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Ted Cruz

7 (6.5%)

Rick Santorum

16 (14.8%)

Michelle Bachmann

13 (12%)

Chris Christie

23 (21.3%)

Rand Paul

49 (45.4%)

Total Members Voted: 107

[Owlbread]

"Physically impossible" meaning "done extensively in many other countries".

Careful now, if you start thinking along those lines you'll be talking about universal, nationalised, free-at-point-of-use healthcare next, or free college education or less restrictive drug/prostitution laws or god knows what.

[Sheb]

To be honest, there is so god damn guns in the US it'd take years for an handgun ban to actively reduce the number of guns in circulation.

[Steeled]

The fact of the matter is that gun crime and shootings have been on the decline for over 20 years and yet there are more guns on the market than ever.

Well it's true that if you start with a particularly bad year (1993 being the worst in many years) then just returning to a rate of much worse then normal is improvement.  But the 11,000 homicides that took place in 2010 (the most recent year the CDC has revised data for) is actually an upward trend from more recent years.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

2010: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/homicide.htm

prior:

If you are going to be making spurious correlations then please at least make accurate spurious correlations.  It would have taken you all of five minutes to figure this out.

It's still a downward trend, even after the repeal of the AWB which let literally millions of baby killing black rifles on the market. In fact around 9000 of those homicides are directly gang related, leaving around 2200 homicides preformed by average Dick and Jane robbers, serial killers, and mass shooters. Which by your infographic would put it on par with knives. http://usconservatives.about.com/od/capitalpunishment/a/Putting-Gun-Death-Statistics-In-Perspective.htm

This honestly would have taken you all of 5 minutes to figure out :^)

[MaximumZero]

I don't think any of us are going to accept "usconservatives.about.com" as an unbiased source, dude.

[stabbymcstabstab]

To all of you who think just blanket banning weapons will get rid of them like this is tiny ass Europe remember how large and rural the US really is not to mention third largest population in the world and one which actively distrusts the government, I don't think trying to get rid of weapons is possible, hell I have access to several MGs that I could grab by taking screwdriver and a duffel bag.

[Steeled]

I don't think any of us are going to accept "usconservatives.about.com" as an unbiased source, dude.

You're right, it's not as if the article directly linked to CDC and government websites. Those gosh dang untrustworthy conservatives.

[misko27]

Then link to those sites, not about.com.

But seriously why are we discussing a dead issue when there is a open war in one of America's two parties?

[Sheb]

Because you know, if an homicide is gang-related, it doesn't count.

But we had the gun debate dozens of time already, maybe it's time to let go.

Regarding Cantor, one shouldn't read too much in his defeat. Other GOP establishment candidates defeated their Tea Party challenger. 

[GrizzlyAdamz]

Ya, but this'll embolden them & whatnot. And really, to play the devil's advocate, just what would it take for other establishment GOP members to 'read the writing on the wall'? Cantor was supposed to be around for [decades].

Spoiler: gunz (click to show/hide)

When it comes to gang-related homicide, banning guns is a treatment, not a cure. A treatment with a low therapeutic index.

But then the reply is 'not banning them but restricting them', & then we get into details. Though, that actually kinda sounds like fun.

[Helgoland]

To all of you who think just blanket banning weapons will get rid of them like this is tiny ass Europe remember how large and rural the US really is not to mention third largest population in the world and one which actively distrusts the government, I don't think trying to get rid of weapons is possible, hell I have access to several MGs that I could grab by taking screwdriver and a duffel bag.

1) Europe is bigger than the US - certainly in population, and probably in territory as well.
2) Europeans generally aren't pinko bleeding-heart commie basterds either. There's a hell of a lot of distrust in government around here as well.
3) Europe's gun laws aren't that bad: There's still access to hunting and sporting rifles, if you have the proper license (which is not impossible to get).
4) The solution is not to "blanket-ban guns", the solution is to limit their production and import while at the same time starting extensive gun buy-back programs. That works for handguns, too!

[10ebbor10]

1) Europe is only half as big as the US, but we do have a higher population (500 million versus 300), and combined larger economy. Which I think was his argument. America has a massive rural area.
2) Indeed. Especially because we get an additional level of governance to distrust
3) They do vary country by country, but in general gun control in Europe is not that strict. I mean, what do you need a machine gun for anyway?
4) Indeed, there's a reason it's called Gun CONTROL, not GUN obiliteration.

[Owlbread]

"3) They do vary country by country, but in general gun control in Europe is not that strict. I mean, what do you need a machine gun for anyway?"

Did you not read the chart from Mainiac where it showed very clearly that handguns were the problem and "other guns" killed fewer people than knives?

American laws on fully-automatic firearms work well as things stand. I'm tempted to even suggest loosening them a bit to allow for more guns to enter the market and be registered, instead of the pre-1986 ones. The problem is that you need to keep the full-auto market niche by keeping the prices as high as they are.

[Sheb]

So we need to make them legal, but ensure they are expensive enough no one can afford them anyway?

[Owlbread]

So we need to make them legal, but ensure they are expensive enough no one can afford them anyway?

It's the current situation in the USA and it works very well, from what I can tell. In certain cantons in Switzerland it's even laxer.

[LordSlowpoke]

i'm tempted to laugh at your assessment of the gun situation in the states but by all means, elaborate on how applying this principle to europe would benefit people

those who actually need them (law enforcement, gamekeepers, sportsmen, etc.) already have them available after all