After a man opened fire at Los Angeles’s airport a few months ago, friends and coworkers undoubtedly turned to each other shaking their heads: Could this really be happening again, so soon? Are these things getting more frequent, or am I imagining it?
You’re not imagining it, according to a new study obtained by Yahoo! News on Thursday. The report, which is set for release in a Federal Bureau of Investigations bulletin next week, finds that mass shootings have indeed become more common. They have spiked from five a year between 2000 and 2008 to 16 a year from 2009 to 2012.
The report also sheds some light on who is committing mass shootings, and how: 94 percent of gunmen are men, though they range significantly in age. Forty percent of mass shootings happen at businesses, while 29 percent take place at schools. Fifty-nine percent of the time, the gunmen use handguns, and 26 percent of the time rifles.
They claim, on average, two lives.
“Mass shootings” are defined by the authors of the report, who are from the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training (ALERRT) Center at Texas State University, as incidents where a gunman opens fire in a public place with the motivation of killing many, at least one of whom is “unrelated” to the gunman. This means the data does not include gang violence or crimes where shooting is a byproduct.
This report is actually a follow-up to a study released in 2010, which found 84 active shooter events happened between 2000 and 2010 and predicted an increase. Adding in 2011, 2012, and as much of 2013 as possible, the number rose to 110. And one interesting statistic jumps out: The number of active shooters wearing body armor rose from 4 percent to 7 percent. Report author Terry Nichols warned, however, that while they are certain about the total number of shooting incidents, they are still working to figure out some of the details of each case as court documents become public.
Personally I don't think most of us needed a study to figure this out, but of course having one will give the NRA something to refute.
Ultimately it will make little difference as apparently there is absolutely no desire among our politicians to take on gun control it seems.
Which sadly means we will likely see many more of these mass shootings in the future.
Update: In unsurprising news gun sales hit a new peak this year:
Gun records checks, fueled by a post-Newtown boom of gun sales, hit a new high in 2013, and industry analysts expect ammunition to be the big seller this year as consumers catch up to all of those firearms purchases.
More than 21 million applications were run through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System last year, marking nearly an 8 percent increase and the 11th straight year that the number has risen.
Mass shootings go up, so more people buy guns to protect themselves, which then puts more guns into the community, to provide more bullets for mass shootings. The circle of death.
Oh wait, I forgot, only criminals use guns to do harm. Trouble is nothing empowers a criminal, or angry spouse, disgruntled employee, or lunatic, quite like having access to a gun.
Tomorrow is the third anniversary of the Tucson slaughter. Any bets on how Mz. Palin will commemorate it ? Respond to this timely report?
ReplyDeleteShe should have shamed into silence after Tucson, but, instead, I know that her black heart feels no remorse.
OT
ReplyDeletehttp://trailblazersblog.dallasnews.com/2014/01/wendy-davis-gop-rival-greg-abbott-helped-payday-loan-industry-collect-high-fees-from-borrowers.html/
Front page Huffington Post:
ReplyDeleteRODEO CLOWN
The Inside Story Of Liz Cheney's Tone-Deaf Candidacy
...Cheney’s campaign was marked by a Palinesque series of news stories involving ham-handed politics and small-time personal dramas: There was the kerfuffle over whether her dad was an old fly-fishing buddy of Enzi's. (The senator says yes, the former veep says no.) There was the time her mom told former Sen. Alan Simpson to shut up when he announced his support for Enzi. (She was incensed that he’d stiff someone who’d campaigned for him as a preteen.) There was a $220 fine for in-state residential claims on her fishing license application. (Cheney hadn’t lived in Wyoming long enough to avoid the out-of-towner fee.) And, when that was reported in the local press, there was a controversy over whether she had wished death on the state’s well-loved small-town papers. (She said she was only talking about the liberal national media.)
There was also a much more serious break between Cheney and her sister over gay marriage. Candidate Cheney’s position was that states should decide for themselves. But she also said that she believes marriage is only between a man and a woman. That drew Facebook rebukes from Mary Cheney, who has two daughters with her wife. The whole tableau, transpiring on social media, had a touch of Jerry Springer about it.
You might say this pattern of cable-style bombast and public embarrassment is at odds with the taciturn Cheney brand. Pull back the camera a bit, though, and it starts to look less strange. “The Cheney women are very protective of, as we called him, The Man. That’s what we called him inside the system, The Man, capitalized,” says Kevin Kellems, Dick Cheney’s communications director during his vice presidential years. “You protect The Man at all costs. And two, if the enemy takes a shot at you, you never, ever, ever admit any level of accuracy on their part. You always, always refute it. It is the centerpiece of their DNA.” It’s a tendency that blossomed in the fiery days after 9/11, and grew strong still as Dick Cheney’s reputation collapsed with the Bush administration. “Give no ground was the operating principle of the Cheney operation. Give no ground, ever.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/07/liz-cheney-candidacy_n_4555295.html
It's pretty telling that they're calling Liz Cheyney's campaign failure "Palinesque". Can't insult someone any worse than that, even a Cheyney!
DeleteWhat a low blow!
GOP Operative Caught In Hilarious Gun Hypocrisy
ReplyDeletehttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/07/alison-lundergan-grimes-guns-brad-dayspring_n_4555969.html
Tea Party Gun Logic
ReplyDeleteMississippi tea partier State Sen. Chris McDaniel: It's probably the hip-hop that's responsible for gun violence.
This is why there was no gun violence before hip-hop was invented. Oh, wait.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/mississippi-tea-party-challenger-mcdaniel-blamed-gun-violence-on-hip-hop
thank cheney and booosh for letting the weapons ban expire
ReplyDeletemurderous fuk_tards
Sarah Palin’s Alien Love Child Is A Distraction From ObamaCare By The White House
ReplyDelete....Fox News, as usual, is taking the lead on this tactic by reporting that Obama’s recent talk about income inequality is just such a distraction, even though he has been talking about that throughout his presidency. Fox raised the distraction allegation on the air with an interview of former Bush crony, and current GOP SuperPAC-Man, Karl Rove. They also made it the headline feature on their website, adding the angle of class warfare to the charge of distraction. For the record, class warfare has been raging for years in this country. It was started by the rich and any objective appraisal of the situation would have to conclude that the rich are still winning.
....It’s only a matter of time until reports about Sarah Palin’s alien love child are making headlines at Fox News as just another attempt by Obama to distract Americans from the health care reform that they presently view favorably.
http://www.newscorpse.com/ncWP/?p=11202
Slightly off-topic......http://news.yahoo.com/ohio-police-man-stopped-speeding-had-48-bombs-164840670.html..................the backstory should prove very interesting........
ReplyDeleteThank you, Gryphen, for continuing to bring this to our attention. I remember when I was a child, in the late '50's and early '60's, I would watch TV westerns like Wyatt Earp, Bat Masterson, and The Rifleman, and be so glad that I did not live back in a time when gunslinging was routine.
ReplyDeleteGood thing I couldn't look into the future.
Both topics are sickening enough on their own, but together they show how much more work we have ahead of us. Tighter registration should be the first step for both sides of the issue, to ensure that only "Good guys with guns" can get them legally. But they can't even agree on that, and the "circle of death" continues to take our kids and our freedoms.
ReplyDeleteThe least we should get through on both sides is stricter gun control laws to ensure "the good guys" are the ones with guns, but we can't even get that done, and the circle of death widens, we lose our rights , our kids and our lives.
ReplyDelete