CatBus

TV’s Frink said:

It’s warmer?

That’s a hoax. It snowed there once.

A new Gallup survey paints a familiar map, but with a twist.

Basically it’s a binary political ideology by state (conservative/liberal) survey, but there are only nine liberal states. The rest of the country is shades of conservative. But regardless of how you view that distinction, it shows trends: all but four states have become more liberal over the last ten years, but many of the biggest swings were in states that were already “Blue” – they just went from being conservative Democrats to moderate or liberal Democrats. Georgia showing the biggest leftward swing of the most conservative states over the past ten years, but still more conservative than average at the moment.

Also:

However, a few states rank significantly higher on the net-conservative list than they do on the net-Republican list. These are Alaska, Idaho, Arizona and Oregon. A handful of other states – Mississippi, North Carolina, Louisiana and Arkansas – rank significantly lower on net-conservatism than they do on net-Republicanism.

So Alaska, Idaho, Arizona and Oregon are states that vote for more Democrats than they should given their level of conservatism. Sounds like the libertarian effect. Mississippi, North Carolina, Louisiana and Arkansas vote for more Republicans than they should given their level of conservatism. Hmm, the South, I wonder what factor could be overriding all other political considerations there?

Puggo - Jar Jar’s Yoda said:

Mrebo said:

Puggo - Jar Jar’s Yoda said:

Mrebo said:

Everything is political nowadays, including every movie. Especially Adam Sandler movies. Corporations are increasingly eager to stake out positions aligned with liberal politics. So be it. If it means conservative-corporate alliance is fractured, then it’s win-win.

Umm… so NOT offering special discounts to NRA members is “staking out a position aligned with liberal politics”? I might buy that if they WERE offering discounts to, say, Planned Parenthood workers, or PETA members. Is that the case?

That doesn’t follow. It’s al about the reason why NRA member benefits were ended. This is clearly about politics.

Couldn’t an equivalent argument be made that the existence of NRA benefits in the first place was what was political, and that eliminating them was Delta’s way of backing out of the politics?

Changing from supporting a conservative cause to being politically neutral is still perceived as movement in a liberal direction, rightly or wrongly. Such is the team sport of politics – if you’re not with us, you’re against us.

It just occurred to me how dumb it was to offer to upload chapter stops when they are text that could be posted in a forum. So here goes–copy these and paste them into TXT files and you’ll get muxman-compatible GOUT chapter stops.

Star Wars

634
3435
8791
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16040
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The Empire Strikes Back

629
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Return of the Jedi

632
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135068
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172483
179191
182726
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194091
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There are chapter stop extraction utilities that should pull the stops from an existing DVD structure. Whether that will do it in a muxman-compatible format is unknown, but usually they offer some conversion options. Those are not stored in the VOB files, but in the IFO files (I don’t know where, actually, I haven’t messed with DVD’s in a while). Once you have that, there’s a menu option in Muxman to import chapter stops from that export file and then it should just work.

If you have trouble with this, I have GOUT-timed DVD chapter stops in muxman format for the whole trilogy. However, they may not match what’s on the existing DVD5. They’re more-or-less the Blu-ray stops with stops for missing scenes removed. And they are a straight conversion from Blu-ray timecodes, so they might jump to less-than-ideal frames on a telecined DVD (or if my math was bad). If you’re interested, just PM me and I’ll upload them.

Mrebo said:

CatBus said:

Fresh on the heels of a member of one right-wing militant group opening fire on students, another right-wing militant group is, without even pretending to seek permission, setting up armed “guards” to “protect” schools, presumably from people very much like themselves.

Assuming this is the same Oath Keepers that’s pulled stunts like these in the past, here’s the con they’re running: Some bloody event has claimed national headlines and they weren’t at it, so people continue to not care about their message. So they try to stir up another bloodbath, so that their members can use their presence at the next massacre as a media platform to spout their worldview. And this time they’re doing it at schools.

As far as I’ve seen there is no confirmation that Cruz was a member of a militant group. Early on there were reports that he participated in a white supremacist organization but that story hasn’t held up according to reports.

I guess the MAGA hat is the only solid evidence of white supremacist leanings, then.

From what I read about the Oath Keepers, there’s plenty to find objectionable but where is the evidence of the “con” to which you allude?

Follow the last link. Attempting to dump a large amount of weapons into Ferguson at that time was nothing less than dumping kerosene on a flame. I have no doubt at all their goal was to get citizens and cops shooting each other in larger numbers, and I credit the citizens of Ferguson for knowing the math on that and declining their “assistance”. Thankfully, the Oath Keepers wasted some rubles on that particular gambit.

Agreed there’s not much the schools can do, we’re back to that “reasonable” standard of intent to harm, and they seem fairly good at staying on the safe side of that line (well, safe for white guys).

Fresh on the heels of a member of one right-wing militant group opening fire on students, another right-wing militant group is, without even pretending to seek permission, setting up armed “guards” to “protect” schools, presumably from people very much like themselves.

Assuming this is the same Oath Keepers that’s pulled stunts like these in the past, here’s the con they’re running: Some bloody event has claimed national headlines and they weren’t at it, so people continue to not care about their message. So they try to stir up another bloodbath, so that their members can use their presence at the next massacre as a media platform to spout their worldview. And this time they’re doing it at schools.

solkap said:

I would like to be able to make a DVD5 set of the Despecialized Editions that has subtitles accessible by the remote.

I already understand that there will be no menus with this version and I’m fine with that.

If I am understanding the term correctly, to achieve this, I need to “mux” a chosen subtitle stream into the finished VIDEO_TS folder, then burn the “remuxed” project to DVD, all using the instructions in the Project Threepio README file as seen below.

But I’m getting confused with step 5. Using the […] button on the right hand side of MuxMan doesn’t seem to find any of the video files in the VIDEO_TS folder. And I’m not sure what to look for with the audio stream.

Plus once I have selected the proper files for video, do I need to do anything with the aspect ratio settings in the 2 “Pref” drop-down menus? Same question goes for the “Language”, “Extension”, and “Delay” drop-down menus in the Audio section?

Thanks for the help!

Sorry for the delay in responding, I don’t browse very often down here and probably should.

MuxMan is looking for raw video and audio streams – i.e. *.m2v and *.ac3 files. An already-packaged DVD has these files already muxed into a series of VOB files.

So what you need to do is merge the VOB files into one giant VOB file (using something like VOBmerge) and then use a VOB extraction utility to extract the video and audio files. Once you’re dealing with the unpackaged raw streams, MuxMan repackages them (with the subtitles) into a new folder structure containing a different set of VOB files.

Keep in mind, subtitles in the DVD format are aliased and not quite as easy on the eyes as other formats.

Meanwhile, Sen. Claire McCaskill remains the nation’s luckiest Democrat.

yhwx said:

https://twitter.com/samswey/status/967068790814134272

25 fatal school shootings since Columbine. How did each shooting come to an end? A thread. (1/x) https://www.aol.com/article/news/2018/02/15/fox-news-anchor-shepard-smith-lists-all-25-fatal-school-shootings-since-columbine/23362465/#slide=ad%23fullscreen

https://twitter.com/samswey/status/967090653011292160

Some of the common themes:
-many shootings happened quickly and ended in suicide
-unarmed school staff de-escalated or subdued shooter in many cases
-in many of these cases school police were on campus. None stopped the shooting

Actually I’m glad you posted this for a different reason. We’ve been talking on and off about suicides and one angle that doesn’t get a lot of discussion is that many mass shootings are also planned as suicides. World’s shittiest suicides, sure, but suicides nonetheless. Presumably some policies designed to prevent suicides would also have an effect on mass shootings.

SilverWook said:

CatBus said:

Meanwhile over a dozen of the grieving families who lost loved ones in Parkland have been getting regular death threats since the shooting. New “red flags” are still popping up all over the field – let’s hope law enforcement manages to find a way to act on some of these other ones.

By potential copycats or those wanting them to not speak up? Sick people either way.

I imagine the latter. After all, what better way to demonstrate that decent law-abiding gun owners don’t want any sort of gun regulation than by threatening to murder those who vocally support the laws? Oh.

Mrebo said:

CatBus said:

TV’s Frink said:

Can you give me the Clif Bar Notes?

Basically slow-ass or no-ass response times. Hard to say at this point how much the “resource officer” (school security guard) on site added to the confusion by what he did or didn’t communicate to the other officers, but clearly there was a bit of “Wait outside because nobody knows WTF is happening” going on there. The sheriff in this case seems to be IMO overly reluctant to call any fault other than on the resource officer until the investigation is complete. It’s pretty clear the initial officers on the scene weren’t following any sort of plan, and that’s a problem. Whether anyone other than the resource officer had the capability to actually reduce the fatalities is unknown and probably unlikely, but slow response times even beyond the point at which they could have prevented anything really do not help paint a picture of a healthy law enforcement presence.

As for the red flag angle, the police are very limited in what they can do when no crime has actually been committed, and the Sheriff manages to explain that really quite badly. “Imminent” is a high legal hurdle – involuntary commitment is probably the only way the existing legal system could have realistically stopped this, and while I’d be easily persuaded that Nazism alone is a dangerous mental illness, I’m not the one that would need to be convinced for involuntary commitment to work (this is also a high legal hurdle). I don’t know if the existing legal system could have stopped this particular attack, but it’s very clear that it did not. Which is why people are so interested in changing laws as a result.

Agree on your impressions. The slow response times might have mattered if not for stopping the shooter then in getting medical care to the people who needed it (as Tapper suggested). Along with other questions/answers, it helped paint a picture of a police department that is not engaged and proactive as it should be.

The Sheriff did make a mess of trying to explain the legal standard. Still “imminent” action is not necessarily required. There is a Florida statute (that the sheriff seems to have had in mind) that states:

“Credible threat” means a verbal or nonverbal threat, or a combination of the two, including threats delivered by electronic communication or implied by a pattern of conduct, which places the person who is the target of the threat in reasonable fear for his or her safety or the safety of his or her family members or individuals closely associated with the person, and which is made with the apparent ability to carry out the threat to cause such harm. It is not necessary to prove that the person making the threat had the intent to actually carry out the threat. The present incarceration of the person making the threat is not a bar to prosecution under this section.

Yeah, the problem is the words “credible” and “reasonable”. There’s a lot of state specific case law behind stuff like that and frankly I don’t know anything about it. Imminent is actually more straightforward to argue – if it meets that standard.

Meanwhile over a dozen of the grieving families who lost loved ones in Parkland have been getting regular death threats since the shooting. New “red flags” are still popping up all over the field – let’s hope law enforcement manages to find a way to act on some of these other ones.

TV’s Frink said:

Can you give me the Clif Bar Notes?

Basically slow-ass or no-ass response times. Hard to say at this point how much the “resource officer” (school security guard) on site added to the confusion by what he did or didn’t communicate to the other officers, but clearly there was a bit of “Wait outside because nobody knows WTF is happening” going on there. The sheriff in this case seems to be IMO overly reluctant to call any fault other than on the resource officer until the investigation is complete. It’s pretty clear the initial officers on the scene weren’t following any sort of plan, and that’s a problem. Now, it’s clear nobody other than the resource officer had the capability to actually reduce the fatalities, but slow response times even beyond the point at which they could have prevented anything really do not help paint a picture of a healthy law enforcement presence.

As for the red flag angle, the police are very limited in what they can do when no crime has actually been committed, and the Sheriff manages to explain that really quite badly. “Imminent” is a high legal hurdle – involuntary commitment is probably the only way the existing legal system could have realistically stopped this, and while I’d be easily persuaded that Nazism alone is a dangerous mental illness, I’m not the one that would need to be convinced for involuntary commitment to work (this is also a high legal hurdle). I don’t know if the existing legal system could have stopped this particular attack, but it’s very clear that it did not. Which is why people are so interested in changing laws as a result.

The part that seems like overreach to me is criticizing the Sheriff for criticizing the NRA. Tapper follows a bit of a “let he who is without sin cast the first stone” playbook, and of course that’s pretty nonsense, but Tapper plays the part pretty well and the Sheriff seems not to have anticipated the Pharisee angle of questioning.

Collipso said:

Mrebo said:

Pitiable story of 21 year old neo-Nazi and how his mother deals with it.

Oh my god. I almost cried.

In that scenario, I would at the very least ask law enforcement to advise me how to legally wiretap my own house so that when it comes down to it (and I regret to suggest it will), I may be able to prevent a crime, provide useful evidence to the prosecution, and/or avoid implication in the crime myself. If one of her rescue dogs was a known biter, she wouldn’t let it walk around off-leash. Sorry for the harsh metaphor, but it’s apt. If you can’t fit it with a muzzle, keep a very close eye on it or you really will be to blame when it kills someone. She’s very lucky indeed to think that (for all she knows) she’s the only parent left bereft because of what her son has become, and she will need to work hard if she wants to keep it that way.

Mrebo said:

yhwx said:

Then I don’t really get your point. If suicides are most gun deaths, then shouldn’t these statistics apply to gun deaths too? I don’t just want a solution for mass shootings. We should want one for other gun problems too.

That is a question. That’s why I pointed out that states with assault weapon bans appear to highly correlate to lower gun deaths and yet I don’t think many suicides (which comprise most gun deaths) are committed with assault weapons. So…maybe something else is going on with these numbers.

I’m with you here. First off, take state-by-state numbers with a huge grain of salt in general. Open borders mean local gun laws have less relevance. I know Alaska and Wyoming have ridiculous suicide rates and lax gun laws. Loosely related maybe, but there’s a whole lot else that feeds into suicide rates. If you just look at Alaska’s native population, for example, the suicide rate gets much worse. Lack of jobs, education, prospects for the future, plus a nighttime that lasts 30 days.

And I question whether many people who commit suicide by firearm will choose to live if they don’t have a gun to kill themselves with. That sounds very doubtful to me.

You’d be surprised how well those seemingly dumb suicide barriers on bridges work. They don’t help everyone, certainly, or even most people. But making suicide just a little bit harder is sometimes just enough to get people to look around at their other options. And not just their other options for means of suicide.

Mrebo said:

As for harm reduction, a gun ban is unrealistic and sacrifices basic liberties (whether you think those liberties are outmoded or rarely needed).

In my opinion, nobody would sacrifice anything important at all under a gun ban. They wouldn’t even be inconvenienced. But yes I agree it’s currently unrealistic.

It’s like the ‘free range’ parenting topic, where charging parents with negligence is about harm reduction.

Except no harm is actually reduced and people are actually harmed, making it sort of the opposite of a gun ban.

What if we could put a virtual end to school shootings without a gun ban? Do we even want to try that?

School shootings are a very tiny subset of the larger American gun problem, which is large and will take a long time to address, and there may be a very different political climate before the whole problem is solved. So while solutions that can pass a legislature are preferred in the near term, I don’t feel we should feel obligated to be silent about solutions that solve the problem more effectively without as many downsides, just because they’re currently unpassable.

ChainsawAsh said:

Mrebo said:

yhwx said:

Mrebo said:

yhwx said:

Mrebo said:

ChainsawAsh said:

Mrebo said:

I think we should all be pleased we’re talking about gun control (mostly large scale banning of guns) exclusively, while some are)admitting it’s almost certainly not going to happen in the foreseeable future. Meanwhile we ignore the enormous numerous failings that could have been avoided to prevent the deaths here and at other schools. Round of applause!

Okay, why don’t you start? What sort of failings?

They’ve been in the news and I’ve mentioned them previously in the thread. But there were the calls to the FBI, including a post by Cruz that he wanted to be a “professional school shooter.” He was expelled from school because he had bullets in his backpack. The family he lived with knew he was deeply troubled, knew he had guns (but apparently not how many and where). Kids at school were afraid of him. People knew he tortured and killed animals. Numerous police and social service visits to the house with no actions taken. The deputy working at the school that day stayed outside when the shooting was going on.

But if he hadn’t had a gun, we wouldn’t be talking about this right now. We would be talking about Trump’s claim that he is, in fact, one-fourth Chinese.

Setting aside the practicality of gun bans, if he didn’t have a rifle, I don’t see why he wouldn’t use a handgun, and if not a handgun, a knife or an explosive device. And then maybe we could talk about how we could stop him from killing whatever number of people he killed. Would it be only 5 dead children? Maybe. We can only guess. There’s a sleight of hand going on here and it’s not by me. If you think this kid only killed people because he had a gun you’re ignoring all those facts, strangely because they’re not controversial.

Of course he had the desire to kill because of all these factors — where did I ever doubt that? Making the process more efficient at catching those at risk is part of the guns debate.

Didn’t mean to respond to your post.

But restricting access to guns makes sense.

The total gun ban idea is unrealistic and wrongheaded.

And for the millionth time, a total gun ban is not the objective. Go back and look at the Australian law posted a couple pages back - that’s the ideal objective we should be working toward IMO.

Yep, I think I’ve been pushing the envelope of the most restrictive regulation possible here, and even I’m not in favor of a total gun ban. And, as we discussed about 30 pages back or so, I’d support policies that aren’t nearly as aggressive as the ones I’m suggesting. I’m just bringing it up because why not give your honest opinion?

Mrebo said:

If you think this kid only killed people because he had a gun

Add the word “seventeen” and you’re on to something. Harm reduction is the concept behind the whole thing. The only one actually fighting against evil is Batman.

Mrebo said:

CatBus said:

TV’s Frink said:

I guess that Hawaii is the exception that proves the rule.

Actually there were some other statistics a while back that used gun ownership rates per household rather than per adult and Hawaii ranked pretty low on that one. I’m not exactly sure how they calculated household though, so that would be something to look into. Part of the weirdness about gun stats is that the rate of gun ownership is trending downward at the same time the number of guns is going up, because while fewer people have guns, those that have them have more of them.

Fake Math!

Foiled again!

TV’s Frink said:

I guess that Hawaii is the exception that proves the rule.

Actually there were some other statistics a while back that used gun ownership rates per household rather than per adult and Hawaii ranked pretty low on that one. I’m not exactly sure how they calculated household though, so that would be something to look into. Part of the weirdness about gun stats is that the rate of gun ownership is trending downward at the same time the number of guns is going up, because while fewer people have guns, those that have them have more of them.

Mrebo said:

In light of the foregoing responses, I still don’t buy the attempt at turning this into a simple math problem.

Math is not offended when you ignore it.

Mrebo said:

CatBus said:

Mrebo said:

CatBus said:

TV’s Frink said:

I’ll admit I only skimmed a bit but I’ve still not heard a single argument why a civilian should be able to buy an assault weapon like an AR-15.

Well, here’s how I’ve seen the argument go in the past. First off, they’d say the “assault weapon” terminology is a meaningless term invented by the anti-gun crowd to make guns seem scary and dangerous. And they’re half right on that front. The “assault weapon” terminology is a meaningless term designed to make guns seem scary and dangerous, but it was invented by the gun industry as a way of selling more guns because “scary and dangerous” makes them more appealing to certain target audiences.

So, rather than defining guns you can’t buy based on meaningless marketing copy, you come up with arguments for guns you can buy, and that’s activity-based. There’s some categories:

1. Hunting. These days, this is mostly a form of entertainment, but this is still utilitarian for a handful of people.
2. Varmints. Seriously, coyotes suck, and guns are a pretty effective way to keep them at bay.
3. Fantasy fulfillment. This is where your “protection from government”, and “protecting your family” come in. None of this is real, but if you close your eyes and wish real hard, you become fantasy Dirty Harry.
4. Culture/heirlooms. Dad gave me this gun, it’s been in my family since great grandpa James used it to rob a train. It has intense personal value.

So, going at the list from easy to hard.

#4 is easy. Heirlooms have no need to be functional. Fill it with epoxy and you can keep your family heirloom gun forever.
#3 is easy too. Protecting your family in a fantasy world is not worth endangering your family in the real world. If you fill your gun with epoxy, it still works just as well in your fantasies and doesn’t endanger your family anymore.
#1 is mostly easy. For the entertainment angle, there’s a big arcade cabinet version of Big Buck Hunter down at the bowling alley. You’ll probably do better at this version anyway.

So we’re down to utility hunting and varmints. You don’t need an AR-15 for either of these activities (although it’s common for both). For these activities, you do not need semiauto, you do not need concealable, you do not need lightweight, you do not need large clips, you do not need rapid reload. Frankly, bow-hunters will tell you you don’t even need a gun, but bow-hunters are crazy so we don’t listen to them. An old-west-style Winchester rifle works fine for both. You have to cock it every time because it’s not semiauto. You need to stop and reload it frequently. It’s not particularly fun to shoot. Luckily none of this matters for those utilitarian purposes. Could one still be used in a crime? Absolutely. A less common, less deadly crime. And if it’s still too deadly, we can still weigh the right to varmint control against the right to remain breathing and decide which one we, as a society, value more.

So while you’ve still not heard a single argument why a civilian should be able to buy an assault weapon like an AR-15, I haven’t heard a credible argument why a civilian should be able to buy a handgun.

Re handguns, why isn’t the argument for self defense credible in your eyes?

When you buy a gun for self-defense (let’s say exclusively for self-defense, just to avoid overlapping justifications), here is your array of outcomes over the lifetime of the ownership of the weapon:

1. The gun will never serve a useful purpose over its entire lifetime.
2. The gun will be used in self-defense.
3. The gun will be used against you or someone you love.

Now, #1 is the far-and-away most likely scenario, well over 99% probability. #2 is an extremely unlikely scenario that serves as the justification. #3 is another extremely unlikely scenario that counters the justification. However, #3 is over 40x more likely to happen than #2. This is why #2 can be so easily dismissed as a fantasy scenario that actually endangers the families of the people who believe it.

The setup is flawed.

1. The existence of instances of self defense are the exceptions that prove the rule.

I think we’re talking past each other here. Buying a gun increases your risk of danger more than it increases your safety. Buying a gun makes you overall less safe which moots the safety justification.

2. Relatedly, if law abiding citizens were disarmed they would likely be at greater risk of violence.

That’s not true at all. Burglars are more likely to steal from houses if they know there’s guns in the house. By buying the gun, you’re increasing your risk of becoming a crime victim, which could lead to violence.

3. Some people are at greater risk of needing self defense than others.

That is true. And some people endanger their loved ones more than others. On average, the rate is just over 40x different, that’s all.

4. I imagine most of #3 are suicides. Followed by murders of supposed loved ones.

Suicides, accidents, murders, burglars who break into your house to steal your guns because you posted a helpful “Protected by Smith & Wesson” sign outside to advertise the fact, and then they shoot you when you interrupt the burglary.

We can speculate on the effect there if handguns were banned, but doesnt negate a need for self defense.

As long as you recognize that the need for self-defense is inextricably tied to a much stronger need to pretend you’re not actually endangering the lives of your loved ones, we’re in agreement.

Mrebo said:

CatBus said:

TV’s Frink said:

I’ll admit I only skimmed a bit but I’ve still not heard a single argument why a civilian should be able to buy an assault weapon like an AR-15.

Well, here’s how I’ve seen the argument go in the past. First off, they’d say the “assault weapon” terminology is a meaningless term invented by the anti-gun crowd to make guns seem scary and dangerous. And they’re half right on that front. The “assault weapon” terminology is a meaningless term designed to make guns seem scary and dangerous, but it was invented by the gun industry as a way of selling more guns because “scary and dangerous” makes them more appealing to certain target audiences.

So, rather than defining guns you can’t buy based on meaningless marketing copy, you come up with arguments for guns you can buy, and that’s activity-based. There’s some categories:

1. Hunting. These days, this is mostly a form of entertainment, but this is still utilitarian for a handful of people.
2. Varmints. Seriously, coyotes suck, and guns are a pretty effective way to keep them at bay.
3. Fantasy fulfillment. This is where your “protection from government”, and “protecting your family” come in. None of this is real, but if you close your eyes and wish real hard, you become fantasy Dirty Harry.
4. Culture/heirlooms. Dad gave me this gun, it’s been in my family since great grandpa James used it to rob a train. It has intense personal value.

So, going at the list from easy to hard.

#4 is easy. Heirlooms have no need to be functional. Fill it with epoxy and you can keep your family heirloom gun forever.
#3 is easy too. Protecting your family in a fantasy world is not worth endangering your family in the real world. If you fill your gun with epoxy, it still works just as well in your fantasies and doesn’t endanger your family anymore.
#1 is mostly easy. For the entertainment angle, there’s a big arcade cabinet version of Big Buck Hunter down at the bowling alley. You’ll probably do better at this version anyway.

So we’re down to utility hunting and varmints. You don’t need an AR-15 for either of these activities (although it’s common for both). For these activities, you do not need semiauto, you do not need concealable, you do not need lightweight, you do not need large clips, you do not need rapid reload. Frankly, bow-hunters will tell you you don’t even need a gun, but bow-hunters are crazy so we don’t listen to them. An old-west-style Winchester rifle works fine for both. You have to cock it every time because it’s not semiauto. You need to stop and reload it frequently. It’s not particularly fun to shoot. Luckily none of this matters for those utilitarian purposes. Could one still be used in a crime? Absolutely. A less common, less deadly crime. And if it’s still too deadly, we can still weigh the right to varmint control against the right to remain breathing and decide which one we, as a society, value more.

So while you’ve still not heard a single argument why a civilian should be able to buy an assault weapon like an AR-15, I haven’t heard a credible argument why a civilian should be able to buy a handgun.

Re handguns, why isn’t the argument for self defense credible in your eyes?

When you buy a gun for self-defense (let’s say exclusively for self-defense, just to avoid overlapping justifications), here is your array of outcomes over the lifetime of the ownership of the weapon:

1. The gun will never serve a useful purpose.
2. The gun will be used in self-defense.
3. The gun will be used against you or someone you love.

Now, #1 is the far-and-away most likely scenario, well over 99% probability. #2 is an extremely unlikely scenario that serves as the justification. #3 is another extremely unlikely scenario that counters the justification. However, #3 is over 40x more likely to happen than #2. This is why #2 can be so easily dismissed as a fantasy scenario that actually endangers the families of the people who believe it.

Although I’m sure people who use self-defense as a justification would have no problem coming up with lots of reasons they and all their friends and family must be freakish statistical outliers without actually having to consider the possibility that maybe they aren’t.

Australia got the convicts, we got the Puritans. And that’s why they yelled “No tradebacks, mate!”