I won't speak for all gun rights advocates, but the ones I know don't use the comparison of cars to guns in reference to the restrictions - its gun control advocates who do that. When most (I won't presume to speak for all) gun rights advocates compares cars to guns, it is to point out the fact that if gun control advocates truly cared about saving lives, they would be equally as active in caring about car deaths, which are higher. Since they aren't, it is clear there must be something else that gun control advocates are concerned with in addition to (or instead of, depending on the specific individual) the deaths. So in context, it is a full comparison. The parent is essentially expanding the context further than the grandparent, and as I pointed out, there didn't seem to be any logic behind it, given that cars have more restrictions than guns, and yet cars cause more deaths, so where is the societal benefit to expanding car restrictions to guns? That is the kind of thinking I just can't comprehend.

You have a very odd definition of "exceptional". The total number of people who died or are injured due to mass shootings in the last ten years are fewer than the number of people who die in a single month due to car accidents. This is really no different than 9/11. Slashdot by and large seems to agree the government massively overreacted to that tragedy, and far more people died in that than in the mass shootings since then. Unless you think America's response to 9/11 has been reasonable, please explain to me why the rights of the people should be taken away for these tragedies but not the other?

I don't understand this kind of thinking - automobiles kill more people than guns do with those restrictions in place, and that is an argument in favor of implementing the same restrictions that automobiles have on guns? Why?

Or, rather than making this a false dichotomy, why not do both? There will always be things we can't deal with, so it is a stupid idea to put all our eggs in one basket. Equally, just because we have a backup plan doesn't mean we should ignore the current situation.

... than high speed internet? Dude, where the hell do you live? It sure as hell ain't anywhere I've ever heard about. I do also have to point out, it hasn't been one hundred years since the creation of the internet, yet you expect the same level of infrastructure to be in place after, what, some forty years?

Speaking a bit more on the article, as a resident in Maryland and 20 miles from DC, it's bullshit. The DC metro area has access to very high-speed broadband - some people just choose not to purchase it, which is a very different thing than the implication in the article. The worst case scenario is that the kids have to go to the local libraries to use it - or perhaps stay a bit later at the schools. There is no "bandwidth divide" going by the definition implied in the article.

Then why didn't the agent simply tell Arrington to do so? She should be far more familiar with the paperwork and process than he is. His suggestion was not unreasonable, but the agent's response sure as hell was.

Personally, "pulling troops out" sounds like evacuate completely, but politicians count on their supporters to jump through mental hoops (like you just did) to justify the vague things they say with what they actually do. Bush's supporters did the same. And like I said, there's still plenty more things he has been dishonest about.

Let's see, we are still in Iraq and Afghanistan, Guantanamo is still open, gas prices are still high... need I go on?

I don't suppose you have any evidence to back that up? Because I've got evidence against those claims.

Having grown up in the Bible Belt, I can tell you certain religious groups DO have objections to IDs with numbers on them. Specifically, one of the things they mentioned was that such things would be used to justify applying even more numbers to us, exactly as you are arguing here. I haven't checked, but I'm going to guess there was a lawsuit at some point in time (maybe multiple ones, since driver's licenses are state-issued) about the numbers on a driver's license, and it was probably shot down because the license is voluntary. (For the record, I am not religious, and I think the "mark of the beast" is pure quackery, but I equally find it delusional when someone pretends to to know the mind of another.)

FTFY. The point is, some things are just so new that they simply require learning a new skill. That seems to be the case here. People decried touch screens for years - now they are common. The Kinect is an entirely new input device. So was the Nintendo Wii. I heard all these same complaints then, too. Perhaps they are right this time, and Metro (which is not Windows 8) sucks - but perhaps not. Incremental changes are fine, but sometimes starting from scratch and coming up with something new is also useful. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't, and time tells. Anything beyond an individual stating whether or not they like it (such as the original rant) is mere hubris.

Now, I swear I've heard that complaint before. Where was it... ah, yes! Of course, how silly of me. That's the exact same complaint I heard from people when I tried to convince them to use Linux!

The simple fact is anything new has a learning curve, and there's nothing wrong with that. Microsoft is attempting something new. Whether or not it works out is still up in the air, they are learning. I can't fault them for that. Perhaps, like the ranter in the article, it just isn't right for him. Perhaps it is the desktop version of the Nintendo Wii - not targeted at hardcore users, but rather at grandma, grandpa, baby brother, and others who are largely computer illiterate (let's face it, Slashdot has never been Microsoft Window's target audience). Perhaps it is truly a horrible interface. Perhaps they are banking on desktop touch screens becoming the next big thing (I was surprised to learn my neighbor had just purchased one). All I know for certain is that the computer industry changes too fast and too rapidly for anyone to actually be able to predict how good or bad something is, and I certainly can't understand the hubris from one ranting computer user on the Internet mentioned in the article declaring a product should be recalled. By all means, the individual should return the product and get your money back, and if enough do so, then the product may be worth declaring a recall.

Ah, so now it comes out. Given how violent you are, its no wonder you don't want people to have guns - it levels the playing field for people without my training against people like you. That was also a rather pathetic attempt at a straw man argument, given that I never said I would run a fiefdom with my bare hands (if you were truly a martial artist, you'd know they trained with non-firearm weapons). And seriously, "make my day"? Real martial artists bow out of respect to one another before the first punch/kick/whatever is thrown. Your ignorance is showing, you might want to get that checked.

No, you re-read it. The context is very clear - ban guns, and we don't have to worry about deaths from nutcases. The Akihabara incident clearly shows that to be false. So, my original statement stands, you've made a straw man.

Yes, actually, someone said exactly that, making your statement a straw man. I refuted the claim that no one had died in a mass murder without a gun. But if we are going to imagine things, then imagine what could have happened had there been one trained individual there with a gun - perhaps the body count would have been one (the attacker) rather than seven? We can engage in what-if scenarios all day long - the point is getting rid of guns doesn't stop mass murder (the school was a "gun free zone", as was Virginia Tech), but identifying and helping crazy people will.