State Gun Rights Lobby Using Streeterville Assaults to Further Agenda

Hey - speaking of Rachael Maddow, (but off the strict topic of concealed carry), she ran a piece yesterday on how al Qaeda is reminding it's members and wannabes in the US that our lax gun laws make weapons of somewhat-mass-destruction easily available:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26...

The money quote?  The al Qaeda guy in the video, after telling adherents about how easy it is to buy a gun at a gun show (no background check, fake IDs work fine), he looks in the camera and asks, "So what are you waiting for?"

Y'all don't see that happening here !

A licensed conceal/carry guy almost shot the young aid (the hero as he's called) of Gabriel Giffords as he tangled with Jared Loughner during the Giffords' shooting:

"Did you ever think in drawing your firearm or you made the determination you didn't have to?" Schultz asked.
"Sir, when I came through the door, I had my hand on the butt of my
pistol and I clicked the safety off. I was ready to kill him. But I
didn't have to do that and I was very blessed that I didn't have to go
to that place," Zamudio replied.
"I would have shot the man holding the gun," he added.
"You would have used that firearm," Schultz pressed.
"You're damn right," Zamudio said.
In a Monday interview, Fox News' Steve Doocy noted that if Zamudio had shot his first target it "would have been a big fat mess."
"Horrible, horrible," Zamudio agreed.
"To be clear, everybody who's reacted to this shooting by saying,
they wish there had been someone other than the killer with a gun at the
scene," 
MSNBC's Rachel Maddow noted Thursday. "There was someone other
than the killer with a gun at the scene. And the person he almost shot
was one of the heroes who had just disarmed the killer."

http://foxnewsinsider.com/2011...

Nowhere in the story except Rachel Maddow's commentary does it say Zamudio almost shot someone.  Having your hand on the butt of a gun and clicking off the safety doesn't mean that the gun is in your hand, drawn, and aimed at someone.  Find me a quote where that took place and there might be a story there. 

The fact is, Zamudio did NOT shoot anyone, even though he had a gun.  In your eyes, his having a gun was idiotic and wrong.  In my eyes the fact that he had a gun, could've used it and didn't, makes Zamudio intelligent.

I saw the interview with Mr. Zamudio - he, himself, explicitly, said that he almost shot the person who was keeping the gun away from Loughner.  This isn't a matter of Ms. Maddow saying so, it's the fact that Mr. Zamodio said so himself.

I realize how much the pro-concealed carry folks dislike that reality.  I'm very sorry that he actually said that.  Remember - you'll get through it!  Denial, anger, bargaining, depression and then, yes, acceptance.  It will be OK - you can do it!

Also, don't try to set up a false dichotomy here.  You tried that my saying, " In your eyes, his having a gun was idiotic and wrong."  That exaggerates the opposing view, creating an unrealistic "either/or".  This situation illustrates that the proposed "good" of having more people running around more of the time in more places with guns doesn't really pan out terribly well in reality.  We all know that more guns will mean more suicides, road rage shootings, deadly arguments, and so on.  That isn't complicated.  The issue is whether or not the potential "good" effects outweigh the obvious "bad" ones.  There's no need to exaggerate people's position on this.

(This is one of those nice illustrations about "the left" versus the hard right-wing in America.  Maddow vs. Fox "News" aren't just opposites in terms of their political outlook (actually, Fox if pretty hard right, and Maddow is only slightly left - if that's confusing to you, it's because you've never actually talked with a real socialist or communist.)  Fox and Maddow are also opposites on their adherence to factual accuracy.)

Regardless of whether he said "almost" or not, he did not. This is not proof of a bad outcome, it is proof that the heroic gun toter will not always come through. I think Arizona is overused.

As for increases in suicides, etc etc. you can't have it both ways. Either Chicago has so many concealed guns that it is as if we have the law in place (as you imply here: We already have thousands of people in Chicago doing concealed
carry illegally.  That's some per-capita concealed carry level.  These
folks are making the argument that MORE concealed carry is needed to
lower the overall rate of theft, violence, etc) and we should expect no increases, or we can expect those increases and the number of illegal weapons is lower per capita than you are positing. I would also say that it should be easy to show that states with more lax gun laws have higher rates of all of these ills. Do you have those numbers? What has Missouri's experience been?

I say all this as someone who is not interested in carrying around a gun and sure as hell doesn't want most of the idiots around me having guns. However, I'd like to see the argument clarified and supported.

I believe that if you compare concealed carry states to the national rates that crime has either stayed about the same or risen.

That's all I'm looking for. If you had 20 rapes per 100,000 residents before concealed carry and 20 per 100,000 after, etc. etc. you'd know that concealed carry doesn't do what the advocates say it will do. If there is a statistically significant impact (either way) we'd know something different.

I feel like there has been enough experimentation with this across the country to have reliable numbers. Instead we are relying on whether some guy "almost" shot someone, and stereotypes about mocha lattes. Why does everyone hate science and data?

But see, that wouldn't work, either, as you can't link the drop in rapes with the change in laws. For instance, there is the story that St. Louis crime dropped 9,2% ... (http://www.stltoday.com/news/l... ... I hate that html isn't working for me.) But this comes in conjunction with a similar drop in crime in metropolitan areas across the nation. Meanwhile, though, the relative position of St. Louis in relation to other metropolitan areas, including us, has stayed roughly the same. Therefore, the best you can say, again, is that there's no effect.

There may be no effect, but that strikes me as a very strong argument AGAINST concealed carry. Why don't people make it? Seriously, here's the deal: every half-wit you know who is not a felon gets to carry around a loaded weapon. In net terms it won't cause crime to fall, but hey, it won't cause it to go up either. I would not take that deal.

Actually, I would think that a lack of demonstrable effect bolsters nobody's argument, which is probably why nobody uses it. Those against can say it doesn't help, while those in support can say it doesn't hurt, either.

Right, but then you can decide if it is a wash are the morons around you (and most of us see morons around us) qualified to carry a loaded weapon. I think if we all voted on whether other people (not us) should be allowed to carry weapons guns would be outlawed. Ditto driving. And procreating.

Perhaps that's true. Nevertheless, as far as any existing data goes, it is a wash. What's more, it's almost impossible, if you really want to get scientific, to show anything otherwise, not with the inherently small statistical sampling crime statistics will always (we hope) reflect.

Consider your earlier example of 20 rapes per 100,000 residents. That means rape occurs to 0.0002% of the population. Say you cut that in half. Sounds good, until you consider that's only a shift of 0.0001% of the population. Shift it the other way, double it, and it's only a shift of 0.0002% of the population. That would be well within the margin of error of any calculation. It tells you nothing.

Meanwhile, if you really want to study such a thing, how do you isolate variables? How do you establish controls? How do you determine causality? You can't. There's no scientifically verifiable method.

In short, in this situation all you can prove is a negative. You can never prove a positive.

I am pretty sure that "margin of error" would be a concept appropriate to polling, as opposed to reported phenomenon. I could be wrong about that.

Even if you can't prove causation, I'd be happy if they could merely show correlation. If they can't show that causation is not even an issue.

Either I'm not doing html right, or Disqus is being weird.

Anyway, the linked article suggests it's not working out so well in metropolitan Missouri ...

http://www.stltoday.com/news/l...

That's not the right statistic. Those "youths" are just like they are here and are all strapped anyway.

When you walk around Missouri now places have to have a sign up if concealed carry is barred from their premises. It's kind of surreal. In any case, the data that would support either TomArch or the gun nuts should be out there. I don't understand why neither side brings it to bear. I kind of suspect that concealed carry is essentially a wash. That would be good to know as well.

Those "youths" are just like they are here and are all strapped anyway.

Well, that's pretty much my point. Conceal/carry has not prevented St. Louis from continuing to suffer the same problems we have here, and has not served as a deterrent. At most, you can say it's had no effect.

Well, no. You can say that thugs are still killing each other. You can't speak to any of the other "against person" crime statistics, or whether anything has changed in the rest of the state.

http://stlbeacon.org/voices/co...

Did you read that article? That isn't it either. Besides, citizen journalism only goes so far.

http://www.bizjournals.com/stl...

Seriously, you can go back to doing whatever you were doing. These don't track the 94% of the state that is not St. Louis, let alone the 50% of the metro area that is county but not city. They also don't highlight the gun legislation taking effect. I am not resistant to the information, this just isn't it.

Well, it's pointless to track the 94% of the state that is not St. Louis, because as you pointed out earlier, gun crimes in metropolitan areas are different than gun crimes in rural areas. Since we are talking about how this relates to Chicago, a discussion of the effect or lack thereof of gun regulation in Ste. Genevieve is irrelevant.

Second, Missouri has since 2003 allowed permits for conceal-carry. That's the gun law we're talking about. They weren't mentioned in these articles because they had no effect.

You're simply looking for information that doesn't exist. All information suggests that in this circumstance in this metropolitan area in this state, there has (I say again) been no effect.

Your St. Genevieve point is well-taken, but a more reasonable comparison to Chicago would be St. Louis County plus St. Louis City.

The information does, apparently, exist. It just doesn't show that guns save lives. I can't imagine how that is irrelevant.

I was responding specifically to Navin's excerpt which did not say that Zamudio said he almost shot him.  If Navin wanted to make the argument, he should have posted the excerpt where Zamudio said that, rather than posting what he did.  And before you start screaming "read the whole article," I will simple say that when I want to make a point by using quoted materials from an article, I quote the materials that directly support my argument.

I was not setting up a false dichotomy in the argument.  I was responding specifically to Navin, who has a very well-documented history of painting these issues as "you want concealed carry = you are Wild West hothead who wants to shoot everyone" and "you against concealed carry = you paragon of intellectual virtue."  

For someone who I just got finished praising for making a well-reasoned argument above, you very quickly turned into a idiot again.  Thank you for assuming that 1 - I don't know the difference between the right and the left, 2 - I don't know what Maddow's politics tend to be, and 3 - I don't know what a socialist or communist is, and how they differ from most people characterized as "liberal" in our country.

I should honestly know better than to try to engage Chicagoist commenters on anything to do with guns.

"you want concealed carry = you are Wild West hothead who wants to shoot
everyone" and "you against concealed carry = you paragon of
intellectual virtue."

Well, the argument for concealed carry in cities like Chicago is a poor one that doesn't rely on facts, but rather heavily relies on pleas to emotion and vigilante sentiment.   You obviously aren't interested in having an honest debate on it though.

I was actually bummed that she was mentioned in the article as it politicizes a pretty straight series of events that doesn't need it.  I actually have never even watched her, as I don't have cable.  Those cable pundits of any political stripe aren't really my thing.

He says he basically came within an inch of doing it.  It also destroys the old saw that somebody having a concealed weapon would prevent a crime from happening.  In fact Zamudio actually struggled with the hero until enough people screamed that *he* was not the shooter. "I would have shot the man holding the gun," he added." (the man holding the gun was giffords aid)

If you'd like hundreds of other examples of concealed carry folks:

Shooting themselves accidentally
Shooting others accidentally
Committing crimes
Going on shooting rampages
Not preventing crimes

..and so on, they're all out there in the news.

To be honest (and not sarcastic for a second), I don't have a problem with the idea of a well-conceived concealed carry law. And I didn't shed any tears when the handgun ban went away.

But this trope, constantly dragged out by the single-issue dilettantes in the gun rights camp, the idea that somehow concealed carry would act as a meaningful deterrent to crime has to be the biggest load of idiotic, fantastical, ignorant, pollyannaish bullshit with which right-minded people interested in issues of public policy are routinely abused. GMAFB.

Man, you just don't get it. You want to stop flash mobs? Here's how you stop flash mobs. He pulls a knife. You pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital. You send one of his to the morgue. That's the Chicago way.

Yeah, and some things in here don't react well to bullets.

(Am I doing this right?)

I'm disappointed in the ISRA. Flash mobs are a weak example of the underlying problem which is that the people of Illinois deserve the same respect and rights that people have in 48 of the 50 other states in this union. No specific acts of violence should need held up as an example. The simple fact is that unless a LEO is standing right at the scene of the crime, any response time is inadequete to cease the crime from taking place, and the courts have ruled that the police are not obligated to protect you anyway. Ultimately, since they have taken the position that your safety is your own responsibility, the government should not have laws in place that criminalize the exercise of that responsibility.

Respect for police (which is a complicated issue, to be sure) is one of the reasons I oppose concealed carry.  During the Giffords shooting in Arizona, a bystander with a handgun tried to intervene in the shooting.  But by the time he ran over, the shooter was disarmed - this guy nearly shot the person who was keeping the gun away from the original shooter.  But imagine if the police had shown up while this guy was running towards the scene with his gun drawn - there would have been another casualty.

Or take the Virginia Tech rampage.  As a police officer responding, I would much rather go into that building knowing that anyone in there with a gun who isn't in uniform is a/the shooter.  Imagine if there was one (or more) "bad guy(s)" and an unknown number of terrified, armed students chasing each other around in that building!  How would a police officer be able to go in there without it being suicidal for the officer, or creating a very high risk of the police shooting one of the concealed carry folks?

That captures the problem entirely, as this is not an Old West movie in which people indicate their intentions by wearing different colored hats. Get three innocent people with guns in a Virginia Tech situation, and you have four people shooting, three of whom have no idea who fired first. They'll all just keep firing at each other until they run out of ammo, and they probably won't hit the guy who started it.

I've always thought that those we're trying to defend ourselves against provide a good example of how conceal/carry would work. These gang kids have been shooting at each other for years. They've had plenty of practice. You'd think they'd be good at it, but they rarely hit what they're aiming for. Far more often than not, it's some innocent bystander getting shot in the head by stray bullets while they're running away or looking out a window.

So maybe we should send them to target practice so they can actually hit each other and not us.  Kills 2 birds with one stone, so to speak.

It's important to note that in both massacres the shooters were legal law abiding gun owners until they decided to go off the rails.

You make a very well reasoned argument against concealed-carry.  I applaud that, as it's unusual to hear anything other than "there's already too many guns" and "people will just shoot themselves."

Numbers, man, numbers. 48 out of 50 states means there ought to be pretty clear numbers reflected in the crimes against person categories. Not just murder, but murder, robbery, assault and/or battery, rape etc. Get the numbers and your argument makes itself.

BTW, the "police do not have a duty to protect you" means you can't sue them whenever there is a crime. It is a pretty limited issue that people have made seem like a massive hole in the protection of society.

I'll repeat myself from above.  We already have thousands of people in Chicago doing concealed carry illegally.  That's some per-capita concealed carry level.  These folks are making the argument that MORE concealed carry is needed to lower the overall rate of theft, violence, etc*.  They need to both prove that concealed carry reduces the overall level of these events AND they need to prove that there is a threshold above which that effect can be seen to a statistically significant level.

(* Notice that I didn't say "reduce crime."  By increasing the number of guns in public, there will be an increase in shootings (accidents, suicides, road rage, domestics, arguments and even a few would-be attackers who get shot).  There would need to be an overall decrease in other shootings to more than offset these increased shootings and/or the decrease in events like muggings and rapes to more than offset the increase in shootings.)

BTW, the "police do not have a duty to protect you" means you can't sue them whenever there is a crime. It is a pretty limited issue that people have made seem like a massive hole in the protection of society.

This. 

And how that turned into "I needs me a whole buncha guns 'cause the gall-durn gubbmint ain't never gonna help nobody 'cause the law says they don't hafta!" is just another example of how pitifully stupid this issue gets.

An armed citizen is in a much better position to ward off a violent
flash mob attack than an unarmed citizen carrying nothing more than a
mocha latte. 

The beauty of concealed carry is the criminal has no idea who is carrying a concealed weapon or not, and if Young Skippy wants to bash your head in and steal your wallet and iPod, s/he might be the new recipient of your 3G iPhone and your Kenny G music collection, or be on the receiving end of a few rounds to center mass.

Well said.  Im not sure what is with all the anti gun nuts on this site -- the gang bangers already have guns, tight gun laws only restrict law abiding citizens from protecting themselves.

I bet after a few of these flash mobbing thugs run into an armed citizen that these flash mobs will fizzle out pretty fast

tight gun laws only restrict law abiding citizens from protecting themselves.

Like Jerod Laughner, The Virginia Tech dude, The Dekalb dude, and so on and so on and so on....................................................

I get what you're saying, but the Jared Lee Loughner case is actually a textbook example of how an armed bystander could make the situation worse.

Joe Zamudio was armed and shopping next door to the campaign event when he heard the shooting start.  He sprinted outside and saw a guy holding a gun.  Now, his first inclination was to shoot the creep, but as it turned out, by the time Zamudio got outside the gun had already been taken away from Loughner.

So Zamudio almost shot one of the heroes of the day.

This is what we risk by having people walking around with guns...

You seem like a man in the know. Can you cite the crime statistics that show how dramatically concealed carry lowers crime? I can't seem to find them.

Thanks!

You don't live in Chicago and you created a Disqus account just to post about the 'gun' thing. 

You know this how?

I call bullshit.  Unless you have evidence for astroturfing, STFU and stop the ad hominems.  Bunch of crap...

Being a city kid, I always assumed that rural areas didn't know what they were talking about when it comes to gun violence.  Actually, there is a good deal of gun violence (plain old murders, domestic, suicide, drug-related (meth) shootings - just like the city) in rural America.

That said, who are these people who troll the web to jump into local discussion boards to promote gun-nuttery or abortion prohibitionism?  Do they patrol Google as lone wolves?  Do they alert each other about new news posts?

The gun violence you refer to is not just like the city though. Density makes all the difference. When drug gangs shoot at each other in Pulaski County there are relatively few people to hit. When they do it in Uptown there are lots of people to hit. I am not inherently worried about the litany of gun violence you listed so much as innocent bystanders.

Well it's a mix of Joe Gun-Tard and actual gun rights lobbyists/astro-turfers.

Ha ha ha ha

http://www.chicagotribune.com/...

Is he one of yours? Smith & Wesson shot into the ground to make magazine salesmen go away. I wonder if they were sent there via text message.

Aw Shawn, you know you'd be gawking at the tall buildings and the mob would take your iPod, iPhone (but not if it's a crappy old 3G model), and gun . . .

Yeah! Receiving end! Center mass! Young Skippy! Hell Yeah! 

Wow, I feel so much manlier now having just thought about that movie-like scenario that will virtually never, ever, ever happen.

And golly, that whole deterrence thing SHORE does work well! Just look at heavily gang- and drug-populated areas. I mean, gang bangers and drug dealers -- who themselves are far, far more likely than the average citizen to be armed? Yeah, they NEVER get shot or attacked by other people!

Thanks, Simple Solutions To Complicated Problems! You are so awesome!!

[rolls eyes]

You are really going to compare gang wars to armed robbery?  To muggings?  To mobs of youths (who, according to media reports, have minimal to no gang affiliation) attacking innocent people in traditionally low-crime areas?

Gang wars are different.  They are fighting over territory.  They go in prepared to kill or be killed.  It is a completely different set of motivations and ideals.  Suspects in muggings and home invasions are generally motivated by financial gain.  Suspects in these latest youth mobs seem to be motivated by mayhem and destruction.  Addressing these various crimes will take different tactics.  And if you don't think perps in robberies, muggings and mob actions don't case their targets before acting, your kidding yourself.  They size them up, find the low-risk targets and pounce.  There is some sense in injecting doubt into the equation with these people.  I sure as heck don't think it will solve the problem (they'll still look for targets that are likely unarmed, weak and inattentive), but it would shake up the equation a bit.

Listen, I'm no fan of concealed carry, even if I generally favor gun ownership. But if you are going to make arguments against it, let's be honest and reasonable.  Your arguments are neither, favoring sarcasm, snark and false equivalencies.  IMO, the facts and arguments are on your side.  No need to resort to that crap.

This isn't SCC...

Edit: removing incendiary rhetoric. Apologies.

You are really going to compare gang wars to armed robbery?  To muggings?  To mobs of youths (who, according to media reports, have minimal to no gang affiliation) attacking innocent people in traditionally low-crime areas?

Yes, I sure am. If we're to believe the arguments supporting concealed carry's/wider legal gun ownership's efficacy in preventing crime, then deterrence is deterrence, irrespective of the nature of the target.

And it seems to me that a person in a position to be committed to robbing someone is quite clearly far more desperate or far more irrational or far more reckless than someone who's involved in concrete, organized matters of group dynamics like gang activity or more easily-rationalized motivations like "territory" (which, oh by the way, also involve "financial gain".) Consequently, if there is a difference between the two, it's that people who have gone far enough 'round the bend to actually want to rob someone or break into someone's house are far LESS likely to be deterred by the possibility of their intended victim being armed. In short, there's MORE rationality -- misguided and distorted though it also is -- in gang-related violence than there is random robberies and burglaries, rendering those inclined to commit the latter, IMO, far less likely to be deterred by a rational evaluation of the risks.

And speaking of crap arguments:

Suspects in muggings and home invasions are generally motivated by financial gain.

Just as, like I already mentioned, people involved in gang- and drug-related violence are.

Suspects in these latest youth mobs seem to be motivated by mayhem and destruction.

Perhaps you should share your special ability to peer into the mindset of these mobs' members with the police department, since you're so cocksure of their motivations. Particularly given the fact that in every instance that I'm aware of, the victims of these attacks have been, you know, robbed. Robbed of things like iPhones and other electronic devices and credit cards. And, uh, cash. Perhaps you're right and that's all just a ruse to cover up some other, larger motive, but me, I think I'll stick with the idea that their motivation is "financial gain" since it seems pretty clear that they've taken things that have actually netted them a "financial gain".

Addressing these various crimes will take different tactics.

I agree completely. And that's precisely what renders the one-size-fits-all solution of "add more legal guns" proposed by the ISRA and other concealed carry advocates so laughably naive and simplistic.

And if you don't think perps in robberies, muggings and mob actions don't case their targets before acting, your kidding yourself.  They size them up, find the low-risk targets and pounce. There is some sense in injecting doubt into the equation with these people.

And if you think perps in robberies, muggings and mob actions possess the requisite X-ray vision to determine if their target is in fact carrying a concealed weapon or that their intended target home contains a gun and someone who knows how to use it, you are kidding yourself. 

And I thought that was the whole point of expanding gun ownership and adding concealed carry in the first place: Isn't the idea that since potential burglars/muggers/whatever don't know who is armed and who isn't, that is what goes about "injecting some doubt" with these people? And that doubt is what creates a deterrent effect wider than just deincentivising the victimization of exclusively those who are armed? If you're correct and they're so specific and careful and nitpicky about choosing their targets, well gee... that clearly that wouldn't work anyway, now would it.

Listen, I'm no fan of concealed carry, even if I generally favor gun ownership. But if you are going to make arguments against it, let's be honest and reasonable.  Your arguments are neither, favoring sarcasm, snark and false equivalencies.  IMO, the facts and arguments are on your side.  No need to resort to that crap.

I also believe the facts are on my side, and that the arguments utilizing them are honest and reasonable. I do not believe, as I explained above, there is any false equivalence in them. And as far as the "snark" goes: I don't suffer fools gladly, and anyone who proposes simplistic, monolithic solutions to vast and complex problems is quite clearly a fool. I reserve the right to mock and deride their utter and unforgivable foolishness as I see fit.

"And if you think perps in robberies, muggings and mob actions possess
the requisite X-ray vision to determine if their target is in fact
carrying a concealed weapon or that their intended target home contains a gun and someone who knows how to use it, you are kidding yourself. "

You didn't even read what I posted, did you?  I agree with you.  They CAN'T know for certain (which is the entire point many advocates for concealed carry make).  But they will still size up their targets.  They'll still pounce on the targets that look least likely to put up a fight.  Which, IMO, makes the pro-concealed carry argument pretty shaky.

Um, HELLOOOOO? I've been arguing against "the pro-concealed carry argument" this whole time. I don't know what the fuck you're arguing, exactly (other than that big, bad me is being too mean to the poor, poor widdle ISRA and concealed-carry/gun blankie fanboys and that these muggers are "just being anti-social", which, uh... um...) but as you'll note above, I italicized the "you" and "yourself" so as to try to indicate that I was still talking about those making that argument. I assumed you'd been actually following along in the discussion here, and already understood that we're in agreement on that point and the italics would be enough for you to get it. 

Apparently I was mistaken.

"I reserve the right to mock and deride their utter and unforgivable foolishness as I see fit."

Yes you do.  And I have to right to call you out as a sarcastic, snarky dick more intent on mocking than making serious points.

This will be a fun little arms race, won't it.

Yes you do.  And I have to right to call you out as a sarcastic, snarky dick more intent on mocking than making serious points.

Knock yourself out. But everybody reading this can see I've made plenty of serious points. So you're not off to such a hot start.

This will be a fun little arms race, won't it.

Not really. [yawn]

"Just as, like I already mentioned, people involved in gang- and drug-related violence are."

Right.  And the context is identical.  And they go into the crime with the same mindset and a gang members protecting their turf. Yes, gang members are certainly financially motivated, but the stakes,
repercussions and mindset are very, very different than a robber, mugger
or thug.  There have been studies about gang culture and motivation.  Ditto for drug cartels.  It is just completely disingenuous to equate this type of organization with petty crimes.

"I agree completely. And that's precisely what renders the
one-size-fits-all solution of "add more legal guns" proposed by the ISRA
and other concealed carry advocates so laughably naive and simplistic."

You seem to be arguing with me as though I'm a concealed carry proponent.  I'm not.  I just think you aren't refuting anything and your rhetoric gets in the way of your message. 

"Perhaps you should share your special ability to peer into the
mindset of these mobs' members with the police department, since you're
so cocksure of their motivations. Particularly given the fact that in
every instance that I'm aware of, the victims of these attacks have
been, you know, robbed. Robbed of things like iPhones and other
electronic devices and credit cards. And, uh, cash. Perhaps you're right
and that's all just a ruse to cover up some other, larger motive, but
me, I think I'll stick with the idea that their motivation is "financial
gain" since it seems pretty clear that they've taken things that have
actually netted them a "financial gain"."

Could you try to be more of a dick about this?  Please?  It makes reasonable conversation so easy...Jesus...

These mobs have had, what?  5+ members in them.  I've seen reports of up to 20.  And you are telling me that 15 people are going to divvy up an ipod and $35 cash?  And that their, say, $30 cut is worth it for the actions they are taking?  How about the guys just pushing bikers off their bikes?  What financial motivations do they have?

Listen, it doesn't take a special ability to spot the motivations of these individuals.  It takes a little common sense.  15 people getting together to first harass and then beat up a person, for a net gain of a few dollars a person doesn't exactly scream "financially motivated" to me.  It sounds like teenagers run amok, not thinking about what they are doing and just being anti-social.  Feel free to draw a different conclusion, but don't pretend I (and the many others making this argument) don't have a point.

Oh, and by the way, if we were to believe your little "group of kids somehow just gets a little out of hand, starts acting irrationally, and somehow, hehe, golly, winds up BEATING AND ROBBING PEOPLE" idea, if they are just "teenagers run amok" not thinking about what they're doing, then we'd also have to believe that this group in particular would be even less inclined to be deterred by a concealed carry law.

(This space reserved for the disclaimer that I understand you aren't making the argument that they would. Since apparently you need such a disclaimer.)

It is just completely disingenuous to equate this type of organization with petty crimes.

No, it's not. If we're to believe, as proponents of this theory would like us to, that the variety of deterrence they propose is a matter of risk vs. reward, the two are wholly, completely equal. A person who is a member of a gang or involved in a drug ring is not going to be deterred by the very high likelihood that their intended target is armed. Similarly, neither is a person who has decided to rob somebody going to be deterred by the much lower likelihood that their intended target is armed. Again, if there is any false equivalence here, it's that even with wider gun ownership, the notion of deterrence is far LESS likely to be effective in preventing "petty crimes."

You seem to be arguing with me as though I'm a concealed carry proponent.  I'm not.  I just think you aren't refuting anything and your rhetoric gets in the way of your message.

You seem to be having a problem reading my point. I was clearly talking about the arguments "proposed by the ISRA and other concealed carry advocates." Try again.

Could you try to be more of a dick about this?  Please?  It makes reasonable conversation so easy...Jesus...

I sure could.

These mobs have had, what?  5+ members in them.  I've seen reports of up to 20.  And you are telling me that 15 people are going to divvy up an ipod and $35 cash?

I'm not telling you that. The, you know, facts as they've been reported are.

And that their, say, $30 cut is worth it for the actions they are taking?

You're free to concoct whatever fairy tale you'd like about what you suppose their motivations to be. But when somebody beats somebody up and takes, you know, MONEY from them, I'm personally inclined to believe that "financial gain" probably has, I dunno, something to do with it. Most people -- people interested in dealing with facts and reality -- call that "robbery" and see it for what it is. I'd try to guess as to your motive for wanting to try to make this something bigger than what it obviously is, but then that'd be conjecture. Just like your overwrought attempts to turn these robberies into something bigger than we know they are.

How about the guys just pushing bikers off their bikes?  What financial motivations do they have?

If we assume it's the same group, then who knows? Maybe it was a robbery that went wrong. Maybe they were trying to steal the bike. Or maybe, since it was in a different place, at a different time, and looks completely different than every single other one of these instances that WAS a robbery maybe that first assumption isn't such a hot one.

Listen, it doesn't take a special ability to spot the motivations of these individuals.  It takes a little common sense.

Absolutely.

15 people getting together to first harass and then beat up a person, for a net gain of a few dollars a person doesn't exactly scream "financially motivated" to me.  It sounds like teenagers run amok, not thinking about what they are doing and just being anti-social.  Feel free to draw a different conclusion, but don't pretend I (and the many others making this argument) don't have a point.

I will draw a different conclusion because that all sounds like something vaguely familiar to me, and those of the rest of us living in reality and actually employing common sense: It's called a mugging.

And that's rich: These muggers, these people who have violently taken items of value from others are "just being anti-social". Riiiiiiight. [rolls eyes]

Yes, yes, if only Illinois had a concealed carry law, so Dick Pearson and all the other similarly-minded white middle class people in safe neighborhoods could get all snuggly-wuggly, nuzzling their cute little gun blankies and feel safe in such a cruel, angry world full of problems of such complexity that they can't even begin to understand (let alone solve) them, incidents like these would all just magically disappear.

Idiots. Clueless, delusional fucking idiots.

But they would get to shoot people. You are completely forgetting that.

True. I have to imagine that spending all that time standing in front of the mirror at home practicing their best Dirty Harry and never getting to actually do it has to leave an empty, empty feeling.

Let's ask Bernie Goetz what it was like!  I'm sure he tells his "rescued" squirrels all about the day that he got to be the big man, the superhero and shoot some minimally armed kids in the back.

Actually let's all remember crazy ol' Bernie Goetz.  Chicago has tons of concealed carry today.  Right now there are thousands of people in the city illegally carrying concealed handguns - not just "criminals" but also thousands of "law-abiding" people.

Advocates of "concealed carry" claim that more concealed guns will reduce crime, but given that we already have plenty of concealed guns carried around the city, I have to ask, what is the critical threshold for per capital concealed carry above which there is a noticable reduction in thefts, violence, etc? 

Idiots don't know what a flash mob is. I assume they support 2nd amendment rights for all Chicagoans right? Even the kids who are robbing people. Right?

Ah, but remember the wording of the bill: "would have allowed well-qualified, well-trained, law-abiding citizens to carry defensive firearms."  Under the law during the Jim Crow era, "all citizens" had the right to vote, but thanks to poll taxes and "civics" or "literacy" tests, "certain" people were "discouraged" from voting.  I'm pretty sure that "certain" people would find it difficult to obtain the concealed carry permit in the real world.

Actually, if we applied a requirement that in order to have any gun you had to demonstrate that you are "well-trained" that would be a huge improvement.  I wish you had to take a class and pass a rigorous practical test, then be re-tested periodically, in order to have any gun.  That would help the situation enormously.

These gun nuts are idiots, but this "everyone will have a gun, even the criminals" makes me nuts. I have never heard a concealed carry advocate unregulated conceal carry. They all preference it with being of age and not having a criminal background. So, no, for the most part these kids would not be eligible.

How about some other criticisms? There are tons of good ones. The pure number of guns in a space increasing the likelihood of inappropriate usage, the likelihood of a carrier misinterpreting a situation and killing people, etc. I'd also like someone more enterprising than I to see if these "wildings" are less common in conceal carry states. From what I saw in the news Memorial Day weekend, Florida had some significant problems. What's their gun situation?