Active-shooter incidents have tripled since 2009: Holder

[billh58]

Attorney General Eric Holder says the number and the lethal nature of active-shooter incidents nationwide have soared over the past five years.

In remarks to the nation's police chiefs in Philadelphia on Monday, Holder said the United States saw an average of five active shooting incidents a year between 2000 and 2008.

"Alarmingly, since 2009, this annual average has tripled. We've seen at least 12 active shooter situations so far in 2013."

The Department of Homeland Security defines an active shooter as an individual actively engaging in killing or attempting to kill in a confined and populated area. Recent examples include the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Conn., in December and the Navy Yard shooting in Washington, D.C., last month.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/10/21/21064404-active-shooter-incidents-have-tripled-since-2009-holder?lite&gt1=43001

NRA and its apologists say that this is just the price we must pay because: Second Amendment, My Rights, Freedom, and Liberty! Yay! More Gunz for everyone!

[Downtown Hound]

1. Hmmm...right about the time that righties were wailing about how everybody should go out

and buy guns, 'cause Obama was gonna take 'em all away. And gun sales went through the roof. And then all of sudden, there's a spike in gun massacres.

Gee, who would have thought that more guns leads to more death? Oh, that's right, pretty much everybody who isn't NRA.

[Hoyt]

2. Oh no, we can't come to that conclusion without a 20 year study

endorsed by the NRA, gun manufacturers, Massad Ayoob, John Lott, Big Jim - War of Northern Aggression - Porter, yahoos in local militias, George Zimmerman, and worse.

[Paladin]

3. Jeez, are we sure about this?

I mean, our resident DU Gun Enthusiasts keep telling us that there are fewer gun murders than ever, and it's just the fault of the hysterical (librul) 24/7 (librul) prejudiced (librul) media. Golly, who are we supposed to believe?

[Lurks Often]

4. It's the FBI & DOJ statistics telling us that the murder rate has been

in a steady decline, but of course you already knew that, didn't you?

[Paladin]

5. More guns than ever in the hands of lunatics. That's what I know.

I don't need FBI or DOJ help in confirming that. The morning headlines are sufficient proof. How many more dead school teachers and students need to stack up before the gun militancy movement acknowledges the obvious fact that something is very, very wrong with the firearms situation in this country?

[Lurks Often]

6. We need to address the social, economic and mental health issues that cause violence

because despite what you think you know, the process of obtaining a gun legally hasn't really changed much in decades. The only really big change was the Brady Bill which instituted Instant Check and the NICS system.

[billh58]

8. Just a word

of advice. This really isn't the Group to argue against gun control. That's what your "favorite" Group is for.

[Lurks Often]

9. Are you that afraid of rational discussion? n/t

[billh58]

13. No, not at all,

but this safe-haven Group was specifically started to discuss ways to implement gun control, and NOT discuss whether or not it is necessary. Your Gungeon is the Group for the discussion of how sacred the Second Amendment is, and how much we all need guns. This Group is reserved for "rational discussion" of how best to address the out-of-control problem of gun violence in this nation.

[Downtown Hound]

10. The process of obtaining a gun is different in every state

And coincidentally (not really), the states where it's harder to get one have less gun violence than those that do. I have yet to hear a gun nut either acknowledge this fact or when they are confronted with it, they do exactly what you're doing: retreat behind some bullshit spin about how we need to look at all causes of violence. Not that I don't agree with that, but I think access to guns is a HUGE aspect of violence that only a fool or a hack would ignore if they were serious about understanding violence.

[billh58]

15. One of the best examples

of this is where I live: Hawaii. We have mandatory registration, virtually no concealed carry (it's up to each County Chief-of-Police to approve, and they mostly don't), and strict penalties for illegal possession, display, and carry.

Hawaii also has the lowest gun fatality rate in the nation. We have plenty of hunters, but to the best of my knowledge none of them believe that they are protecting our Freedoms from our own government.

[Kolesar]

26. That was insightful

We just got back from Hawai'i and Kaua'i.
Volcano NP was closed, but we had a good time!

[billh58]

27. Glad you enjoyed

your visit, and sorry that Volcano NP was closed. Haleakala NP here on Maui just re-opened as well, and of course the Arizona Memorial on Oahu re-opened to thousands on the first day.

Aloha,
Bill

[Lurks Often]

16. Not entirely correct

the process of buying a gun from a FFL or from out of state is the same across the country since that is governed by Federal law.

In state private transfers are governed by state law which does vary from state to state.

If your premise was true, Washington DC, which still has some of the strictest gun laws in the country should be fairly free of gun violence and it is not.

In contrast you have Vermont, which has very liberal gun laws and it has very fun gun deaths every year

[Downtown Hound]

20. Actually it IS entirely correct

That's another thing I've noticed gun nuts do. Whenever you bring up that red states have more gun violence, they ALWAYS bring up Washington D.C. Guess what? It's an outlier. It's also primarily a dirt poor ghetto.

When you have overwhelming evidence of greater gun violence in areas with no gun control, one city that doesn't fit with that doesn't take away from the many other STATES that do. It's like saying New York is more racist than Mississippi because there's one small town in it that dominated by the Klan, while ignoring that for many decades the entire state of Mississippi was dominated by the Klan.

[billh58]

7. The Gungeoneers never

consider that the drop in the overall US crime rate may be due to something other than "more gunz." Overall improvements in police communications, faster police response times, the proliferation of cell phones, and many other factors are contributing to this reduction in crime.

The fact remains, however, that guns are much too easy to obtain for those who should not have access to them. Gun owners are not held accountable for stolen, "lost", or privately sold lethal weapons, and this pipeline feeds criminal access to guns. Family abusers, including some police officers, are allowed to keep their guns and use them to threaten, maim, and kill family members. Those with restraining orders are allowed to keep their guns and often end up killing their ex-partners.

Mainly because guns are specifically designed to efficiently kill, they are the weapon of choice for most violent criminals. Guns make suicide attempts more likely to succeed for the same reasons. But the Gungeoneers say that these "insignificant" statistics are just the price we must pay for: Second Amendment, My Rights, Freedom, and Liberty.

[Lurks Often]

11. Whether or not the drop in the crime rate, especially the overall murder

can be attributed to more guns or not is debatable and hard to conclusively prove one way or the other. However since the murder rate has been decreasing steadily while gun ownership has gone up shows that more guns does not lead to more murders.

Federal law is quite clear, purchase of a firearm through an FFL or purchase of a firearm that crosses state lines requires a background check.

In state private purchases are subject to state law which varies from state to state.

Here is the ATF form that lists the things that disqualifies a person from buying or owning a firearm.
http://www.atf.gov/files/forms/download/atf-f-4473-1.pdf

Perhaps you should be asking why law enforcement and prosecutors, either at the local or Federal level, aren't enforcing the existing laws.

[Downtown Hound]

12. Bullshit

Murder rates spiked in the 80's and early 90's largely because of the crack cocaine wars. Crack was a new drug (which some people, including myself, believe was imported by the CIA to fund illegal wars in Central and South America) and cities became war zones while the gangs who sold it fleshed out their turfs. When the crack wars subsided (decreasing popularity of the drug, turf zones settled, gang leaders imprisoned) murder rates started dropping and have continued ever since. However, the availability of guns in America has continued to make our nation a much more violent place than it would be otherwise. Were guns not so available, we have even less murders.

[Lurks Often]

18. Supposition on your part

and you fail to address the social and economic issues that continue to plague the high crime areas of the country, most of which are centered around major cities and their immediate suburbs.

[Downtown Hound]

21. Actually I don't fail to address those issues

What you fail to address is the simple fact that study after study has shown that more guns equals more death. Guns are not the only factor, but they are a STRONG contributing factor.

The only person failing to address anything here is you, because every time somebody brings this up, you retreat back into your "social and economic" issues shield. I fully acknowledge that social and economic factors play strong roles in gun violence. What I'm not conveniently leaving out (like you are) is that the availability of guns plays a strong role too.

[BainsBane]

25. That one even would need a study to determine that more guns result in more deaths

Shows the extent to which ideological zeal overrides reason.

[billh58]

14. The main reason

that "law enforcement" in many areas of the country is not enforcing existing law, is the NRA and its insidious right-wing (Koch Brothers) political influence at all levels of our government.

When you repeat the NRA propaganda, especially on a Democratic discussion board, you are a part of the reason as well by aiding the NRA and their apologists in spreading the poison of gun cultism.

[Lurks Often]

17. So much for rational discussion

as soon as the discussion takes a direction you don't like, you trot out the "NRA propganda"

Is everything you don't agree with "NRA propaganda"?

[billh58]

19. The NRA, and those

like yourself who apologize for them are representative of everything that I dislike about dangerous gun cultists. The NRA is responsible for all that is wrong with America's gun violence epidemic.

[jimmy the one]

22. how to make a more valid comparison

lurkso: If your premise was true, Washington DC, which still has some of the strictest gun laws in the country should be fairly free of gun violence and it is not.
In contrast you have Vermont, which has very liberal gun laws and it has very fun {few} gun deaths every year

Invalid, you contrast a small rural state with a city, generally nothing meaningful comes from a state to city comparison.
DC has a population density about 10,000 per square mile, Vermont maybe 50, & Vermont's largest city Burlington iirc about 40,000 while DC has ~550,000 peoples. Vermont is maybe 95% white while DC is about 70/30 B/W, so Vermont doesn't have much racial problem.
DC is the nation's capital full of intrigue & carpetbaggers & high minded ladder climbers & ted cruz infiltrators - Vermont people go for vacation to get away from big cities like DC.

Might surprise you that 8 of the top ten states with the highest violent crime rates are PRO GUN states. More guns more lies.
And, 2011: city ---- viol crime rate .... murder & nn-MS:
Washington DC ....... 1,177.9 ................... 13.9 (2012 stats exception)
New York City ...............639.3 ........................5.1 (2012 exception)
Chicago: .................. 1,061.0 ......................15.9 {18.5 2012}
Memphis PROGUN: .... 1,583.5 ......................17.9
Nashville PROGUN ..... 1,181.3 ........................8.2
Miami PROGUN ......... 1,197.6 .......................16.8
Kansas City Mo PROGUN .. 1,199.7 .................23.4
Atlanta PROGUN Ga......1,432.8 ......................20.7
St Louis Mo PROGUN ....1,856.7 ......................35.3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_cities_by_crime_rate

Chicago, DC, & NYC are guncontrol cities of course; Making a VALID comparison of large city to moderate-large city, we see that DC isn't doing so bad at all compared to several PRO GUN heavyweights, either at parity or better than most. And who done did the bestest? GUN CONTROL New York City that's who, well below all the others, & with that evil gun control genius bloomy at the helm too.
I cherry picked pro gun cities of course, only to offset unfair criticism aimed at Chicago & DC which also get cherry picked by gun-gurus & gunbrats.

(I think Wikipedia just came out with 2012 stats last week or so, my chart was lifted from a post on rkba where I used 2011 data, but a quick check on the cities above showed little difference in the 2 years.)

[jimmy the one]

24. the bigger picture

lurkso: Whether or not the drop in the crime rate, especially the overall murder can be attributed to more guns or not is debatable .. However since the murder rate has been decreasing steadily while gun ownership has gone up shows that more guns does not lead to more murders.

Selectively picking mid 90's as the start year produces that result for you, but guns have increased about 300% (quadrupling) since the early 60's -- that big bulge in the center of the gun death bell curve is the quarter million gundeaths since early 60's, dwarfing 9/11, pearl harbor & all the school shootings combined.
.. The murder rate in 1962 was about 4.6 (guns ~3.0), stayed above 8.0 from 1971 - 1995 peaking at 10.2 in 1980, all while guns were tripling from 75 million to ~225 million.
.. From early 60's to mid 1970s both the national gunstock & the murder/gunmurder rate doubled (75 million to 150 million guns, 4.5 to ~9.0).
.. Certainly other factors play into it, drugs as others mentioned, lead in gas & paint etc, but guns enhanced the carnage.

In early 1960's the national violent crime rate was 160, then guns doubled & tripled & the violent crime rate peaked at 758 in 1991 & stayed above 500 for over 20 years.
.. In 2011 the violent crime rate rests at 386, a 150% increase from 1960's, while national gunstock went from 75 millions to ~300 millions.
.. Duh, the bigger picture MORE GUNS MORE CRIME. (this applies to both progun states & gc states, with few exceptions like NY & VA).
http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/uscrime.htm

But, adherents to the 2nd Amendment Mythology manipulate facts to their propagunda all the time - whereas, while total guns in USA have indeed increased to 300 million, the personal gun ownership rate has dropped from over 40% last century down to ~33% now, which is the better explanation why murder rates & violent crime rates have fallen since mid 90's.

[BainsBane]

23. Yet despite that, mass shootings have increased.