A new study reveals mass confusion among police, prosecutors, and judges with "stand your ground" laws.
Florida first enacted the Stand Your Ground law in response to Hurricane Katrina and the looting that had taken place in Louisiana. Twenty-four other states, using the Florida statute as a model, have adopted the “Stand Your Ground” law and many others have enacted SYG type statutes. In the ten years after its passage, “stand your ground” has been invoked with breathtaking frequency. And in ways that have allowed killers and violent attackers to go free with little or no investigation into the crime.
The Tampa Bay Times has done an extensive study on the cases, where the “stand your ground” law has been invoked, dating back to the 2005 passage. The results have been eye-opening to say the least and while it is not possible to go over every case, some of the cases stand out and highlight why this law needs to be revisited.
The roughly two hundred cases where the “stand your ground” law has been invoked (as of 2012) show confusion among police, prosecutors, and judges about how and when the law should be applied. If you claim “stand your ground” as the reason you shot someone, what happens to you can depend less on the merits of the case than on who you are, whom you kill and where your case is decided.
Among the findings cited by the Times:
- Those who invoke “stand your ground” to avoid prosecution have been extremely successful. Nearly 70 percent have gone free.
- Defendants claiming “stand your ground” are more likely to prevail if the victim is black. Seventy-three percent of those who killed a black person faced no penalty compared to 59 percent of those who killed a white person.
- The number of cases is increasing, largely because defense attorneys are using “stand your ground” in ways state legislators never envisioned. The defense has been invoked in dozens of cases with minor or no injuries.
Durell Peaden, the former Republican senator from Crestview, Florida, and one of the sponsors of the bill, said the law was never intended for people who put themselves in harm’s way before they started firing. As the Times so aptly put it “the criminal justice system has been blind to that intent.” And summarizing just a few of the cases to date would appear to support this:
- George Zimmerman while being expressly told not to chase down Martin by a 911 operator continued in his pursuit of Martin who was walking away from Zimmerman and unarmed.
- In a two page opinion Judge Casanueva held that Alphonse Gallo was immune from prosecution under “stand your ground” after a “shootout at the OK Corral” at 2:30 in the morning where Gallo and Patrick Barbour argued over a debt Barbour owed Gallo. As the fight escalated and eventually broke into a gunfight “between four men in the middle of the street” nearby officers hearing the shots rushed in to investigate. When the officers arrived and tried to help Barbour, who had multiple gunshot wounds a crowd surrounded him and refused to let the officers in to help. Barbour died from his injuries and by the time “law enforcement could secure the area; there was no sign of any of the firearms. However, law enforcement discovered twenty-six shell casings of four different types in the vicinity.” Casanueva simply stated that the “legislature passed the law…because it determined that it is proper for law-abiding people to protect themselves, their families, and others from intruders and attackers without fear of prosecution… ”
- Anthony Gonzalez, Jr. was part of a 2010 drug buy that went sour when someone threatened Gonzalez with a gun. Gonzalez chased the man down and killed him during a high-speed “gunbattle through Miami streets.” Prosecutors agreed to a plea deal of three years in prison because of “limitations imposed on us by the ‘stand your ground’ laws [that] made it impossible for any prosecutor to pursue murder charges.”
Prior to SYG laws deadly force to protect “possession” was prohibited. In addition, a “duty to retreat” required a person to retreat if possible. Now, it is not only okay to use deadly force, it is okay for you to go retrieve your gun and then come back to exact revenge on someone. Or hunt down a 17-year-old kid walking home from the grocery store because he is black and seems suspicious to you.
Instead of finding ways to repeal these laws, efforts are underway to expand them and make them more potent. Using deadly force in such a way is never okay simply to protect possessions.
Oh, but they are the especially annointed, don’tcha know? They think their color makes them special, and their desire for what you got trumps your right to defend your property, and trumps your right to live if you get in their way. And oh, if you defend yourself against lethal assault, they’ll riot in every city that will put up with their lawlessness until someone they don’t like hangs for it,guilty or not. That’s why they don’t like the SYG law; it puts a crimp in their freedom to rape, rob pillage, assault, buy/sell drugs, and get schoolgirls pregnant … isn’t that right, Wendy?
I agree that SYG should not be a license to kill. Why should I have to let somebody take my possessions? I am not materialistic. I have modest possessions. But, I work really hard for what I have, and see no reason to let anybody just come and take them. I should be able to defend them. If I have to use deadly force, so be it. I agree with most of the stuff written here. I agree it is not a license to hunt someone down. If you try to take a police officers possession, they can shoot you on sight. So, again I see no reason somebody should able to take the little stuff I have and work hard for without being able to protect it. What gives somebody the right to come take them anyways? Who are they to come take my stuff?
Aren’t You lucky “DC”… I don’t believe in Flame wars either…. I Also don’t believe in arguing facts with morons, or debating Walls…. Because not one of your so-called facts are in fact, a “Fact”… they are just opinions dressed up as facts… Something you learned by overindulging in Fox News rhetoric!
But I know you have a tough time telling the difference!! You should look them up in that book called a dictionary… Here I’ll spell them for you…. Pay attention, ’cause Fox News won’t teach you this >>>>>
F… A… C… T is not the same as O… P… I… N… I… O… N… Got that????
And unreasonable paranoia induced “Fear of Shadows” does NOT a home-invader make!
(Isn’t it amazing just how many of those fearful shadows populate the Good Ole White Boy USA, while managing to avoid every other civilized country in the world…. it’s perplexing… until we begin to realize that the USA, thanks to people like YOU, the NRA, The Tea Party and the Republicans is on the Fast Road to become a 3rd rate country living in the Wild West of the 1800s all over again!!! You are the magnets drawing all those Evil fearful shadows… They must be your inbred kin!! )
Life is difficult when you swagger through it as a Wall….
You want your guns…. Good…. You got them… Enjoy!!!! Myself, and all of us other deprived unarmed folk, will keep our Tourist dollars and stay out of your States, while we relax in safety, spending our money in a secure environment, far from trigger-happy idiots like you…
And every time one of your moronic NRA brothers shoots himself or herself, or gets shot by one of his family members, I will just rack that up as a victory for the good guys, and the survival of the species… you know… US…. the ones that learned our lessons…
Never Play with Guns!
I just feel sorry for Your kids… They never had a chance!
Well, you just proved your inability to disprove any of my facts by resorting to typical Saul Alinsky-style name-calling and unsupported statements, but that will do you no good. The more you engage in flame war tactics, the more you lose the debate, and everybody sandbagging this forum can see it. I love it when you leftist resort to these tactics; it makes my efforts so much easier.
Obviously you do believe in flame wars, so you just proved yourself a liar. And it is also clear you don’t believe in debating because you have no facts to debate with. Claiming a fact — a documented fact anyone can look up — is an opinion proves you are not only a liar, you are a propagandist and either a very well-trained “useful idiot” as described by V.I. Lenin and quoted by Saul Alinsky, or an apparatchik yourself.
“…overindulging in Fox News rhetoric”? Heck, I don’t see much Fox News rhetoric. Fox News doesn’t put out much in the way of rhetoric; it puts wide-eyed leftist dorks on the air and lets them destroy their own credibility. I don’t even see news anchors or interviewers having to make any closing comments; they figure their audience is intelligent enough to draw their own conclusions. They have debate panels on their programs with five or six people sitting around a table making comments on news stories, and it is so easy to determine which of them are leftist idiots, or leftist apparatchiks who think everyone else is an idiot, that it is embarrassing. I normally don’t take pleasure in seeing someone make an utter fool of themselves, but I’m glad to see your side of the debates doing so: It makes it obvious they have nothing of any value to offer the American people.
Do you perceive “unreasonable paranoia induced ‘ Fear of Shadows’ everywhere you look? You must be projecting your own fears, because I don’t. I’m quite comfortable walking through my home unarmed in total darkness. Why do you think I am paranoid, when it is abundantly clear you are extremely paranoid about me?
Oh, my word! I just read your next paragraph, and you are astonishing! You actually, really, believe that thanks to people like me, the NRA, the Tea Party and the Republicans, America is on the Fast Road (your capitalization) to becoming a 3rd rate country? That is an amazing fantasy, CS, because if it weren’t for SPECIFICALLY people like me, like the NRA (and quite a few other pro-rights organizations), like the Tea Party, and like (not “the Republicans,” but specifically) the TEA PARTY Republicans, America would already be a 3rd rate satrapy governed with an iron fist by Marxist thugs. It sure didn’t become that way on our watch. It became that way on Jimmy Carter’s watch, NeoCons* Bush’ and Bush’ watches, communist terror group Institute for Policy Studies member Clinton and his wife’s watches, who chaired a Center for American Studies group that sent hand grenades that looked like toys into Nicaraugua to blow the hands off little children, and now a cocaine-smoking hustling con-man from Kenya whose stated OBJECTIVE, CS, is to take America off the list of world super-powers and make her a 3rd world satrapy run by incompetent fools more interested in their vacations at taxpayer’s expense than they are in running the country — oh, and whose number one objective is to figure out a way of disarming the American people so America can be re-taken by those who consider themselves our rightful masters.
I’m glad you acquiesce to our intention to keep our guns, CS, because that is what we intend to do, and we intend to keep all our other rights, too. I’d appreciate it if you would keep your promise to stay out of our States; the more ignorant anti-rights bozos that come here the more difficult it is to maintain our liberties under the rule of law. You people seem to think your fear of guns somehow translates to compelling specific performance from us, and it doesn’t. And you know, CS, as well as I do, that the occupied territories of our nation where citizens are treated as cattle and prohibited from exercising citizen rights, are anything but “safe,” and anything but “secure.”
There you go again, trying to engage in flame war by lying through your teeth: “Trigger-happy idiots like” me? What gives you that impression, other than your own bigotry and ignorance of reality? I’ve never shot anyone in my life, and I’ve had a long life. Aren’t you just a little too high-strung and prone to wild-eyed assumptions to engage in an intelligent debate?
Which reminds me, any time you want to start an INTELLIGENT debate, based on the facts you claim you support but haven’t dragged out of mothballs yet, feel free to drag them out to see if they stand on their own merits or are just bigoted nonsense, like everything else you have said. You’re wasting our time, CS, put up or shut up.
You know, NRA members don’t generally shoot themselves, nor do they generally get shot by family members, There are idiots out there with guns, but most of the shooting is done by gang members shooting at gang members. The best family shootings are when women defend themselves from men who think they own them and can bear them. Ever hear of the old saying, “Can’t beat women who shoot!”?
In closing, CS, I have to point out that your wild-eyed accusations, insults, prejudices, and general strident nonsense makes you look an awfully lot more out of control than I am. Probably just as well you’d rather be a sheep than a sheepdog; you sound like someone who likes to throw his weight around. Probably why you are so furious: Can’t throw your weight around like you want if your victims are armed, can you?
Hahahahaha….. Out of the mouths of morons….
Still spouting your Hillbilly opinions i see…
“Res ipsa loquitur”
Sure, and make the most of it. I have to admit I was a little slow off the mark. Being a fairly honest person, and striving to be completely honest at all times, I didn’t realize at first the most obvious reason anyone would be adamantly, vehemently … dare I say “as violently as you are”? … opposed to Stand Your Ground laws is if that person saw those laws as being the end of his ability to rip people off, rape, rob, assault, and decide whether they were going to live or die, with impunity. Tell me, CS, are you one of those who see the end of their criminal career staring them in the face if Stand Your Ground remains the Law of the Land?
If so, that does my heart good. It is meeting its designed objective. Merry Christmas, CS, and I wish you the best of luck in finding an honest job … if you have the discipline and work ethic to keep it. But to keep it you’re going to have to move away from all the homies telling you how terribly oppressed you are.
What a bunch of crap, Wendy. A new law recognizing the right of citizens to stand their ground instead of cowering before criminal thugs and allowing them to take over the neighborhood is passed, and prosecutors take a while to get a handle on this new idea of liberty in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave, and you immediately claim the law needs to be repealed instead of allowing a body of rulings to develop establishing the proper parameters required to invoke it.
Worse than that, you don’t even provide proof of your thesis, or even legitimate anecdotal evidence supporting it. The Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman sure as heck doesn’t support your thesis; just because some police dispatcher tells a civilian (who happened to be a neighborhood watch captain) to back off doesn’t mean its okay for a thug like Martin, high on ‘Lean,’ to bash his head into a concrete sidewalk. Zimmerman had every right, and as neighborhood watch captain he had the duty, to keep track of someone who didn’t belong in the neighborhood, especially given the number of recent burglaries in the area. Martin proved the surveillance was justified; he attacked Zimmerman and tried to kill him. Do you think Zimmerman should have just let himself be killed? Are you an idiot?
You don’t provide any where near enough information about the Alphonse Gallo anecdote to determine what relationship the “Stand Your Ground” law had in the incident. If you believe in the court system, you have to conclude Judge Casanueva knew more about the actual event than you are telling us, and that means you have a significant bias against the principle that the liberty and rights of the private citizen are superior to the agenda of the criminal actor.
The Anthony Gonzalez, Jr. anecdote is ludicrous in the extreme. While it appears on its face to support your thesis, in reality — based exclusively on the carefully-limited information you provide — it argues for judicial corruption or a flat-out lie. A homicide committed in the course of a felony is not self-defense; it is murder, and that principle overrides Stand Your Ground.
What is your problem with law-abiding citizens being free? What is your problem with a citizen having the liberty to go about his business unmolested any where he has a legal right to be? What is your problem with a citizen exercising his concomitant responsibility to control his immediate surroundings in a law-abiding manner? Are you a Statist, who believes the almighty State has the superior right to second-guess every conflict on the theory that maintaining peace and tranquility is a superior obligation than protecting one’s right to be unmolested? You think the victim of a crime should roll over and take whatever a thug wants to dish out on the theory that the thugs’ wants are superior to the rights of the victim?
Maybe this speculation is accurate, and maybe not, but your animosity toward Stand Your Ground indicates a really skewed view or lack of understanding of the principles of liberty our nation was founded to preserve and protect.
You are totally off your rocker! Zimmerman had NO RIGHT to do what he did…regardless of what the laws/jury states. If we all behave exactly as he did, we’d have a death rate similar to the Black Death.
Zimmerman was a dick that wanted to be a vigilante hero and ended up killing a KID (not a “thug” as you so racistly put it)–and a kid who had every right to be where he was doing exactly what he was doing! So, YOUR bias is showing! Do you seriously feel it is perfectly acceptable for a person to call 911 because he’s scared of a kid in a hoodie, then IGNORE the recommendations given on that 911 call, pursue the non-violent, non-aggressive (though still fearsome somehow) person that isn’t engaged in any illegal activity, undoubtedly scare the crap out of that kid in a hoodie by following him (would YOU be scared if some guy you didn’t know was stalking you??) thereby provoking a fight with that kid in a hoodie, and ultimately killing that kid in “self-defense”? That’s cool with you? If so, where can I find you, because I’m feeling scared and I think I need to stand my ground!
Hey, ‘Black man;’ thanks for engaging me. It sounds very much to me like you’ve been listening to that race baiting twerp Al Sharpton and his hustling cohorts like Eric Holder and his boss. The guy (Sharpton) makes his living conning people like you into believing a black man can rob, steal, rape, murder, but if a white man defends himself, that’s a racist insult. Sorry, dude, it ain’t. And Eric Holder ALWAYS sticks his beak into any situation in which a white man defends himself against a black, but he totally ignores the thousands of cases of black on white crime including, but not limited to, those depicted in Colin Flaherty’s book “White Girl Bleed A Lot.”
I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt here because at least you have enough education to construct a sentence properly and spell. I’ve known a lot of blacks I’ve had great respect for, including my partner in San Francisco when we were private investigators years ago, but they all had at least a modicum of education like you appear to have. They also could think their way out of a paper bag, unlike the yo-yo’s Sharpton is playing for a riot of fools. So I’ll give you a chance to argue your point and see if you can think or if you are just another black bigot.
I can give you chapter and verse on Martin and Zimmerman because I followed the investigation and I followed the trial, but for the moment I’ll just address your comments. Trayvon martin was a punk and a thug who had been suspended from school for cutting classes, for having marijuana in his possession, and he was all excited about the “gangsta” culture. His text message record revealed he had been trying to find a gun to buy. His social media pages showed his buddies all showing gang signs and gangsta-style threats. His momma had thrown him out of the house for his refusal to do anything she told him to do, and she told him to go live with his daddy. On the way to daddy he stopped at a convenience store and bought a watermelon-flavored soft drink and Jolly Rancher’s, ingredients typically used to concoct “Lean” or “Purple Drank” when combined with prescription-strength cough syrup. Martin’s toxicology report recorded 1.5 nanograms/milliliter of Delta-9 THC, 7.3 ng/ml Delta Carboxy THC, and Cannabinoids, all chemicals associated with ingesting cannabis. If he was a “KID,” Mr. Black Man, he sure wasn’t going to win any citizenship awards.
Zimmerman saw him walking through the neighborhood in the early evening, but it was already dark. He didn’t recognize him, and it was his job as neighborhood watch captain to keep track of strangers traveling through the neighborhood. There had been burglaries and thefts in the neighborhood. Zimmerman had full justification for keeping track of Martin. Then Martin takes off, which is certainly suspicious behavior if he had a right to be there. Zimmerman tried to find him, and yes, the police dispatcher told him to back off. Police dispatchers ALWAYS tell citizens observing suspicious behavior to withdraw, that is their training, because 1) they have to say that because if they don’t the city could be sued if someone gets hurt, and 2) police agencies seem to have the arrogant idea that no one is responsible for what goes on in the real world but them. The fact is, Mr. Black Man, we are all responsible for what goes on in the real world, even you.
After Zimmerman left his vehicle and was looking for Martin, Martin ambushed him, knocked him down, sat on his chest in a cagefighter move and started ramming Zimmerman’s head into the concrete sidewalk, and Zimmerman later had the injuries to prove it. Zimmerman quite righteously defended himself from attempted murder.
Now, are you going to sit there and actually claim that if someone was bashing your head into the sidewalk you would let them kill you rather than defend yourself? You actually reckon you are going to sit there and say, “gee, I guess I’d better go ahead and die because I shouldn’t have been trying to do my job?”
Conclusion: OBVIOUSLY Trayvon Martin wasn’t scared of Zimmerman; if he had been he wouldn’t have attacked him. That was rage, Mr. Black Man, fueled by a Cannibis high and probably Purple Drank and no doubt a lingering rage over the fact that society and decent conduct demands a little self-discipline from rebellious twerps. He brought his fists and cagefighting skills and a concrete sidewalk to a gunfight, Mr. Black Man, and that is pretty stupid, don’t you think?
Yeah, the way it actually happened, I’m cool with that. And don’t threaten me, Mr. Black Man; that will buy you a lot more trouble with the law than you need. Now, you willing to discuss facts, or you want to continue with your fantasy? Shall we discuss the idiocy of gun control?
Doncline > You are a threat to Me… and I will stand my ground against you and other Gun-Nut morons that think the USA is exempt for the ethical morality that has civilized the Rest of the World… You are obviously a Paid Up member of the American Taliban, and a paid-Off member of the NRA… So by Virtue of Both, I am accusing YOU of being a Traitor to the American Dream and its Historical Constitution (as opposed to the Perverted version your Tea-Party/NRA Supreme Court has created) and a Predator, that should be Locked-Up on Sight! You are a walking intolerant Murderer-in-waiting, looking for an excuse to get your name in the Paper!
I am Standing MY Ground!!! YOU are a threat to everything that was good and proper in the USA. and an perversion on 2-legs!
Boy, what fun! Why hold back? Why not say what you really mean, CS? 🙂
Okay, Cosmic Surfer, I’ll be your huckleberry. Let’s see if you can think any better than you can shoot your mouth off. Now, I’m serious CS; I don’t engage in flame wars. I deal in facts and history and principles and rights. Let’s see if you can back up any of that tripe with facts and history and principles and rights:
You reckon it is “ethical morality in the rest of the world” for the authorities in England to throw the victim of an assault or home invasion or burglary in jail (gaol, they say there) for five years for resisting and causing the slightest injury to the perpetrator? You think it is “ethical morality” for the Japanese police to throw you in a cell and keep you there until you confess to whatever crime they think you should confess to? Bringing it closer to home, do you think it is “ethical morality” for a group of punks, two black men and two black women, to attack a white guy and girl, cut them, stab them, rape the girl in front of the guy, castrate the guy, disembowel the girl, and murder both of them, and expect any other guy and girl in that city to comply with a law that prohibits them having the tools of self-defense?
Do you think it is “ethical morality” for a woman to be raped and strangled with her own panty-hose instead of having the right to defend herself from a 200-lb. rapist with a knife or baseball bat?
Do you think it is “ethical morality” for the Aurora Theater to invite murderer James Holmes to a target-rich environment of helpless theater-goers by hanging “Gun Free Zone” signs on the front door?
Do you think it is “ethical morality” for Colin Goddard to cower under a desk and take four bullets from Seung-Hui Cho at Virginia Tech, and then advocate in public, without even blushing, that everyone else should be prepared to suffer the same fate as he, and worse, rather than be the person who STOPS the maniac and save lives because he has the good sense to be armed?
Do you think it is “ethical morality” to smugly brag about the “responsibility” teachers and administrators of elementary schools have for the safety of the children in their care, and let them die as heroes without a freaking chance of meeting that responsibility because the authorities won’t allow them to have the tools to defend the children? Do you think dying because you are disarmed by government thugs makes you a hero?
Tell you what, Cosmic Surfer: If you think the above examples indicate “ethical morality,” I invite you to live in a foreign country as a helpless subject of both the arrogant boffins in government and vicious thugs on the street for a few years and see how you like it. This is the United States of America, CS, and we have a well-earned reputation of not putting up with tyrants and murderers. It is very definitely an “ethical morality” to accept responsibility for the safety of yourself, your family, your neighbors, and any and all helpless innocents in your vicinity. If you can’t do that, CS, you haven’t got “ethical morality”; you have cowardice. And if you want to attack me for refusing to allow some Adam Henry take my life or the life of my loved ones, you are mentally ill — and that is the official medical opinion of Sarah Thompson, MD, and others. I’ll direct you to their diagnoses if you wish.
As for the rest of your meaningless tripe, The word “Taliban” denotes a pseudo-religious sect that uses their pseudo-religion as an excuse to murder at their whim. Your accusation is therefore stupid and false; I, and gun owners like me, protect people from murderers. I would even protect you from murder if the occasion were to arise, in spite of your insistence that we all be victims.
I don’t know what you mean by “paid-off member of the NRA;” that seems to be a nonsensical statement. But yes, I am a Life Patron member of the NRA (I paid them; they don’t pay me), and a Life Member of Gun Owners of America, and a Life Member of the Second Amendment Foundation, and a member of Jews for the Protection of Firearm Ownership (though I am not a Jew), and of State level pro-rights organizations, and I make no apologies for it, so make the most of it.
Your accusation that I am a Traitor to the American Dream and its historical Constitution is almost laughable, CS. I say “almost,” meaning it is worth a snicker and a snort or two. The facts are exactly opposite, and clearly you have no clue about either one. Unlike you, I won’t speculate as to what YOU mean by either one, but the first means whatever you want it to mean and the second recognizes your right to achieve the first without interference from government, and with your rights to achieve it protected by government.
I hear nonsense from people like you and I have to wonder why in the world you advocate the destruction of the first nation in 25 centuries — 50 centuries — to be founded on the premise that individual liberty trumps the arbitrary whim of kings and princes and government functionaries. How do you justify that advocacy, CS?
Oh, let’s see, you called me a “Predator, that should be Locked-Up on sight!” (sic). Who or what do you think I am preying on, CS? Bad guys who prey on the weak and helpless? Even if I was, is there something wrong with that? If the occasion arises I stand in the way of predators, that’s true; but how do you figure I’m a predator? Or don’t you even understand the definition of the words you are spouting?
Intolerant? You have no clue. Here’s a newsflash, CS: I am intolerant of injustice, that’s true. I’m intolerant of a government that does not obey the charter of limited powers that created it, that’s true. I’m very tolerant of mentally-ill doofuses who advocate in the marketplace of ideas that everyone should become helpless vassals and peasants that anyone with a gun or a knife or a baseball bat should boss around, that’s true. That’s why I’m here rattling your cage, CS. I’m very intolerant of bullies who think women can or should be owned, or be hurt, or be punished, or be stalked, or be ordered about like a well-trained pet — and I encourage the ladies to get armed and get trained and stop looking like a punching bag.
Now, on the other hand, CS, how intolerant are you to claim I or anyone else should be without rights and without the means of defending our rights?
So, you are “Standing (Your) Ground!!!” FWIW, you look pretty silly standing there looking all grumpy and ready to fight when no one is threatening you and you don’t have anything to fight with anyway. But I will honor your right to stand there and throw a three-year-old temper tantrum if you want, so long as you don’t threaten anyone. But I will also honor your right to respect the right of others to exercise their rights.
Now that we’ve had our little discussion, CS, would you like to adopt a rational demeanor instead of throwing all these asinine insults around, and explain what rights you think anyone has if they depend exclusively on others to defend them?
Aren’t You lucky “DC”… I don’t believe in Flame wars either…. I Also don’t believe in arguing facts with morons, or debating Walls…. Because not one of your so-called facts are in fact, a “Fact”… they are just opinions dressed up as facts… Something you learned by overindulging in Fox News rhetoric!
But I know you have a tough time telling the difference!! You should look them up in that book called a dictionary… Here I’ll spell them for you…. Pay attention, ’cause Fox News won’t teach you this >>>>>
F… A… C… T is not the same as O… P… I… N… I… O… N… Got that????
And unreasonable paranoia induced “Fear of Shadows” does NOT a home-invader make!
(Isn’t it amazing just how many of those fearful shadows populate the Good Ole White Boy USA, while managing to avoid every other civilized country in the world…. it’s perplexing… until we begin to realize that the USA, thanks to people like YOU, the NRA, The Tea Party and the Republicans is on the Fast Road to become a 3rd rate country living in the Wild West of the 1800s all over again!!! You are the magnets drawing all those Evil fearful shadows… They must be your inbred kin!! )
Life is difficult when you swagger through it as a Wall….
You want your guns…. Good…. You got them… Enjoy!!!! Myself, and all of us other deprived unarmed folk, will keep our Tourist dollars and stay out of your States, while we relax in safety, spending our money in a secure environment, far from trigger-happy idiots like you…
And every time one of your moronic NRA brothers shoots himself or herself, or gets shot by one of his family members, I will just rack that up as a victory for the good guys, and the survival of the species… you know… US…. the ones that learned our lessons…
Never Play with Guns!
I just feel sorry for Your kids… They never had a chance!