I don’t really know where to begin on this mess. They messed their pants so badly even hip waders couldn’t hold it all. This is not reporting. This isn’t even editorializing. They don’t check their facts and I have doubts if they even know how to recognize a fact. It’s the rantings of people with severe mental problems. It starts with the title “Brazen weapon fire chills police“. It doesn’t let up for an instant:
The gang shoot-out that rained gunfire and smoke on a quiet Dorchester street this week disturbed police on many levels: the seemingly new height in disregard for neighborhood safety, the fact that a 12-year-old girl watching TV inside a nearby house was shot through the leg.
Since when do gangs have any regard for “neighborhood safety”? Do they expect them to meet at a gun range to have their shoot-out? Gangs, in the common usage of the word, are criminals. Do they think criminals care about memorizing and following the gun safety rules that the rest of us do?
But even more alarming: At least one of the weapons used in the gunfire was an AK-47 assault rifle, the fourth time in three weeks that one had been found or used in Boston and the seventh time since last July, when a 32-year-old man was shot dead with one.
Police say they are noticing more of the fearsome firearms on Boston streets than last year and, in particular, are concerned that there have been so many in the past three weeks. Tomorrow afternoon, Mayor Thomas M. Menino will meet with ministers in Roxbury to discuss crime in the city and the sudden proliferation of the rifles.
But more alarming than there are criminals among us is that there are “fearsome firearms on Boston streets”. Well then, why doesn’t someone go out there and pick them up and take them home? Oh, that’s right. That’s not what they meant. They meant criminals are using the firearms on the streets. And, I say this having not lost a single bet in the last 35 years, I’m willing to bet than none of those rifles were actually assault rifles. They are intentionally using words to inflame emotions.
“This [weapon] can lay down a lot of fire in an urban area where there is basically no cover from it,’’ Commissioner Edward F. Davis said yesterday. “You can conceal yourself from these weapons, but they’ll rip through a car. They’ll rip through a telephone pole. They can rip through just about anything in an urban environment.’’
What he doesn’t say is that common hunting rifles such as a 30.06 have far greater penetration than these rifles.
“Everybody understands when they read the morning paper that you have to push as much as you can to get these guns off the street,’’ he said.
Only those that believe the morning paper. And this article is a very illustrative example of why more and more people don’t believe the “morning paper”.
Nine assault rifles have been confiscated so far this year, compared with four seized in 2008. Eighteen assault rifles were found in 2007.
Want to bet?
But police worry about the attractiveness of assault rifles to gangs. AK-47s are much more powerful than handguns, capable of firing at least 100 yards, and can be easily converted into automatic weapons.
The range of the AK-47 on human sized targets is much greater than 100 yards. With common ammo it’s about a 4 MOA gun. This makes it capable of first round hits, with a skilled marksman, at about 300 yards. So what? Common hunting rifles chambered .308 Winchester, 30.06, or .300 Win Mag, in skilled hands, can reach out and touch someone at 600 yards and beyond. They can’t be “easily converted into automatic weapons” for two reasons; 1) Assault rifles ARE automatic weapons and these, almost for certain, are not assault rifles; and 2) Firearms that are “easily converted” into automatic weapons are not allowed on the market and haven’t been for decades.
The guns have surfaced as Boston police have pushed to provide more of their own officers with M16s, high powered semiautomatic rifles.
In May, the Globe reported that police had ordered about 200 M16s free of charge from the US military and made plans to train dozens of officers and arm them with the rifles.
M-16s obtained from the military are NOT semi-automatic. They are fully automatic. Facts? What do facts matter to these mentally deranged writers? That’s right, they don’t. (Update: As pointed out in the comments the M16s were converted to semi-auto by the Boston Police Department. The article was written by the same writer. She was careless with the facts in this article even though she knew them.)
Community leaders and gun control advocates yesterday said many of the illegal guns in Massachusetts likely come from states like Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, where private gun owners can sell their weapons to anyone without requiring background checks.
Bruce Wall, the pastor of the Global Ministries Christian Church in Codman Square, said he is planning to hold a prayer summit on the steps of the New Hampshire State Capitol in Concord, N.H., to get the attention of public officials and call on them to tighten their laws.
“We’re going to pray for the trafficking of guns to stop,’’ he said. “Those gun shows in those states are making a lot of money off people in Massachusetts. Now the criminals are using weapons that can outpower what the police have.’’
Let’s see… violent crime rates (FBI stats for 2007 that I just happened to have on my computer):
Blaming the laws in states with low crime rates for the high crime rates in their state proves that logical thinking doesn’t even rate a place holder in their brains. If it was private sales of guns increased crime then why is the crime rate lower, by at least a factor of PI, in those states than in Massachusetts? Massachusetts should look to the laws and policies of states with low crime rates, see what is different, and emulate those other states. NOT insist that those other states adopt their failed polices.
What do you think? Are the authors correct that it’s all about “fearsome firearms”? Or is it that the authors have crap for brains?
Author Maria Cramer can be reached at mcramer@globe.com let her know what you think. I sent her a link to this post and a link to Just One Question.
Update: I received a response from her:
From: MCramer@globe.com
Sent: Friday, July 31, 2009 7:59 AM
To: Joe Huffman
Subject: Re: Brazen weapon fire chills police
Thanks for your note.
Maria Cramer
Reporter
Boston Globe
w: (617) 929-3169
c: (617) 291-6008
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