Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Oregon Man Shoots Himself in a Bumbling Accident - Continues to Enoy his Gun Rights

Local news

A Douglas county man is recovering from injuries suffered during an accidental self-inflicted gunshot wound. 

At about 3:30 p.m. on Monday, November 2nd, Douglas County Communications received a report of an accidental shooting at a residence in the 11-thousand block of Driver Valley Road in Oakland. 

According to the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office, Gary Becker, 65, was carrying his Ruger .243 Caliber Rifle inside the house to put it away after hunting, when it slipped out of his hand. They say the butt of the rifle hit the ground and the rifle went off, causing substantial damage to Becker’s left hand.

24 comments:

  1. Interesting title. Why would you opine that his Constitutional rights should be violated due to a self inflicted accident?

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    1. Because someone who proves that he's incapable of safely handling guns should lose the right to do so. Should it require the death of an innocent first? Or would you oppose the loss of gun rights even in that case?

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    2. It should be "one strike and you're out." Or at least a temporary loss of rights until attending a safety class and proficiency training.

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    3. Sounds great. As soon as you get on board with revoking driving privileges [not a Constitutional right], I might get on board with your convoluted logic.

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    4. "It should be "one strike and you're out."

      Good luck selling that Baldr, you might need to engage in some creative writing to make it sound like "common sense" in some way. Some of the current candidates are suffering uncharacteristic bouts of honesty and with the assistance of the gun control lobby are discovering that its more than just money that supports gun rights.

      https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/did-gun-control-cost-mcauliffe-and-democrats-the-virginia-election/2015/11/04/fa5dfdfa-830d-11e5-9afb-0c971f713d0c_story.html

      Former Mayor Bloomberg just dropped a big pile of money into Virginia races, heavily outspending gun rights advocates and didn't do well. I believe it suggests that they are wandering over the line of what many consider to be "common sense".

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    5. Hey Baldr, I just saw some news from out your way. A variation of the sanctuary city movement by the looks of it,

      Sixty-one percent of voters in rural Coos County voted to pass the “2nd Amendment Preservation Ordinance,” which also prohibits local enforcement of Oregon’s new background check law. That law requires universal background checks for gun purchases in the state — even for private sales."

      http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/11/05/3719580/coos-county-passes-gun-rights-law/

      As well noted in the article,

      "It’s not clear, however, whether the ordinance can be legally implemented. Charlie Hinkle, a constitutional law expert in Portland, Oregon, told the Huffington Post that local governments and officials are not allowed to decide “what laws are constitutional.”

      Something I have said quite often when I bring up the lack of enforcement in regards to those jurisdictions that enact sanctuary laws forbidding their employees from enforcing federal immigration laws.
      I believe their are 36 counties in Oregon. That makes 35 to go.

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    6. The local ordinances about what constitutes criminal negligence should be changed to include every incident with a gun in which someone is hurt or killed. Once we get that done, we'll expand it to include those incidents in which no one is injured. You know how I love that incrementalism.

      In the end, in the ideal, ALL misuse of a gun should result in the loss of gun rights. Then we'd be left with only the truly responsible as gun owners. I realize why this is so frightening to you and why you take it so personally.

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    7. Once we get that done . . .

      Another way of saying "never," then, ;-)

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    8. Yep, incrementalism and perfidy...the only success the gun control industry ever has.

      Gosh...for the country's seek...I certainly hope nobody ever misuses any other Constitutional right.

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    9. "The local ordinances about what constitutes criminal negligence should be changed to include every incident with a gun in which someone is hurt or killed."

      Mike, in this case, there likely wasn't a local ordinance that applied since he lived outside the city limits. I'm referring to the rather tame infraction of discharging a firearm in the city limits.
      As for getting such an ordinance passed at a county level, good luck with that since it would certainly not pass. There are already a number of laws which could apply to negligent shootings resulting in the injury or death of others as we've seen in some of your recent posts.
      BTW, the discharge within city limits ordinance is actually quite common and is routinely allowed in states with preemption laws. They also normally make an exception for defensive gunfire.

      "Once we get that done, we'll expand it to include those incidents in which no one is injured. You know how I love that incrementalism."


      Yes Mike, I've noticed. And it seems to be spread evenly across the board of those who represent the gun control lobby, all the way down to the individual supporter. That is one of the many reasons that members of the evil gun lobby don't trust you when you say we just want to close this one tiny "loophole" and refuse to compromise.
      A good example of this incrementalism is California. Every year they add new crimes to the ever expanding list of offenses that result in the loss of gun rights to the point where even their Democratic Governor has started actually vetoing some gun laws.
      To be fair, those who support the expansion of gun rights, also practice this technique, though in their case, they normally have hard facts on their side.
      Some examples of this incrementalism in the pro gun side are the recent passage of a law in Minnesota that would allow its citizens to possess suppressors in accordance with federal law. The representative of the gun control lobby trotted out clips from gangster and spy movies showing how a person could kill someone in complete silence and get away with it. The gun rights advocates used rhetoric like 39 states already allow citizens to own them with no instances of legally owned suppressors being used in a crime. In this case, reason won out and Minnesota became number 40.

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  2. maybe he deserved a head shot for putting other innocents at risk from his stupidity

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    1. Just looked on the map, he lives well out of town in the country. The risk to innocents was likely quite small. So I imagine you'll just have to satisfy yourself with fantasies of the long term pain and disability he'll likely be suffering.

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    2. How small is the risk of having to carry a gun, just in case? 12,000 gun shot deaths (minus suicides from 33,000 gun shot deaths) out of a population of 310 million. Carrying a gun for such a small percentage, is an irrational fear.

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    3. Nice try Tad. The damage guns do goes far beyond the number that are actually killed. And the sad truth is much of that damage would be eliminated with a few simple changes, ones that would not disarm the responsible.

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    4. But it's ok to shut down the gun ranges that us responsible gun owners shoot at because the sound of gunfire is icky. You keep telling me that I have nothing to worry about if I'm responsible, but clearly that is not true.

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    5. 12,000 gun shot deaths (minus suicides from 33,000 gun shot deaths) out of a population of 310 million. Carrying a gun for such a small percentage, is an irrational fear.

      Or alternatively, restricting guns for such a small percentage is an irrational fear.

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    6. "How small is the risk of having to carry a gun, just in case? 12,000 gun shot deaths (minus suicides from 33,000 gun shot deaths) out of a population of 310 million."

      The problem is Tad, is that you're using incorrect numbers. A better way of looking at it, in my opinion, is to do the math using the number of violent crimes reported. The FBI defines violent crimes as murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault. Crimes which most people would allow a person to use deadly force to defend against.
      The latest number of violent crimes reported by the FBI was a bit over 316 million in 2013. After doing the math, one might ask whether its irrational to not carry, though that is a decision that is an individual one.

      https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2013/crime-in-the-u.s.-2013/tables/1tabledatadecoverviewpdf/table_1_crime_in_the_united_states_by_volume_and_rate_per_100000_inhabitants_1994-2013.xls

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    7. " You keep telling me that I have nothing to worry about if I'm responsible, but clearly that is not true."

      Why, because a particular gun range might be shut down. That ruins everything for you? I know you're all about the convenience/inconvenience ratio, but if you weren't so self-centered you'd have empathy for those who want to enjoy the serenity of an outdoor scene without the sound of gunfire and the lead from millions of rounds leaching into the groundwater.

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    8. There you go SS twisting and changing again. No, I'm talking gun shot deaths. You can (as you usually do ) change the issue to general crime. That's your dishonest interpretation.

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    9. MikeB: "Why, because a particular gun range might be shut down. That ruins everything for you?"

      Uh, yeah. Because that's my gun range.

      Again, what is the harm of the sound of distant gun fire? Are these people so mentally disturbed and fearful that they wet themselves? Emotional trauma? Long term PTSD? Are untrained gun owners a better result?

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    10. You know, there are plenty of parks they can go to if gunfire disturbs their precious "serenity". They could go to Redwood regional park, which is literally adjacent to Chabot, but far enough to the north to not hear any shots. Or they can do Tilden, Lafayette reservoir, Mulholland Ridge, San Pablo reservoir, Briones, Cull Canyon, Don Castro, Green Belt, Garin, Oyster Bay, Hayward Regional Shoreline, Mt. Diablo... And that's just in the immediate East Bay Area. Believe me, there is no shortage of parks. But I guess they'll have to shut down the airport too, because some of these parks are under the flight path... serenity and all.

      For me, there is one other shooting range, which would become twice as crowded (getting a lane on the weekend requires a reservation even now), but the same pansies can shut that one down for the same reasons. I used to never go there because it was a crime for me to drive through Berkeley with a Ruger 10/22 cased and locked in the trunk (yeah, seriously), but the intrepid warriors who fight for freedom got them to drop it post Heller.

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    11. "There you go SS twisting and changing again. No, I'm talking gun shot deaths. You can (as you usually do ) change the issue to general crime. That's your dishonest interpretation."

      I'm not twisting or changing, just disagreeing with you. While the page I cited showed different classes of crime, to include property crimes. The figure I used from it was for violent crime.
      While you may believe that the number of homicide deaths don't justify the decision to carry, I believe the decision to carry covers more than that. Do you believe that people shouldn't be allowed to protect themselves with deadly force against crimes the FBI defines as a violent crime?

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  3. "They say the butt of the rifle hit the ground and the rifle went off, causing substantial damage to Becker’s left hand."

    One could say that being shot in the hand at close range by a high velocity rifle round would serve as an immediate teachable moment for him. Notwithstanding Mike's dream list of offenses that would result in permenant loss of rights, in the majority of the US, the most he would have been charged with is discharge of a firearm in the city limits. If he lives in town. Something that obviously isn't a felony.
    However, he in essence punished himself for his lapse to the tune of thousands of dollars in medical expenses, a good amount of pain, and very good possibility of at least some level of permenant damage.

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  4. At least this fool shot himself and not some innocent bystander

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