As for the Mets front office, well you know where I stand. I am not as cynical or disillusioned about them as you. Just wait, Joey, things will be better sooner rather than later. I wouldn’t be surprised if 2013 turned out to be the year we all thought 2012 would be up to July. It will depend on the bullpen and how Alderson rounds out the OF and rotation. Though I think the bullpen performance can make the biggest difference for next season.

Watching the stooges are part of that childhood innocence I try to retain when being able to to stop the world for I want to get off. Can’t do that most of the time but when one can, it’s precious.

That kind of explains my disheartening with the Mets. They too gave me time to escape from the world but now the organization represents everything in that world I want to take a break from – not the players (good or bad) – but the front office, ownership and the way Citi Field feels more exclusive than inclusive.

Loved the old A&C television shows more than the movies, Oswald.

Laurel and Hardy probably the all-time best.

As for aim, it’s pretty good, so anyone crossing me better watch out, haha! I’ve actually gone target shooting before. No, I don’t own any guns and never have. A friend of mine had guns and that’s why I went target shooting.

Enjoy the holidays!

Actually, I was hoping the aim of both you and Metsie would be so bad that the only injury would be to trees losing some of their barks.

You too with the holiday wishes. Actually, my wife and I celebrate both – me being Jewish we’ve concluded Hanukkah and now with her being Catholic, having her presents underneath a Christmas Tree (of course accompanied by a Menorah).

One of the gifts she got me was the complete collection of Three Stooges shorts, appropro for me, wouldn’t you say? As some here would no doubt add to that, every time I think I weaken the Met nation, Nyuk, Nyuk.

I hope that some real change comes out of Newtown instead of everyone just forgetting about things after awhile. The NRA gun lobbyists need to just shut up this time. Their excuses sound increasingly laughable and hollow.

If I don’t run into you later on this week, you and your family have a merry x-mas or happy hanukkah, whatever it may be!

You know I like ya both so why not settle this with an old-fashion challenge at sunrise?

Even if that doesn’t settle the argument, we can still sell tickets to the events with all proceeds going to the New York Mets so they can afford to get us some decent players.

• Finally here is REAL Harvard University peer-reviewed, non-biased research from the Harvard School of Public Health that states gun ownership is correlated with homicides … A quotes from the research:

“Our review of the academic literature found that a broad array of evidence indicates that gun availability is a risk factor for homicide, both in the United States and across high-income countries. Case-control studies, ecological time-series and cross-sectional studies indicate that in homes, cities, states and regions in the US, where there are more guns, both men and women are at higher risk for homicide, particularly firearm homicide.”

Link: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/research/hicrc/firearms-research/guns-and-death/index.html

Regarding survey of prison inmates –

• This is NOT at all relevant to Newtown. Adam Lanza was not a crininal but a mentally ill individual for whom the consequences of confronting an armed victim would likely never entered his mind.

• But the worst part of this bit is that it is just anecdotal in nature. Mauser-Kates didn’t even include any numbers, LOL. How do we know that a vast majority of those interviewed didn’t say they weren’t frightened at all by armed victims? This is very shoddy to leave out the percentage results.

Finally, here is some additional reading material for you …

A report showing how gun ownership and homicides in the U.S. have both declined in tandem (using FBI data):

Link: http://themonkeycage.org/blog/2012/07/21/the-declining-culture-of-guns-and-violence-in-the-united-states/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+themonkeycagefeed+%28The+Monkey+Cage%29

And here is a report that shows states with tighter gun control laws have fewer deaths by guns:

Link: http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/01/the-geography-of-gun-deaths/69354/

Any questions, just ask. I won’t take 4 days to cite relative specifics either.

Now on to the question of “More Guns, Less Crime?”

The part of the report you quoted says: “Denmark has roughly half the gun ownership rate of Norway, but a 50% higher murder rate, while Russia has only one‐ninth Norway’s gun ownership rate but a murder rate 2500% higher.” Here are the problems with that:

• Newtown – This has little relevancy to Newtown issues, which primarily center around severely restricting assault type firearms so that deranged people cannot go on killing sprees.

• Any analysis that seeks to use Russia as a model for comparison is very flawed. Russia is not comparable to Western Europe. It isn’t even comparable to half of Eastern Europe anymore. It’s like trying to use the old Wild West in the U.S.as a sample set for modern crime patterns in this country. The only countries applicable to the U.S. are Western countries with similar lifestyles and socio-economic conditions, because we all know that plays the biggest part in overall crime.

• The data for Denmark and Norway as presented in Table 1 is also questionable (not just the Luxembourg data). It doesn’t mesh with the following study which puts the murder rate at 0.9 and 0.6/100,000. Those numbers are essentially equal. Since Mauser and Kates got the Luxembourg number wrong, I tend to discount their Norway and Denmark numbers as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

• And here are links to some studies that show a correlation between gun ownership and homicides, contrary to the propaganda piece you posted These are neutral peer reviewed studies, not published by a political group with a blatant bias such as The Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy:

o http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1485564/pdf/cmaj00266-0071.pdf
o http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/dranove/htm/dranove/coursepages/Mgmt%20469/guns.pdf
o http://home.uchicago.edu/~ludwigj/papers/JPubE_guns_2006FINAL.pdf

Now on to the question of “More Guns, Less Crime?”

The part of the report you quoted says: “Denmark has roughly half the gun ownership rate of Norway, but a 50% higher murder rate, while Russia has only one‐ninth Norway’s gun ownership rate but a murder rate 2500% higher.” Here are the problems with that:

• Newtown – This has little relevancy to Newtown issues, which primarily center around severely restricting assault type firearms so that deranged people cannot go on killing sprees.

• Any analysis that seeks to use Russia as a model for comparison is very flawed. Russia is not comparable to Western Europe. It isn’t even comparable to half of Eastern Europe anymore. It’s like trying to use the old Wild West in the U.S.as a sample set for modern crime patterns in this country. The only countries applicable to the U.S. are Western countries with similar lifestyles and socio-economic conditions, because we all know that plays the biggest part in overall crime.

• The data for Denmark and Norway as presented in Table 1 is also questionable (not just the Luxembourg data). It doesn’t mesh with the following study which puts the murder rate at 0.9 and 0.6/100,000. Those numbers are essentially equal. Since Mauser and Kates got the Luxembourg number wrong, I tend to discount their Norway and Denmark numbers as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

• And here are links to some studies that show a correlation between gun ownership and homicides, contrary to the propaganda piece you posted These are neutral peer reviewed studies, not published by a political group with a blatant bias such as The Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy:

o http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1485564/pdf/cmaj00266-0071.pdf
o http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/dranove/htm/dranove/coursepages/Mgmt%20469/guns.pdf
o http://home.uchicago.edu/~ludwigj/papers/JPubE_guns_2006FINAL.pdf

• Finally here is REAL Harvard University peer-reviewed, non-biased research from the Harvard School of Public Health that states gun ownership is correlated with homicides … A quotes from the research:

“Our review of the academic literature found that a broad array of evidence indicates that gun availability is a risk factor for homicide, both in the United States and across high-income countries. Case-control studies, ecological time-series and cross-sectional studies indicate that in homes, cities, states and regions in the US, where there are more guns, both men and women are at higher risk for homicide, particularly firearm homicide.”

Link: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/research/hicrc/firearms-research/guns-and-death/index.html

In most of the cases, these reports & articles have little or no relation to Newtown (including your pdf) but since you wanted to get into a general gun control debate – instead of sticking to the assault weapons issues specific to Newtown – I’ll oblige.

The last part of the material you posted was simply the conclusion/opinions of Kates and Mauser based on flawed data. So instead of addressing their opinions, I’ll concentrate on the specific data arguments they were making.

FAULTY DATA

First, one of the biggest problems with the Kates and Mauser study is the reliability of the data. For example, they have Luxembourg’s homicide rate at 9.01/100,000 in Table1 on page 4. It has been pointed out by many already that the number is grossly incorrect and, on face value, illogical. All other sources of data (including the one right below) for Luxembourg have its homicide rate at roughly 2.5/100,000 where it’s hovered more or less for the last few decades.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

It is common knowledge that the only Western nation that has had a homicide rate close to that 9.01 figure is the U.S.

The gross error in their data brings up two questions:

1) Were the authors dishonest, playing loose and fancy with the data in order to make it fit their opinions?

2) Or, were they just sloppy and incompetent? How thoroughly did they check their data? (THIS IS WHERE PEER-REVIEW WOULD REALLY HAVE HELPED). And how competent are they to begin with when they couldn’t even spot this blatantly anomalous outlier? That figure should have raised a big red flag that something was wrong with the data.

The point being … if they can put out a study with such a large error one has to question the entire validity of the piece, especially since this study was NOT peer reviewed.

Metsie – Here’s a reply to the section of your propaganda report you posted yesterday. Moreover, you asked me for links (for the first time yesterday), so I’ll also give you plenty of them concerning gun control.

In most of the cases, these reports and articles have little or no relation to Newtown (including your pdf) but since you wanted to get into a general gun control debate – instead of sticking to the assault weapons issues specific to Newtown – I’ll oblige.

The last part of the material you posted was simply the conclusion/opinions of Kates and Mauser based on flawed data. So instead of addressing their opinions, I’ll concentrate on the specific data arguments they were making.

FAULTY DATA

First, one of the biggest problems with the Kates and Mauser study is the reliability of the data. For example, they have Luxembourg’s homicide rate at 9.01/100,000 in Table1 on page 4. It has been pointed out by many already that the number is grossly incorrect and, on face value, illogical. All other sources of data (including the one right below) for Luxembourg have its homicide rate at roughly 2.5/100,000 where it’s hovered more or less for the last few decades.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

It is common knowledge that the only Western nation that has had a homicide rate close to that 9.01 figure is the U.S.

The gross error in their data brings up two questions:

1) Were the authors dishonest, playing loose and fancy with the data in order to make it fit their opinions?

2) Or, were they just sloppy and incompetent? How thoroughly did they check their data? (THIS IS WHERE PEER-REVIEW WOULD REALLY HAVE HELPED). And how competent are they to begin with when they couldn’t even spot this blatantly anomalous outlier? That figure should have raised a big red flag that something was wrong with the data.

The point being … if they can put out a study with such a large error one has to question the entire validity of the piece, especially since this study was NOT peer reviewed.

In most of the cases, these reports and articles have little or no relation to Newtown (including your pdf) but since you wanted to get into a general gun control debate – instead of sticking to the assault weapons issues specific to Newtown – I’ll oblige.

The last part of the material you posted was simply the conclusion/opinions of Kates and Mauser based on flawed data. So instead of addressing their opinions, I’ll concentrate on the specific data arguments they were making.

FAULTY DATA

First, one of the biggest problems with the Kates and Mauser study is the reliability of the data. For example, they have Luxembourg’s homicide rate at 9.01/100,000 in Table1 on page 4. It has been pointed out by many already that the number is grossly incorrect and, on face value, illogical. All other sources of data (including the one right below) for Luxembourg have its homicide rate at roughly 2.5/100,000 where it’s hovered more or less for the last few decades.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

It is common knowledge that the only Western nation that has had a homicide rate close to that 9.01 figure is the U.S.

The gross error in their data brings up two questions:

1) Were the authors dishonest, playing loose and fancy with the data in order to make it fit their opinions?

2) Or, were they just sloppy and incompetent? How thoroughly did they check their data? (THIS IS WHERE PEER-REVIEW WOULD REALLY HAVE HELPED). And how competent are they to begin with when they couldn’t even spot this blatantly anomalous outlier? That figure should have raised a big red flag that something was wrong with the data.

The point being … if they can put out a study with such a large error one has to question the entire validity of the piece, especially since this study was NOT peer reviewed.

Now on to the question of “More Guns, Less Crime?”

The part of the report you quoted says: “Denmark has roughly half the gun ownership rate of Norway, but a 50% higher murder rate, while Russia has only one‐ninth Norway’s gun ownership rate but a murder rate 2500% higher.” Here are the problems with that:

• Newtown – This has little relevancy to Newtown issues, which primarily center around severely restricting assault type firearms so that deranged people cannot go on killing sprees.

• Any analysis that seeks to use Russia as a model for comparison is very flawed. Russia is not comparable to Western Europe. It isn’t even comparable to half of Eastern Europe anymore. It’s like trying to use the old Wild West in the U.S.as a sample set for modern crime patterns in this country. The only countries applicable to the U.S. are Western countries with similar lifestyles and socio-economic conditions, because we all know that plays the biggest part in overall crime.

• The data for Denmark and Norway as presented in Table 1 is also questionable (not just the Luxembourg data). It doesn’t mesh with the following study which puts the murder rate at 0.9 and 0.6/100,000. Those numbers are essentially equal. Since Mauser and Kates got the Luxembourg number wrong, I tend to discount their Norway and Denmark numbers as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

• And here are links to some studies that show a correlation between gun ownership and homicides, contrary to the propaganda piece you posted These are neutral peer reviewed studies, not published by a political group with a blatant bias such as The Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy:

o http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1485564/pdf/cmaj00266-0071.pdf
o http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/dranove/htm/dranove/coursepages/Mgmt%20469/guns.pdf
o http://home.uchicago.edu/~ludwigj/papers/JPubE_guns_2006FINAL.pdf

• Finally here is REAL Harvard University peer-reviewed, non-biased research from the Harvard School of Public Health that states gun ownership is correlated with homicides … A quotes from the research:

“Our review of the academic literature found that a broad array of evidence indicates that gun availability is a risk factor for homicide, both in the United States and across high-income countries. Case-control studies, ecological time-series and cross-sectional studies indicate that in homes, cities, states and regions in the US, where there are more guns, both men and women are at higher risk for homicide, particularly firearm homicide.”

Link: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/research/hicrc/firearms-research/guns-and-death/index.html

Regarding survey of prison inmates –

• This is NOT at all relevant to Newtown. Adam Lanza was not a crininal but a mentally ill individual for whom the consequences of confronting an armed victim would likely never entered his mind.

• But the worst part of this bit is that it is just anecdotal in nature. Mauser-Kates didn’t even include any numbers, LOL. How do we know that a vast majority of those interviewed didn’t say they weren’t frightened at all by armed victims? This is very shoddy to leave out the percentage results.

Finally, here is some additional reading material for you …

A report showing how gun ownership and homicides in the U.S. have both declined in tandem (using FBI data):

Link: http://themonkeycage.org/blog/2012/07/21/the-declining-culture-of-guns-and-violence-in-the-united-states/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+themonkeycagefeed+%28The+Monkey+Cage%29

And here is a report that shows states with tighter gun control laws have fewer deaths by guns:

Link: http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/01/the-geography-of-gun-deaths/69354/

Any questions, just ask. I won’t take 4 days to cite relative specifics either.

**Had to correct you on the FBI study you yourself misinterpreted
**Had to straighten you out as to who published that NRA propaganda piece
**Had to straighten you out as to the fact the mother was in full compliance with all CT laws
**Had to straighten you out as to the fact the shooter had previously been deemed not dangerous to himself and others,

You are totally clueless, illiterate, and unethical to boot.

YOU’VE ALREADY LOST A MILLION TIMES IN THIS DISCUSSION!

It’s one thing to be so thick headed and illiterate as you, but you are terribly dishonest and can’t admit when I proved you wrong.

I sincerely hope we are not done as I was looking forward to tearing apart your NRA crap tomorrow.

YOU’VE ALREADY LOST A MILLION TIMES IN THIS DISCUSSION!

I will post the links tomorrow. This is the first time you are asking me for additional material. So you can wait till tomorrow. And since you need to read things multiple times till it sinks in, I will repeat this paragraph a few times.

I will post the links tomorrow. This is the first time you are asking me for additional material. So you can wait till tomorrow. And since you need to read things multiple times till it sinks in, I will repeat this paragraph a few times.

I will post the links tomorrow. This is the first time you are asking me for additional material. So you can wait till tomorrow. And since you need to read things multiple times till it sinks in, I will repeat this paragraph a few times.

YOU’VE ALREADY LOST A MILLION TIMES IN THIS DISCUSSION!