World News Thread & Breaking News!!

[PikeCowboy]

Nice, what is this now, 7 prime ministers in 7 years, and we've come full circle too!

I wonder how much resistance the Komeito will have against changes in Japanese constitution

 

[bd popeye]

Again CNN, and probably others also, are advertising how they're not going name the shooter as requested by the families of the victims. Yeah they can do that without mentioning it. The problem is the media's general way of reporting these events probably encourages these types of sociopaths. There's a part of individual human nature to rebel against what society says is the norm.

There's a saying as you know A.Mace in the news media bizz.. "If it bleeds..it leads." sad but true.

In my opinion the news media not only reports the news but are also fear mongers.

 

[bladerunner]

Not wanting to bring politics into this of course... but that Chinese stabbing could have been much more terrible if gun access was as easy as in the States.

The parallels of these two attacks are terrifyingly similar, yet the final victim count is very different. I'm sure I don't need to spell out the reason for this difference.


People with mental disorders seems to be increasing all around the world, and we can only expect more of this in coming years, even with increased funding in mental health care. But making it harder to kill people should be top priority. The constitution's right to bear arms, gun culture, with the gun lobby backing everything... if all this is worth a couple of dozen people getting shot dead every few months and years in the eyes of three hundred million people in the country, then so be it.

My sympathies for the victims, in both Newton and Chengping.

As a current owner of two rifles 3 shotguns and a .22 gas fired slug gun Im opposed to the idea of doing away with the idea of the right to own guns.
As the pro gun owners have suggested many a time, "its not the guns that kill people , people kill people". Even without guns , is'nt going to stop some crazed person from attempting multiple killings. He can for example drive his car on the footpath at speed on a busy day and run people dow n by the dozens. Do we start banning cars after that?

 

[kyanges]

As a current owner of two rifles 3 shotguns and a .22 gas fired slug gun Im opposed to the idea of doing away with the idea of the right to own guns.
As the pro gun owners have suggested many a time, "its not the guns that kill people , people kill people". Even without guns , is'nt going to stop some crazed person from attempting multiple killings. He can for example drive his car on the footpath at speed on a busy day and run people dow n by the dozens. Do we start banning cars after that?

But a gun doesn't get me to work in 15 minutes... .

 

[paintgun]

As a current owner of two rifles 3 shotguns and a .22 gas fired slug gun Im opposed to the idea of doing away with the idea of the right to own guns.
As the pro gun owners have suggested many a time, "its not the guns that kill people , people kill people". Even without guns , is'nt going to stop some crazed person from attempting multiple killings. He can for example drive his car on the footpath at speed on a busy day and run people dow n by the dozens. Do we start banning cars after that?

if there is a ban on firearms, the kids in Newtown would live to see another day

 

[MwRYum]

The majority was expected, but it looks like they've won a supermajority, enough to tinker with Japan's constitution.

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LDP's victory as well as the ultra-right new comer took 3rd place is all too expected...and probably that's how the world will end on the 21st as well - the first salvo hails the coming Armageddon is the 2nd Sino-Japanese War.

 

[icbeodragon]

if there is a ban on firearms, the kids in Newtown would live to see another day

Well, first, that doesn't answer the question the reply posits.

Second if there was a ban on firearms the entire scope of American history would potentially be different. We're something like 200~ years too late to seriously be considering a firearm bans on the scale that China has. It wouldn't work today, nor would it be desirable today, and yes, I'm speaking with the certainty that there will be more shootings somewhere in the country at some future date.

 

[plawolf]

I love guns, was a member of both the rifle and clay pigeon shooting clubs at uni, and would buy a few handguns and rifles tomorrow if they were legal in the UK/or did not require so many permits as is the case with a hunting rifle.

However, I don't need a gun, nor does any civilian anywhere in the developed world or the vast majority of the developing world.

Owning a gun in any country where there is even the most rudimentary rule of law is a choice, and past time.

The vast majority of Americans don't own a gun because they honestly think they need to one day use them to overthrow their government, and the ones who actually think that should be the very last people in America to actually be allowed to own fire arms.

Anyone who believes guns don't kill people should re-acquaint themselves with reality and remember what exactly guns were designed and made to do. Just look at the two remarkably similar cases with despicable cowards targeting children in America and China.

It would have been hard to design a more clear-cut illustration of just how much of a difference gun ownership made, and the tragic facts speak for themselves.

As I have already said, I love guns, but I consider the enjoyment I would have had from owning and shooting fire arms to be a tiny, inconsequential price to pay if it meant a single child who would have been killed by a bullet was saved. And there can be absolutely no doubt at all that tighter gun control laws would save lives, a great many lives.

For the vast majority of Americans, gun ownership is either for recreational purposes, or for self-defense, and for neither of those purposes do you need assault rifles, 50 cal sniper rifles, or many many other weapons you would only ever need or expect to find on a battlefield. Restricting the sale and ownership of such weapons should be a no-brainer, and all polls shows the majority of Americans either support, or have no fundamental problem with banning such weapons. Yet, a tiny tiny vocal minority have somehow managed to make ownership of such weapons sacrosanct, and any talk of banning them effective career suicide. It is hard to think of a more vivid example of a total failure of democracy.

 

[SampanViking]

The vast majority of Americans don't own a gun because they honestly think they need to one day use them to overthrow their government, and the ones who actually think that should be the very last people in America to actually be allowed to own fire arms.

The notion of needing firearms to protect against overweening government is one argument that is trotted out, time and time again. Unfortunately, since the worst that Government can do has already been done: i.e. multi trillion dollar bail out using tax payers monies to criminally reckless Wall St Bankers, at the cost of mass unemployment, home dispossession, bankruptcy, the destruction of life prospects and the general American Dream for generations for millions of ordinary US citizens, and nobody has come out and fired a shot, it sounds increasingly hollow.

As there seem to be regular school and mall shootings but never a shot at a single Wall St Kleptocrat, I think its time to face reality and give them up.

 

[bladerunner]

if there is a ban on firearms, the kids in Newtown would live to see another day

IMO and I don't want to be thought of as being callous minded, but to be calling for a banning of gun sales every time we have one the episodes we have just seen/read about is a typical knee jerk over reaction.

Yes it was a horrific tragedy but in the U.S. annual murder numbers run into 10000-14000 annually and I dare say a fire arm is used in many of the cases. As a side note, there's close to 1000 child deaths annually alone. in the U.S. In some Western countries the child death ration due to abuse can be close to 4 per 100,000. My point here here is that deaths here draw very little public reaction and most cases, swept under the carpet.

Meanwhile China which has a low violent crime/ murder rate because of its strict punishment policy and gun control , has had its share of notorious murders. a quick google search throws up a few, one of the most notorius killers being Yang Xinhai who between 1999 -2003 murdered 65 people, sometimes whole families with axes, hammers and shovels.