Dan J

MSNBC.com report hammers myth that more guns lead to more homicides

This morning’s (March 24, 2:22 PM) report carried by MSNBC.com headlined “Record numbers now licensed to pack heat” further confirms what gun rights activists have been arguing for years: More guns in private hands does not equate to more homicides.

The highest gun homicide rate is in Washington, D.C., which has had the nation’s strictest gun-control laws for years and bans concealed carry: 20.50 deaths per 100,000 population, five times the general rate. The lowest rate, 1.12, is in Utah, which has such a liberal concealed weapons policy that most American adults can get a permit to carry a gun in Utah without even visiting the state.-MSNBC.com

The decline in gun homicides also comes as U.S. firearm sales are skyrocketing, according to federal background checks that are required for most gun sales. After holding stable at 8.5 to 9 million checks from 1999 to 2005, the FBI reported a surge to 10 million in 2006, 11 million in 2007, nearly 13 million in 2008 and more than 14 million last year, a 55 percent increase in just four years.- MSNBC.com

This is further evidence that everything the gun prohibitionists have been claiming and predicting over the past two decades has been fundamentally fraudulent,”—SAF Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb.

The gun prohibition lobby is on the ropes. They’ve been reduced to corporate demagoguery against Starbucks for not banning open or concealed carry in their shops in an attempt to create publicity and “stay relevant.” Their campaign has less steam than a cup of hot Joe on a cold Seattle morning.

http://www.examiner.com/x-4525-Seattle-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2010m3d24-MSNBCcom-report-hammers-myth-that-more-guns-lead-to-more-homicides

Statistic Fail - Correlation does not imply causation

Why corral the conversation over to "presidential requirements" .... the writer doesn't ....he just asks why there are so many unanswered questions and hidden parts of the Presidents past.

So lets hear your comments on that.

In other words, you have nothing and you need to make an issue out of something... or your head will explode.

ask again in a year, or better yet when all the cuts to medicare have triggered, and im betting that the line of people would be much longer among the people not killed or not among the 25%+ unemployed as a result of the mandates and restrictions. give it time give it time

Businesses set prices at what they can get customers to pay for it. Japanese companies buy the same MRI machines that we get in the US for a fraction of the cost. Not because the MRI makers are selling at a loss, its that American hospitals/clinics will pay a lot more. In Japan the price for MRI's are controlled by the government so hospitals and clinics have less room for inefficiencies. In the US, there is a lot of room for inefficiency and profit.

That's weird. All I get are error messages and can't google other ways to get to hotmail.com.

The webpage cannot be found

HTTP 400

Most likely causes:

•There might be a typing error in the address.

•If you clicked on a link, it may be out of date.

What you can try:

Retype the address.

Go back to the previous page.

Go to and look for the information you want.

Status code 400 = Bad client request

Your browser or a proxy in between is sending a bad request to the server causing an error. It might be caused by the browser itself or something installed in the browser.

Hello,

I'm new to VJ and have done a lot of reading and I'm still confused on where to begin my journey. I've been dating my fiancee for over a year and half. I'm a US Citizen and she's Indonesian. Our plan is to marry is to have a traditional Indonesian marriage in Jakarta in APR 2011 and have her come to the US immediately after the wedding. Of course this leads to a lot of questions. Just to begin...

1) Is 13 months ample time to gather the necessary documentation to wed in APR 2011 and have her move to the US shortly thereafter?

2) From my understanding (which is limited), if we marry in Indonesia we'll need to file a K-3 when we're married. This process may take up to 6 mos from the day we're married. If a visa process typically takes 6+ mos to process, what type of visa or paperwork can we file 6-12 mos BEFORE we're married so that I won't have to wait additional mos after our wedding date for her to come to the US?

Thanks,

Gila

There is no visa that will allow you to do exactly what you want to do without a significant waiting period.

However, Indonesia like the US, does not recognize a wedding ceremony as a marriage unless you go through the steps to legalize it. In Indonesia for a Muslim wedding it is done by signing a marriage book. For all other religions you have to go to a government office to register the wedding.

You can have your ceremony/going away party without taking the step to legalize the marriage and then follow it up with a wedding at the county offices once your fiancée is in the US. The thing to be aware of is that until you have your wedding in the US, you are not yet married if the question arises (Which it might at the PoE).

Hmm...ask doctors how to fix the health care system...what a concept

Doctors have a pretty narrow view, and are probably not going to suggest anything that might result in them getting paid less. This reform was focused more on the payer side rather than the provider side.

Unfortunately, until Washington is reformed in the way it works, they won't be working for us again anytime soon.

Correction, it wont be working for YOU anytime soon. But then you have a very minority libertarian view of how government should work.

I draw the line on innocent people.

Government officials usually are always far from innocent.

And you are the judge of that? Does just opposing your view make a politician no longer innocent?

In this day and age, we're talking about the wrong type of democracy.

Go read and study the framework of this nation and the constitution. Majority rule was the last thing the founders intended to happen.

The government represents the will of the people. If the people want to do something different than what the founders preferred, than they can do that. If you are in the minority and you disagree with the majority. You have 3 choices. 1. Try to persuade people to make your view the majority view. 2. Put up with the way that the people want the government to run. 3. Find another country to live in.

You can bring up the founders all you want, but the will of the people, not the will of the founders are what matters today. The founders did not prevent the people from reshaping the purpose of government to fit the needs of a changing world.

Unfortunately, human nature dictates that we only learn/understand things from a violent perspective.

You can be a peace loving hippie all you want, but you still need to break some windows to get people's attention.

Do you think King George would have ever listened to the colonies being like; "oh hey, we want to be separate from England now, so can you please just let us do that?"

Do you think the American people would have ever gone for WWI had the Lusitania not been sent out as a sacrifice to boil people to call for retribution?

DO you think the American people would have wanted to be in WWII if it weren't for Pearl Harbor?

We are a violent species who understands violence above all else. When we are peaceful and in semi-agreement on things we can resolve issues with words. However when there's a stark disagreement in which neither side wants to bend, it usually takes a war to decide the continued fate of man kind.

Only? BS? Or was your elementary school a fight club?

Democracy is not war. You don't like how a solution to a particular issue turns out, vote for someone else. If the majority of the people don't agree with you and elect representatives who oppose the style of government you want, put up with it or GTFO. Government is not about what you as an individual wants, its about what the majority wants.

Not really. Fear makes them think twice about their vote all the time. Threatening their 'position' only makes them think about their vote in the few months leading up to an election/only if they really care about getting re-elected.

The only fear that has a place in democracy is the fear of not getting re-elected. Fear of or threats of violence from the people is just weak.

Joining a distinguished group of state attorneys general in challenging the constitutionality of the health reform legislation, now comes Orly Taitz, who in a new federal court filing argues that the bill violates her "right" to practice dentistry.

Along with her lawyerly pursuits, Taitz operates a dental office in Rancho Santa Margarita, California.

The challenge comes in the form of an amended complaint in a Birther case in district court in Washington, Taitz v. Obama, that challenges the president's citizenship.

Along with raising the specter of death panels and charging that Obama, as an illegitimate president, does not have the right to sign the health bill into law, Taitz writes in the new section of the complaint, titled, "VIOLATION OF COMMERCE CLAUSE AND OF PLAINTIFF'S RIGHTS TO GAINFUL EMPLOYMENT AS A DOCTOR OF DENTAL SURGERY UPON DEFENDANT'S IMMINENT SIGHNING OF THE HEALTH BILL":

"Health bill, as being prepared and reconciled, will create an enormous machine of governmental burocracy which will intrude into Plaintiff's practice, will affect her doctor-patient relations, will undermine her Hippocratic oath, will force her to ration medical care and de-facto deny medical care to elderly, whom some committees of burocrats will deem to be too old to receive such care, meaning too old to live." (Typos in original.)

She adds:

"Such bill will subject her to threat of multiple Medical-Dental malpractice legal actions as standard of care will clearly go down.

Such bill will constitute unreasonable infringement upon her gainful employment in Dental Surgery as overburdening of interstate commerce in clear violation of commerce clause."

Did she read the bill, or is she filling the lawsuit off of information provided by Fox News?

No, I don't have an article. But it comes from real world talk in the business district. Screw the articles this is real life.

If you will humor me I will try and explain. This was about the action that businesses will take in reaction to a new law. Especially the very small ones with 50 to 100 employees.

Lets start simple. There is a mandate which states if you have 50 or more employees you must furnish health insurance or face fines or higher taxes per employee.

If I have 65 employess what will I do as a business owner? First, I will find a way to par my work force down to 50 people. I will need to get out from under the mandates and scrutiny of the Guv and IRS. This also means I will not have to furnish insurance for the remaining 49 employees. The Guv will give them money to buy their own since they make under 50,000 a year. No need for me to spend this money. They will be covered without me now. Good for all parties except taxpayers who will pay for the 49. Oh well.

My savings will be around $500,000 in health insurance expenditures for the year (low estimate).I see a vacation cottage on the lake for next year.

Do you understand?

You will also have a hard time finding good employees. Offer no health insurance, and they will go work for your competitor. Those you get left with are probably not good enough to get hired by a competitor.

You are basically destroying your human capital, to take more money home with you. In the long term a very poor decision. If all your employees are working in positions that can easily be automated, replace them with robots and you can get rid of most of your salary too.

Actually they wont be screwing their employess. But this is what happens when bad laws are passed.

The company wont feel bad because they will drop the insurance knowing the employee will be thrown a subsidy to buy insurance dictated by the Feds. The employee will still have insurance but it will be the cheap O insurance required by law. So the employer is not putting the employee out in the cold. The insurance will still be there but now paid by the taxpayer.

I think some of these businesses are smiling from ear to ear. They can see getting out from under the cost of health insurance for employees. More boats and toys for the owners.

Yes, you will see many splits to make a company appear to have less employees. I think the Temp sevices will boom also. They can supply and management a group of employees for a company.

Businesses exploiting employees has nothing to do with laws and everything to do with money. There was a time when it was much worse, but we now have laws preventing that. Although now even some of those are being bent and pushed.

Some companies will do everything they can to avoid paying for health insurance. They are also companies that are going to find recruiting difficult and in time see an end to their business. All the good people will find better places to work. Or go into business for themselves.

This is not really about the cost of health insurance. Its about control. Very few companies were lobbying to get out of the health insurance provider area, simply because it allows them to use health insurance as a perk when hiring. It helps keep people at the job instead of going to someone else, because the employee may not want to risk not being covered. And prevents employees from going into business for themselves for the same reason.

Start preparing now if you work for a company who have 50-100 workers.

I hear mumblings in my line of work that these companies will start looking to reduce their workforce to under 50 so they can skirt the Guv mandates on employers.

It will depend on on how the accounting comes out. some say they will make more money by reducing employess along with a reduction in output instead of suppling mandatory insurance or paying a per employee fine.

They are saying screw the goverment.

The other possibility is reducing to under 50 and getting the rest from temp services. As needed.

If anyone they are screwing their employees, they might be able to do it right now since its an employers market and people are taking any work they can get. But once the market recovers they will have a hard time recruiting employees.

Just wondering if education of a spouse from Ghana has any effect on the way the visa process goes. So is my husband is not a college graduate or have a fancy education will that affect the process of getting his visa? Or are they granting most Visa's to those who have college educations?

Not for family based visas. It does however play into some of the work visas.

How many of these requests are for his birth certificate?

The domestic terrorists will see to it.

The are patriots fighting to keep health care free. With this bill, they actually have to buy health insurance instead of using the emergency room as a free primary care clinic.

The other point of view is to make the system equally mediocre for everyone... like the Canadian system or the UK's NHS.

Maybe if we actually spent as much as them, but considering how much we do spend on healthcare, we have to be spending the money on something other than care, like buying porches and private jets... oh wait.

But even for those people with money, borders are not a problem. Where else are you going to get stem cell vanity treatments?

That is even more embarrassing. Having used a different system myself, I can personally vouch that our system here is nothing to write home about.

I did love watching the repub senators claim we have the best system in the world. Based on ###### what..

It is, if you have a particular point of view. One that finds it better that high quality of care is only available to those who can afford it. These people don't find a problem with health care being available to fewer and fewer people, it makes it more exclusive.

World is going to end in 2012 anyway - so we are good to go...

It certainly will...

Wow, thats insane. Thanks. Now i wonder how long until we get the GC? So for people that can drive, they have to use a foreign license or something until they get their Green card?

Passport can function as an ID for the time being. You can use a foreign drivers licence to drive in the US, but it varies somewhat by state/country.

In a wire transfer situation like this, the bank will usually report it without needing you to do anything. You can ask the bank to be sure.

Speaking of God and all that....

Steve I noticed you still have this photo as your signature..... yet you still have not shared the quotes where Jesus "Preached" social justice?

Jesus preached Personal responsibility in aiding the poor, not forcing others to take on the burden Christians should have.

Did the Good Samaritan, when he helped the man in need even ask the inn keeper for a discount on the food or price of the room?

Give me the quotes man.

It would be a waste of time, it wouldn't change how you interpret the bible. If you pick and choose verses in the bible, you can interpret it to say anything you want.

I think there are two factors playing into this.

War Fatigue. Iraq has been going on for 8 years, I think a lot of people just want it to be done with.

Escapism. Watching a war about Iraq doesn't really provide the same escapism that a movie like Avatar or Alice in Wonderland provides. If anything it just reminds them more of the ####### that is still going on.