have a gun and the bad guy goes away

Yes, it's Kleck's number, and it's been shown to be fraudulent. It also includes defensive uses of a gun by police, which could be extrapolated to number several every day by every armed police officer in the US, every day (there are nearly half a million sworn police officers in the US). And it includes defensive uses against animals. And by the military. We're talking pure imagination here. And all of it based on a sample of 196 phone interviews.

At the same time, the DOJ under Edwin Meese (a Second Amendment absolutist) could only account for 87,000 defensive uses of guns, not Kleck's 2.5million. And this was against 135,000 gun deaths or injuries in the US.

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/p...

You see part of the problem, right? Here's some analysis of Kleck's number.

http://vacps.org/public-policy...

The number is a fantasy.

You and most others completely miss the point. Regardless of the deficiencies of current 3D printers they will only get better and be able to produce stronger and more sophisticated items.

Things that are illegal to manufacture or own now will be child's play to print and no one will be able to guess you did it. No paper trails, no pictures of you at some counter buying parts to assemble into an illegal item, etc.

Want some money? You don't have to be a skilled engraver, just print up some plates and go to town. Don't have a printing press? No problem, 3D print the parts and put it together.

How about something to put drugs into pill capsules. Did you know it's illegal for you to own such a device. ? No problem, just print out the parts and bolt'm together.

Printed guns are a side show.

The list isn't actually exhaustive: we have the "Federa Analog Act" for that...

I see nobody asked the real important questions.

Are they also checking if you can get high from a substance?
Is somebody going to leak that list?

No need to do that. The Federal Government has gone to great expense and trouble to compile this exhaustive list of drugs that can get all the blinky lights in your brain going.

Is that "top-six largest US cities which happen to also have the strictest, most onerous anti-gun laws" or "top-six largest US cities and then screw the results so we only look at the ones with strict gun laws"?

I replied on impulse and from memory. I believe it was more like if you remove the gang-related gun violence stats from the 12 largest cities, many of which have some of the strictest & most onerous gun laws, the US averages for gun violence/deaths is somewhere in the middle of the international averages.

The point stands, however, that the "highest gun violence rates" claim against the US compared to international stats is disingenuous, misleading, and wrong.

Direct quotes from a United States Department of Justice report released by the Obama Administration in November of 2011. Link below.

âoeBlacks were disproportionately represented as both homicide victims and offenders. The victimization rate for blacks (27.8 per 100,000) was 6 times higher than the rate for whites (4.5 per 100,000). The offending rate for blacks (34.4 per 100,000) was almost 8 times higher than the rate for whites (4.5 per 100,000).â

âoeMales represented 77% of homicide victims and nearly 90% of offenders. The victimization rate for males (11.6 per 100,000) was 3 times higher than the rate for females (3.4 per 100,000). The offending rate for males (15.1 per 100,000) was almost 9 times higher than the rate for females (1.7 per 100,000).â

âoeApproximately a third (34%) of murder victims and almost half (49%) of the offenders were under age 25. For both victims and offenders, the rate per 100,000 peaked in the 18 to 24 year-old age group at 17.1 victims per 100,000 and 29.3 offenders per 100,000.â

http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/htus8008.pdf

> The vast majority of the US is in no way some sort of ultra-violent "wild west", as some who have swallowed the propaganda and are anti-2A/anti-US, try to paint the whole nation.

The majority of this "propaganda" comes from your own cop shows.

Gee, a US TV entertainment show dramatizes it's content? They're not documentaries??? /sarc

Sounds more like people not being intelligent enough to differentiate between fantasy and reality.

The propaganda I'm talking about and that I know you're well aware of despite your snark comes from the government and anti-gun groups.

Guns are like the panopticon, in that once the technology is out there neither ever will, or even can, be made to go away. The only logical action, as with the panopticon, is to make them universally available for anyone to purchase and possess who is not either underage, psychologically unstable, or a convicted criminal prohibited from owning firearms.

"An armed society is a polite society."

"An armed man is a citizen. A disarmed man is a subject."

"Firearms stand next in importance to the constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under independence ⦠from the hour the Pilgrims landed to the present day, events, occurrences and tendencies prove that to ensure peace security and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable ⦠the very atmosphere of firearms anywhere restrains evil interference â" they deserve a place of honor with all that's good." - George Washington

Strat

As much as I disagree with his business tactics over the years, Gates is a freaking genius. One read of the "Internet Tidal Wave" memo, which was written years ago and was correct about 90% of its predictions, should tell you that. Gates was one of the primary reasons, if not the only reason, Microsoft was successful to begin with. These three people are complete fools and ought to be off with Ballmer.

No, but the DEA controls registration for prescribing and/or dispensing controlled substances. While a doctor who can't write a prescription can still be useful, it would still hurt business.

And the DEA does have the power to shut you down. In that case it was legitimate with appropriate judicial oversight, but it wouldn't be unheard of for a law enforcement agency to tell someone "either help us, or we'll come back and things will get a lot messier."

From (1), it looks like you could state it as 96.9% of all blacks were not imprisoned and 99.5% of all whites were not imprisoned. If you account for age and sex, "between 6.6% and 7.5% of all black males ages 25 to 39 were imprisoned in 2011" while about 1.1% of all white males ages 25 to 39 were imprisoned in 2011.

For blacks (I couldn't find the stats for whites here), the results are highly dependent on education. 30 percent of those without college education and nearly 60 percent of high school dropouts had prison records (2).

.

(1) Carson, E. Ann, and Sabol, William J., "Prisoners in 2011" (Washington, DC: US Dept. of Justice Bureau of Justice Statistics, Dec. 2012), NCJ239808, p. 8. http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/p11.pdf

(2) Pettit, B.; Western, B. (2004). "Mass Imprisonment and the Life Course: Race and Class Inequality in U.S. Incarceration". American Sociological Review 69 (2): 151–169.

There is nothing extreme about it, it is entirely routine:

The principal law enforcement reasons for the U.S. State Department to deny
or revoke a passport are the existence of (1) a valid federal or state felony arrest warrant; or (2) a
criminal court order, condition of parole or condition of probation that forbids departure from the
United States (See 22 C.F.R. 51.60-51.62)

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/smart/pdfs/passport_fact_sheet.pdf

This pdf is about sex offenders, but that isn't relevant to the regulations they cite (and I'm just demonstrating that it is standard procedure). 22 C.F.R. 51.62 allows them to revoke a passport if the bearer would not be eligible to get a new passport:

51.62 Revocation or limitation of passports.

(a) The Department may revoke or limit a passport when

(1) The bearer of the passport may be denied a passport under 22 CFR 51.60 or 51.61 ; or 51.28 ; or any other provision contained in this part; or,

22 C.F.R. 51.60 allows for denying a new passport based on outstanding arrest warrants:

(b) The Department may refuse to issue a passport in any case in which the Department determines or is informed by competent authority that:

(1) The applicant is the subject of an outstanding Federal warrant of arrest for a felony, including a warrant issued under the Federal Fugitive Felon Act (18 U.S.C. 1073); or

Put together, they can and do revoke passports based simply on having an outstanding arrest warrant, without a specific court order

This is the letter I sent to my elected officials. Each sent me a form letter back in response on their views on the 2nd amendment that made it clear none of them read my letter.

--------

As a parent, I found the events in Sandy Hook Elementary truly frightening. As a society, we should look for solutions to prevent gun violence. However, the discussion I'm seeing in Washington D.C. pointing back repeatedly to video games is not only off the mark, but it is harmful. When we point the finger in the wrong direction, we obfuscate the real issues, preventing them from being addressed. And we punish unfairly.

No one has ever found a link video games and aggression beyond vague correlations that don't stand up to basic logic and reasoning.

Violent crime has actually decreased since 1994 while video games are being played more. http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/glance/tables/viortrdtab.cfm

Juvenile crime is actually at a 30-year low.

72% of Americans play video games. There does not appear to be any clear correlation to violent behavior.

Violent video games are just as popular, if not more-so in countries like Japan, Germany, Canada, England, etc. without any correlation of violent behavior.

The talking point that video games give people the courage to commit crimes they wouldn't otherwise could be applied just the same to music, books, movies and television shows. It is flawed logic to begin with, but video games should be viewed the same way as these other mediums. They are self-regulated with ratings to allow parents to make informed decisions about what games/shows/movies, etc. are appropriate for their children.

I served in the Marine Corps. Playing Halo is not the equivalent of military training and I find it laughable that people make such claims.

In the immediate aftermath of the Columbine school shooting, President Clinton and his wife were both quick to blame video games. Hillary Clinton made it a core issue of her tenure in New York, trying repeatedly to pass federal legislation to criminalize the sale of violent video games to kids (a problem that doesn't exist given that each study has shown most retailers will not sell M rated titles to children - http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2008/05/secretshop.shtm). If they had instead focused immediately on the actual issues, perhaps we wouldn't have had as many school shootings since then.

The more time that we waste in Washington D.C. blaming the wrong parties, the more we perpetuate the actual issues. Doing so is disrespectful and a disservice to those who have lost loved ones to such violence.

I am hoping that we can count on you as a leader to steer the discussion to where it needs to go (responsible gun control, mental health advocacy, reasonable security measures).

Obama tried to stop it, the the pubs went all 'there isn't anyplace you can put them' and 'You can't let terrorist go! "and then stopped all government action.Obama to move on.

Zombie Lie. This has been debunked so many times it's not even funny. Obama's "closure" of Gitmo would have simply moved the system of star chambers to a SuperMax in Illinois. And he's free to start wars without Congressional authorization (Libya) or notify Congress via a letter that he's stationing troops and weapons in a foreign country, but he cannot move a few hundred prisoners to a system that holds 1.6 million without the explicit blessing of Congress?

http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/htus8008.pdf

"After 1991, the victimization rate for blacks fell until 1999, when it stabilized near 20 homicides per 100,000."

"In 2008, the o ending rate for blacks (24.7 oenders per 100,000) was 7 times higher than the rate for whites (3.4 oenders per 100,000) ( figure 18)."

The 3.4 offenders per 100,000 is slightly lower than Europe's 3.5 rate per 100,000. So, we clearly have a race problem in the United States. The reality is that we have reaped what was sown centuries before with slavery and continue to exacerbate the problem with public policy. I would like to thank our European ancestors for planting the seed of slavery and colonization... that is the real root of the problem and the one we have to clean up.

I realized this was a tall order when I asked you and because I knew you didn't have data to back up your assertion. The reason is nobody collects really good statistics

Don't twist my words. Go to the Wikipedia page on "gun control", it tells you that people have looked at tons of data and never been able to find a strong effect. Some studies have shown small statistically significant effects, but not consistently, and the effects were generally so small that they don't justify gun control.

Also see this study from Maryland https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=242922 [ncjrs.gov]

And how do those statistics relate to the inference that gun control works? Or that guns are in the legal possession of perpetrators?

According to http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/ascii/fuo.txt [usdoj.gov] based on survey data of prison inmates,

Seems to support what I was saying: if you add that up, about 90% of the guns used or possessed by state inmates were in their possession illegally. That's what I was referring to by "illegal gun", because a gun becomes an illegal gun when it is transferred from an owner who may possess it legally to someone who may not possess it legally.

If you think that you can choke the supply of illegal guns by choking the supply of legal guns, you're right, you can do that. It worked, for example, in the GDR. In fact, the GDR achieved very low overall crime rates. Of course, everybody's life was completely supervised by their government, they could not travel abroad, and any behavior or ideas that were thought to threaten the security of the state or society resulted in being sent to a psychiatric institution. That is exactly the direction we are heading, and there is a continuum between where we are now (more liberty, more crime, and more inequality than most other developed nations) to where nations like the GDR are (no liberty, nearly no crime, nearly no inequality). Where people like you and Obama are vague, naive, or dishonest (it is hard to tell which), is that you promise to deliver the benefits without the loss of liberty. You haven't experienced it, I have: believe me, it is not a good direction to go into.

I realized this was a tall order when I asked you and because I knew you didn't have data to back up your assertion. The reason is nobody collects really good statistics. Criminals who know they're going to commit crimes with guns often take steps to remove serial numbers and thus traceability. But that is not by any means all criminals. Some people bought guns with no evil intent and only ended up committing crimes with them later when circumstances they did not anticipate happened. (Arguments are the immediate causes of about 30% to 40% of homicides but that doesn't apply to a number of categories of gun crime). Of those who do acquire guns with bad intent, most of them buy them one way or another.

The trouble is that the information is largely not collected in the first place. Most guns involved in crimes are never traced with respect to how they were acquired. However, according to this: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/guns/procon/guns.html only about 10% to 15% of guns used in crimes are stolen. The rest are purchased. There are no really reliable statistics detailing how many of these purchased guns were purchased legally versus illegally.

Those data are pretty old, but I doubt that stat has changed markedly.

Also see this study from Maryland https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=242922

“guns sold in Maryland during the 1990s had at least a 4.7-percent chance of being recovered by police in association with a crime somewhere in the Nation within 10 years. Handguns sold in the Baltimore area had a 3.2-percent chance of being recovered in Baltimore within 5 years” “Most guns recovered in crimes had been sold by a relatively small proportion of dealers located in or close to urban areas.” “The simultaneous or rapid purchase of multiple guns by one individual was a risk factor for gun trafficking related to their criminal use.”

According to http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/ascii/fuo.txt based on survey data of prison inmates,

In 1997, 14% of State inmates who had used or possessed a firearm during their current offense bought or traded for it from a retail store, pawnshop, flea market, or gun show. Nearly 40% of State inmates carrying a firearm obtained the weapon from family or friends. About 3 in 10 received the weapon from drug dealers, off the street, or through the black market. Another 1 in 10 obtained their gun during a robbery, burglary, or other type of theft.

So first you tell me that 99% of sex crimes are committed by somebody they knew.

As soon as he said this you should have known he was bullshitting you. I gave him a link to educate himself but I am sure he wont.

Criminal Victimization in the United States, 2005 Statistical Tables from the DOJ. I thought you might like the facts to back up your claims. Enjoy.

Well, we can't analyze statistics intelligently and act on them, because the NRA lobbied Congress to prevent us from doing so.

Rubbish. The Department of Justice can perform statistical analysis as well as anyone.

Bureau of Justice Statistics

You are leaving out some inconvenient facts there about the Center for Disease Control, not firearms control . . . .

Public Health Pot Shots - How the CDC succumbed to the Gun "Epidemic"

Contrary to this picture of dispassionate scientists under assault by the Neanderthal NRA and its know-nothing allies in Congress, serious scholars have been criticizing the CDC's "public health" approach to gun research for years. In a presentation at the American Society of Criminology's 1994 meeting, for example, University of Illinois sociologist David Bordua and epidemiologist David Cowan called the public health literature on guns "advocacy based on political beliefs rather than scientific fact." Bordua and Cowan noted that The New England Journal of Medicine and the Journal of the American Medical Association, the main outlets for CDC-funded studies of firearms, are consistent supporters of strict gun control. They found that "reports with findings not supporting the position of the journal are rarely cited," "little is cited from the criminological or sociological field," and the articles that are cited "are almost always by medical or public health researchers."

Further, Bordua and Cowan said, "assumptions are presented as fact: that there is a causal association between gun ownership and the risk of violence, that this association is consistent across all demographic categories, and that additional legislation will reduce the prevalence of firearms and consequently reduce the incidence of violence." They concluded that "[i]ncestuous and selective literature citations may be acceptable for political tracts, but they introduce an artificial bias into scientific publications. Stating as fact associations which may be demonstrably false is not just unscientific, it is unprincipled." In a 1994 presentation to the Western Economics Association, State University of New York at Buffalo criminologist Lawrence Southwick compared public health firearm studies to popular articles produced by the gun lobby: "Generally the level of analysis done on each side is of a low quality. The papers published in the medical literature (which are uniformly anti-gun) are particularly poor science."

As Bordua, Cowan, and Southwick observed, a prejudice against gun ownership pervades the public health field. Deborah Prothrow-Stith, dean of the Harvard School of Public Health, nicely summarizes the typical attitude of her colleagues in a recent book. "My own view on gun control is simple," she writes. "I hate guns and cannot imagine why anybody would want to own one. If I had my way, guns for sport would be registered, and all other guns would be banned." Opposition to gun ownership is also the official position of the U.S. Public Health Service, the CDC's parent agency. Since 1979, its goal has been "to reduce the number of handguns in private ownership," starting with a 25 percent reduction by the turn of the century.. . . more

And you can't get precise figures because the NRA lobbied congress to forbid government funding from paying for research into gun fatalities

That is false. Law enforcement agencies, you know, the ones that normally deal with crimes like murder, can engage in research and statistical analysis. The CDC was restricted. And why?

There are some huge gaps in the facts you present. Lets add in a bit more for people to see:

Public Health Pot Shots - How the CDC succumbed to the Gun "Epidemic"

Contrary to this picture of dispassionate scientists under assault by the Neanderthal NRA and its know-nothing allies in Congress, serious scholars have been criticizing the CDC's "public health" approach to gun research for years. In a presentation at the American Society of Criminology's 1994 meeting, for example, University of Illinois sociologist David Bordua and epidemiologist David Cowan called the public health literature on guns "advocacy based on political beliefs rather than scientific fact." Bordua and Cowan noted that The New England Journal of Medicine and the Journal of the American Medical Association, the main outlets for CDC-funded studies of firearms, are consistent supporters of strict gun control. They found that "reports with findings not supporting the position of the journal are rarely cited," "little is cited from the criminological or sociological field," and the articles that are cited "are almost always by medical or public health researchers." . . .

Further, Bordua and Cowan said, "assumptions are presented as fact: that there is a causal association between gun ownership and the risk of violence, that this association is consistent across all demographic categories, and that additional legislation will reduce the prevalence of firearms and consequently reduce the incidence of violence." They concluded that "[i]ncestuous and selective literature citations may be acceptable for political tracts, but they introduce an artificial bias into scientific publications. Stating as fact associations which may be demonstrably false is not just unscientific, it is unprincipled." In a 1994 presentation to the Western Economics Association, State University of New York at Buffalo criminologist Lawrence Southwick compared public health firearm studies to popular articles produced by the gun lobby: "Generally the level of analysis done on each side is of a low quality. The papers published in the medical literature (which are uniformly anti-gun) are particularly poor science."

As Bordua, Cowan, and Southwick observed, a prejudice against gun ownership pervades the public health field. Deborah Prothrow-Stith, dean of the Harvard School of Public Health, nicely summarizes the typical attitude of her colleagues in a recent book. "My own view on gun control is simple," she writes. "I hate guns and cannot imagine why anybody would want to own one. If I had my way, guns for sport would be registered, and all other guns would be banned." Opposition to gun ownership is also the official position of the U.S. Public Health Service, the CDC's parent agency. Since 1979, its goal has been "to reduce the number of handguns in private ownership," starting with a 25 percent reduction by the turn of the century. . . .

As Bordua and Cowan noted, one hallmark of the public health literature on guns is a tendency to ignore contrary scholarship. Among criminologists, Gary Kleck's encyclopedic Point Blank: Guns and Violence in America (1991) is universally recognized as the starting point for further research. Kleck, a professor of criminology at Florida State University, was initially a strong believer that gun ownership increased the incidence of homicide, but his research made him a skeptic. His book assembles strong evidence against the notion that reducing gun ownership is a goo

So what you're saying is that Lanza would have done the same amount of damage as fast as he did without the use of a semi-automatic assault rifle?

Sadly, yes, he probably would have. They found discarded 30-round magazines with as few as 15 rounds fired from them, and reports are that he "reloaded frequently." He started shooting about 9:35 a.m., and stopped shooting 11-14 minutes later. He fired 50-100 rounds, meaning he fired 4-9 rounds per minute, or one round every 7-15 seconds, on average.

If you're familiar with a weapon, you can swap a magazine in seconds. Lanza was familiar with these weapons, they were owned by his mother, who took him to the gun range where he fired them. Reducing the capacity of the magazines he had access to would have had little to no effect on the "amount of damage" he would have done - he wasn't emptying magazines to begin with.

The US has almost double the rate of any other industrialized nation when it comes to gun related crime. The reasons for that are fairly simple: a) it's too easy to buy a gun, b) the cultural insanity that calls itself the "gun culture" has put weaponized assault on the forefront of everyone's mind.

That's a vast oversimplification of the problem. Much of our gun violence is drug related. In fact, it's incredibly rare, statistically speaking, that a mass murder is committed like this. handguns are the tool of choice for most gun homicides, to the extent that "other guns" are involved at a rate roughly similar to knives and blunt objects.

In fact, murders like what happened at Sandy Hook or Virginia Tech or Columbine are mostly caused by mental health problems. These are surprisingly rare. The other crimes

People outside major cities are perfectly happy to reap the rewards they bring to our society, but when it comes to gun violence, the non-city dwellers say "Screw you, we're keeping our guns. You're on your own".

The irony of you making this statement is delicious. For all of your hand-wringing, the solutions being proposed to "stop crimes like this" do nothing to stop the vast majority (i.e., inner city poor & drug trafficking-related) gun violence in the least. But, because suburban white kids were killed at Sandy Hook, AR-15s are evil and need to be banned today - nevermind that handguns kill vastly more people, and that those people are vastly inner city young men who are involved in gangs and drug trafficking. They're not as photogenic, being brown inner city folks, but if you truly cared about "violence," you'd stop focusing on the statistical aberration that occurred at Sandy Hook, and start focusing on the vastly larger problem of handgun violence related to gang and drug trafficking. It's very clear that you're one of the comfortable suburban middle classers opining about how we're going to "keep our kids safe."

Not sure where you got the average of 9200 - but the interesting word there is "handgun" - which are not covered under the assault weapon ban.

http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/homicide/tables/weaponstab.cfm

Only back to 2005, but "other firearms" homicides in the latest year available was 2868, which assumingly includes rifles and long arms. High-capacity magazines will include handguns, but there is no data to back-up having 10 rounds in a handgun is any better than having more than 10.

In fact, the overall homicide rate has been falling over the past 25 years (which includes times with and without the AWB) - and that's why many in Congress agreed that the previous ban had no effect.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Assault_Weapons_Ban#Expiration_and_effect_on_crime

According to the FBI, 300,000 people defended themselves with guns - not millions. http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/guns.cfm

Gun related crime in the UK has fallen http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8153392.stm

The ratio of gun crime to population in the UK is 0.0001. In the US it is 0.0011.

So, with easy access to guns and culture of gun ownership means that you are 10 times as likely to be involved with a gun crime in the US, even though you have a gun to defend yourself.

By all means, defend Gun ownership on the moral grounds of your US constitution, defend it on cultural grounds, or how you wish to own a gun, or how you want to rise up to overthrow your government. Don't defend in any way by claiming it makes the world a safer place, because that, sir, is bollocks.

But, you take a large group of people that have all the other risks for becoming criminals and add lead on top of that and you get a significant rise in crime.

Well that's the theory put forth here.

From TFA:

Tulane University toxicologist Howard W. Mielke found that children exposed to high levels of lead in the 1960s and 1970s resulted in a significant uptick in crime 20 years later.

However, left un-explained is why the lead only caused a significant rise in male crime in the cited time period. Unless they can explain why there was no uptick in female offenders, there appears to be a flaw in their reasoning.

But, you take a large group of people that have all the other risks for becoming criminals and add lead on top of that and you get a significant rise in crime.

Well that's the theory put forth here.

From TFA:

Tulane University toxicologist Howard W. Mielke found that children exposed to high levels of lead in the 1960s and 1970s resulted in a significant uptick in crime 20 years later.

However, left un-explained is why the lead only caused a significant rise in male crime in the cited time period. Unless they can explain why there was no uptick in female offenders, there appears to be a flaw in their reasoning.

greater than 90% of violent criminals arrested during those two decades were all cigarette smokers

Citation Needed.

Nearly 90% violent criminals arrested during those two decades were MALE.
Cigarettes and/or Lead exposure was not gender specific, yet murder statistics are.
So put that in your pipe and smoke it. ;-)

I would love to hear a scientific (not political) discussion of how they screwed up.

Well, one could start by looking into the seemingly disproportional effect lead would have to have on males vs females if their theory were to hold any water.

The offending rates for females declined since the early 1980's but stabilized after 1999. Offending rates for males peaked in the early 1990's, fell to record lows,and stabilized in recent years. Female murder rates show no characteristic peaks related to the peak exposure to lead.

Chart Here.
Data here.

I would love to hear a scientific (not political) discussion of how they screwed up.

Well, one could start by looking into the seemingly disproportional effect lead would have to have on males vs females if their theory were to hold any water.

The offending rates for females declined since the early 1980's but stabilized after 1999. Offending rates for males peaked in the early 1990's, fell to record lows,and stabilized in recent years. Female murder rates show no characteristic peaks related to the peak exposure to lead.

Chart Here.
Data here.

females are a lot more likely to get a warning instead of a ticket from a cop than a guy.

This is arguably more the fault of the (about 80% male) cops, who are sexually attracted to women and let this fact affect their decisions.

I have noticed comments like this a lot on /. lately. You seem to think you are refuting the point that females are a lot more likely to get a warning instead of a ticket by pointing out WHY you feel it happens. The fact that most cops are male does not change the original point that women get warnings more often than they get tickets so it is not "arguably more the fault of the about 80% male cops". It can be 100% the fact that the drivers are women AND 100% the fact that most cops are men since the two are not mutually exclusive.

females are a lot more likely to get a warning instead of a ticket from a cop than a guy.

This is arguably more the fault of the (about 80% male) cops, who are sexually attracted to women and let this fact affect their decisions.

Doesn't matter really what I'm considered...as long as I'm the one left still standing, breathing and able to reproduce (optional).

That is exactly what a barbarian would say.

If it is between my life and ANY other human life on this planet, MY life is always the most important to me.

You assume the 'home invader' was going to kill you, which according to statistics (and even more so according to your story) is really unlikely (in the US): http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/vdhb.pdf

About 24,000 burglaries yearly lead to serious injury, which is 8.5% of all violent burglaries and 0.6% of all burglaries. And I'm pretty sure things like a broken arm or serious concussion are counted as serious injuries, but this is speculation, of course.

By the way, I do agree on choosing ones' own life over that of another (barring relatives), but I also strongly believe in a civilized society and a civilized judicial and enforcement system. I.e. no vigilantism.

Get OUT with this non-sense!! Gaming Online is NOT public life or commerce. It is an online arena that is populated with tons of underage teens/kids. SOME (not all) sex offenders target these kids for vicitimization and allowing them access to them is insane.

If banning the convicted sex offenders from online gaming keeps one person (kid or not) from being victimized by a sexual predator then so be it. Comparing existing modern societal norms to the acts of an "extremist religious cult" is not very rational.

Apparently, the combination of your low ./ id and the way you framed the last sentence of the post gave you the +5 Informative rating. Maybe this is informative, but it's bad information. Maybe it just means that there are 5 sex offenders on ./ with mod points.

I get that abuses of power happen and labeling someone who is innocent as a sex offender is the WORST type of crime and should be punishable to the same extent as someone who is found guilty of the accused crime.

As a society we have passed laws that identify sex offenders for life because there is enough historcal case data that indicates recidivism is 4x higher for released sex offenders than other released offenders. Keep in mind that this does not include sex offenders that are never caught. http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=1136

My last point is that by now, sex-offenders know the risks of getting caught. The stigma. The Megan's Law websites. The prison time served in protective custody, but still fear being the target of violence. The fact that the sex offense will always appear on your background check. The banning of internet use or online gaming seems minor in comparison.

There is and always has been a line that a society will use to determine who should be banished. Spartans tossed less that perfect physical specimens off a cliff. In the US, sex offenders get a life long tag as a sex offender.

The DOJ publishes a continuation every year. But it's so hard visiting the server linked under the graph and clicking three times to find the right statistic, isn't it?

The PDF is more informative:
http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/vdhb.pdf

Apparently, making less than $7500 a year is pretty dangerous for a household.
Also dangerous: running a household as a single parent, an American Indian, or as someone under the age of 20.

Of course, if you are worried about violence during a burglary, know that your enemies are close to you:
"One or more household members knew the offenders in some manner in 65% of the 266,560 burglaries that took place while someone was present and experienced violence (table 17). Overall, household members knew approximately a third of these offenders as intimates (current or former) (31%), or relatives, well-knowin individuals or household acquaintances (34%)."

Much like the "pertectin' mah fambly" gun nuts who build up arsenals against the mythical home invasion,...

National Crime Victimization Survey - September 2010
Victimization During Household Burglary

*An estimated 3.7 million burglaries occurred each year on average from 2003 to 2007.

*A household member was present in roughly 1 million burglaries and became victims of violent crimes in 266,560 burglaries.

*Simple assault (15%) was the most common form of violence when a resident was home and violence occurred. Robbery (7%) and
rape (3%) were less likely to occur when a household member was present and violence occurred.

*Offenders were known to their victims in 65% of violent burglaries; offenders were strangers in 28%.

*Overall, 61% of offenders were unarmed when violence occurred during a burglary while a resident was present. About 12% of
all households violently burglarized while someone was home faced an offender armed with a firearm.

*Households residing in single family units and higher density structures of 10 or more units were least likely to be burglarized (8 per 1,000 households) while a household member was present.

*Serious injury accounted for 9% and minor injury accounted for 36% of injuries sustained by household members who were home
and experienced violence during a completed burglary.

Three examples of guns saving lives? Here are three examples of gun owners being shot with their own gun:

http://crimeblog.dallasnews.com/2011/04/mckinney-homeowner-shot-with-h.html/

http://www.wtvy.com/home/headlines/Enterprise_Man_Shot_In_Attempted_Burglary_138608814.html

http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2011/06/21/escalon-police-officer-shot-while-investigating-burglaries/

In fact, tens of thousands of guns are stolen each year (can you cite tens of thousands of cases of gun owners successfully stopping crimes each year?):

http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=4534

Thanks for the correction.

According to http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/schedules/ a Schedule 1 drugs are defined as "Substances in this schedule have no currently accepted medical use in the United States, a lack of accepted safety for use under medical supervision, and a high potential for abuse.". Schedule 2 are "Substances in this schedule have a high potential for abuse which may lead to severe psychological or physical dependence."

Marijuana clearly has medical uses so including it as a Schedule 1 substance is misleading to say the least.

A better source of information: http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/vdhb.pdf

"The mean prison sentence for murder and nonnegligent manslaughter was nearly 20 years and 8 months; the median was 24 years and 3 months."

Not to defend the judgement, but I'm going to go ahead and say that 20 years in prison is a lot higher on the 'life-ruining' scale than $675,000.

The terminology the DEA uses is Classes 1 through 5 drugs

Class I's are the big no-no's

Substances in this schedule have a high potential for abuse, have no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States, and there is a lack of accepted safety for use of the drug or other substance under medical supervision.

        Some examples of substances listed in schedule I are: heroin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), marijuana (cannabis), peyote, methaqualone, and 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (“ecstasy”).

Most of the stronger opiates (morphine, demerol, oxycodone) are Class II drugs. Weaker opiates and some benzo's are Class III. Weaker benzos and a whole raft of other oddities are in IV and V.

The higher the classification, the more stringent the reporting / prescribing rules. Most physicians / Nurse Practitioners / PA's in the US have Class 2-5 licenses. Trying to get a Class I ticket is likely to get you a nice, personal meeting with somebody with a gun, a tie and a DEA ID card.

Note that marijuana is listed right along with heroin (which is just substituted morphine). USA! USA! USA!

Drug laws vary widely of course, but as an example, the US DEA drug schedules both directly specify molecules, including derivatives and precursors in some cases, and also have some entries like "barbiturates not specifically listed." In addition, they include the statement, "This document is a general reference and not a comprehensive list. This list describes the basic or parent chemical and does not describe the salts, isomers and salts of isomers, esters, ethers and derivatives which may also be controlled substances."

Yeah, it looks like it varies by state, but prior to 2005 a NP could not register for a DEA number AFAIK.

yet we all get to pay millions to house them for decades

With the way the US prison system is run, I doubt most people accused of molesting children would remain alive for decades in such a situation. But otherwise, a spot on assessment!

When the legal standard is to torture them multiple times a day with beatings, rapings, stabbings, multiple hundreds of days in solitary confinement, water boarding, electrocution, repeated and multiple bone breakage to the same spots, and being injected with gasoline (All actions performed by both other inmates as well as the guards, all perfectly legal as evidenced by the fact it is encouraged by law enforcement instead of prevented), many people even just accused of child molestation simply do not survive long.

What's worse, the large majority of those accused have never touched a child or child pornography in their life, and never would as you say.

The government knows very well the accusation of possessing child porn is the best way to have your enemy put to a slow and very painful death, with no ability to counter it or prove your innocence.
They are not likely to give that power up without a huge fight, and likely applying said power to anyone that attempts to have it removed.

Just a tad under half of the deaths in prison are officially logged as suicide. Independent investigations into some of these have shown many were under suspicious causes, and suspected of homicide caused by jail and prison workers. Makes you wonder what percentage of that 47% was not suicide at all, but was caused by guard beatings and torture.
(PDF warning) http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/shsplj.pdf

The worst part about it all is the staggering number of people in prison who were convicted on no or flimsy evidence. Happens quite frequently. Despite the fact the courts are supposed to err on the side of innocent, it is painfully obvious how much money you throw at a lawyer has much more effect on your judgement than if you actually are guilty or not.

http://www.dc.state.fl.us/pub/timeserv/annual/section2.html

The average time spent behind bars for someone who commits a violent crime in Florida is about 7.1 years.

Murder used to mean an average sentence of about 10 years. Lately it's an average sentence of about 20 years.

Sex crimes are around 6 years. This includes lewd acts on a child.

Armed Robbery is around 10 years.

http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2009/offenses/violent_crime/index.html

Violent crime is declining, even during a recession.

http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/p08.pdf

About 50% of state prisoners in 2006 were incarcerated for non-violent crimes.

About 90% of federal prisoners in 2008 were incarcerated for non-violent crimes.

America is very much a non-violent place. If you don't believe me, go live in Afghanistan or Pakistan or Sudan or Israel or Syria or Libya or Iraq or Burma.

Uh, the war on drugs is from Reagan. This was instituted to prevent illegal use of the drugs.

Quick googling provides quota history back to at least 2002 so maybe it was Bush.

Personally I'd love to see Limbaugh come out against the quotas on Oxycontin...