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Comment Re: Great one more fail (Score 0) 600

Unlike for civilians, there are open statistics for police officers being shot with their own firearms. In fact, the percent is 5% of officers shot are shot with their own weapon. One in twenty.

It might be worth noting that your 5% figure actually translates to THREE officers shot with their own weapon in 2011 (from the FBI report). Out of 780K police officers. So, in any given year, about 0.0004% of police are killed with their own weapon....

Hardly a significant problem.

Comment Re:Great one more fail (Score 0) 600

One? Are you joking? According to CDCâ(TM)s WISQARS, there are about 14,000-19,000 nonfatal injuries stemming from accidental shootings per year in the U.S.

Of course, my comment was about men shooting their penises off, in response to GP's comment about same.

And there are NOT 14K-19K shot-off-penises per annum in the USA.

Comment Re:99.99%, eh? (Score 2) 600

Or do you think the "liberal media" is covering up the hundreds of thousands of people who use guns to prevent themselves from being stabbed in our (incredibly safe) country every day?

So, I gather that you think that the "liberal media" is covering up the hundreds of thousands of people who shoot themselves accidently in our (incredibly safe) country every day?

Because, face it, that doesn't actually happen all that often either. Note that the average is somewhere around 600 fatalities per year in a nation of 330 million. Which puts accidental shootings way below traffic deaths (33000 per year) as a problem to worry about.

Comment Re:Great one more fail (Score 5, Insightful) 600

Yet Another Responsible Gun Owner Shoots His Own Penis
At least five American men have shot off their penises since 2010.

Note that this new "smart" gun won't save you from doing this.

Note also that an average of one such accident per year in a land of 300+ million makes it less common than being struck by lightning. So when we get that lightning problem under control, I can turn my attention to the "shooting my own penis off" problem....

Comment Re:High-power industrial civilization may not last (Score 2) 196

With the obvious exception of U-235, mining something doesn't actually make it disappear. It'll still be around in a landfill somewhere, if it whatever it was made into wasn't recycled.

So, no, we're not going to run out of raw materials unless our population keeps growing exponentially. And the best projections have it peaking in the 10-12B range, then declining back to lower than it is now (note that, absent immigration, the USA and western Europe are already experiencing a population decline).

On the other hand, our industrial society has been based on the assumption of an ever-increasing population (as an obvious example, Social Security assumes more children than elderly, an increasingly shaky assumption). We're going to have to make some changes by and by, when population goes into a semi-permanent decline.

Comment Re:In other words....Don't look like a drug traffi (Score 3, Interesting) 462

Hmm, 62K seizures in 13 years across the entire nation...

So, a bit fewer than 5K per year nationwide. Which is considerably lower than your chance of getting killed in an auto accident (about 33K per year).

So, while it's pretty clearly corrupt and of questionable Constitutionality, it's not so prevalent as to make it something to really worry about if I have seven times as much chance of being killed in an auto accident (or twice as much chance of being murdered).

Note that I am not endorsing this sort of behaviour by police/judges/feds. Merely pointing out that TFA is aiming to be rather more alarmist than reality requires....

Comment Re:At least he didn't snap and kill them all! (Score 1) 140

Especially in the US, a lot of these kinds of incidents end with the person getting a gun, going back to the office and wiping out those that have wronged them.

I take it that these kinds of incident are vanishingly rare, then?

Or is it just that your definition of "a lot" is pretty much the same as "almost noone"?

Because, when all is said and done, the kind of shooting you describe is rare enough to make national news.

Which is not actually the same thing as "common"....

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