this law already took effect.. while the arguement about its +'s and -'s is endless, please be careful and have a friendly smile permanently attached to your face at all times while vacationing in Florida... and this is not a joke... if some bad dude grabs your gal and you absolutely correctly decide to punch him out - think first - instead of being punched back YOU MIGHT GET A BULLET... ________________________________________________________________ nytimes.com October 4, 2005 Tourists to Florida Get a Warning as Greeting By ABBY GOODNOUGH MIAMI, Oct. 3 - A national gun-control group is riling Gov. Jeb Bush and Florida's mighty tourism industry by warning visitors that arguing with locals here could get them shot. The group, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, based in Washington, began handing out fliers at Miami International Airport on Monday, cautioning visitors to take "sensible precautions" and to be aware that altercations on highways, in nightclubs or on the beach could provoke a shooting. The fliers offer tips like "Do not argue unnecessarily with local people," and "If someone appears to be angry with you, maintain to the best of your ability a positive attitude and do not shout or make threatening gestures." The group said it was passing out the fliers to protest Florida's new "stand your ground" law, which lets people use guns or other deadly force to defend themselves in public places without first trying to escape. The law took effect Saturday, six months after the Legislature passed it. The National Rifle Association had lobbied hard for its passage. On Sunday, the Brady Campaign ran advertisements in The Boston Globe, The Chicago Tribune and The Detroit Free Press, featuring a handgun-shaped map of Florida next to the words "Thinking about a Florida vacation? Please ensure your family is safe." The ad is to run in The Guardian of London this weekend. Governor Bush and the state's tourism agency, Visit Florida, have derided the effort as a scare tactic. Both said that the crime rate in Florida was at its lowest in 34 years. About 80 million people, including repeat visitors, come to the state each year, fueling a $57 billion tourism industry, according to Visit Florida. "I think it's pathetic, to be honest with you," Mr. Bush said when asked last week about the Brady Campaign's effort. "It won't have an impact on changing visitor patterns. But, you know, it's shameful that people would try to scare visitors when they show up, traveling hours to get to what we call paradise." In Britain, where Florida is considered a popular vacation destination, a spokesman for the Association of British Travel Agents said members had begun telling customers about the law. But the spokesman, Sean Tipton, said the law would not stop tourists from traveling here. The Brady Campaign effort stirs memories of the early 1990's, when, after a rash of attacks by local residents on foreign visitors to Miami and other Florida cities, rental car companies distributed brochures warning tourists to keep their doors locked and not to stop if their car was bumped. Peter Hamm, a spokesman for the Brady Campaign, said the group did not want to be accused of dredging up old fears about Florida, but it decided it was a risk worth taking. "We very much want people to think we are behaving responsibly and using the right tone about this," Mr. Hamm said. "But our side is struggling to hold off the N.R.A. as they march forth with this agenda of theirs. Sometimes when you are in the minority you have to take a risk." He said the group was spending about $100,000 on the effort and would pay four workers from a temporary agency to distribute fliers at the Miami airport from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., five days a week, for at least a month. Starting next week, he said, the group will also pass out fliers at Orlando International Airport. Mr. Hamm said the Brady Campaign was fighting a similar proposal in Michigan and preparing for a battle over a new gun bill in Florida. Introduced last month by State Representative Dennis K. Baxley, a Republican who also sponsored "stand your ground," the new proposal would impose criminal penalties on businesses that try to stop employees from keeping guns in their cars while parked at work. It is modeled on an Oklahoma law that drew attention recently after several large companies joined a federal lawsuit to block it. Marion Hammer, a former president of the National Rifle Association and its lobbyist in Tallahassee, Fla., said the proposal would also ensure that businesses were not liable when guns locked in cars in their parking lots ended up "misused." "They can't any more tell you that you can't have a firearm in your vehicle," Ms. Hammer said of private businesses, "than they can tell you that you can't have an umbrella or a pair of sunglasses." As for the Brady Campaign's fliers, Ms. Hammer called them "silly" and misleading. Only people with permits to carry concealed weapons, about 350,000 in Florida, can invoke the law in public places, she said. "Nothing in this law allows people to use force against people they are arguing with," she said. "Tourists have nothing to fear in Florida unless they are coming here to break into our homes, to carjack our vehicles or attack us on the streets." The Miami airport is allowing the Brady Campaign to approach passengers in several "First Amendment zones" near arrival points. When the first fliers were distributed on Monday, most recipients kept walking, but some stopped, foreheads crinkling as they read the boldface warning. "I'm just kind of shocked," said Susie Glasgow of Peoria, Ill., who was on her way home after a cruise to the Bahamas. "I'm sure we'll be back, and this is a little bit scary." Steven Stoller, who was arriving from New Jersey, said he was happy to be made aware of the law but also happy it existed. "I don't want it to be like the Wild West," Mr. Stoller said. "But if people are threatened with their life, they should be able to shoot first." Terry Aguayo contributed reporting for this article ___________________________________________________________ more on the analysis of this law: http://writ.news.findlaw.com/sebok/20050502.html

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old news.. :) here is an article i posted a while back... scary stuff NRA is doing and republican are doing since they are paid to do so... reason is not the strong suit of NRA leadership... --------------------------- With new law, shooters may beat the rap Posted on Sun, May. 08, 2005 Carl Hiaasen/In My Opinion If you're a defense attorney in Florida, you've got to be excited by the new ''Protection of Persons and Property'' bill passed by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Jeb Bush. This is the bogus ''self-defense'' law that allows people to start shooting wherever they happen to be, whenever they happen to feel threatened. The measure was written by the National Rifle Association, but the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers couldn't have done a slicker job. Starting Oct. 1, any person who is confronted has no ''duty to retreat,'' and ``has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm....'' Every gang-banger in the state should write a thank-you note to the NRA. For years, street thugs have tried without much luck to use self-defense as an excuse for their bloody shootouts -- and now it's right there in the statute books: If you get fired at, dawg, you can fire back. Better yet, the law is so purposefully slack that if you even imagine you're going to be fired at, you can pull out your legally purchased AK-47 and open up. Your attorney will say you had a ''reasonable belief'' that you were in danger, and it's hard to dispute. Being a gangster is a full-time dangerous gig. Thanks to the knuckleheads in Tallahassee, the courts could be seeing a lot more cases in which self-defense is creatively invoked. ''You don't even have to be that creative,'' quips Richard Sharpstein, a top Miami trial lawyer. He predicts ''an enormous swell'' in assault and homicide cases in which the main defense is self-defense. Except for generating more political contributions from the NRA, passing the law was utterly pointless. Floridians have never been too shy about shooting each other. The motivation is more often an insult than a threat. We've got one of the worst murder rates in the country, and the vast majority of those killings are committed by family members or acquaintances of the victims. In the relatively few cases where citizens have killed a menacing criminal, the justice system has been solid in its support. The head of the state prosecutors' association said that he knows of no instance where a law-abiding person has been hauled to court for using deadly force to protect himself or his family -- at home or elsewhere. Even the main sponsor of the new law, Rep. Dennis Baxley of Ocala, couldn't cite a single case of a lawful firearm owner being locked up for shooting someone in self-defense. But Florida lawmakers seldom let the facts deter them from sucking up to rich special-interest lobbies such as the NRA. By broadly expanding the so-called ''castle doctrine'' to public places -- whether it's the Publix, Dolphins stadium or the neighborhood pub -- the Legislature has opened what Sharpstein calls a ''Pandora's box of excuses and justifications'' for violent assault. Long ago I interviewed a member of the infamous Outlaws motorcycle gang who was doing a prison stretch for fatally stabbing a man during a bar fight. Naturally, the Outlaw said he'd acted in self-defense, an argument that didn't fly in court. ''Today he probably wouldn't even be charged,'' says Fred Haddad, a prominent Broward defense attorney involved in the case. Like Sharpstein, Haddad thinks the Legislature has made it easier to try the ''self-defense'' defense. ''Where it's really going to help is the cases of those who act first'' and claim they feared for their safety, he says. In the absence of any demonstrable need for broadening the self-defense provisions, Rep. Baxley and others were left to argue that it would be a powerful deterrent to criminals, who would henceforth be reluctant to accost potentially armed citizens in public places. Oh sure. The death penalty doesn't deter these creeps. Mandatory hard time for using a gun doesn't discourage them. They aren't overly worried about the cops. But the remote possibility of being winged by a little old lady on her way to the ATM -- that's supposed to scare a hardcore badass into giving up his predatory ways and going straight. Only in the inverted universe of Tallahassee would such laughable nonsense carry the day. Implicitly encouraging armed citizens to ''stand their ground'' when they could get away doesn't make the streets safer. It invites tragedy for the crime victims as well as bystanders. The bad guys surely aren't scared. Ironically, more of them could be out on the streets because of the new law, which will make it easier for shooters to beat the rap in court. It was self-defense, Your Honor. Honest. lyosha ****************** What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

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lyosha
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What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

oh, well... old news indeed... but it just became active.. in case you're hitting Miami this weekend..

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i am often there :)

quote:

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Originally posted by raspizdyaichik: oh, well... old news indeed... but it just became active.. in case you're hitting Miami thiw weekend..

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lyosha ****************** What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

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lyosha
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What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

are you two done jerking each other off? what is it with you pansies and fear of guns I wonder?

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Sic semper tyrannis
~War is Peace~Freedom is Slavery~Ignorance is Strength~ George Orwell "1984"

Scare tactics... Liberals are trying to blackmail other states not to pass similar law or they will run the same campaign in those states to kill the truism!

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Hasn't it been shown that crime is lower where gun laws are more relaxed? And as far as any decrease in tourism, that is just ridiculous. It will not decrease at all. I am generally pro-gun control, but trying to stay objective... I have trouble with the reasoning that this law will affect specific actions. It will affect trials and stuff like that. I am more concerned with unregistered guns, former criminals with guns, kids with guns, high impact guns, etc. Law abiding legal gun owners will use them when they see fit regardless of laws, than ask questions later. in a courtroom. That is human nature.

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"The trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money" -Margaret Thatcher

i again recommend that you read http://writ.news.findlaw.com/sebok/20050502.html and don't complain if, god forbid, you're shot, and then proven guilty of a deadly assault cuz the shooter "believed" you're after his life...

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hell no.. every country (western) that has more stricked gun laws has a much lower murder rate... and this example is very different... it's not about "relaxing" gun laws.. it's about personal responsibility... if you kill someone and there was no real threat - you must go to jail...

quote:

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Originally posted by Egor: Hasn't it been shown that crime is lower where gun laws are more relaxed?

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lyosha ****************** What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

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lyosha
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What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

Raspizdyai - I read your link. So what? Snake, many factors cause crime. So what I meant was, inside the US, and even Canada (where the differences in cultural and social causes of crime are relatively insignificant), you will see that crime is lower where criminals are afraid of being shot. Higher where they are not. There are communities with MANDATORY gun ownership in every house that have zero crime as a result. I can look for links for you if you haven't heard of that. Europe doesn't apply here for cultural reasons. Canada does.

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"The trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money" -Margaret Thatcher

quote:

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Originally posted by Egor: Raspizdyai - I read your link. So what? Snake, many factors cause crime. So what I meant was, inside the US, and even Canada (where the differences in cultural and social causes of crime are relatively insignificant), you will see that crime is lower where criminals are afraid of being shot. Higher where they are not. There are communities with MANDATORY gun ownership in every house that have zero crime as a result. I can look for links for you if you haven't heard of that. Europe doesn't apply here for cultural reasons. Canada does.

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Canada doesn't apply either due to differences in population. Only state to state /city to city comparisson inside US is a valid one.

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- Независимость - это когда в 20-й раз наступаешь на одни и те же грабли, а русские уже ни при чем....

Go NRA! I should join too. Guns kill people and spoons make people fat.

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quote:

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Originally posted by KGBMan:Canada doesn't apply either due to differences in population. Only state to state /city to city comparisson inside US is a valid one.

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Crime rate is not TOTAL crime. It is crime divided by population. So what you are saying does not seem to make sense. To show what I am talking about - compare areas with similar population densities.. You'll see what i mean.

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"The trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money" -Margaret Thatcher

again - bs.. read the statistics... if you are talking about statewide laws - florida had very high crime rate (compare to other states).. and FL did have one of the most relax gun laws.. as far as citywide crap - crime does go down the first year.. then it goes back up... check the statistics for kenessew... as you noted, there are many factors contributing to the crime rate... and nobody (but NRA) showen that "relaxed" gun laws do anything to reduce crime...

quote:

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Originally posted by Egor: Raspizdyai - I read your link. So what? Snake, many factors cause crime. So what I meant was, inside the US, and even Canada (where the differences in cultural and social causes of crime are relatively insignificant), you will see that crime is lower where criminals are afraid of being shot. Higher where they are not. There are communities with MANDATORY gun ownership in every house that have zero crime as a result. I can look for links for you if you haven't heard of that. Europe doesn't apply here for cultural reasons. Canada does.

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lyosha ****************** What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

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lyosha
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What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

I don;t need to show that relaxed gun laws reduce crime. Its just a theory. One that makes sense to me. If I need to rob a house, I will try to find an area where people tend to not own guns. I will stay away from areas where people do. Seems elementary. But you do need to show that relaxed gun laws INCREASE crime. That burden of proof thing again. What is the point of this whole topic? Is that not what you are alleging? "bulletproof vest", "permanent smile". You are not going to scare anyone with this BS, its already been tried.

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"The trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money" -Margaret Thatcher