jeremy_sylvis

joined 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

Actually, the data shows that the assault weapons ban of 1994 was associated with a decrease in mass shooting deaths and the number of incidents

Correlation from causation aside, for this to have any real significance, there would need to be a drop in mass shooting counts.

That aside, your own citation shows any change in deaths is questionable at best - it looks as if the average may have even increased, by the included graph.

It also seems to pretend that _merely banning the sales of more "assault weapons" would have nullified the impact of existing assault weapons.

However, after the ban expired in 2004, there was an almost immediate and steep rise in mass shooting deaths.

Again, correlation from causation aside, for this to have any real meaning there would have to be only one changing factor... and the trend would have had to been consistent with a near-elimination of the count of events.

Can you truly think of no other changes? No, say, incredible spike in the media glorifying and sensationalizing such events, inadvertently promoting them as a means of getting violent retribution as one commits suicide?

It boils down to this: was there any direct scaling of such values with the actual count of owned "assault weapons"? Of course not.

It is important to note that many additional factors may contribute to the shifting frequency of these shootings, such as changes in domestic violence rates, political extremism, psychiatric illness, firearm availability and a surge in sales, and the recent rise in hate groups

Wow. So, you dilute the value of your own correlation by highlighting factors known to be common underlying issues, yet double-down on "suggest" and "decrease".

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

It's almost entirely that.

When you have nearly no-one who wishes to commit such atrocities as a violent suicide, it doesn't matter what tools are available for the job.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago

Have you considered any of the underlying factors to such and how Canada might differ?

[–] [email protected] 11 points 9 months ago (5 children)

It's also unlikely the US Military, being citizens of the United States themselves, would have a high degree of adherence to such orders to bomb and destroy their fellow man.

That anyone thinks such is realistic is indicative of the depth of delusion.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 9 months ago (1 children)

"decent" seems to be doing some heavy lifting here. A linguistic analysis of writings of the Framers cross-referenced against era culture and stats highlights the depth of your misunderstanding.

right there in the text

Ah - I see we're not only cherry-picking, but we're depending on a preamble e.g. a preparatory or introductory statement as somehow limiting of scope or indicative of audience to which a right was granted.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 9 months ago (2 children)

That, and obviously the proliferation of weapons has made mass murder accessible, and in the minds of some people as described above.

Are you under the impression such things were ever not accessible?

At what point did we start regularly testing and proving out water? When did we start ensuring school bake sale food must be store-bought? You seem incredibly short-sighted.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (2 children)

I'm not sure what you're referring to as a "fetish" or an "unregulated" lobby. If you were referring to nonsense like the NRA and their fundraising efforts, you'd be obligated to highlight Everytown etc. and their blue-aligned fundraising. You can't point out a wedge issue and one side without recognizing the other side and its equivalent benefit.

If one has a clean criminal history, is a legal adult, and - in most states - has undergone some additional scrutiny or proof of proficiency, then sure - they can buy a firearm.

Given how Afghanistan turned out, I'm not sure how you think the concept of resisting the armed forces of a government as a distributed and well-armed populace is somehow unthinkable.

It's fair to say we've a cesspool of stupidity - but only due to our politicians continued neglect of actual underlying issues in favor of partisan wedge-driving and profiteering of the ad revenue of sensationalized violence.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 9 months ago
[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago
[–] [email protected] 0 points 9 months ago

If that were the case, you'd be able to point to a significant amount of daily firearm violence - above and beyond every other form of violence.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I'm not sure how you'd argue a background check and being of age at a minimum as a lack of firearm control.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

But the problem is still solvable through gun control, because gun control can pervade culture, as demonstrated by many other countries.

How likely do you believe it is to bring about the constitutional amendment necessary to ban firearms? To gain support of 2/3s the states in addition to a 2/3 majority in Congress?

That aside, you could argue symptoms could be addressed through such extremes if it were possible to do so, but you couldn't argue such measures address underlying issues - solve problems.

 

It looks like Iowa DNR - at best - was negligent in reviewing permitting for the water usage of the proposed carbon capture pipeline.

There's certainly something to be said for how this somehow just keeps happening to things on the orbit of ethanol and corn.

 

Notable excerpts:

OMAHA, Nebraska – A company that planned to build a carbon pipeline through Iowa and four other states is canceling the project.

Navigator CO2 is blaming “the unpredictable nature of the regulatory and government processes involved, particularly in South Dakota and Iowa.”

The rest is various statements from involved organizations.

 

Excerpts:

According to a release from the office of the governor, the Iowa CDL INfrastructure Grant program will award $4,844,092 to ten community colleges in Iowa. The funds go towards building new facilities or adding onto existing ones, as well as purchasing new equipment.

The release states that the investment in CDL programs will help colleges support an increase of 1,305 participants in their annual class size.

The release specified that the grants will be administered as reimbursement and programs must offer competency-based training or a training course that will allow a student to complete training and take the licensing exam within a 30-day window. Additionally, colleges that are part of the program will have agreed to a 5-year tuition freeze for their CDL programs once the project from the award is complete.

I'm particularly excited to see the tuition freeze agreement to help offset the injection of funds.

 

“Democrats are struggling in Iowa because they’ve totally lost touch with Iowa values and our voters,” said Addie Lavis, Hinson’s campaign manager. “ … Ashley’s record of conservative accomplishments speaks for itself, and she and our team are working every single day to keep Iowa red and fire Joe Biden in 2024 so we can take our country back."

Ironically, Red Team isn't wrong here.

By party registration, Iowa is roughly a three-way split between Democrats, Republicans, and Independents. During the last major election cycle, the IDP ran multiple anti-firearm candidates. That same cycle, Iowa passed a ballot initiative to codify strict scrutiny on firearm restrictions in the state constitution. It passed with an unprecedented ~66% support. Red team wins here by simply not shooting itself in the foot in pushing something Iowans clearly reject. This should have been what one would call a sign, yet... they seem to have not learned from this.

During the 2022 cycle, voters were polled for priorities. Most voters considered reproductive health important but not as important as economy/inflation, wages, and education. The IDP campaigned almost exclusively on reproductive health while Red Team won here by speaking to these priority issues voters highlighted - even where it was misinformation or lies. It was such a shit show the Libertarian Party managed to regain major party status. Specific to my district, we lost Axne (D) to Nunn (R) - and with Axne's throwing in with anti-firearm efforts while also throwing in with police-friendly efforts, it was entirely predictable.

Twitter has been full of prospective candidates happy to criticize red team but fuck-all for those same prospective candidates and plans to actually, say, tangibly address Iowan concerns or make lives better for those Iowans.

Locally, the running commentary is that these are all such obvious shortcomings and failings its as if the IDP is trying to lose - even incompetence should eke out a win here and there but IDP loses consistently.

 

Despite appointing two of the three judges siding in favor of Reynolds' effort to reinstate a 2018 abortion ban, Iowa Supreme Court split on a ruling, leaving the ban blocked.

Upside: This is a solid win for Iowans and their reproductive rights.

Downside: The Iowa Democratic Party was utterly dependent on this as a wedge issue last election cycle and has proven inept at adapting strategy; unless they can find a way to win over voters, they're likely going to get creamed harder.

 

It's not a good feel.

I suppose this plot will be strawberries next year...

 

Our garden is in its third year. These are the current plots/plants as of the start of June.

The goal was to have some form of soaker irrigation in place by the start of the month and we'd accomplished that, though it left much to be desired. We'll be improving on that for next month - one branching topology experiment is already in place and working well.

The strawberries and beans have been getting wrecked by pillbugs and the tomatoes have been getting wrecked by whiteflies and aphids; the other goal for next month is introducing some predators and pest control.

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