Cheap 'idiot-proof' rifle killed Phila. officer" - dialogue with reporter Sam Wood

[PennsyPlinker]

Sam, I appreciate your coming on this forum to ask questions. but to be blunt, you are asking in the wrong direction. What the SKS is does not really matter. It is a gun. There are lots of types of guns out there, and all of them are lethal, from the bullets that come out of the end to smacking someone in the head with the gun itself.

No, the issue is the human heart. The gun is a tool, an inanimate object. It is the purpose for which it is used which is evil, and there are many things that could be substituted for that gun. Cars are even more dangerous than guns. My chainsaw is a dangerous tool too. People have been killing other people for thousands of years, using stones, knives, clubs, bare hands, etc. It is a heart issue, or if you will, an issue of the wickedness of man. It was not the gun which killed the officer, it was the man using the gun which killed him.

More laws are not going to stop people like this. There are already plenty of laws on the books. Many of them were broken. Look at the rap sheets of the people involved in the crime. They did not come by their firearms legally, and piling more laws on top of the ones already in existence is not going to change that. Even in totalitarian societies, people can still get guns or other weapons with which they commit their crimes.

Yes, this is going to be political, and you, as a reporter with a large audience, have a unique opportunity most of us will never have. You can get the message out that it was not the gun, it was the man. It was a man who was let loose time and again by a corrupt, overburdened, legal system. None of these men should have been out on the street. But they were. Until the problem of criminals is addressed at the root, writing more laws and restricting law abiding citizens will help no one. In fact, the reverse will be true. Look at Washington DC, murder capitol of the US for a time. They have the most restrictive laws you can get, but people still commit crimes with knives, guns, etc. It is a heart issue.

[625]

Sam,

I still say you are a hack, but I applaud your courage for coming here and seeming to want answers. Why you didn't do this to begin with makes no sense. Well, it does, but you won't appreciate my opinion.

There are plenty of gun forums that have tons of extremely knowledgeable folks, far more so than the average cop or ATF agent. Why didn't you seem to want to get the facts straight to begin with? You stated you used the internet to get your info. Where did you look? Did you find that laughable ammo price on a website, or did that extremely ignorant ATF agent pull it out of his ass?

I have a hard time taking you seriously when you keep sensationalizing everything. You say that officer Stephen Liczbinski (yes, he has a name!) was assassinated. No, he was murdered. There is a difference. No need to try and make it sound romantic. Stop with the excessive drama, and you might have more respect from your readers.

Just read this thread and you will have answers to some of your questions.

I'm not knee-jerk anything.

You certainly seem that way about going to press without checking your stories for accuracy.

[King 5.45]

Pennsy rather well nails it.

Hearts kill, hearts hardened by hopelessness and despair, fueled by poverty, desperation, a lack of adequate parenting, and a society around them that celebrates violence and amorality.

Your article, Sam, drew my ire principally because of its title, "Cheap 'idiot-proof' rifle killed Phila. officer." The whole premise that firearms kill, rather than people, is a mindset that we've been struggling against for decades.

People kill, Sam, not guns — nor razor blades, nor sharpened automobile antennæ, nor bricks, nor lead pipes, nor any other improvised or legitimate weapon that you could think of.

Saying that guns kill has an immediate effect. It mitigates the personal component of animus, rage, mental imbalance, jealousy, greed or whatever it was that motivated one individual to kill another.

All of a sudden, we aren't faced with a generation of principally young urban men who have a near-total lack of empathy for other human beings. Instead, we're faced with firearms, jumping into their hands and inducing these same men to pull the trigger on cops, innocent bystanders, and each other.

Politicians eager to harness the sympathies of unsophisticated voters blame guns, mostly because it's suicide to point the finger at those very same voters and blame their parental skills and lack of integrity.

Down deep, the more sophisticated are afraid of their own lack of self-control around firearms, and so they project onto those who own firearms responsibly and who can maintain self control. Obviously, if the average anti, afraid of their own underlying emotional turbulence, doesn't feel enough self-trust to own a firearm, no one else should have that right, either.

"Assault weapon" is a Schmoo, Sam. It's whatever a politician wants to call it. It's the image that counts, Sam, the one piped into the voter's head. People see a semiautomatic version of an AK47 and think "bullet-hose," because the propaganda machine seeks to break down the barriers, not only between truth and fiction, but between what constitutes a rifle, and what constitutes a submachine or machine gun.

An "assault weapon," by its original definition, is a fully automatic, or selective-fire weapon, that shoots an intermediate cartridge, somewhere between a pistol and a full-bore rifle in size and destructive capacity. Unfortunately, that definition has gotten rather bent and twisted, and has been lent out towards the idea of enacting laws that criminals break with impunity.

When I was a younger man, my LTCF allowed me to carry a loaded shotgun in a motor vehicle, strangely enough, because the definition of "firearm" included shotguns of a certain barrel length, or less. This year, I don't know. I'm certain that handguns are still kosher and fit within the definition of a "firearm," but they may have slipped rutabagas and Swiss chard into that definition, too. Who knows?

You see, Sam, you want to know what an SKS is. Nominally, it's a ten-shot carbine-length rifle that fires a 7.62x39 cartridge from a fixed ten-round magazine, reloaded with stripper clips. Some variants exist that can accept 30-round magazines, but most shooters eschew hacked SKSs that originally lacked this capability. Obviously, semantics don't matter to the dead.

But they do matter if they are employed as a weapon against reason and the ability of the people to enjoy the full benefit of the Second Amendment. That "assault weapon" thing is a meme, Sam — please, don't sell memes to an impressionable public. Educate them to form their own opinions — don't place a pre-made agenda above the fold for them.

Maybe you need to immerse yourself a bit in the culture in order to come to see things from our point of view. Consider that an invitation.

[WitsBusa]

You certainly have the right to your opinion 625.. But in all honesty, other than directing him to other posts, your attack on the guy who came into the lion's den voluntarily, didn't answer any of his questions or help educate him at all concerning the underlying issue.

[crlovel]

Exactly what WitsBusa said. The first article has already happened. Instead of attacking him, let's see if we can't bring him over to our point of view? Antagonizing him isn't apt to make him want to set the record straight here. This is a real chance for our cause.

I sent a message to PA Patriot to come talk to Sam after I wrote my response to him. Hopefully they're having a nice discussion now, and we'll all find out what happened, if anything.

[625]

You certainly have the right to your opinion 625

Thanks, Captain Obvious.

If he read the thread, he would not be asking some of these questions. Hell, did you even read the thread? You might want to check out Frenchy’s post in particular.

your attack on the guy who came into the lion's den voluntarily, didn't answer any of his questions or help educate him at all concerning the underlying issue.

I disagree. Some of his questions have already been answered here. Why post the same thing twice? Sam needs to understand that we, the readers of his rag newspaper, simply want the facts, not sensationalized BS.

[PennsyPlinker]

Originally Posted by 625

Sam needs to understand that we, the readers of his rag newspaper, simply want the facts, not sensationalized BS.

And he is here for that reason, or at least he says so. So what if he didn't read the entire thread? How many people read a post and can't even answer what the OP asked? How many people talk about something completely different? Give the guy a chance. The old saying goes, you will catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. If the man wants to get some real, accurate information, lets help him out instead of berating him for coming here.

[King 5.45]

I directed my response to him, and emailed him the permalink at the paper. If he wants to read it, he will.

Originally Posted by PennsyPlinker

And he is here for that reason, or at least he says so. So what if he didn't read the entire thread? How many people read a post and can't even answer what the OP asked? How many people talk about something completely different? Give the guy a chance. The old saying goes, you will catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. If the man wants to get some real, accurate information, lets help him out instead of berating him for coming here.

[WitsBusa]

Originally Posted by 625

Thanks, Captain Obvious.

If he read the thread, he would not be asking some of these questions. Hell, did you even read the thread? You might want to check out Frenchy’s post in particular.



I disagree. Some of his questions have already been answered here. Why post the same thing twice? Sam needs to understand that we, the readers of his rag newspaper, simply want the facts, not sensationalized BS.

That's the kind of attitude and demeanor that will surely open people up to cogent dialogue with you.. atta boy.

[625]

or at least he says so.

His article is already "out there". The damage has been done. Funny thing is, I don't think articles that are this poorly written do much damage. Anyone with common sense would at least pick up on some of the inaccuracies, at least the bit about the gun doing the shooting. Anyway, I don't trust this guy one bit. If you guys want to help him, go for it.