Ouch for California Teachers

Judge Strikes Down Tenure For California Teachers

As a college student who has had some pretty bad teachers, I can't I say I like tenure.

But on the flip side of the number of violent crimes decreasing, the overall numbers of death and injuries from guns has gone up over the same period. Which goes back to the point I've made before, that the NRA has gone from an organization in favor of responsible gun ownership, to one of straight gun ownership. The more people out there with minimal or no gun safety training handling guns doesn't sync with the idea of "a well-regulated militia, being necessary for the security of a free state. "

Where do you see that data? Everything I see shows gun-related deaths/injuries staying pretty flat:

I'm not arguing a side in regards to the gun control debate, but I wouldn't put much stock in crime numbers.

If you have some time, read through these pieces from Chicago Magazine. It's especially interesting if you enjoyed the TV show The Wire (it covers some of the same crime stat issues they did). Anyways, it shows how police departments like Chicago fudge the numbers to make it look like crime is going down. Since there is no universal way of reporting crime data, it's tough to tell when it really is up or down.

http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Ma...o-crime-rates/
http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Ma...me-statistics/

When it comes to these shootings, I think the media could do us all a favor and cut back on the glorification of the shooters. These nuts know now that if they run around shooting a few people, their manifesto will be read to millions of people. Their face will be plastered all over the news. Everything that feeds that narcissism will come to fruition.

I don't think it's any surprise that most of these shooters now come complete with some message they want to spread. And I think even without guns, they'd find a way to kill to get it out knowing the media will eat it up.

Those number are in the per 100,000 population. Population is increasing, so ergo, if those numbers are not decreasing at the same rate as population is growing, the overall numbers are rising. And the per 100,000 numbers have a slight rise to them. The numbers in the per X population for gun deaths/injuries don't reflect the same decrease in the per X population for violent crimes.

The highest numbers were in 2008 and 2005. 2009 had fewer deaths than 2005 and 2002 had nearly identical injury numbers to 2009. I'm not sure how anyone could look at the above numbers and make any kind of conclusion that gun deaths/injuries are more of an issue now than they were in 2002 or 2005.

One of the top commentators there was from this website that claimed 453 "real" homicides in Chicago in 2013. (It's a pretty cool website, heyjackass.com) Chicago claimed 415. That's a pretty significant difference, but it doesn't wipe out the overall trend, even if you assume that Chicago is wrong and the website is correct in every single disputed homicide report. You'd also have to make the assumption that Chicago was much more precise and liberal with their crime reporting techniques in the early 90s, when logic tells you they would have been fudging even more. (Edit: Chicago reported 943 murders in 1992. Why can't we increase that roughly 10% and assume some fudging there too - I bet they were pretty desperate to stay under 1,000? I wonder how many murders heyjackass.com would have reported that year.)

And to respond to another point above, you'd have to also assume that the whole concept of missing people suddenly became a big thing for the first time around the early 90s, when all these murders were apparently replaced by "missing people" whose bodies were never found. Which again seems like a stretch, I think its easier to find missing people and bodies today than it was ever before.

And the DOJ and other entities report similar reduction in crime across the U.S. And I don't even know where to fit in the more common trend, like the one that started this discussion, where police tend to INFLATE the reality of crime for budget purposes.

I think in any other context, people dismissing evidence of this scale would be accused of having an agenda. But when it comes to crime, police, and guns, there's more empowerment to just believe whatever you want.

Here's the raw numbers for gun deaths and injuries, that shows the rise, with figured from the CDC, DOJ and DHHS.

Guns in the United States: Firearms, armed violence and gun law

Deaths:
2011: 32,163
2010: 31,672
2009: 31,347
2008: 31,593
2007: 31,224
2006: 30,896
2005: 30,694
2004: 29,569
2003: 30,136
2002: 30,242
2001: 29,573
2000: 28,663
1999: 28,874

Non-fatal injuries:
2012: 81,396
2011: 73,883
2010: 73,505
2009: 66,769
2008: 78,622
2007: 69,863
2006: 71,417
2005: 69,825
2004: 64,389
2003: 65,834
2002: 58,841
2001: 63,012

Why should we use flat numbers instead of rates?

I get that gun crime is decreasing way more than than gun accidents (which is either a flat number or a rising number), but what does that tell us and why is that surprising? There's a ton of reasons gun crime is down. (reduced lead paint, abortions, the internet, more police, enhanced law enforcement tools, aggressive prosecution of gangs). Gun clumsiness and negligence isn't impacted by the those kinds of factors.

So, basically, the gun issue was "solved" in 2004, became a major issue in 2008, then got better again in 2009 before becoming a bigger issue in 2010 and staying flat in 2011.

When looked as a % of the population, this is just year-to-year noise. None of it shows any significant increase.

The raw numbers match up with the increase in firearm sales. If you just look at per/X of population numbers, that does better at showing rates, not totals. As the number of firearms sold has increased over the past 10 years, so has the number of deaths and injuries from firearms.

http://www.atf.gov/files/publication...pdate-2012.pdf

So, if I am in a city of 10,000 people and 300 own firearms, guns are less of an issue there than if I was in a city of 50,000 people and 301 own firearms - correct?

Realistically that depends upon the caliber (no pun intended) of the 300 versus the 301.

I got a feeling this is going to get really, really ugly.

Similar to the point I've been making. A gun in the hands of someone who has had the bare minimum of training on how a gun works and gun safety is a risk to themselves and those within range of where a bullet could travel from the gun. To me the bigger problem isn't the number of guns, it is the number of people that haven't had even a bare minimum of gun handling or safety lessons.

The increase in pistol sales is pretty crazy. The gun manufacturers have to love the gun control debate, it just keeps people running to the gun shops.

It's kind of funny that everything is about Obama taking away guns and yet more guns will be sold under his Presidency than any other in history.

I was going to laugh, but then realized that you were correct and knowing or not knowing Aaron Hernandez was actually statistically significant. Which is awesome.

Ah, cool, didn't equate that at the time.

Eric Cantor lost his primary in Virginia.

:thumbsup:

So, gun ownership more than doubled, while gun deaths went up 11%, and that's a worrying trend? FWIW, there was a 14% increase in population.

Sounds like maybe the new gun owners are more responsible than the old ones.

A fate that should have befallen anyone who claimed to be a conservative but backed this amnesty b.s.

There are different ways to count gun ownership, and that affects the picture as well. Some counts show that the number of households with firearms has decreased, but the average number of firearms owned per person in a household with firearms has greatly increased. It is hard to get an accurate count, due to push back of fears of creating a gun registry. So basically the most accurate number available is the total number of firearms manufactured.

Cantor lost, the first time a sitting House Majority leader has lost a primary in 115 years.

Looks like the rumors of the Tea Party's demise have been grossly exaggerated.

Actually it's the first time a sitting House Majority leader has lost an ELECTION in 115 years. They're still checking to see if a sitting Majority Leader has ever lost in a primary (from what I just heard).

Wow.

SI

And now the $64,000 question: is it a district that could go Democrat in the general election? (From my ~2 minutes of googling, it looks like "lol, no.")

I am rubbing my hands with glee at the Eric Cantor news. :D

Or have they?

There are definitely questions -- still unaswered afaik -- about how much of the outcome, or at least the margin, was affected by Dem crossover voters.

Saw that exact thing happen in my own state house district a couple years ago.

Interesting insight from redstate here perhaps. Basically that immigration was the issue that opponents galvanized around but that arrogance was why there was an opening for that to happen in the first place.

Why Eric Cantor Lost | RedState

Costa is reporting that Costa was relaxed as his internal polls showed him up 20-30 points. He outspent his opponent 1 million to 75K the final week.

Insane./

The two candidates now from Cantor's former district are both professors at the same college.

Exactly what I figure is happening. Democrats voting Tea Party so they get to general election and then lose against Democrat.

From the you can't make this shit up file:

The guy who played Cooter from Dukes of Hazard ran against Cantor in 2002 and lost. He urged people to crossover vote for Brat in the primary.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/0...n_5463196.html

I'm not sure it's quite "lol, no" as you said but it's a typically 60/40 or 65/35 R district when we lived there. Just like most, it's an oddball jerrymandered district that gets some of Richmond but a lot of the rural area north of there.

SI

Does anyone know if Cantor is planning to pull a Lieberman and run as an Independent Republican? Is it even possible in his state?

Not possible.

https://leg1.state.va.us/cgi-bin/leg...0+cod+24.2-520

doesn't look like Dem Crossover was the solo reason .. turnout was high compared to 2012, just Cantor actually LOST 1/3d of his vote total from 2012.

Cantor can run as a write-in (like Lisa Murkowski in 2010), but if he does, it should make the election more winnable for the Democrat (assuming that guy is a decent candidate).

Ironically, I tend to see Cantor as a guy who started out somewhat as a moderate (well, at least by GOP standards, so LOLNOPE), tacked hard right to court the Tea Party, and then got burned trying to get back to the center. So this loss serves him right, the hypocrite.

Doesn't seem like he can actually.

I think that morons like Rachel Maddow who are celebrating Cantor losing have no clue what this is going to entail for their side - especially if (when?) the Republicans win the Senate this year. This election was a signal to the GOP - the Tea Party is still alive and will still be going after scalps. Which means, continue to be obstructionist. With the Tea Party losing primary after primary there was hope that the 2015 Republicans would be more willing to work with the President, but that hope may be dashed now.

I'm happy about it because a strong Tea Party means an increasingly marginalized (from an electoral standpoint) GOP.

Yep. A strong tea party will be a hindrance in 2016. Republicans can have the Senate in 2014 for all I care as long as Obama wields the veto pen. I think I read 2016 is a good year for the Dem's to take back the Senate if they lose it this year? At the very least get the biggest embarrassment to Wisconsin since Joe McCarthy out of the Senate (Ron Johnson).

I know fellow Dems like to say that - hey, if more Tea Party, it'll help us down the road. But the Tea Party influence led to the excessive gridlock we have now. And while the Tea Party hurts in Senate races when they say crazy things - they have tended to win House races in Conservative districts.

In addition, Obama has had around a 42% approval rating for quite a while now. Tea Partiers in the Congress hasn't improved the standing of Obama for most people in the country.

{scratches head} Wouldn't that at least make it equally likely to be crossover though?

It'll likely be easy enough to figure out fairly soon, a comparison of voter info & tracking how many traditionally voted in D primaries but voted in this one would tell the tale ... I'd just be very surprised if that level of detail was available to the media or the public less than 24 hours after the polls closed.

In my state's closed primary a lot of liberals and moderates registered Republican just to vote against the tea party candidates, helping the regular Republicans to landslide wins. That seems so much more sensible to me. Vote for the guy you think is the better candidate, the guy who will be better for your state, instead of the guy you actually think will be worse, just your team might look a little better by comparison, and thus has a theoretical better shot, maybe, in the future. This isn't just a game, these things have real implications. The next time I hear a liberal complaining about it being someone else's fault that their guy couldn't accomplish much of what he promised, I'll remember that that was the strategy all along. Winning is more important, it's just a team sport like following the NBA finals or something. Maybe more of this tea party obstructionism in the first place was the plan of some liberals in power all along. It's an easy enemy, you can paint your opposition as generally unreasonable, and you have a built-in excuse for all your policy failures and ineffectiveness.

Eh, one does what they can to discomfit the enemy, that aspect of it really doesn't bother me a whole lot philosophically.

That said, the only time I've cast an intentional crossover vote that I can recall was a year when the local sheriff's race -- where I had a very clear favored candidate -- was being decided in the (D) primary and that happened to present an opportunity to vote against the legend that was Cynthia McKinney. I mean, if you're in the neighborhood anyway ....