I hate the birthday thing. In a perfect world, everyone would just get their birthday off and there would be no damn cake at work.

What do you mean it didn’t work? The explicit purpose of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban, according to the people who wrote it and passed, was to prevent mass shootings. In 1989, a man armed with an assault rifle, a variant of the AK-47 with large magazines, killed five children and injured 29 more in a school in…

The whole “enforce the laws already on the books” argument is a red herring, and the people who use it know it.

How about the reporting law or check ups by the FBI. They dropped the ball on this shooting.

Many of the strident ones are howling for a ban, sure, but let’s get real, that isn’t going to happen, and that isn’t realistic anyway.

I thought the problem was the exact opposite. The ban identified specific mechanical features and not the concept. Seems to me there should be a ban on any weapon that meets 2 of these 4 criteria: 1) shoots > x projectiles/minute, or 2) has a range of y meters, or 3) takes a certain caliber or greater projectile, or…

Yes, most modern hunting rifles (that I’ve seen; I haven’t seen them all, obviously) are semi-automatic rifles. So we’re on the same page here, bolt action and lever action wouldn’t have any restrictions that don’t already exist, but anything else would—and when I say “restrictions” I mean pre-purchase and…

What laws? Gun owners talk about these laws not being enforced, but nobody can say specifically what they are. What laws?

Ghost guns are already a loophole to any sort of engineering based phrasing of a law. Semi-automatic does not apply to them because it is not a finished functioning gun yet, it is a paperweight when it arrives and requires milling at home to make it function. Best first step IMO to this issue is making it as hard to…

As a gun owner I don’t support an ‘assault rifle’ ban for pretty much the reasons noted above. The term assault rifle is kind of an arbitrary category and we know what owners and manufacturers will do: Find the loopholes, changes just enough to get past the law, put a new model number on it, and move on. You will…

Yes, the assault weapons ban was ridiculous because you’re trying to ban a concept, not a description of a mechanical function. Of course it didn’t work. It’s like a war on drugs or terrorism; you can’t “battle” a nebulous concept.

But what is the “risk” here?

Yes, there was a cross country skier that learned how to ski 6-weeks ago (actually I think it was a shirtless Tonga guy). And there was a speed skater who learned how to skate a few weeks ago (she raced inline prior). The only reason we are upset about it is because the half pipe is “our” sport. We are only allowed so…

Not being able to ski in the slightest (the one time I went, I managed to twist my ankle falling on a bunny slope), we clearly have different definitions of “proper technique”. I certainly wasn’t arguing that tons of people would do better than her. I just don’t see a difference between this & other people who are…

Yeah, I wonder how many of the jabronis who comment have ever been in a competition halfpipe. They’re basically ice, the walls are vertical and about 18’ high. I’ve snowboarded since ‘91 and those things scare the hell out of me. Also, there’s a reason ski areas don’t build the damn things, they’re death traps.

A gold medal is a gold medal, but having announcers explain what the Swaney Statute is every two years, in sport after sport, is priceless.

When oily Tonga guy competed in cross-country skiing after only three months experience it was touted as an inspirational story by NBC. How is this different?

I tried skiing for the first time recently and can attest to how brilliant this performance was. Not once in this run did she fall over and roll around trying to get back to her skis.

Yo, what are you talking about? She makes it all the way up to the blue line five out of six times, doesn’t fall down, SKIS BACKWARDS, and doesn’t degrade herself or her country with showboating theatrics. Just good, clean skiing. Give this woman the Gold medal for efficiency and self respect.

I’d like to see you try and qualify for Women’s Freestyle Skiing, Patrick.