First, to "The Less Old than I Coot" YOU: "Here, in Spain, most schools are secure and strangers cannot simply walk in." ----------------------- He was NOT a "stranger" rather he was a registered student as have been those in nearly every school shooting. ------------------------ YOU: Many schools employ security guards, mostly unarmed, to deter unwanted visitors. ------------------------Like they are going to stop a nut with weapons. ----------------------- YOU: The police in Spain are armed and are very quick to respond to emergency calls - fortunately the steps taken for reasonable security mean there are not many emergencies. ------------------------So are the police in the U.S. It just takes time to get to the shooting. AND I disagree with the police surrounding a building and taking too damn much time to enter. If not prevented from doing so, MOST cops would do what I would. Just go in and get the bad guys as fast as possible! And if I got wounded or killed trying, well so be it. ------------------------ YOU: Mind you, school assaults appear to be an almost uniquely American event - maybe American shootists are simply cowards by nature? ------------------------ 1. ALL people who shoot unarmed people who are not trying to do them either great bodily harm or kill them, are cowards. (Because someone is unarmed does not mean they could be very dangerous and/or killers.) Yea, there are a lot of things which are uniquely American. Like saving the world AND helping more other countries and people than ANY ten (or more) other counties COMBINED have. ==================== In reply to Dave YOU: I did not say there were more than one gunmen; I said "one or more." ----------------------- Yep, that is what you said. Sorry! ------------------------YOU: I did not say he had machine guns; I said "automatic weapons." ------------------------1. I NEVER said, you said they were "machine guns" 2. The term "automatic weapons" most certainly INFERS MORE than just a pistol. (or pistols.) ------------------------YOU: Regarding the law as it applies to firearms; I am not opposed at all to the responsible ownership of firearms. I personally own a number of legal and registered firearms, myself, which I have used both for hunting and for target shooting. ------------------------1. EXCELLENT 2. The proven facts are, in case after case the registration of firearms has been the first step in the confiscating of them. And that, is a NO NO! ------------------------ YOU: I am adamantly opposed to any law that would ban the legal ownership of firearms. (They can take my firearms away when they can prise them out of my cold, dead fingers...) ------------------------ GOOD! Same here! ------------------------ YOU: Furthermore, I am also fully aware of what happened in Nazi Germany, and I wish a lot more of the people who keep naively pushing to ban firearms were aware of those facts. I also wish they would see past their fear and recognize the fact banning firearms will not stop firearms- related crimes. Criminals are rather notorious for ignoring the law! ------------------------ I was positive YOU knew only you are not the only one reading this thread. ------------------------ YOU: What I am against is the idea that it's perfectly OK to leave functional firearms lying around unlocked, along with the ammunition that goes in them, or worse, loaded and unlocked firearms where any kid from 3 years of age and up can get his or her hands on them. ------------------------ While I agree with you on that, it has absolutely NOTHING to do with the present shooting. ------------------------ YOU: While I often agree with you on many things, I cannot agree with the idea of students and teachers carrying loaded firearms in a school. ------------------------ An emotional, illogical response not based on fact. ------------------------ YOU: That's a great way to get a whole lot more people killed in a situation like the one that happened at Virginia Tech. ------------------------ 1. Another emotional and illogical response. 2. Really? Where is YOUR PROOF??? ------------------------ YOU: If, on the other hand, you are recommending that people be required to take specialized training and carry licenses to prove that they are properly trained for a situation like today (perhaps SWAT training?), then it might work. ------------------------ NO, they do NOT need "swat" training. ALL they need is basic firearms knowledge and how to shoot. And this has been PROVEN to be effective OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN! ----------------------- YOU: However, you must remember even highly trained military and police personnel STILL sometimes shoot the wrong people. ------------------------ SO? 1. Nothing is perfect and never will be. 2. Still, shooting at a guy who is walking around executing innocent people sounds damn good to me. ------------------------ Please, Take Care! Neil

Well James K, There you go spouting your religious stuff again. Stuff which anyone who is not a programmed religious robot knows does NOT stand up to rational thought and/or the test of time. --------------------- YOU SAID: "We can place all sorts of garbage in the minds of our young people, but don't you dare to post the 10 Commandments, lead a prayer group, or hand them a Bible, because it may just corrupt their little minds." --------------------- I am not even going to really go deeply into the more than a thousand years of proof it IS wrong! Like the Crusades, the burning of scientists who knew the truth, the Inquisitions, Witch Trials the many many religious wars between Catholic & Protestants. Nope, I will just cover a few of the terrible things Christians have done in the last fifty years. (I'll not even include WWII.) Ever hear of Jim Jones and the Peoples Temple? Well James, they had a LOT of Bible reading, being lead in prayer groups & most certainly believed in the 10 Commandments, all of which most certainly corrupted their little minds. It led to JonesTown! And James, are you telling me that when David Koresh was not screwing little girls, he was not reading the Bible, leading prayer groups and pushing the 10 Commandments? Well James, Koresh's doing so most certainly corrupted little minds. And it led to WACO! How about TWO (of many) CHRISTIAN TERRORISTS, Tim McVeigh and Eric Robert Rudolph, who most certainly read the Bible, were in prayer groups and who believed in the 10 Commandments? All of which most certainly corrupted their little minds! All that led to (among many other crimes) the Blowing up of the Federal Building in OK City, and the Olympics in Atlanta, GA. So James, there is nearly 2,000 years of proof that reading the Bible, participating in prayer groups and the belief in the Ten Commandmnt does NOT make people better ar all. In my view, (as a FORMER Christian & one who has most probably forgotten more about the Christian religion than MOST Christians will EVER learn about it) it damn well makes them worse! Of course, before you or other Christians will ever realize that, you will have to DE-program yourselves. Neil

Hi Neil, Your post regarding your view of what Christianity is reveals a lot. I can certainly understand why you are so opposed to it. You're not alone, either. A lot of people have exactly the same understanding of Christianity. What I find interesting is why a man of such intelligence and education as yourself continues to define Christianity by the people who call themselves Christian and then do terrible things, rather than by the founder of Christianity from whom comes the name. I can assure you that there is NOTHING Christian about bombings, massacres, inquisitions, religious wars, etc. There is also very often nothing Christian about many, many people who were raised going to church, who go to church every Sunday, and who call themselves Christian. You can call a potato a rose all you want, and it's still a potato. A person cannot become a Christian by being raised a Christian or thinking he or she is a Christian. The only way a person can become a Christian is by putting his or her faith in Jesus Christ. That faith creates a BIG change in the heart of the person, which leads to the love of ALL people, not to bombings, massacres, inquisitions, religious wars, etc. Religion, in many forms, can and has been USED as a tool for all manner of atrocities over the centuries. It is PEOPLE who are corrupt, not true Christianity. You are most welcome to disagree with me, Neil. It will not change my views or upset me. You are more important to me than you can imagine. God bless, Dave

Hi Dave, Thank You. (While I did not mean to side track this forum into religion, comments like James K's cause such things to happen.) And I can not figure out why a man of your intelligence and your education as continues to disregard facts. Such as: A. A Christian is NOT defined by how other Christians think they should act any more than an American is defined by the way I think an American should act. It sickens me to know people like Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dalmer, Tim McVeigh, Eric Robert Rudolph, Benedict Arnold, John Kerry, Jane Fonda, John Mureta and Nancy Polosi are fellow Americans, only they are. And it really makes no difference if I like it or not. B. And Dave, it makes no difference if you like it or not as a Christian is ANYONE who believes the Bible is the word of their god and Jesus is the son of the Christian god. They can be smart or stupid, good or evil, they are still Christians. I am not responsible for what is in the Bible, I did not write the Bible, I only report what any person who knows how to read, can read in it. C. The "good book", the "guide book" of the Christians tells of how it's "loving" "just" "caring" & all knowing god KILLS and KILL and KILLS some more! D. How that same book instructs all those who believe in it to KILL, KILL and KILL SOME MORE! And yet, you Dave, and other Christians just go around acting like those things are NOT in the Bible. BOTH the New and Old Testaments are parts of the Bible! And in the New Testament, Jesus says EVERYTHING in the Old Testament is true. And yet many Christians act like THEIR book does not say the things it says. Nor can I figure out why most religious people deny the main reason MOST people are religious in the first place is because whomever raised them PROGRAMMED them into believing in the same religion they are. The Catholic Church says: "Give me a child until the age of six and they are mine forever." ALL religions program their childern. (Of course, if this programming was fool proof, there would not be millions of former Christians who are now Atheists.) Or why religious people will not admit they have NO more proof what they believe is any more valid than is ANY other religious belief? Each insists theirs is the right & correct one & yet NONE of them as one more shred of evidence it is more true than does any other. Over 30,000 different gods and thousands of different religious beliefs. None with any proof what so ever and it is IMPOSSIBLE all of them to be true. (Observing nature and saying it is proof of a god, or gods is totally irrational & illogical!) Or why Christians do not study the roots of their religion? Where did it come from? If they did, they would find: Nearly every story in the Bible came from another religion. That the laws and ways of living the Christians seem to think they invented were around long before their religion. There were NINE Golden Rules written/in use before Christians claimed to author it. There were FIFTEEN "Crucified Savors BEFORE Jesus. NINE of them were "born of Virgins" nine born around Winter Solstice, Crucified and Resurrected 3 days later The story of Jesus has 346 exact copies taken from the story of an Indian "Savor" who was crucified in India some 1,250 years before Jesus was supposed to of existed. And yet, you Christians really believe the story of JC was origional? Amazing! If Ignorance was Bliss, most Christians would be in a constent state of climax. Another amazing thing to me is how so many Christians can deny scientific facts! Particular when anyone who knows much history knows the Christian religion has been PROVEN WRONG on subject after subject after subject time after time after time! The world is only 10,000 years old? Evolution is not a fact? JEEZE, GIVE ME A BREAK! Denying those 2 FACTS is STUPID! Highly intelligent and educated people from all around the world who come from all types of religious backgrounds enter science to search for & find out the truth. Yet, after their years of study and many tons of evidence, many Christians (not all) say these hundreds of thousands of highly intelligent scientists are wrong. And what proof do these Christians have the scientists are wrong? They have NO PROOF! All they have is a book containing bunch of stories put together by a bunch of fairly ignorant (thought the earth was the center of the universe, had no clue the world was not flat and on and on and on) people living in the Middle East over 2,000 years ago. Yep, that is their "proof" all these scientists are wrong! WHAT A JOKE! Well, it is not really a joke because these backward thinking people are still holding up progress just like they have been for well over a thousand years! And I am supposed to respect such ignorance? It just boggles my mind and makes me have NO respect for those who deny facts. I could go on and on about these types of things, only I shall close with the following. TODAY, there are still Witch Trials going on in the United States! And the most recent poll by Newsweek Proves MOST Christians in the United States are BIGOTS! They are BIGOTS because they will not vote for an Atheist NO MATTER how well qualified the Atheist may be! That means they would not vote for some of the most respected, famous and successful people in the history of the world! Because, like it or not, believe it or not, accept it or not, the facts prove Atheists are the LEADERS, or among the leaders, in nearly EVERY field of human endevor! So sorry Dave, only the things MOST Christians do sicken me!

Hi, Dave and Neil,

I sense an argument, more of semantics than passion here.

If I am a Christian because I was brain washed in my early years, who, I wonder, brain washed Neil into becoming an Atheist?

With regards to the tactical arguments Neil has put up; precision in speech is a wonderful thing and if one posts from the point of view of grammatical presentation, etymological precision and (as yet to be confirmed) factual accuracy - nobody would be posting because the emotional need would cease to exist until the academic requirements had been satisfied - but - once the academic requirements are satisified we will all be singing from the same song sheet, rendering the posting of an opinion redundant.

The Old Coot