Holy f-ing cow! While I still believe the revelation is just speculation at this time, it looks like our crazy mass murderer decided to kill those innocent people because he was worried about being committed.
NEWTOWN, Conn. – The gunman who slaughtered 20 children and six adults at a Connecticut elementary school may have snapped because his mother was planning to commit him to a psychiatric facility, according to a lifelong resident of the area who was familiar with the killer’s family and several of the victims’ families.
So, let me get this straight. Mom decides the kid is bonkers and needs to be locked up, and he snaps and kills her, then kills a bunch of other people. No law or firearm ban in the world would have fucking stopped someone this insane from committing harm out of anger once they snapped. Anyone pretending otherwise is desperately stupid. All the laws to deal with this were in place and they didn’t matter. There is a lesson here: crazy and evil people are always going to have the law applied to them retroactively, because nothing short of the ability to predict the future will prevent these people from doing their crazy.
But all you gun grabbers can keep pretending the problem is guns and that disarming good people after someone evil and crazy commits a horrible act will prevent other evil and insane people from doing more of the same.
78 comments
No ping yet
Mississippi Yankee says:
December 18, 2012 11:35 pm at 11:35 pm (UTC -4)
Falling on deaf ears and/or closed minds in 3…2..1
Poosh says:
December 18, 2012 11:56 pm at 11:56 pm (UTC -4)
You may or may not know this but one of the most proficient (and I’m talking top 5) serial killers in the world (he might even be no.1) was arrested in the UK in 1998 or there abouts. So modern times. He killed some 215 people. And is estimated to have killed 260.
He was a doctor. He simply killed his patients. One after the other. Over decades.
260. Britain. Caught in 1998. Killed himself in jail, in 2004 I think. Harold Shipman.
salinger says:
December 19, 2012 7:43 am at 7:43 am (UTC -4)
But a locked cabinet would.
Any restrictions, laws or bans are made because of irresponsible gun owners actions such as this lunatic’s mom.
salinger says:
December 19, 2012 7:47 am at 7:47 am (UTC -4)
When did you guys start moderating comments?
AlexInCT says:
December 19, 2012 8:16 am at 8:16 am (UTC -4)
Speaking of mass murderers Poosh. I think Rachel Carson, the mother of the environmental movement, has your doctor beat.
Her stupid scaremongering got DDT, the chemical that eradicated malaria in the west, banned just in time to prevent many others that could have benefited from it from doing the same. Of course, since it was mostly yellow, brown, and black people that ended up doing the dying, by the millions, it’s no biggie. She was saving the environment!
AlexInCT says:
December 19, 2012 12:10 pm at 12:10 pm (UTC -4)
You must be trying to prove how dumb you are. How do you know the cabinet was not locked? What if he had decided to use a bomb instead? Or poison? Or what if he had done what every criminal does? Obtain some weapon illegally, then used that to make his mom open the locked cabinet? Someone that wants to kill will not be deterred. That is the one thing you gun grabbers continue to ignore, because in the end it proves that no matter how many law abiding people you punish with your stupid need to restore your false feelings of security.
Oh, bullshit. This is such a huge lie. The people agitating for bans and even more useless laws right now are doing so to take advantage of the emotional state of those that are struggling with the loss of security, and their objective is to make the ownership of firearms so onerous that for all intents and practical purposes nobody can own one ever.
I again point out that the places that already have implemented the very same draconian rules all the gun grabbers are pushing for at the federal level – liberal bastions like Detroit, L.A., NYC, Chicago, and D.C – have the very highest incidents of gun crimes and gun violence in the damned nation. Please explain to me why when presented with years of data making the indisputable case that the very bastions of liberalism with the most draconian rules suffer from the worst abuse of firearms problems, violence, and deaths, I should now be inclined to think that if the feds do this everywhere, we are going to suddenly see a different result?
The line of reasoning that we need to make it harder on the people that have done nothing wrng because of those that abuse it doesn’t pass the smell test. Why do we only hear leftards tell us that we have to accept the punishment for the crime of others when it pertains to firearms? There is no consistency. When is the last time you heard some leftard say that because someone abused one of their sacred cows that we should allow less of that sacred cow?
Who is you guys?
stogy says:
December 19, 2012 3:00 pm at 3:00 pm (UTC -4)
Still haven’t actually read Silent Spring, huh Alex? It’s much easier to cut and paste from your daily list of talking points than to actually go and and discover that they are little better than vacuous bilge (is that a mixed metaphor?)
If you had actually done your homework, you’d know that Rachel Carson actually addressed the need to continue spraying for vector control but not for agricultural use. The international ban on POPs negotiated as part of the Stockholm agreement bans its use as an agricultural insecticide, not as a means of vector control and disease prevention.
While Rachel Carson’s work is now really quite outdated, she was one of the first people to publicly predict the problems of resistance that would continue to grow if DDT and other chemicals were not used carefully. In every country that DDT was used, resistance rose very quickly (due to DDT having a hugely long half-life of 12 years, meaning it stayed around for a lot longer in the environment until them bad bugs got used to it).
CM says:
December 19, 2012 3:14 pm at 3:14 pm (UTC -4)
You’re attempting to be sarcastic and maybe even ironic, right? Alex got repeated explanations in response to this claim of his in the other thread, and choses to ignore it and keep repeating himself. He’s arguing against nobody. At least, nobody here.
Alex would have me believe that because burglars can break in through my windows, I shouldn’t lock my doors. He also continues to ignore the predominent MO of rampage killers. They don’t tend to use bombs, or poison. They’re not just “out to kill” – they usually have a specific plan and a specific need to do it in a certain way. And he also ignores the research which suggests that tighter gun laws correspond to less gun-related deaths. Ignore and repeat, ignore and repeat.
stogy says:
December 19, 2012 4:24 pm at 4:24 pm (UTC -4)
So junior reaches for a gun… no wait. It’s locked in a secure cabinet by law. Ammunition is kept separately, so even if he could have got a weapon, it wouldn’t have been much use. He reaches for a knife instead. Mom is able to fight off junior for a bit. She screams. Neighbors hear. They call the police. Sirens. Junior runs outside, leaving Mom pretty badly injured. Junior runs to the school where he confronts a teacher. She backs away, calling for help. Two teachers come running. Together they manage to disarm him, although some minor injuries are sustained. The police arrive and take him into custody.
So the guy snapped. But people can move away from knives more easily than guns, and there is often more time to react or call for help. And there are possibilities for disarming a knife wielder that just don’t happen with guns. So while no law would have stopped this insane person from doing harm, they sure as hell can impact on the scale of that harm.
Hot!
6 
10
CM says:
December 19, 2012 4:32 pm at 4:32 pm (UTC -4)
Which was demonstrated on the very same day in China.
Poosh says:
December 19, 2012 5:12 pm at 5:12 pm (UTC -4)
MY GODS. The libtards have been taking extra retard-pills today.
It is actually stressful.
CM says:
December 19, 2012 5:31 pm at 5:31 pm (UTC -4)
Surely Shipman has a protégé who can relieve that stress for you?
AlexInCT says:
December 19, 2012 5:31 pm at 5:31 pm (UTC -4)
I actually read it as a teenager Stogy, I was real hard core into science and already knew I was going to study engineering, because I like logic, and I realized as I read that pile of tripe, even back then, that it was very little science and a ton of emotional nonsense, intended to scare people. This was when these people where telling us the ice age was coming and we needed to get a one world government with totalitarian power to save us from that. Guess what these people are saying these days? Carson’s tactics are alive and well today too. Here is a pertinent review:
Sounds a lot like the bullshit that the people that tell us unless we let a collectivist wealth redistributionist tyrannical one world government control our movement and access to energy we are going to end up living in water world, do with their “science”.
AlexInCT says:
December 19, 2012 5:41 pm at 5:41 pm (UTC -4)
Maybe if junior is as stupid as you are. Shit, you could have even had Santa Claus pop in to kung-fu fight junior, and it would be about as believable as your nonsense and desperate scenario. As I have already pointed out, if the story about mom being on the verge of committing him, I am certain she took precautions to keep him away from her firearms. And yet, he got to them, making your dubious scenario fall flat on its face.
I can think of a dozen ways of the top of my head, not a one requiring any violence or much effort, of how junior could have gotten around any precautions to keep him away from guns. Either from mom or elsewhere, if I wanted to. Evil or crazy people do not have to be as stupid or incompetent as your average liberal really is. The easiest thing to do, just of the top of my head, would be to simply feed mommy some of junior’s anti-psychotics, till she was nice and unbalanced, and then take advantage of that. I would not be surprised we find out something exactly like that happened.
AlexInCT says:
December 19, 2012 5:49 pm at 5:49 pm (UTC -4)
OH BULLSHIT, CM!
I got nothing but the same old tired tripe that comes up every damned time people like you see a tragedy they can exploit. You still R-E-F-U-S-E to provide me with that fool proof system that you pretend if enacted will stop tragedies like this from happening again. I believe that isn’t because you know there isn’t one, I am sure you like the other idiots that want it have convinced yourselves it will work, but because it boils down to basically disarming the population. I didn’t even bother with your Australia example because it was so moronic and ignored the real facts and date to make a political point, as others that debunked it for you, showed. Excuses & propaganda =/= explanations, CM. That’s why they are being ignored.
I will repeat it again: in every place where the liberals got the gun grabbing they wanted – Detroit, Washington D.C, N.Y.C, L.A, and Chicago – violence and death have gone up. That’s because the only people armed are the agents of the state and the criminals. The poor law abidng and disarmed citizens are being terrorized, ad the police is always minutes away when seconds count. So explain to me why if the feds do more of this, which is the solution you people want, things will suddenly not just be different this time, but this whole scheme will actually work.
CM says:
December 19, 2012 6:00 pm at 6:00 pm (UTC -4)
Except you keep spectacularly failing to demonstrate it.
CM says:
December 19, 2012 6:18 pm at 6:18 pm (UTC -4)
Not at all. It’s all there. The rationale is clearly explained, and yet you keep pretending people think they can solve “crazy and evil”. As explained, you’re not responding to anything anyone here is actually saying. It’s the same old thng.
And, again, using personal abuse only further undermines your comments.
There is no fool proof system. Who on earth has suggested there is? But there is a wie variety of choices, which is my main point in all of this. You keep putting up ridiculous comments like that in order to pretend there are no choices. Ludicrous.
Again, this just illustrates that seem unable to understand the responses you get. You seem to be seeing a whole lot of different words.
And there we go with that same tired straw man argument again. Insanity.
Riiiiiight. Of course it was. Don’t even need to deal with it.
Awesome.
Ah, right, you mean “Alex facts”.
What date did I ignore Alex? And what political point am I making?
I’ve not seen it debunked. Where? I put up a link which goes through various studies. Has someone demonstrated that they’re all wrong?
Where have I put up excuses and/or propaganda?
Again, what are you talking about?
“You people”. That’s always an excellent sign of someone that isn’t even interested in a discussion.
I’ve never advocated simply banning guns. Again you rely on making shit up because you’re incapable of being part of any sort of reasonable and rational adult discussion.
I’m certainly willing to look at your examples. Please provide the evidence of causation to support your claims.
AlexInCT says:
December 19, 2012 7:29 pm at 7:29 pm (UTC -4)
Actualy, you keep failing to ge it because you are fanatically devoted to the nanny state’s cause, CM.
CM says:
December 19, 2012 7:40 pm at 7:40 pm (UTC -4)
What’s to “get”? I “get” that you rely on insinuations, allegations, and accusations (and I’m-willing-to- bets) and treat them as “fact”. As you never get beyond that level of consideration, what else is left?
That you think I’m “fanatically devoted to the nanny state’s cause” is yet another example of you seemingly being unable to get beyond a superficial and simplistic understanding of……well, anything.
mrblume says:
December 19, 2012 7:52 pm at 7:52 pm (UTC -4)
They don’t have to be, but sometimes they are. Sometimes they are even actual liberals. So the policy foils the stupid killers, which exist, ergo benefit proven. How do you like that for logic.
Mississippi Yankee says:
December 19, 2012 7:59 pm at 7:59 pm (UTC -4)
MY
CM
Not at all CM. It was quite obvious to me that Alex was setting up a Leftard Mastubatorium for you and your little friends to jerk-off in.
Did you have the proverbial “Happy Ending”?
AlexInCT says:
December 19, 2012 8:23 pm at 8:23 pm (UTC -4)
That’s because every one of you libs is dancing around the fact that there simply is no way to stop crazy or evil.. Instead all you have done is push even more of the same failed policies, always punishing the people that did not do anything bad, as if that will this time finally work and prevent bad or evil people from doing horrible things. Look, I get that you are desperate to reestablish your security cocoon after this horrible event. I will even admit that you might actually believe that gun grabbing will make that so. But the data proves, without any possibility of doubt or refutation, that the places with the most draconian laws, be they firearm related or otherwise, all have far higher crime and death rates, even when you only look at those related to fire arms. So what is going to make it different this time? This is more of the same stupid shit Krugman did with the stimulus. It didn’t fail, it was not big enough!
So why is it personal abuse, I assume in the sense that it is an insult instead of something sexual, to point out that you are offering no new solution, and that it will not make a difference? Even an incremental one, and especially at the cost to freedom tied to it.
Exactly!
Those of you that pretend that denying law abiding citizens their constitutional 2nd amendment rights, all so you can pretend your gun grabbing will this time solve a problem you yourself just pointed out has no solution, sure as hell seem to be doing just that. If the draconian gun confiscation your side wants will never stop it anyway, why should I willingly give up my rights, my ability to defend myself, and risk the wrath of a pathetic and petty collectivist government, just so people like you can pretend things are better? Fuck that.
The only choices I have seen from all you leftists have involve me losing my freedoms, rights, ability to protect myself, and amount to punishing me for the crimes of others, all so people like you can pretend things got safer. Offer a choice that does not involve even more draconian firearm restrictions that will only serve to disarm law abiding citizens. I have seen none of those.
If the choice involves more violations of my second amendment rights, and I repeat, that’s all you and your fellow collectivists are offering, then I am not pretending there are no choices. There are no choices. Period.
Sure is ludicrous that I keep having to point out that the supposed choices your ilk want to discuss, already live in the biggest liberal bastions in this country, all have resulted in horribly detrimental outcomes that directly contradict your mantra that more gun control will make things better.
I understood them perfectly. I refuse them because they are both unacceptable and prove not to work. Let me type real fucking slow for you, and maybe, just maybe, this time it will sink in: we do not need more restrictive fire arms laws, because that model DOES NOT WORK. The places in with the most draconian laws in this country – Detroit, Washington D.C, L.A, Chicago, and N.Y.C, all liberal strongholds – also have the highest crime and homicide rates, both firearms related and otherwise. So you will pardon me, that based on this empirical and indisputable data that zero tolerance rules produce more crime and deaths, I simply refuse to consider your request we now do more of the same at a federal level. I am not insane. I do not expect that this time, because of magic, the result would be different.
I must have read it elsewhere then. But the facts, when you don’t get them from the lefty talking points you linked but are actually looked at logically, is that the numbers tell a different story than the one the gun grabbers are pretending they do. First off, Australians are not Americans and have no second amendment protecting their rights. We do. We would be fools to let our government violate the very protection our forefathers put into place to protect us from abusive government. You might not care about this because as a typical lefty you can never find any fault in anything collectivist governments have done. Be it mass murder, the imprisonment of billions, countless wars, and the abuse of people that dared to point out their governments where failures. I however will never give up that right.
Second, the statistics show that violent deaths, with or WITHOUT firearms, where already trending down in Australia before the law was passed. There was a bump upwards in the years immediately following the law’s passage, but after that homicides started trending down yet again. And yes, homicides with firearms went down by the largest percentage. But this doesn’t tell me that the confiscation of firearms was responsible for any of the decline. What the numbers show me is that denied firearms, people chose OTHER ways to commit murder. My proof is in the fact that total homicides went down a by a percentage far smaller than homicides with firearms, clearly showing that people just switched to other means to commit murder. I am having a hard time finding statistics for crime in general in Australia in this same period. My suspicion is that that jumped once the people got disarmed, including crime with firearms,d thus there is no big desire to put that out there. I for one refuse to however be told I have to live in a place where I can not own any firearms. Fuck that. Also your suicide statistics fail to show that denied guns people picked other means to kill themselves. You didn’t stop the deaths, you only disarmed the people and left them ripe for abuse from cmnas, or worse, their government.
I am absolutely not interested in any discussion where I am told I need to give up even more of my rights, my freedoms, and my ability to protect myself by gun grabbers. The laws in my state are already amongst the most draconian in this union, and yet, I read stories about how practically every weekend we have people get shot in our urban areas here in CT. Not to mention that this monster murdered 27 people in a “gun free” zone. At least not until you explain to me why when the biggest liberal bastions, with the most draconian laws possible, also have the highest crime and homicide rates, letting the feds do the same to everyone, will this time make a difference.
Bring something else to the table and we can discuss. As the heading of this post says: you an not legislate away evil and/or crazy people’s ability to do horrible things. Punishing those that have done nothing wrong because of evil or crazy people is not an option. Violating the 2nd amendment is not acceptable.
AlexInCT says:
December 19, 2012 8:45 pm at 8:45 pm (UTC -4)
I think we need to pass laws to prevent agents of our government to own guns after stories like this one. But I get told I need to depend on these people for protection…..
Mississippi Yankee says:
December 19, 2012 9:01 pm at 9:01 pm (UTC -4)
Alex, I may be overstepping my bounds but I noticed that the time stamp on your link is from TODAY. This leaves me to conclude that “Fast and Furious” guns are still out there. Killing the good, the bad and the ugly. Many of which, news reports have told us, were children too.
Not to put too finer point on the EVIL associated with that entire program.
CM says:
December 19, 2012 9:07 pm at 9:07 pm (UTC -4)
LOL – that’s a “glass half full” approach if ever I’ve seen one.
CM says:
December 19, 2012 9:21 pm at 9:21 pm (UTC -4)
I give up on this Alex, you’re just repeating yourself all over again. I’m not going to do the same because it’s obviously pointless and you’ll just continue to refuse to understand. You’ve pretended to answer everything, but you’ve actually answered nothing because you’re arguing against an imaginary position. While it’s fascinating that you’d think it was worthwhile, it gets boring pretty quickly. Good luck.
Mississippi Yankee says:
December 19, 2012 10:29 pm at 10:29 pm (UTC -4)
No matter what “they” say about you (sometimes it makes me blush) I appreciate that you have a sense of humor.
stogy says:
December 19, 2012 11:38 pm at 11:38 pm (UTC -4)
How was this unbelievable? It happened in China last week. Knives are more difficult to handle, slower to kill, easier to avoid (putting a table between you and a gunman isn’t going to slow him/her down at all), and more easily overpowered. Who’d win 90% of the time in a fight between a man with a gun and a man with a knife?
And certainly junior could have popped a couple of pills in momma’s tea, but then he takes the bottle of pills to the local school (a secure building) and…
Even assuming he managed to get in, there are so many more potential points for intercession here that the risks to students with junior and his bottle of pills (while real) are extremely small. You’re reaching Alex, and it’s not pretty.
I was really hoping you’d say this. What are you actually arguing here? See if you follow it through, I think what you are saying the laws on gun ownership are ineffectual in preventing weapons from falling into the hands of the mentally ill. A first option is that you are arguing for the status quo: accepting that gun massacres will continue to happen. I find that argument repugnant. It means accepting that innocent deaths are an unavoidable part of modern societies, and that we shouldn’t do anything to stop them (unlike roads, where for example we have introduced speed limits and seat belts).
Now if the US wants to address gun massacres, based on your argument, then either an increase in gun ownership is warranted (whereby pretty much everyone carries at all times), or a huge reduction in the number and variety of weapons available to everyone is warranted. It’s only the latter that will really have an effect on the number and lethality of gun massacres. Increasing gun ownership only increases the chance that weapons will fall into the hands of the criminally insane.
stogy says:
December 19, 2012 11:59 pm at 11:59 pm (UTC -4)
It would be great to see where you got your data on that – particularly for New York and DC.
The FBI has crimes involving firearms decreasing in 2011 in DC by 22%, in New York decreasing by 14%, California decreasing by 3% and Illinois increasing by 4%. New York’s murder rate was expected to fall below 400 this year for the first time in decades, and DC’s below 100. On the other hand, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Arkansas, North Dakota all saw increases of double digits (NK by 50%).
I’d be interested to know how this fits your theory.
Mississippi Yankee says:
December 20, 2012 12:53 am at 12:53 am (UTC -4)
I deliberately left out your last sentence;
Because all that straw in a heated argument could catch fire. You disingenuous little man.
My dear St. Ann has a piece up that actually sites studies done concerning mass killings.
Luckily, some years ago, two famed economists, William Landes at the University of Chicago and John Lott at Yale, conducted a massive study of multiple victim public shootings in the United States between 1977 and 1995 to see how various legal changes affected their frequI deliberately left out your last sentence;
Their study controlled for age, sex, race, unemployment, retirement, poverty rates, state population, murder arrest rates, violent crime rates, and on and on.
In it she brings up no less than 7 cases where these types of vile acts could have escalated to horrific proportions but weren’t allowed. She also notes:
Would it be possible to see where you obtained the figures from your comment just above this one?
The reason I ask is that I seem to remember reading, on more than one occasions, that NYC was reviling Chicago and Detroit for murders in 2012. And although Baltimore isn’t DC their murder rate, per capita, is astounding.
Oh and I “wonder” about [Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Arkansas, North Dakota all saw increases of double digits] also. But as DCAV&V has proven I have been wrong before.
hist_ed says:
December 20, 2012 1:40 am at 1:40 am (UTC -4)
Been out of these part a while, but have to wade in on this one. I am a gun owner. I have a carry permit. I know that the Second Amendment protects, above all, a political right-the right to resist tyranny.
Alex, when Salinger said:
He got it right. The real villain is, of course, the nut job who pulled the trigger. A close second is the mom. She had someone living in her house that she was actively working to commit and she let that person have access to her guns. I have kids, my guns are locked. If one of my sons grow up to be so nutso that at 20 I think I need to have him committed, I am going to have fucking Fort Knox for a gun safe. We don’t yet know how mom secured her guns (or if she did) but it obviously wasn’t fucking good enough.
My guns, in their nice secure safe, are kept loaded. Not much good if they aren’t when the bad guys come knocking.
Oh and hey gun nuts (I count myself among you): Denying that guns are more dangerous than knives in the hands of a psycho is simply ignorant. We mock gun control freaks all the time because they think the .223 is “high powered” and talk about the shoulder thing that goes up. The fact that guns are so common in the US does increase the (successful) suicide rate, does make occasional domestic disputes more deadly and has a host of other effects. It also acts as a deterrent to crime, frequently ends crimes before they can be completed, puts food on the table and gives me a really great way to work out my job stress. Gotta talk about the good and the bad. Acknowledge both sides when you discuss.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 5:57 am at 5:57 am (UTC -4)
Actually, it wasn’t my argument. It was Alex’s. I was just taking it to its logical conclusion. There were only three possible outcomes from the argument Alex made – he said that gun laws are ineffective at keeping guns out of the hands of madmen, and there is nothing that could be done to stop them, including gun safes. I presented each of the possible actions based on Alex’s conclusions. If you can think of another, then please add it. I would be genuinely interested. And I am quite tall.
The Landes and Lott papers are classic examples of an inductive error. Once you look a little closer, none of their contentions hold. There are quite a few papers that take apart their arguments, but start with this one - it’s open access and pulls out some of the main weaknesses.
The stats I quoted were from the FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2011. The New York under 400 story was widely reported across the States and internationally in both conservative and liberal media outlets. Try the Economist. And here’s the DC under 100 story I read on NBC a couple of weeks back. I note that the reasons for the change are complex, not simply stricter gun laws. But it shows some of the nonsense that is being put out in the name of debate – that gun crimes are out of control in stricter gun law states is a fallacy.
I think hist_ed is starting from a good place in terms of analyzing the pros and cons. To take it a little further, what is the best possible social good that can be obtained from use and/or restrictions on gun access? What are the ways that the risks can best be reduced? That may mean that some restrictions will be placed on ownership of guns, on right to carry concealed, and magazine size. It also may mean compromise on the part of gun opponents. I am worried that the debate will just end up with another round of “they’re gonna come’n take our guuuns!” which just goes nowhere.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 7:39 am at 7:39 am (UTC -4)
Alex, your comment on Rachel Carson contained so many fallacies I don’t know where to begin. I am pretty pressed for time, so I’ll hand over to my wonderful friend Bug Girl, who did an excellent take down of the “Carson was worse than Hitler” argument way back in 2007.
The critique you posted of her work:
I don’t worship the ground that Carson walked on. I consider her a pioneer acting within the scientific limitations of her time, and a major influence on the better science that came later. I am glad that we have stronger environmental restrictions and better research on pesticide use. Where I am posted right now (a lower-middle income country outside the US), there aren’t such restrictions, and there are massive health problems in communities where pesticides have been systematically overused for decades. She wasn’t so far wrong on resistance, which was one of the main reasons why DDT was discontinued for malaria management (rather than your fictional ban) and she did actually support the controlled use of DDT in vector control and disease management, at least until better alternatives could be developed, so worse than Hitler she certainly wasn’t. But driven by an agenda, she certainly was, meaning that her work did lack balance.
It’s also worth noting that most of those who worked on the edited book you linked to were also not scientists (Meiners is an economist), so I would postulate that they had other interests in mind (pushing an anti-environmental agenda?) in publishing the book. I gather you haven’t turned your “skeptical” gaze on this book either. Otherwise you would also find it problematic.
You finish by attacking the “warmists”, arguing that they are all pushing a “collectivist wealth redistributionist tyrannical one world government control”. Given how badly you did when you last argued on global climate change policy, I really think you should let that one lie.
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 8:12 am at 8:12 am (UTC -4)
Yes MY, practically all of the Fast & Furious guns are still out there and being used by the cartels to terrorize the people. The only ones recovered so far are the ones occasionally dropped at crime scenes. The new Mexican government, hard core left-wingers, has been hard at work helping Team Obama burry as many of these stories as possible, and has given up on what the previous government correctly labeled a blatant act of war. And an act of war it was. Agents of the US government transferred an enormous amount of incredibly powerful and deadly automatic firearms to the drug cartels that where at war with the Mexican government, without informing said government and in violation of Mexican sovereignty, under the pretense that it was part of some investigation, only so they could do what they just did after the Newtown tragedy: capitalize on the deaths to push for more gun grabbing.
BTW, the silence in the LSM and from the left on Obama’s many such violations of sovereign nations, is incredibly telling to me. Obama has made Boosh look like a fucking piker. Back when Boosh was in charge the left and LSM where screaming bloody murder and demanding we get permission from the UN for everything. Today Obama’s drones kill people, including what under Bosh would have been called innocent children, everywhere, and the UN is never consulted. Operations in Libya, Syria, and a ton of other places most Americans have never heard about, including the “Fast & Furious” one in Mexico, blatantly violate those nation’s sovereign rights, every single one of them without UN approval, I add. And all we get is excuses or people pretending nothing is happening.
At this point, after the reaction to the shooting tragedy at this school, anyone that still doubts that this administration was desperate for any kind of crisis that would cause emotional reactions, so they could use that to sway public opinion in favor of allowing them to shit all over the second amendment, anyone still defending the “Fast & Furious” operation as something other than a government sanctioned act of war to create such a crisis, is a fucking moron.
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 8:28 am at 8:28 am (UTC -4)
Let’s start with this article, which sadly again is one done by the media outside of the US, because ours is hell bent on avoiding these facts.
Note that California, because of the huge violence in L.A and other such leftard controlled urban areas, ends up with the big prize for total counts. D.C however, has the per capita highest rate. These numbers are older too, and if you think you can focus on the fact that in 2009 they were trending downwards, here is some more recent facts. You can conduct the same exercise for NYC.
BTW, take the information from any study that solely focuses on homicides with a grain of salt. The reason they focus only on deaths is done, on purpose, so they can avoid talking about the fact that when you look at all the violence, these numbers are astronomically high in the places with the most draconian gun laws. Also, and especially when looking at aggregated statistics that do not break down by demographics, make sure the numbers are not polluted by the addition of suicides. Another practice used by those that want to show super high firearm death numbers when they want to scare you into thinking firearms are a big problem in the US.
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 8:42 am at 8:42 am (UTC -4)
Who did this hist_ed? I believe that my argument has consistently been to simply point out that you can not prevent evil or crazy people from doing bad things, and any and all attempts to do so anyway serves only to punish and disarm the law abiding citizens exercising their constitutional rights, like me and you. There are already so many laws to stop things like this from happening on the books, that I am certain everyone is a law breaker on a daily basis. And yet, these tragedies keep happening.
We already have laws that tell firearm owners they need to secure their firearms. We already have laws that prevent those deemed unsuitable, like criminals and crazy people, from getting any firearms. We have laws against murder or violence of any kind. We even have laws declaring places like schools “gun free zones”, for Christ’s sake! all these laws, and they still didn’t stop this tagedy. So now I am being told I need to give up my 2nd amendment right so these people can pretend that will make a difference. Fuck them.
BTW, Sally’s comment about a locked cabinet making a difference is nothing but hot air, because, as I pointed out, the mother was certain to have a locked cabinet, considering how many firearms she had. It is the law here in CT. If she didn’t, we would have heard that by now.
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 8:56 am at 8:56 am (UTC -4)
You are a fucking liar on top of being an idiot Sally. Gun safes and trigger locks are the law in CT.
balthazar says:
December 20, 2012 9:05 am at 9:05 am (UTC -4)
http://www.lwcbooks.com/articles/edgedweapons.html
A summary, in short, according to FBI statistics.
Subject shot, 10% die from their wounds
Subjects stabbed, 30% die from their wounds
Thanks and have a nice day.
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 9:08 am at 9:08 am (UTC -4)
Oh, please. She cherry picked data, hid the stuff that contradicted the narrative she wanted to convey, and then capitalized on an emotional writing style to scare a bunch of nincompoops into going along with there nonsense. She killed millions. Even some of the enviros no longer refute that.
You can keep pushing the narrative Stogy, but Carson, like Margaret Sanger whom worshipped at the altar of eugenic and was a racist, are responsible for the deaths of tens, if not hundreds, of millions, because of politically motivated claptrap passed of as science. Just like the AGW cult of today, they have an agenda and have invented the “emotionally motivated or consensus science” to give it legitimacy. Progressives lied, and people died. In the millions as usual.
salinger says:
December 20, 2012 9:34 am at 9:34 am (UTC -4)
Yeah – well I can read. just another instance of Allie going off half cocked. I won’t hold my breath waiting for an apology for another demonstrably misinformed comment.
Poosh says:
December 20, 2012 10:24 am at 10:24 am (UTC -4)
Not too sure if this was lost or not, but Harold Shipman, who killed up to 260 people in the UK over the past few decades was not doing it by accident or with good intentions – he was a serial killer, who intentionally killed his patients and was never detected until he cocked up, when he tried to get one of his victim’s life insurance or some such.
The point being the most potent murderer in the UK was a practising, respected, loved, doctor. Not a gun-wielding maniac. I say this to put into prospective the fact that the UK does have low gun-crime rates (keep in mind some of our gun-crime stats include Airifles, and weaker “one shot only” pistols.)
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 10:41 am at 10:41 am (UTC -4)
Shit Alex. The fact that there was never an international ban on vector spraying of DDT and the fact that had DDT been continuously used it would be almost completely useless by now due to resistance blowing an almighty hole in your argument, you’re still arguing this.
This is why I quit coming here before. You are absolutely incapable of building a sound argument. There is really nothing going on in your feeble mind that doesn’t fit in with your radical twisted view of the world.
What a fucking tool.
Hot!
5 
5
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 10:45 am at 10:45 am (UTC -4)
Balthazar:
Have another look at this argument and see if you can tell me what’s wrong with it.
(And just btw, I don’t really trust that link of yours. Have you got something more solid?)
hist_ed says:
December 20, 2012 12:42 pm at 12:42 pm (UTC -4)
Why are you certain? I’m not. I am really curious. I know some gun owners who don’t secure things as well as they should. Even if she had some sort of locks on them, it is obvious that whatever precautions she took were insufficient. Irresponsible gun owners are bad. There are bloggers and writers out there who have a knee jerk reaction to defend any gun legal gun owners. They shouldn’t. We need to be better than that-when we see people acting like jerks or dangerously, the gun folks need to step up and call them out.
At a little target shooting event, I once saw they guy acting as rangemaster (ex-army firearm instructor) for our group punch someone who was being irresponsible with his guns (we had brought some beer for after the shoot, this guys started drinking his right away then got belligerent when we told him he wasn’t shooting today). I was simply going to leave, but, as did every other person there, completely supported the rangemaster in excluding this idiot. You wouldn’t tolerate someone acting dangerously on the range, we need to behave the same way in the public sphere.
Until I get told that the whack job spent an hour with power tools defeating a gun safe, I am going to assume that mom was irresponsible.
But I completely agree that banning a few types of semi auto rifles or making it super double illegal to have guns within 684.3 feet of school is not going to help one bit.
ilovecress says:
December 20, 2012 12:50 pm at 12:50 pm (UTC -4)
Holy shit -Alex linked to the guardian.
hist_ed says:
December 20, 2012 12:50 pm at 12:50 pm (UTC -4)
Oh and as an aside, school design is really getting worse for these situations. Y’all know I’m a teacher. We got a new building last year. The old school had its drawback, but the walls were two layers of brick, most of them also covered by two layers of metal filled with crap (lockers). The doors had small, easily covered windows and all windows had blinds. Each room had an external fire escape (essentially a big window that opened).
The classrooms in my new building are like fishbowls. Lots of windows, interior and exterior. The doors to each wings are mostly glass (easily shot out, so these door are useless to stop people) and we are barred from having any blinds or coverings on the interior windows. The windows to the outside are small-yeah some of my kids could crawl through them, but it would take a while to evacuate.
In the case of a campus shooter, we are supposed to get someone out to lock the main hallway doors (the ones that are almost all glass) and then cower in our fishbowls and wait for doom.
I really am not sure if I would carry if there was a law in the state authorizing it in school. I think I’d want a fast open combination pistol safe in my room-wouldn’t let the kids know it was there.
hist_ed says:
December 20, 2012 12:53 pm at 12:53 pm (UTC -4)
Aid agencies do not fund DDT. For the poorest nations, international aid is most or all of their anti-malarial efforts.
I am also sure that the 30 million dead people killed by malaria in the last few decades are, each and every one of them, quite happy to know that they died so that DDT could be remain potent as it sits on the shelves and isn’t used much.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 1:10 pm at 1:10 pm (UTC -4)
[Sigh]. hist_ed. Do a little more reading on this. Aid agencies (including USAID and the WHO) have and do provide funds for the use of DDT for indoor residual spraying. Don’t confuse a ban on agricultural use of DDT (bad because it promotes resistance) with vector control (good when part of a comprehensive well-managed strategy).
The big issue is and has always been resistance – use DDT carelessly and it becomes useless within a few years (because it has a half life double any of the alternatives). This is why many governments began switching over to pyrethroids and other alternatives in the 60s and 70s (as they should have). DDT is most effective when periodically phased in and out of a program, and other means of vector control are used in tandem.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 1:15 pm at 1:15 pm (UTC -4)
Alex still hasn’t actually thought through the implications of his own argument. Neither Sally (heh! Sorry Sally) nor I are arguing that a gun safe would have necessarily made a difference.
Start thinking Alex. This is your chance to actually show me that you are capable of thinking through a whole argument, rather than misrepresenting my position or reverting to your list of fundy talking points.
Poosh says:
December 20, 2012 1:18 pm at 1:18 pm (UTC -4)
I know nothing about DDT but am confused as to how this somehow became an argument … even though it seems to have been my fault.
In regard to Australia it is absolutely NOT the case that the ban caused a decline in firearm violence or deaths. The fact is there was already a decline prior to the ban. The decline occurred PRIOR to the increased bans. Claims otherwise are not being honest. It is possible the ban sped up the decline, of course.
I don’t think one should conflate gun regulation, or control, with the outright ban of such weapons. In addition state-by-state differences in law make things even more problematic. I’d be curious to see detailed, intelligent, state-by-state analysis.
There’s nothing wrong with gun regulation, I don’t think that many conservatives think gun regulation is bad, after all I doubt many conservatives think you should be allowed to own a machine gun. Or an RPG.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 1:51 pm at 1:51 pm (UTC -4)
Hi Poosh, Sorry – every time I see the Rachel Carson = Hilter argument I get all my buttons pushed. It’s about the most stupidly fallacious argument to appear in the past 5 years, and it deserves to be challenged every time. I’ll drop it if Alex stops saying the stupid.
You’re right about the lack of data. And the decline predating the ban. But the fact is that Australia hasn’t had a gun massacre since Port Arthur (apart from a mentally ill gun club member/university student killing two other students – which isn’t counted as a massacre) could mean that it has worked. But how do you prove a negative? I spend quite a bit of time in Australia, and I have noticed not so much a decline in guns, but a decline in gun culture – ownership was never high, but is now only about 6%. Most people are quite shocked at the idea they could or should own a gun. People still die in fights. There are glassing at bars. But deaths are rare.
I also find it interesting that the NRA a couple of years back actually manipulated the Australian data to show that there had been an increase in gun deaths (someone actually posted it here a couple of years back). And there was even an e-mail in circulation with a policeman quoted saying gun violence was out of control – except he and his data were both completely made up. The Australian attourney general had ask for the NRA to take the page down.
You’re right about Dr Shipman, of course. He is certainly the biggest (known) serial killer. And he didn’t need guns to do it. But I don’t think anyone here is arguing that stricter gun laws will prevent all serial killings. What it may do is reduce homicide rates – particularly in domestic violence situations – and the evidence we have points to tougher regulations working. Australia was lucky that a conservative PM introduced the gun control laws, which really reduced the politics involved. I still think it was one of Howard’s greatest achievements. It took courage.
balthazar says:
December 20, 2012 2:12 pm at 2:12 pm (UTC -4)
Other than the fact you don’t like it? There’s nothing wrong with it. The argument was which is more deadly when assaulted with it. The numbers dont lie in this case, of the people attacked with a knife vs a gun, 30% die as opposed to 10%. I suspect that the number may be slightly skewed because of self inflicted accidents, but other than that. Facts is Facts.
BTW that number was pulled out of the UCR on the FBI website. you can go there and get all the numbers you want.
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 2:29 pm at 2:29 pm (UTC -4)
What a pile of bullshit. This nonsense is what you get when people that have no clue try to pretend they are smart enough to understand what they don’t.
First of all, when you make it so cost ineffective that it is worthless, it is OK to say that DDT was banned. Period. The manufacturers in Europe and the US stopped making it, they stopped exporting or licensing it, and nobody else could or did make it, unless it was to be used in such an ineffective way that it woulnd’t matter at all. It does you no good to be able do vector spray, which I think was also banned in Europe and the US, when that doesn’t do anything to erradicate the problem, anywhere.
DDT was used for a single decade in North America and Europe and completely eradicated the malaria mosquito. Completely. Dead. Gone. Cases of Malaria after that came from people traveling elsewhere. DDT did not make its way to the third world countries, you know where the brown and black people live until the early 70s. That’s also when the ban happened, stopping the effective use of DDT cold. Had they been able to complete the spraying process, the malaria mosquito would have been eradicated in but a decade there too, and DDT would no longer need to be used.
Since you do not understand how nature selects for resistances/immunities , let me point out that happens when a species has a mutation that adapts to allow it to survive some condition that generally kills that species off. These mutations happen when, for example, the eradication cycle is not run completely. Just like when people are prescribed antibiotic courses, feel better after a few days, and then stop the cycle prematurely, only to now have a resistant version of whatever viral agent was fing them up. As I pointed out, malaria was wiped out in North America and Europe because the cycle was run to its completion. It never came back despite the fact mosquitoes did. In the third world we broke the cycle, allowing for some resistant malaria virus to pop up. Then the idiots that needed excuses to justify the death sentence they put on these people used that to pretend DDT was not effective. Pure unadulterated bullshit.
Thanks for playing.
CM says:
December 20, 2012 2:37 pm at 2:37 pm (UTC -4)
Right back at ya. Aside from the blushing. ;-)
Section8 says:
December 20, 2012 2:39 pm at 2:39 pm (UTC -4)
Stogy, you are correct. Organizations like USAID do fund DDT, but it’s structured in such a way that while they don’t “ban” it, it’s pretty much been limited to a means of application that is so expensive that it’s not feasible to use it meaningfully.
http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PDACH948.pdf
I’ve emphasized their reasoning. What is “practical reasons”? How much of this DDT threat is really a threat? Yes, over extended use in counties where Malaria it is no longer a problem is an issue. I think its outright ban entirely in the States is a little nutty as there are other pests that were controlled with this, but once again the developed nations have taken a what’s good for me is good for you approach to this issue and not weighing in the benefit/risk in comparison to the problem for the region with the problem.
Fact is any way you want to spin it there have been study after study that when DDT use goes up, the Malaria cases go down.
So question is why did costs go up? Well, there was no international “ban”, but when the producers of the countries that were producing it ban it for their own use, then that tends to discourage other countries from using it. Fact is due to the panic it was more difficult to distribute, goods with traces of DDT from developing nations brought here have been turned away further putting pressure on those developing countries, etc. So while you get on Alex’s ass for assuming he’s made a statement that there was an “explicit ban” for all uses in all nations, the fact is that you are leaving out a lot of variables as well such as international pressure, increasing cost, standards of application that drive up the cost to the point where it’s not cost effective and not applied.
DDT has been shunned due to a lot of misinformation about it. I don’t even know how that can be in dispute.
As for resistance, it is correct, there has been some resistance to it. It’s also more than just killing the pest though. It’s a strong irritant to them so this idea that it was scaled down simply due to resistance isn’t really true. The bulk of it was due to the fear and pressure as a result of misinformation about the chemical in the first place.
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 2:46 pm at 2:46 pm (UTC -4)
Because if you live in CT, definitely if own a (legal/registered) AR-15, don’t have a gun safe to store it in, or are careless enough to leave it lying around, and anyone complains, your ass goes to jail? Also the fact that the LSM has not pretended gun safes or trigger locks would have made a difference. That’s because they know safes and locks are the law in CT already, and it did no good. About the only chance we have of hearing about this aspect of the story is if the LSM can spin the story to show that there was negligence on the mother’s part, so they can then make the argument that since locks and safes are not enough, people shouldn’t have guns.
Unless the mother was hiding the keys in her cooch, so that when the son came looking she got a warning, I can think of plenty of ways that this monster got around those limitations. Remember, he gunned mom down while she was sleeping, and likely took the guns while she was sleeping too. I know that a determined person can get around obstacles. Ask my dad. I was stealing his car to take it for a ride with my buddies by the age of 13. I had hundreds of copies of his keys and never needed to hard wire it. I even bypassed the security system he put (sucks for you when your kid is into electronics).
If I had been an evil or insane fuck, hell bent on killing people for whatever reason, I can categorically say that had I been thus inclined, I would have gotten to my father’s or someone else’s firearms, no matter what precautions they had taken, and barring that, had hundreds of other means at my quick disposal to cause death and carnage. There is NOTHING that can stop people like that. We can pretend we can take precautions, but it is all a pipe dream. And at some point, we simply need to say that the cost to our freedoms far exceeds the return. Yes, human life is precious, but then so are our rights and freedoms. If you are one of those people that wants to make the point that we should lose rights and issues to preserve life, say so. At least then people know they are dealing with someone that thinks trading freedoms for the illusion of security. As always is the case though, these people end up disappointed when the illusion of security is shattered, like just happened at this school.
Poosh says:
December 20, 2012 2:49 pm at 2:49 pm (UTC -4)
That’s indeed true. But it depends on the country. In the UK for example, there has been 1 and a half gun massacres since the ban of firearms. Yet there were only roughly 2 gun massacres prior to the gun ban in 1999. The UK just doesn’t have this sort of problem that other countries have – and it didn’t have it when we were armed. Looking at Australia’s gun massacres the main ones were either gang warfare (Mad Max style.. literally) or media-induced (copy cat massacres). I honestly think the MEDIA are the primary cause here.
Sensible gun regulation and control are fair enough. But I’d wager there is a lack of enforcement and lack of sensible gun regulations – not the existence of the right to bear arms.
Also, can someone explain to me why “Assault” weapons are problematic i.e worse than pistols etc? From my understanding semi-automatics are probably just as lethal as a good pistol but more wieldly. The clips contain no more than you can for a pistol no? And a rifle is hardly what I would want if I was firing in a room. Given automatic weapons are banned and would be useless anyway from my understanding).
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 3:02 pm at 3:02 pm (UTC -4)
Since I never made such a comparison, I think you might need your head examined. I pointed out that Carson sentenced millions to death by writing an emotional book, replete with shoddy pseudo-science, all in the name of saving the environment. Hitler just wanted to burn down everything. Then again, Hitler did adopt many of the things the left loves these days. The nanny state, eugenics – today disguised as women’s rights or whatever else – gun grabbing, and the vilification of a certain segment of the population.
It is only stupid and fallacious if you have an aversion to science, the real kind, not the stuff Carson did or the AGW crowd does these days, Stogy. Cherry picking the data, hiding the things that destroy your case, and using emotional appeal to scare people into adopting something, is what should be called out. The left loves to pretend they like science, but that is all it is; pretense.
I know the left hates being reminded that with a very few exceptions, most of what they have done has resulted in far more horrible unforeseen, or foreseen, circumstances, and if pointing that out makes me stupid, then I will wear the badge with honor.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 3:05 pm at 3:05 pm (UTC -4)
No. It wasn’t. It’s use in agriculture was banned. Not always effectively. But it was never banned in most developing countries (including just about all of Africa) for vector control. So bullshit on this one.
Alex, it has been manufactured in India for the last 50 years by a company called HIL. So bullshit on this one too.
Yes. But it was done in a way that was supported by a powerful public health intervention that included the draining of swamps, indoor spraying, and other measures. It wasn’t just DDT but a very solid well-planned strategy involving other pesticides – not just DDT. Something that many developing don’t have the systems of governance for. So wrong. Bullshit on this one too.
Yeah. Where I live now, you patronizing little prick – and there is malaria here too. Many other countries began using DDT in the 1950s. Sri Lanka from 1945. So bullshit. Beginning to see a pattern here?
Sri Lanka has introduced it and removed it several times in the past five decades due to resistance, not because of any bans. India has restrictions on its use allowing it only to be sold for public health measures. The WHO strongly advises its use only in tandem with other public health activities to limit problems of resistance. So wrong again. No ban on public health. Just more Alex bullshit.
Sri Lanka stopped spraying in 1969 when resistance began to emerge. They swtiched to malathion in 1973 to combat resistance. Then back to DDT recently.
Actually, I understand resistance very well. The malaria cycle has only ever been broken in countries with very strong public health systems, allowing multiple strategies in tandem to work together. This is why the US and other countries were able to wipe out malaria quickly. On the other hand, the massive amounts used in agriculture across the developing world meant that the amount of time available before resistance emerged was very short. We had a powerful tool in DDT, and we wasted it.
But you’ve missed all the important stuff about resistance – the different kinds, how mosquitoes respond to different chemical compounds, cross resistance, localized and regionalized varieties, behaviors. All of that. This is the important stuff in understanding how malaria needs to be dealt with. Because you are talking bullshit. Again.
You lost on every point again Alex. I would love to actually have a real conversation with you. Stop using the talking points and start thinking for yourself. It’s beyond pathetic.
CM says:
December 20, 2012 3:16 pm at 3:16 pm (UTC -4)
I’m not sure Alex has ever had any sort of real conversation with anyone who disagreed with him. I’m sure he thinks they’re “real” though.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 3:17 pm at 3:17 pm (UTC -4)
Section 8:
That’s simply not true. They go up and down depending other public health programs, depending on levels of resistance in the mosquito population, depending on roads, rivers, rainfall, population density, whether the locals want it or not and good governance.
All of the good literature on DDT use with mosquitoes says: Look at the history of its use in an area. Phase it in and out. Focus on bed nets and indoor residual spraying. Check for behavioral resistance patter. Find out whether local communities support its use. Then use it sparingly.
Sorry, but this is just completely incorrect. It’s still as cheap as dishwater. Doing all the other stuff above is expensive and time consuming. It’s not a cheap solution at all.
As for resistance – I am talking about genetic resistance in the species, not the popular kind.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 3:25 pm at 3:25 pm (UTC -4)
That was Sowell’s argument. And he is the one who got it on the list of talking points. That you, as a fundy tool, have gladly picked up. Whether you actually mentioned it or not is immaterial, seeing as you can’t actually think for yourself.
It’s a 50 year old, very imperfect book. The science has moved on from them. We know stuff we didn’t know then. She was right about resistance. Her work led to much better research later on. She didn’t kill more people than Hitler.
Wow! Suits you! :)
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 3:36 pm at 3:36 pm (UTC -4)
DDT spraying for malaria mosquitoes, outdoors, in the areas they breed, was not banned? Really? Then why are the malaria mosquitoes not eradicated everywhere? Don’t give me that resistance bullshit. We wiped them out in Europe and North America, and have no resistant strain at all.
Note that I changed that in my post (which I had accidentally posted before being done) after I researched it, but I didn’t get it in before you replied. That it is manufactured only in India is telling though. Good for them. Note however that the point I am making is that DDT spraying, outdoors, to kill mosquitoes wholesale, is banned. What you call vectored spraying, that ineffective and costly indoor use, will never eradicate the problem. Frankly i hope the Indians do whatever it takes to deal with their malaria problem.
Oh, please. WTF? The brown and black people couldn’t do this excuse? Seriously? That’s how you are going to defend it? Could they do it today? Last I heard they tried but without the DDT it hasn’t done much.
Look, I am not going to argue that things like controlling water levels helped, but there is NO FING WAY they got rid of every swamp out there, and I believe that this new emphasis on the other pieces is done on purpose to diminish the role of DDT. This wouldn’t have anything to do with scared environmentalist types trying to cover their asses? The best way to destroy mosquito populations was and remains through pesticides, and nothing, absofuckinglotely nothing, came close to the effectiveness of DDT. If those other pesticides you speak off where even half as effective as you would like us to believe they were, then we wouldn’t be having this discussion. That’s because nobody would have cared about a DDT ban. So bullshit right back at you.
Really? And yet they were not able to eradicate their malaria mosquito population? Could that be because they were stopped right in the middle of it? Remember that discussion we had about acquiring immunity? That’s gonna happen right then and there. And spare me the phallus size jokes. Next thing you know we will be trading mom ones.
If you don’t finish the job in one clean sweep, you ARE going to get resistances. I pointed that out.
You might have a case except for I remember that they used DDT when building the Panama Canal, and it saved thousands of lives. Last I was there, and it is over 2 decades, I do not think I would count Panama amongst the places with a strong public health system.
Actually the one that seems to be avoiding the obvious, and doing so by trying to obfuscate the simple facts, is you. You only get resistance if you don’t finish the job the first time. When the DDT banning happened it interrupted that cycle in the third world, and allowed resistant mosquitoes to come into play. You can keep dancing around that all you want.
You and your butt monkey CM seem to be the only idiots that think that’s the case.
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 3:40 pm at 3:40 pm (UTC -4)
As the links I posted about Carson should have fucking clued you in moron, I get my facts about DDT and environmental things from experts in those fields. I am smart enough to know that Sowell’s expertise is in economics, and I would not consult him on DDT other than to look at the economic impcat that not eradicating malaria has had on third world countries. Thanks for putting words in my mouth though, setting up that straw man, then knowcking it dwn hard. You go girl!
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 3:43 pm at 3:43 pm (UTC -4)
Balthazar:
So if knives are a better weapon, then that’s all you’ll need to defend your house with. The pesky imperialist, repressive government? Will quake in its boots when it sees you coming with your knife. Let’s forget guns and all have knives instead!
You’re arguing that knives are a more effective killing machine based on mortality rates – but I bet you won’t reach for the knife first when you hear a window breaking downstairs… Because you know that you will have a better chance of taking someone down with a gun, with much less risk of being disarmed. Knives require skill to use properly, and for the unskilled it’s too easy to disarm someone. Guns, people practice with.
You need to include the number of attempted assaults with the data, to really know the lethality of knives vs. guns.
Thanks. I’ll check it out. I keep getting sent to a bunch of flaky websites with the same rubbish text.
CM says:
December 20, 2012 3:52 pm at 3:52 pm (UTC -4)
They don’t need to come in your window. There’s no point making things harder for them because they’ll get you anyway if they want to, so you’ll have just left your door unlocked and wide open.
AlexInCT says:
December 20, 2012 4:01 pm at 4:01 pm (UTC -4)
Oh je-ZUS! I have read plenty of science books, I got me a BS in AE and EE, and a masters in EE, love physics and math, many of those books from back when Carson wrote hers, and I never encountered such emotion driven arguments nor have I ever heard any authority say that the content of any of those books was “imperfect” because the author fudged the facts. In fact, if any author in those fields had done what Carson had, they would have been run out of the scientific community and forced to forever live in shame. There is a huge difference between your scientific hypothesis being faulty or replaced over time, and faking data and hiding information that would debunk your argument. One is the natural part of the scientific cycle, the other, in any age, is an affront to real science. I will leave it up to you to guess which one is which.
No clue if this is true or not, so I will pass. My instinct tells me not to trust someone that did what Carson did.
If that makes you sleep better at night keep saying it. To me, her unscientific and evil book, replete with falsehoods, manipulated data, and which hid information that would have debunked her false premise, made the authorities make incorrect decisions that cost millions their lives. She may not have set out to do so, but that’s what she did. The concept isn’t knew. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 4:54 pm at 4:54 pm (UTC -4)
One more time, for the dummies… er…. dummy.
Just about all of the peer reviewed literature on malaria eradication discusses the problem of resistance. I’ll cite some down the comment.
On the US eradication program, here’s the CDC (from their website):
So IRS, some aerial spraying, drainage. Just like I said. Strong public health measures. Good management. A great example of a government intervention gone right.
Some countries have. But they are countries with strong public health systems, with fairly authoritarian governments. It has nothing to do with race. Sri Lanka is back to using DDT (now that resistance has subsided) and with their superstrong public health program, malaria is way down.
They make it under licence from the WHO, apparently. It’s not an act of global resistance. It’s not illegal. Never was. They’re allowed to make it under the Stockholm Treaty.
If you had even read 1% of the peer-reviewed literature on this, you’d know that DDT was very effective in its early years (waaaaaaaay ahead of the global agricultural bans). Resistance quickly made it ineffective in many areas (still quite some time before the global agricultural bans). Many regions where agricultural spraying was widespread still have high levels of resistance. Cross resistance means that many other pesticides are much less effective as well.
Yeah. It’s clear that you have a high-school level understanding of it. You still haven’t answered the points I asked about resistance. I even linked to a nice, easy to follow guide earlier, but you weren’t up to reading it. One more time: behavioral, cross, genetic – all of them require different understandings and strategies.
Dropping a fuck-load of DDT on every field and lake between here between here and Timbuktoo will not eradicate malaria. The CDC knew that in 1948.
Er…wasn’t the Panama Canal completed in 1914? I thought DDT wasn’t invented until WW2, and then according to you, not introduced to the developing world until the 1970s. Now you’re saying 1914?
True, but…
Resistance was well underway before your non-existent ban on public health usage of DDT, the agricultural form of which came into effect in 1972. It was mainly due to massive agricultural misuse of DDT. We had a great tool. We lost it. Mostly. In 1982 Chapin and Wasserman wrote in Nature:
So there you have it. Resistance predates the ban on agricultural DDT. Poor management of the resource and its misuse in agriculture promoted resistance. If we had used it right, then we wouldn’t have Malaria today. No point in blaming Hitler… I mean Rachel Carson for that.
I think we’re pretty much done here.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 4:59 pm at 4:59 pm (UTC -4)
heh!
CM says:
December 20, 2012 5:05 pm at 5:05 pm (UTC -4)
And there’s no point in sanctions or any action to prevent Iran going nuclear. Nuclear weapons don’t kill people. That’s FACT.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 5:10 pm at 5:10 pm (UTC -4)
Yet you’re surprisingly impervious to any evidence that doesn’t match your agenda. You are about the least scientific person I have ever come across. You never admit you’re wrong. You never admit to uncertainty. You’re a complete expert on everything from social policy to physics. You don’t read any of the links I put up. You don’t follow basic principles of scientific enquiry (either inductive or deductive). You are socially argumentative. In fact, most of what you say about Rachel Carson could be completely applied to you.
It’s a total mystery how that Nobel prize has eluded you (not the peace one though).
Incidentally, it would appear that Gordon Edwards may also have overstated his case against Rachel Carson:
It goes on… definitely worth a read though.
I’m done. Deal me out.
stogy says:
December 20, 2012 5:12 pm at 5:12 pm (UTC -4)
You’ll be right as long as you have your trusty penknife. Balthazar said so!
(what’s the bet he has sunk his life’s savings into a penknife company. Dammit! Missed my chance. Again).
CM says:
December 20, 2012 8:01 pm at 8:01 pm (UTC -4)
I’ll second that.
Hot!
3 
8
CM says:
December 20, 2012 8:04 pm at 8:04 pm (UTC -4)
Planes don’t fly. People fly.
Hot!
2 
8
CM says:
December 20, 2012 8:42 pm at 8:42 pm (UTC -4)
http://www.tnr.com/blog/plank/111263/meet-john-lott-the-man-who-wants-teachers-carry-guns#
http://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2240&context=fss_papers
balthazar says:
December 21, 2012 9:42 am at 9:42 am (UTC -4)
I never said that, the sheer fact of the matter is that most people are absolutely HORRIBLE at hitting what they aim at. This is more of a factor imho in the shooting deaths. Knives are a close in weapon, and once you are that close its really easy to do a ton of damage with them.
I, on the other hand, am a very good shot, so no, i wouldnt use a knife, since i can hit, center mass, what im aiming at.
Mississippi Yankee says:
December 22, 2012 12:02 am at 12:02 am (UTC -4)
Sometimes ya just gots ta love Karma
Payback, Texas style or Law of Unintended consequences
Iconoclast says:
December 25, 2012 11:19 am at 11:19 am (UTC -4)
So much Epic Fail, it’s hard to know where to begin…
You are implying that there are currently no laws at all to regulate gun ownership when you state, “no point in sanctions or any action to prevent…”, which is insultingly stupid. Nobody is advocating taking away already existing laws, we are simply advocating against knee-jerk additional legislation that won’t necessarily make anyone any safer anyway.
Connecticut already has some of the toughest gun laws in the country, and the weapon used may already be illegal to own in that state, but those tough laws obviously didn’t prevent this tragedy from occurring, did it? Your various “open windows and unlocked doors” nonsense “arguments” utterly ignore this.
You are correct in that nuclear weapons don’t kill. After all, of all the thousands of nuclear weapons that have been created, the vanishingly small percentage that caused human death were those that were actually detonated — by other humans. The vast majority of nukes through history have merely sat in their silos and bunkers, completely inert, not harming a single person. And in all likelihood, what people tend to fear is not the spontaneous detonation of these weapons, but some mentally unhinged human getting ahold of one, or several.
If you sincerely desire to “discuss the issues” it may serve you well to be less disingenuous, if you could manage……