it made me a Google+ profile which I didn't want.

I noticed a week or two ago that the Google Play store will no longer permit you to submit reviews and ratings for apps if you do not have a Google+ account. No opting out of it either.

I suspect the day is coming where you will have to have a G+ account to even download from the Play store (and what a stupid fucking name that is BTW, Google Play).

It is faintly amusing to me though that I can create an unlimited number of gmail accounts under any nom de plume I choose. Riddle me this: Which has more potential for abuse? (1) The ability to create an unlimited number of fake gmail accounts, or (2) the ability to create an anonymous G+ account?

Here's the exact quote from a [US] senate resolution...

So? Whoever wrote that was blithely repeating a myth. The Israeli minister of intelligence, Dan Meridor, conceded that Ahmedinejad never actually said that Israel “must be wiped off the map.”

10 U.S.C. 311 : US Code - Section 311: Militia: composition and classes:
(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a
declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.
(b) The classes of the militia are -
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.

That, and which homes are also the safest to rob. All in all, a bang up job for the journal! Really, this should call attention to the poor privacy laws in New York. This kind of information should not be public.

Indeed. I don't understand why this is public information to begin with. It's no ones business what products I buy or own.

So basically its a map of people without guns, and therefore excellent homes to invade and rob. Thanks Journal News! Douch bags.

...until they actually make their archives downloadable to the general public. Their TOS expressly prohibits downloading from the site, which makes their archive useless to the masses. And don't tell me about Warrick...I'm well aware of it, as well as the fact that they haven't been accepting submissions for months.

Here's the relevant cite from the FAQ:

Can people download sites from the Wayback?

Our terms of use specify that users of the Wayback Machine are not to copy data from the collection. If there are special circumstances that you think the Archive should consider, please contact info at archive dot org.

I seem to get mod points every two or three weeks now...I'd be glad to toss some your way.

We might as well just get used to the idea of mass shootings occurring on a regular basis with ever increasing body counts.

Or take proactive measures to ensure the safety of every man, woman and child in this country. Which might mean (gasp!) arming teachers and permitting guns to be carried by law-abiding citizens where they are currently banned. In the meantime, the country should do a better job vetting the mentally ill and ensuring they do not have access to firearms. This isn't gun control; it's called common sense.

To paraphrase another poster, the horse has left the barn. Our gun culture in the US is what it is. Instead of trying to do the impossible (disarm the US populace), politicians need to be pushing for measures that will improve mental health care in this country and will help identify those individuals who should not be around guns in the first place.

That's a nice list of US based gun supporting sources you have chosen to backup your statements.

I hardly think pro-gun-control groups will carry the statistics needed to prove my point.

That said, I did provide a couple of non-partisan links in followup posts (if you consider Wikipedia "non-partisan"). Also, you state that an American is 3.5 times more likely to be killed by someone (regardless of weapon). To be complete, you should find some countries that (1) have some form of gun control more strict than the US and (2) have higher per capita homicide rates. I found several, but I'll leave this as an exercise for the reader.

My point in all this is that there is no clear correlation between gun control and crime, despite claims to the contrary.

You are 40 times as likely to be killed in by a firearm in the US (no gun control) as in the UK (no guns).

You are comparing apples and oranges, my friend. Of course murder-by-firearms rates will be lower in countries where the per capita firearm ownership is lower. No one is arguing that.

In fact, the U.S. doesn't even make it in the top 100 when comparing per capita intentional murder rates (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate). So one would be hard-pressed to argue that there is a positive correlation between gun control and murder rate (regardless of weapon).

And to be fair: It doesn't make sense to compare murder rates by firearms between countries with varying levels of firearms control. A better comparison is overall murder rate. The U.S. doesn't even make it in the top 37 on a per-capita basis (Source: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-crime-murders-per-capita)

Notice how many "Western" states there are in this listing, all with gun control policies far stricter than the U.S. Apparently, they are killing each other with items other than guns.

I would not buy one for just that reason. A couple of Kahrs I own do not have safeties. But I have never "accidentally" fired off a round, because I'm rather meticulous about the 5 rules of gun safety:

1. All guns are always loaded.
2. Don't let the muzzle of the gun cross anything you're not prepared to shoot.
3. Keep your finger out of the trigger guard, up on the frame of the gun, until the sights are on target and you're prepared to shoot.
4. Always be sure of your target and what's beyond it.
5. Maintain control of your gun.

(I did not make these up nor claim credit for them. Expanded details can be found here: http://www.spw-duf.info/safety.html)

Every other western nation has seriously controlled guns and their level of gun violence is dramatically lower than in the US.

Cite needed.

Oh wait, I've got some cites you can use:

Our most conservative estimates show that by adopting shall-issue laws, states reduced murders by 8.5%, rapes by 5%, aggravated assaults by 7% and robbery by 3%. If those states that did not permit concealed handguns in 1992 had permitted them back then, citizens might have been spared approximately 1,570 murders, 4,177 rapes, 60,000 aggravated assaults and 12,000 robberies. To put it even more simply Criminals, we found, respond rationally to deterrence threats.
Source: More Guns Equal Less Violent Crime
by Professor John R. Lott, Jr.
University of Chicago Law School

This is one of the favorite arguments of gun control proponents, and yet the facts show that there is simply no correlation between gun control laws and murder or suicide rates across a wide spectrum of nations and cultures. In Israel and Switzerland, for example, a license to possess guns is available on demand to every law-abiding adult, and guns are easily obtainable in both nations. Both countries also allow widespread carrying of concealed firearms, and yet, admits Dr. Arthur Kellerman, one of the foremost medical advocates of gun control, Switzerland and Israel âoehave rates of homicide that are low despite rates of home firearm ownership that are at least as high as those in the United States.â A comparison of crime rates within Europe reveals no correlation between access to guns and crime.
Source: Gun Control: Myths and Realities
David Lampo, Cato Institute

According to the study, published last year in The Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, European nations with more guns had lower murder rates. As summarized in a brief filed by several criminologists and other scholars supporting the challenge to the Washington law, the seven nations with the most guns per capita had 1.2 murders annually for every 100,000 people. The rate in the nine nations with the fewest guns was 4.4.
Source: Gun Laws and Crime: A Complex Relationship
By ADAM LIPTAK, The New York Times