At least 8 people were killed and more than 60 hurt in mass shootings across the US this weekend

[Blue_State]

Probably not breaking news and should go in the gun thread.

 

[MamboDervish]

The point is Trump was trying to do something about it, . . . "

No he wasn't. The House of Representatives had crafted a comprehensive BI-PARTISAN immigration bill back in 2018 that Trump crushed with a veto threat. The only thing Trump was trying to do something about was pandering to his idiot xenophobic base with his bullshit wall, which we all knew before it was built would have no effect on border access.

Trump administration sabotage of bipartisan immigration plan ensured its demise

The Trump administration's 11th-hour strategy to sabotage a bipartisan immigration bill revealed the White House as a key obstacle to a deal to help Dreamers.

www.chicagotribune.com

Trump's "Impenetrable" Border Wall Easily Penetrated By Saws

It is almost as if this has been a bad idea all along.

www.gq.com

Smugglers Use Household Tool to Easily Penetrate Trump's 'Virtually Impenetrable' Wall

Mexican gangs are using $100 saws to remove portions of the wall in just minutes

www.rollingstone.com

Evidence shows Trump’s border wall was an embarrassing failure

The entire border wall endeavor is an obvious failure. Republicans keep pretending not to notice.

www.msnbc.com

But Trump's wall is off topic, so I'll not respond to any more thread hijacking.

 

[RAMOSS]

The wall wasn’t done yet. But Biden fixed the problem by stopping it.

The point is Trump was trying to do something about it, and if Sleepy or his veep would have bothered going to the border and listening to border agents he might have learned that that wall was a critical tool in helping them control the flow of narcotics into the country. But he didn’t give a shit. He’d rather blame guns for deaths, even though deaths from drugs dwarf those from “gun violence.”

Oh, you think the WALL could have done something. Never mind that the vast amount of the increase was under the Trump admin, and never mind a physical wall would not have helped.

You don't think the restrictions due to covid had anything to do with it?

 

[Antiwar]

Yeah, right after Sleepy stopped construction of the wall and made sure every border agent from San Diego to Brownsville had his supply of diapers and formula ready instead of handcuffs. Like I said: priorities.

^ Wants children handcuffed.

Yes, the great wall of T**** was dismantled and turned into an undocumented immigrant child daycare center.

 

[Noodlegawd]

Sounds like hogwash to me. I think a lot of kids today think we fought the British in the Civil War. Many of them are clueless.



Yeah, well, I care about it. It’s a tremendous loss in human potential, and tragedies are playing out all over the country for parents, siblings, children, friends. I think we could put a dent in the problem by executing drug dealers, starting with cartel bosses and working our way down. Mass murder is still a capital offense in this country.

It's very easy to avoid. Don't want to kill yourself with a fentanyl overdose? Don't use drugs that some criminal sold you. Not my problem. When they start sprinkling it into the water supply, then it becomes my problem, and I'll start to care.

And if we want to get rid of the problem of sociopathic criminals lacing relatively safe recreational drugs with fentanyl, we can legalize and regulate relatively safe recreational drugs and stop the useless war on them.

 

[Ahlevah]

Oh, you think the WALL could have done something.

Okay, at the risk of repeating myself, Sleepy should have tried talking to the people tasked with protecting our border. Ask yourself this: if walls don't keep people out, why did Hadrian build a wall across Britain? Why did the Chinese build the thousands of miles of the Great Wall? In more modern times, is Israel's wall effective in keeping terrorists out of the country? In the United States, does a wall reduce crossings in areas where it's been constructed, permitting border agents to focus on areas less-well protected? The answer is yes, it does:

The results speak for themselves: illegal drug, border crossings, and human smuggling activities have decreased in areas where barriers are deployed. For example:

San Diego Sector:

• In one short 12 mile section in the San Diego Sector, the wall reduced CBP manpower requirements by 150 agents every 24 hours. That is approximately a $28 million return on investment per year in salaries and benefits. These agents were redeployed to fill resource gaps in other areas of the border -- further improving our security.
• CBP’s San Diego Field Office continues to be a significant source of narcotics seizures. From FY 19 to FY 20, seizures of fentanyl, marijuana, and methamphetamine all increased, with meth seizures jumping at alarming rates in the past several years – demonstrating that the border wall is forcing drug smugglers to where we are best prepared to catch them – our ports of entry.

Yuma Sector:

• Illegal entries in areas with new border wall system plummeted over 87% in FY 20 compared to FY 19.
• In FY 19, CBP deployed a temporary barrier, which it has replaced with a permanent system, at the Sanchez Canal, which resulted in illegal entries decreasing in this area by more than 1,000 per month.
• In FY 19, in areas of older existing border fencing or barriers, Yuma Sector apprehended 12 large groups (over a 100 persons) compared to zero large groups in FY 20 with new border wall system.
  • Family Unit entries have decreased over 95%
    • FY 19: 51,961 vs. FY 20: 2,940

RGV Sector:

• In a section of RGV (Zone 1) apprehensions have decreased since the construction of the border wall system. This is a location that has never had any border infrastructure.
  • CBP has seen 79% decrease in apprehensions in this area (Zone 1) since the completion of border wall system.
  • CBP has seen a 26% decrease in narcotics seizures since the completion of border wall system in this area.
• In another section of RGV, prior to construction of the border wall system it was common to see illegal aliens running across a heavily traveled road, putting themselves and members of the community at risk.
  • Smugglers are now forced to take their groups further west into areas that are less dense with brush and easier for CBP surveillance cameras to detect illicit activity.

El Paso Sector:

• El Paso Sector has experienced a significant reduction in drug and smuggling activities in areas where the new border wall system was built.
  • Most notably, in Zones 14 and 15 of the Santa Teresa (STN) AOR where apprehensions have decreased by 60% and 81% respectively when comparing the last half of fiscal year FY 20 to the first half of FY 20.
• El Paso Station has experienced similar results from the new border wall in Zones 20 – 23, with a reduction in apprehensions of 70% during the same timeframe.

The Border Wall System is Deployed, Effective, and Disrupting Criminals and Smugglers | Homeland Security

Effective physical infrastructure works to secure our Southwest Border. Since the U.S. Border Patrol began constructing border barriers nearly 30 years ago, these barriers have proved to be a critical component in gaining operational control of the border.

www.dhs.gov

You don't think the restrictions due to covid had anything to do with it?

Nah, I think it's Putin's fault. And greedy oil companies.

 

[Ahlevah]

And if we want to get rid of the problem of sociopathic criminals lacing relatively safe recreational drugs with fentanyl, we can legalize and regulate relatively safe recreational drugs and stop the useless war on them.

Relatively safe? How about the stoners driving on our highways and killing innocent people? I guess that's not your problem either.

Crash rates jump in wake of marijuana legalization, new studies show

New research from IIHS and HLDI confirms the trend, but a separate study of injured drivers found no increase in crash risk from the drug except when combined with alcohol.

www.iihs.org

 

[TomFitz]

Whether someone commits suicide with a gun or a gram of fentanyl is of little consequence at the end of the day. And in case you weren't clear on the issue, a "gun suicide" is a form of suicide. It involves a person choosing to take their own life. It does not involve taking the life of someone else who had no chance to exercise their opinion on the matter.



I didn't say it was threadworthy. I was referring to it to indicate that the topic of the thread isn't really threadworthy by comparison to a topic about which nobody ever starts threads. How do you decide whether something is "worth starting a thread over?" Do you have any standards for that? Do you think 50+ easily preventable deaths every day caused by drunk and reckless drivers is less threadworthy than 8 people killed over the weekend in mass shootings? If not, why haven't YOU started one? Or 50 for that matter, since we surely have that many about mass shootings.

Ok, never mind about all that. I'll join the discussion YOU want to have now. So what? So what if 8 people were killed? What should we do about it? When you answer, be sure to give us a point of reference so we know you're not biased. Tell us why your solution is proportional to what you think we should do about other problems that remain unsolved.

No, you were hoping to derail the thread by diverting the topic to drunk Drivers.

You were seen through.

Comparing automobile accidents to mass shooting seeks to normalize mass shootings with false equavalanches.

 

[Ahlevah]

^ Wants children handcuffed.

I want our border agents to focus on catching people smuggling drugs into our country, and policies that discourage migrants and illegal border crossings. Sleepy seems to prefer they die crossing from Colombia to Panama in the Darien Gap.

"It would have been better to let me die”, on the other side of the Darien, hundreds survive the nightmare of death.

For hundreds of migrants waiting to reach the United States, hope is shifted to recover the bodies of their relatives.

www.latimes.com

 

[RAMOSS]

Okay, at the risk of repeating myself, Sleepy should have tried talking to the people tasked with protecting our border. Ask yourself this: if walls don't keep people out, why did Hadrian build a wall across Britain? Why did the Chinese build the thousands of miles of the Great Wall? In more modern times, is Israel's wall effective in keeping terrorists out of the country? In the United States, does a wall reduce crossings in areas where it's been constructed, permitting border agents to focus on areas less-well protected? The answer is yes, it does:

The Border Wall System is Deployed, Effective, and Disrupting Criminals and Smugglers | Homeland Security

Effective physical infrastructure works to secure our Southwest Border. Since the U.S. Border Patrol began constructing border barriers nearly 30 years ago, these barriers have proved to be a critical component in gaining operational control of the border.

www.dhs.gov

Nah, I think it's Putin's fault. And greedy oil companies.

Yes yes yes, the Trump admin , with the DHS made that claim.

It has not been shown to be true.

 

[Noodlegawd]

No, you were hoping to derail the thread by diverting the topic to drunk Drivers.

You were seen through.

Comparing automobile accidents to mass shooting seeks to normalize mass shootings with false equavalanches.

There's nothing false about the "equavalanches." What matters the most, that innocent people are killed, is precisely equivalent. Well, not equivalent actually. The drunk driving problem is far worse, and would probably be a lot easier to improve if we applied some of the same extreme penalties to it that gun control zealots want to apply to things like owning 11-round handgun magazines.

And I'm not derailing anything by pointing out the hypocrisy of people who insist that mass shootings are a national epidemic and demand stricter laws, while simultaneously having literally nothing to say about the much bigger problem. You're just agitated because you have not excuse for your double standard.

So when are you going to answer my question? Why should anyone care about 8 mass shooting deaths over the weekend, when 50+ drunk driving deaths EVERY weekend hardly ever makes the news? Why can't we just ignore the former, like you do for the latter?

 

[Ahlevah]

Yes yes yes, the Trump admin , with the DHS made that claim.

It has not been shown to be true.

If the stats are not true, rather than engaging in faulty logic by simply disparaging the source, prove it. Meanwhile, would it make you feel better to know that Biden's DHS shows apprehensions in the Southwest increased 163% from 2020 to 2021, with much of the problem concentrated in areas towards the east lacking a wall, such as the Rio Grande and Del Rio Sectors? Sleepy's agents had 1.7 million encounters last year, and in the first two months of this year, before the spring flood starts, they've already had more than 300,000. I can see why he wants to stick his head in the sand and change the subject to gun violence, or January 6th, or Putin, or climate change.

U.S. Border Patrol Southwest Border Apprehensions by Sector

Securing America's Borders

www.cbp.gov

Southwest Land Border Encounters

Securing America's Borders

www.cbp.gov

 

[RAMOSS]

If the stats are not true, rather than engaging in faulty logic by simply disparaging the source, prove it. Meanwhile, would it make you feel better to know that Biden's DHS shows apprehensions in the Southwest increased 163% from 2020 to 2021, with much of the problem concentrated in areas towards the east lacking a wall, such as the Rio Grande and Del Rio Sectors? Sleepy's agents had 1.7 million encounters last year, and in the first two months of this year, before the spring flood starts, they've already had more than 300,000. I can see why he wants to stick his head in the sand and change the subject to gun violence, or January 6th, or Putin, or climate change.

U.S. Border Patrol Southwest Border Apprehensions by Sector

Securing America's Borders

www.cbp.gov

Southwest Land Border Encounters

Securing America's Borders

www.cbp.gov

And, you know what that doesn't show? The effectiveness of walls in remote areas. You are also making the bad assumption that if you don't think a physical wall will work that you want open boarders. That is just plain silly. It's almost a bad idea that thinking a physical border will impede the flow of drugs

 

[Ahlevah]

And, you know what that doesn't show? The effectiveness of walls in remote areas.

What I know is border encounters along the southwestern border with Mexico have exploded under Biden, increasing from 430,000 in Fiscal Year 2020 to 1.7 million last year. While Biden's focused on invading Russians, we're being invaded by millions of Guatemalans, Salvadorans, Hondurans, and Mexicans. And let's not forget the drugs. Maybe you can explain the flood. Perhaps it's a side-effect of global warming? I don't think it's the result of tougher border security.

 

[RAMOSS]

What I know is border encounters along the southwestern border with Mexico have exploded under Biden, increasing from 430,000 in Fiscal Year 2020 to 1.7 million last year. While Biden's focused on invading Russians, we're being invaded by millions of Guatemalans, Salvadorans, Hondurans, and Mexicans. And let's not forget the drugs. Maybe you can explain the flood. Perhaps it's a side-effect of global warming? I don't think it's the result of tougher border security.

Tat sounds like horrible rhetoric. It is the kind of language I would expect from someone who is reacting with emotion and partisan motivations, rather than looking at something logically.

 

[Ahlevah]

Tat sounds like horrible rhetoric. It is the kind of language I would expect from someone who is reacting with emotion and partisan motivations, rather than looking at something logically.

I tend to get emotional when I see sanctimonious liberals claim they care about kids but then are silent when it comes to the ones dying from drugs or making a dangerous trek north because of Biden messaging and refusal to properly enforce our customs and immigration laws.

 

[RAMOSS]

I tend to get emotional when I see sanctimonious liberals claim they care about kids but then are silent when it comes to the ones dying from drugs or making a dangerous trek north because of Biden messaging and refusal to properly enforce our customs and immigration laws.

You know what would even be better than getting emotional. I think using facts and being rational would be.

 

[madman]

The mass shooting in Dumas, Arkansas was not the only one this past weekend

At least 8 people were killed and more than 60 hurt in mass shootings across the US this weekend​

yeah, so

it's my god damn right!


















/sarcasm

 

[Ahlevah]

You know what would even be better than getting emotional. I think using facts and being rational would be.

I’ve presented rational facts. I asked you a perfectly rational question. Why have border apprehensions skyrocketed in a year under Biden?

 

[TomFitz]

There's nothing false about the "equavalanches." What matters the most, that innocent people are killed, is precisely equivalent. Well, not equivalent actually. The drunk driving problem is far worse, and would probably be a lot easier to improve if we applied some of the same extreme penalties to it that gun control zealots want to apply to things like owning 11-round handgun magazines.

And I'm not derailing anything by pointing out the hypocrisy of people who insist that mass shootings are a national epidemic and demand stricter laws, while simultaneously having literally nothing to say about the much bigger problem. You're just agitated because you have not excuse for your double standard.

So when are you going to answer my question? Why should anyone care about 8 mass shooting deaths over the weekend, when 50+ drunk driving deaths EVERY weekend hardly ever makes the news? Why can't we just ignore the former, like you do for the latter?

Sorry, but since your kind of thinking first appeared on bumper stickers 50 years ago, quite a bit has been done to deal with drunk driving.

We care about mass shootings because every one of them is preventable. All you need are real, effective, national and sensible gun regulation.

Mass shootings of the kind that Americans seem to think are (or should be normal, only happen in the United States.

That will take the gun out of the hand of the crazies.

 

[Jay Falcon]

Even twice as many wouldn't be all that many, in the grand scheme of things. Far more than that were killed by drunk drivers this weekend, and every other weekend. Strange nobody started a thread about it.

That's a different problem, and a completely unrelated issue. Why can't you see that?

 

[Ahlevah]

We care about mass shootings because every one of them is preventable. All you need are real, effective, national and sensible gun regulation.

No, they’re not. You’re dreaming. How, for example, would you have prevented the 2015 Paris attacks, in which ISIS-affiliated terrorists used a Yugoslavian-made AK variant and suicide belts to kill 130 people? These weapons were already illegal in France.

Mass shootings of the kind that Americans seem to think are (or should be normal, only happen in the United States.

What’s normal is Democrat-style revolving-door justice in which violent criminals are arrested and then let out on bail or paroled to murder thousands of people every year.

That will take the gun out of the hand of the crazies.

Yeah, like I said, good luck with that. And even if you get the guns who’s going to prevent the loons or terrorists from using a vehicle to mow people down at parades? NOBODY.

 

[Somerville]

I’ve presented rational facts. I asked you a perfectly rational question. Why have border apprehensions skyrocketed in a year under Biden?

It certainly looks like you don't quite understand what is taking place along the southern border. If more people have been apprehended, it might be a result of more efficient patrolling along the border. There is also the issue of increasing violence in some of the Central American nations, violence that causes people to run for cover - like we are seeing in Europe as several million humans run from their homeland.

 

[Ahlevah]

It certainly looks like you don't quite understand what is taking place along the southern border. If more people have been apprehended, it might be a result of more efficient patrolling along the border.

It could also be because adults with minors are just walking up to Border Patrol agents requesting asylum.

There is also the issue of increasing violence in some of the Central American nations, violence that causes people to run for cover - like we are seeing in Europe as several million humans run from their homeland.

“Increasing violence”? That’s a nebulous statement. Did that violence just coincidentally increase the moment Biden took office, and can you provide a specific example with something resembling stats to support it? For example, Guatemala is a major source of migrants, but it appears that its homicide rate has been on a steady decline since 2014.

Homicide rate in Guatemala 2022 | Statista

In 2022, there were more than 17 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants in Guatemala, the second consecutive increase.

www.statista.com

 

[PeacefulWarrior]

If anything accidental deaths should be easier to prevent,

LOL.

Your whataboutisms are very feeble, but I know that you 1) probably do not have the capacity to understand that and/or understand why...and 2) would not care even if you did have the capacity to understand that.
Disgusting little society we've nurtured for ourselves here....a real shithole. Chickens are coming home to roost.
But at least FrEeDuMbZ$™.