Posted: 20 October 2005 at 2:08am | IP Logged

How is everyone... any developments?

Posted: 20 October 2005 at 7:05am | IP Logged

SSDD

I see you are back with Mars Avatar...

Posted: 21 October 2005 at 4:58pm | IP Logged

A foot in the doorway for moral relativism.

Excerpted from http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=1235048

WASHINGTON Oct 20, 2005 — Congress voted Thursday to sweep away the ability of gun crime victims to sue firearms manufacturers and dealers for damages, answering complaints by President Bush and the gun industry that big jury awards could lead to bankruptcy.

Opponents called the 283-144 vote in the House proof of the gun lobby's power over the Republican-controlled Congress, but Bush said he looked forward to signing the bill. "Our laws should punish criminals who use guns to commit crimes, not law-abiding manufacturers of lawful products," the president said.

The Senate passed the bill, 65-31, in July.

The bill's passage was the National Rifle Association's top legislative priority and gave Bush and his Republican allies on Capitol Hill a rare victory at a politically troubled time when several top White House officials and GOP congressional leaders are under investigation.

When Bush signs the measure into law, a half-dozen pending lawsuits filed by cities and counties against the gun industry would be dismissed. The localities that are plaintiffs to those suits include Los Angeles, San Francisco, Cleveland, Gary, Ind. and New York City. Antigun groups said pending suits by families of people murdered in gun crimes also could be dismissed.

"This is a get-out-of-liability-free card," said John Russo, city attorney for Oakland, one of 11 cities and counties in California whose suits against the industry would be dismissed.

"If you were to do something that brought harm to somebody else, you would be subject under the laws of your state to a lawsuit," he added. "I guess that does not apply to gun manufacturers."

Closely watched is a Massachusetts case in which the family of Danny Guzman killed with a handgun stolen from Kahr Arms is suing the company, alleging it did not have enough security at its factory, according to Daniel Vice, staff attorney with the Brady Center To Prevent Handgun Violence. Guzman, 26, was shot in 1999 outside a Worcester nightclub with a 9mm handgun stolen by a Kahr employee with a criminal record, the family's attorney said.

Posted: 21 October 2005 at 5:26pm | IP Logged

Leif

,

I’m the first person to condemn the gun policies of the U.S government and the NRA, I am for much stricter gun control, thorough background checks, serial number tracking, the works, if you ask me the U.S should tightly restrict gun sales.

However I don’t see how this law is moral relativism and I am against blaming gun manufacturers for the shortcomings of government legislation and for actions of violent individuals.

The case stated in the article is a rare one, we all know that the issue is frivolous law suits against gun companies (which are won by appealing to the gut feeling of the jury) for manufacturing a weapon that was bought and used later by a person that has no direct relations to the gun manufacturing company. It’s no different from suing Black & Decker for selling the chain saw that was used for the Texas chainsaw massacre…

It’s the government’s role to restrict gun sales and the individual’s role not to use them inappropriately.

P.S. I’m also in favor of limiting the ridiculous “pain and suffering” awards given to people who sue doctors.

Posted: 22 October 2005 at 9:41pm | IP Logged

Publisher,

You and I have a little communication problem. All these years I thought we had been reading and writing about moral relativism! So...instead of me trying to convince you what it is, how 'bout you define moral relativism and then I'll try to relate to your definition with my viewpoint on weapons (or any other toxic's) distribution.

Deal?

Posted: 23 October 2005 at 4:56am | IP Logged

Moral relativism is the position that moral or ethical propositions do not reflect absolute or universal truths but instead are relative to social, cultural, historical or personal references, and that there is no single standard by which to assess an ethical proposition's truth.

Posted: 23 October 2005 at 7:54am | IP Logged

Yoss,

Ah, Yes.

The only question is: Whose ass...

Posted: 23 October 2005 at 8:21am | IP Logged

Eytan -

Leif assumes the weapons manufacturers carry a responsibility because they "Lobby" (as is the custom in the US type Democracy) to make any sort of weapon legally accesible to anyone that wants to have it, thus increasing their Market and profits, while parallelly increasing the number of weapons held by people who are unable to hold and use them with care, a situation which - turn - becomes a public hazard.  

Another consideration (mine, this time) - weapons in the hands of the public challange the authority of the State, which is supposed to have a monopoly on the use of power.

Leif,

A Law against weapons in the hands of the public will effect only Law abiding people. Criminals  will not give a damn.

Since nobody can assure that the police will get more manpower and more authority at the same time people are forbidden to hold weapons for self-defense, this will expose innocent citizens to criminal harm without providing a sufficient answer to crime.

I think this is the reason the situation had deteriorated so much in the first place.   Somehow in the U.S. there is an embedded notion - perhaps because of historical reasons - that security is primarily the responsibility of the citizen. 

Just like dealing with natural catastrophes is.

The state is only doing people a favore when it "helps" them when they fail to excercise this responsibility.

It is something very deep and fundamental to the "American" psych, which also has a positive aspect - promoting individual responsibility and individual enterprise, also in the community level.  A sense that a person has to act in order to achieve a desired goal, not just sit back and wait for external action.

But it also has a down side, by "morally" relieving the State from its responsibilities.