"HEMI-Powered" schreef in bericht
...
snip
Bouler, it has been said that anyone can give an hour talk on any
subject, even one they know nothing at all about. But, to give an
effective 15 minute talk or to distill a complex and technical subject
down to only 5 minutes, both of which I had to do on my job, is VERY
difficult indeed.

I most appreciate the complements you extend to me on my knowledge of
cars and other things. However, there is likely far LESS here than
meets the eye, meaning that while I can speak reasonably intelligently
about all cars, not just Chrysler, I cannot speak to specifics of even
cars designed during my tenure at Chrysler. The reason I can at least
speak to most anything vehicular regardless of company or national
origin is that the basics of the vehicle product development process
from design (styling) to engineering to testing to tooling to
manufacturing and assembly is pretty much universal throughout the
world. What separates the better car companies from the 2nd and 3rd
tier crowd is how well they APPLY basic principles and how much
proprietary knowledge they can accumulate and effectively implement to
increase features, fuel economy, safety, etc. while at the same time
increasing quality, reliability, and durability (those are 3 different
things, ask if interested) at the lowest possible cost.

I think carfactories can build cars that go on for many more years, but at
the same time the're digging their own grave.

I know I burned DVDs from some History Channel episodes maybe a
year or
so ago. If I get ambitious enough, I'll try to find them but I have
made a mental note to re-record them again on my DVR. It's a dumb
coincidence that a rather long episode or two aired just last week,
I think, relating the story of Titanic's construction, it's major
structural and safety weaknesses, details of the sinking itself,
and results of the most recent dives on the wreak, which I think
began in 2002 and maybe ended a year or two later (but I'm rather
hazy about that, please help me out if you can).

Sorry Jerry I cant.

OK, if these shows come on again, I'll try to snag them and perhaps I
can mail you a DVD of something you may not have seen in The
Netherlands.

That would be nice.

Maybe I should have put in a grin or two of my own, but each of
us is gifted in different ways. Perhaps one of mine to compensate
for lack of foreign language skills is what people tell me is a
logical mind and an insatiable appetite for new information. In
fact, it has been a basic philosphy of mine back at least to my
High School days as a teen-ager that learning is a life-long
endeavor. Unfortunately, ALL of my classmates in Engineering School
were like me and I suddently found myself as a brand new freshman
in 1965 going from top 5% in my H.S. class to about the bottom
5-10% and on academic probation for 3 trimesters. One more and I'd
have flunked out. Still in all, I barely made it, I recall
something like only a 2.32 or so GPA.

Could you explain that, we have a comlete other schoolsystem, so I
don't have a clue what 2,32 GPA means.

Sorry, I did it again, damnit! GPA means Grade Point Average. We use a
4.0 grading system in community colleges and universities where 0.0 is
an E or F, 0.5 is barely passing maybe with a D-, 2.0 is a C, 3.0 is a
B and 4.0 is an A. My school, Oakland University, used a 4.3 system
where 4.3 was essentially an A+. I hope your schools at least use a
similar letter grading system.

Most schools use a decimal system from 1 till 10, of course 1 is not very
good and thats an understatement, but 10 is passing a test without mistakes.
Avrage 6 is suficcient to go to a higher class.

To recap, American schools are basically organized this way: K-6
(Kindergarten through 6th grade) is called "elementary school, grades 7
and 8 "middle school" and 9-12 "high school." Colleges and universities
are divided into "undergraduate" which means one hasn't yet earned the
most basic degree, a bachelor of science or bachelor or arts, and
"graduate" degrees which include a masters or PhD (Doctor of
Philosophy) and also MD (Medical Doctor), DDS (Doctor of Dental
Surgery), and LLD (Letter of Law Doctorate, I think, i.e., an attorney.

Schoolsystem is very different in The Netherlands since I was young and I
can hardly explain the system now.
Basisschool (children from 4 till 12), kindegarten is included but the name
does not exist anymore.
They are talking in groups, grop 1 till group 8.
After that school is a very complex system I cannot explain anymore.
University is of course the highest grade.

So, under my university's grading system, I graduated barely above the
minimum necessary, a 2.0, with what amounted to be a low C+.

My youngest daughter went always for the minimum because there were much
things nicer than school, she only worked hard when she decided to become a
maternity nurse (says my dictionary)
She looks like her father, till my 16th I did not study very hard.

The only thing thats clear is that you had to work hard to graduate,
so we can shake hands.
I completely agree that learning is a life-long endeavor, for you,
for me because we are interested in a lot of things.
Not everybody thinks the same way.

Yeah, I worked my skinny ass off, Bouler! Here's what one of my days
was like: I'd get up early, eat a breakfast of oatmeal or bacon and
eggs, finish up any homework and commute to school Go to school and
study on campus until early afternoon, return home, eat a fast dinner
and go to work in a department store from 5-9 PM to earn gas money and
money to go on dates with girls. Then, study until about midnight or
when I fell asleep at the kitchen table. On weekends, I'd date, have
fun with my friends, go cruising to try to pick up girls or maybe
engage in drag racing at night while working Saturday and Sunday 8
hours and studying in whatever time was left besides sleeping.

Because I was studyïng in a boardingschool we studied 6 days of the week and
had specific studyhours and you did not get a chance to miss them, the
punishment was most of the time staying in school the whole weekend.
We had not much choice we simply had to.
No time to earn some money and not much time to have fun, exept when you
were doïng something cultural so me and my friends played in a band, were
singing in a lot of choirs, we did everything possible to get out of the
building to make fun and of course with girls.
Sometimes it was dangerous because you could be send home and never
graduate.
4 times I was very near but I came away with it.
I did not choose the school for earning a lot of money, I wanted to educate
children and pass my knowledge to them.
After all it was not payïng bad an we had lots of holidays;-)

The goal for me was two-fold: earn a degree that would enable me to try
for a high-paying job (which is why I chose engineering which is still
the highest paying job with a B.S. degree, the most I hoped to attain)
and stay out of the Army and a rice paddy in Viet Nam at least long
enough to earn my degree. Our draft system believed that having a
college degree, especially a technical one, was an important asset
militarily even if one did not become an officer (I was an enlisted
man, coming out a sergeant with 3 stripes after 20 months), so we had a
system of student deferrments that allowed only 4 years for college.
So, I HAD to get it done. I started work the next day after
commencement and fought the draft for about a year and lost. But, as it
turned out while Army life was hardly fun at the time, I DID get a
chance to tour much of southern Europe and the experience of being
completely on my own matured me greatly and turned out to be quite
useful in my later career.

Lots of pretty
smart men and women go to engineering school and the admissions
process we used here prior to affirmative action initiatives
guaranteed that only the best of the best got in.

Thats life Jerry, for my school to study for teacher there were 120
people that want that study at that specific school, after a
starting examination only 48, the maximum the school could handle
got that chance I I was one of them.

I did not have to take the standard testing of the day, such as the SAT
(Scholasitic Appitude Test) as a senior in High School, but my grades
and a recommendation from my counselor, principle, and at least one
teacher were required. Then, I had to compete against all other
applicants based on the number of freshman class openings. Once
accepted, I spent two entire days of mathematics and English aptitude
written testing, one day for each. Talk about difficult! Wow! My
English scores were OK but my math score was barely passing. My advisor
told me that if I actually cut it and graduated I would be the first in
his experience with a math aptitude that low. That sobered me up -
fast! He helped me a great deal through the many tank traps along the
way such as scheduling conflicts and getting me into the lesser
difficulty liberal arts classes that were required beyond what were
called "core curriculum" for my engineering school degree.

I don't know what the numbers were at my college as I didn't have
access to the number of applicants nor the number who failed to make
the cut on the 2-day testing gig, but I would suspect it was similary
to your experience. My engineering class itself was small, maybe 40 or
50 (I've always wished that OU had a yearbook, but they didn't) and I
think they all managed to graduate. That I know of, my ranking was 4th
from the bottom, or maybe 5th, but no higher. The class was divided
along lines of intelligence and grades informally. The smart guys
studied together and refusted to help us not so smart guys because they
wanted us to get lousy grades so the "curve", or statistical grading
system to decide the numeric score you're probably familiary with is
helped by the number of people on a test that score below the
statistical median or mean and skew the grade distribution to the low
end making it easier to earn a 3.0 or 4.0.

We helped each other a lot, maybe because teaching each other is a way of
learning too.
I still heve many contacts from that time and we had several reunions.
Next year again a reunion because its than 45 years ago we graduated.

Very smart after all;-)
Nobody knows 100% of something is my humble opinion.
A specialist is someone who knows almost everything about almost
nothing.

I agree. Just like the gun slinger days of the old American West,
where there was ALWAYS someone faster on the draw, there is always
someone smarter than you and wealthier than you. But, there is also
at least one person dumber and poorer than you, also! grin here,
no insult intended Seriously, one of my favorite saying from the
Dirty Harry cop movies is "a man's GOT to know his limitations",
that is, be humble one can NEVER know it all, no matter how hard or
long one tries, because the colllective body of knowledge on even a
narrow subject is exploding so fast.

I think that was the best Dirty Harry ever said and I agree
completely. Yes I know those movies from Clint Eastwood, I think he
is in politics now. Now I think I need some sleep, its 4.30 AM;-)

Most people like his other quotes, basically "this is a .44 Magnum and
will blow you head clean off, now do you feel lucky? well, do you,
punk?" Yeah, that's OK, but I liked the other one because it was useful
in real-life and not just cop movies. It is interestint that you are
familiar with the Dirty Harry series. It was a money maker but not an
award-winning movie. I often use movies to illustrate things to you and
others and I wonder a lot if my international friends know what the
hell I'm talking about! grin

Guns in America and guns in The Netherlands is world of difference.
Not many people have guns here and its even forbidden exept for policeman
and guards.
I think there are to many guns in the states.
--
Greetings
Bouler (The Netherlands)

Bouler added these comments in the current discussion du jour ...

I most appreciate the complements you extend to me on my knowledge
of cars and other things. However, there is likely far LESS here
than meets the eye, meaning that while I can speak reasonably
intelligently about all cars, not just Chrysler, I cannot speak to
specifics of even cars designed during my tenure at Chrysler. The
reason I can at least speak to most anything vehicular regardless
of company or national origin is that the basics of the vehicle
product development process from design (styling) to engineering to
testing to tooling to manufacturing and assembly is pretty much
universal throughout the world. What separates the better car
companies from the 2nd and 3rd tier crowd is how well they APPLY
basic principles and how much proprietary knowledge they can
accumulate and effectively implement to increase features, fuel
economy, safety, etc. while at the same time increasing quality,
reliability, and durability (those are 3 different things, ask if
interested) at the lowest possible cost.

I think carfactories can build cars that go on for many more years,
but at the same time the're digging their own grave.

At one time, at least from the 1950s to the OPEC Oil Embargo of 1973,
the American car companies followed a philosophy called "planned
obsolecscence" where minor styling changes were made every year and
major styling changes were made every 2 or 3 years. The idea was to
make your 3 year-old buggy look like last week's lettuce to entice you
to buy a new one. So, quality was simply awful and problems never got
fixed, just replaced by new ones much the same way that software bugs
never get fixed anymore. The Japanese "invasion" in the 1980s taught us
very painfully two big things: quality IS very important and resale
value/overall mimimum cost/mile driven IS very important to owners.
These 2 things, the rapid rise of Federal emissions and safety
regulations and the outrageous costs of doing all those redesigns made
it impossible to continue. These days, cars pretty much look the same
for the 4, 5, 6, 7 years of their "platform", resale value is greatly
enhanced and the high development costs can be amortized over much more
sales volume.

This very same idea spread quickly to all the world's car makers, even
including your French-made Renault. French cars and maybe Italian city
cars were/are about the only brands WORSE than American cars of the
halcyon days so if Renault had not adopted a new philsophy based on the
world-class Japanese, it is highly unlikely your car would ever have
made it to 16+ years of driving without rusting away and the engine
falling on the ground. Of course, your countries very strong inspection
laws force you to do preventative maintenence on your car, at least for
safety and emissions parts.

OK, if these shows come on again, I'll try to snag them and perhaps
I can mail you a DVD of something you may not have seen in The
Netherlands.

That would be nice.

I have an MS Word list of my movies that I'll send to you, Bouler.
Except for the ones marked with $$$ meaning they're commercial tapes
and DVDs that most often cannot be copied, the rest I burned on my
Panasonic DVR. Besides things we've been talking about here, the
Titanic and the number of shows about that, I have many TV shows about
Iwo Jima where my father was, the so-called American Muscle Car series
on Speed Channel, THC's Modern Marvels series, and the like.

All of you lurkers, I'm not exactly in the DVD biz, so don't salivate
quite just yet. But, Bouler, if you see a few things that may interest
you, it is very inexpensive for me to copy some DVDs. In advance of
that, please privately send me your address and international phone
number. I'll send you mine if you don't mind figuring out how to make
an international number from our local standard.

Sorry, I did it again, damnit! GPA means Grade Point Average. We
use a 4.0 grading system in community colleges and universities
where 0.0 is an E or F, 0.5 is barely passing maybe with a D-, 2.0
is a C, 3.0 is a B and 4.0 is an A. My school, Oakland University,
used a 4.3 system where 4.3 was essentially an A+. I hope your
schools at least use a similar letter grading system.

Most schools use a decimal system from 1 till 10, of course 1 is not
very good and thats an understatement, but 10 is passing a test
without mistakes. Avrage 6 is suficcient to go to a higher class.

Hmmm. Not at all familiar with that, so I'm glad I expanded on our
system so you'd at least have a chance to understand ours. Thanks for
that.


To recap, American schools are basically organized this way: K-6
(Kindergarten through 6th grade) is called "elementary school,
grades 7 and 8 "middle school" and 9-12 "high school." Colleges and
universities are divided into "undergraduate" which means one
hasn't yet earned the most basic degree, a bachelor of science or
bachelor or arts, and "graduate" degrees which include a masters or
PhD (Doctor of Philosophy) and also MD (Medical Doctor), DDS
(Doctor of Dental Surgery), and LLD (Letter of Law Doctorate, I
think, i.e., an attorney.

Schoolsystem is very different in The Netherlands since I was young
and I can hardly explain the system now.
Basisschool (children from 4 till 12), kindegarten is included but
the name does not exist anymore.
They are talking in groups, grop 1 till group 8.
After that school is a very complex system I cannot explain anymore.
University is of course the highest grade.

This sounds similar to our idea, but I recall discussing some pretty
big differences between your boarding school and our combo of high
school and college so there's not all that much overlap, I don't think.

So, under my university's grading system, I graduated barely above
the minimum necessary, a 2.0, with what amounted to be a low C+.

My youngest daughter went always for the minimum because there were
much things nicer than school, she only worked hard when she decided
to become a maternity nurse (says my dictionary)
She looks like her father, till my 16th I did not study very hard.

I would have really wanted to do better but luckily for me back in
1969, the car companies were hiring any graduate engineers with a pulse
because of the total redesign of their entire car and truck lines due
to the 1968 MVSS (Motor Vehicle Safety Standards) that came out of the
NTHSA (Nationalal Traffic and Highway Safety Administration, I think)
and the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) for emissions and toxic
substances regulations and the like. We were also burned with regs from
OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) for increasing
safety from injury and poisoning in our plants and offices.

Yeah, I worked my skinny ass off, Bouler! Here's what one of my
days was like: I'd get up early, eat a breakfast of oatmeal or
bacon and eggs, finish up any homework and commute to school Go to
school and study on campus until early afternoon, return home, eat
a fast dinner and go to work in a department store from 5-9 PM to
earn gas money and money to go on dates with girls. Then, study
until about midnight or when I fell asleep at the kitchen table. On
weekends, I'd date, have fun with my friends, go cruising to try to
pick up girls or maybe engage in drag racing at night while working
Saturday and Sunday 8 hours and studying in whatever time was left
besides sleeping.

Because I was studyïng in a boardingschool we studied 6 days of the
week and had specific studyhours and you did not get a chance to
miss them, the punishment was most of the time staying in school the
whole weekend. We had not much choice we simply had to.

Something that the United States has yet to learn is that the rest of
the world, but primarily the Asians, have as much education at the end
of what amounts to be our high school nearly as we have with a bachelor
degree from a university. These countries are literally eating our
lunch in engineering and software/computers as well because they have
50% or more technical education than we require. Worst of all, though,
American students are pretty damn lazy and do not comprehend that their
livelihood for 4 decades or more depends on a good an education as they
can possibly get, and not playing with sex and drugs.

No time to earn some money and not much time to have fun, exept when
you were doïng something cultural so me and my friends played in a
band, were singing in a lot of choirs, we did everything possible to
get out of the building to make fun and of course with girls.
Sometimes it was dangerous because you could be send home and never
graduate.
4 times I was very near but I came away with it.
I did not choose the school for earning a lot of money, I wanted to
educate children and pass my knowledge to them.
After all it was not payïng bad an we had lots of holidays;-)

I found that being forced by circumstances - my father was a "blue
collar" hourly paid auto worker - to work while in college and I found
that to be a very worthwhile endeavor, so we pretty much made our
daughter work for spending money also.

I don't know what the numbers were at my college as I didn't have
access to the number of applicants nor the number who failed to
make the cut on the 2-day testing gig, but I would suspect it was
similary to your experience. My engineering class itself was small,
maybe 40 or 50 (I've always wished that OU had a yearbook, but they
didn't) and I think they all managed to graduate. That I know of,
my ranking was 4th from the bottom, or maybe 5th, but no higher.
The class was divided along lines of intelligence and grades
informally. The smart guys studied together and refusted to help us
not so smart guys because they wanted us to get lousy grades so the
"curve", or statistical grading system to decide the numeric score
you're probably familiary with is helped by the number of people on
a test that score below the statistical median or mean and skew the
grade distribution to the low end making it easier to earn a 3.0 or
4.0.

We helped each other a lot, maybe because teaching each other is a
way of learning too.
I still heve many contacts from that time and we had several
reunions. Next year again a reunion because its than 45 years ago we
graduated.

Most people like his other quotes, basically "this is a .44 Magnum
and will blow you head clean off, now do you feel lucky? well, do
you, punk?" Yeah, that's OK, but I liked the other one because it
was useful in real-life and not just cop movies. It is interestint
that you are familiar with the Dirty Harry series. It was a money
maker but not an award-winning movie. I often use movies to
illustrate things to you and others and I wonder a lot if my
international friends know what the hell I'm talking about! grin

Guns in America and guns in The Netherlands is world of difference.
Not many people have guns here and its even forbidden exept for
policeman and guards.
I think there are to many guns in the states.

Over here, most Americans have an entirely incorrect understanding of
our 2nd Amendment. Here's what it says, and I'll explain why most
people think what they do:


"Amendment II

A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free
state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be
infringed."

People ONLY use the "right of the people to keep and bear arms" clause
and delete the rest. The root of this Amendment goes back to our
British Colonial period prior to 1776 and the later Revolutionary War
because the British would regularly confiscate all the farmer's muskets
anytime there was unrest. The modern version of a "militia" is what we
now call the National Guard which is a full military organization of
both the Army and Air Force under the command of a state governor. The
idea originally was for states to use a paramilitary organization for
the common good AND to defend against the possibility of a rogue
Federal goverenment trying to change the rules and establish tyranny.
Our Supreme Court heard arguments for a Washington D.C. handgun ban
last month that is its first 2nd Amendment case in 75 years.

In short, if one reads this Amendment and has ANY knowledge of why it
is there, they can easily see that it does NOT guarantee you the right
to own a rifle, shotgun, handgun, assault weapon, sub-machine gun or
anything. But, the threat IS real even today. In New Orleans,
Lousianna, the city hit the hardest by Hurrican Katrina in 2005, the
Mayor actually sent his police around and confiscated over 1,000 guns
presumeably to prevent deaths due to looting. I don't want to start
some gigantic flame war about guns, so I'll stop now.

--
HP, aka Jerry

"If it waddles like a duck and quacks like a duck, it must be a duck"

"HEMI-Powered" schreef in bericht
...

Read all and I agree.


In short, if one reads this Amendment and has ANY knowledge of why it
is there, they can easily see that it does NOT guarantee you the right
to own a rifle, shotgun, handgun, assault weapon, sub-machine gun or
anything. But, the threat IS real even today. In New Orleans,
Lousianna, the city hit the hardest by Hurrican Katrina in 2005, the
Mayor actually sent his police around and confiscated over 1,000 guns
presumeably to prevent deaths due to looting. I don't want to start
some gigantic flame war about guns, so I'll stop now.

You're right, but we have a lot in common.
--
Greetings
Bouler (The Netherlands)

Bouler added these comments in the current discussion du jour ...

Read all and I agree.


In short, if one reads this Amendment and has ANY knowledge of why it
is there, they can easily see that it does NOT guarantee you the right
to own a rifle, shotgun, handgun, assault weapon, sub-machine gun or
anything. But, the threat IS real even today. In New Orleans,
Lousianna, the city hit the hardest by Hurrican Katrina in 2005, the
Mayor actually sent his police around and confiscated over 1,000 guns
presumeably to prevent deaths due to looting. I don't want to start
some gigantic flame war about guns, so I'll stop now.

You're right, but we have a lot in common.

Which part do we have in common? Does The Netherlands have some
equivalent to our 2nd Amendment or do you just mean you think we share
views on guns, specifically gun control? I'll just crack the door open
just a bit. If I were running things, I'd hardly ban guns except for the
kind which only are used to commit crimes or terrorism, such as automatic
weapons, assault rifles, etc. But, I'd strengthen the laws similar to
Great Britain where you could OWN pretty much anything you wanted but
must keep it in a controlled armory and apply in writing to take it to
wherever you proposed to use it for target shooting, hunting, or perhaps
a collecting show.

--
HP, aka Jerry

"If it waddles like a duck and quacks like a duck, it must be a duck"

"HEMI-Powered" schreef in bericht
...
Bouler added these comments in the current discussion du jour ...

Read all and I agree.


In short, if one reads this Amendment and has ANY knowledge of why it
is there, they can easily see that it does NOT guarantee you the right
to own a rifle, shotgun, handgun, assault weapon, sub-machine gun or
anything. But, the threat IS real even today. In New Orleans,
Lousianna, the city hit the hardest by Hurrican Katrina in 2005, the
Mayor actually sent his police around and confiscated over 1,000 guns
presumeably to prevent deaths due to looting. I don't want to start
some gigantic flame war about guns, so I'll stop now.

You're right, but we have a lot in common.

Which part do we have in common? Does The Netherlands have some
equivalent to our 2nd Amendment or do you just mean you think we share
views on guns, specifically gun control?

Thats the part I meant.

I'll just crack the door open
just a bit. If I were running things, I'd hardly ban guns except for the
kind which only are used to commit crimes or terrorism, such as automatic
weapons, assault rifles, etc. But, I'd strengthen the laws similar to
Great Britain where you could OWN pretty much anything you wanted but
must keep it in a controlled armory and apply in writing to take it to
wherever you proposed to use it for target shooting, hunting, or perhaps
a collecting show.

In The Netherlands we have a law too that allows some people wearing guns.
But they all should have a license.
--
Greetings
Bouler (The Netherlands)

Bouler added these comments in the current discussion du jour ...

Which part do we have in common? Does The Netherlands have some
equivalent to our 2nd Amendment or do you just mean you think we
share views on guns, specifically gun control?

Thats the part I meant.

The latter, I'll assume.

I'll just crack the door open
just a bit. If I were running things, I'd hardly ban guns except
for the kind which only are used to commit crimes or terrorism,
such as automatic weapons, assault rifles, etc. But, I'd strengthen
the laws similar to Great Britain where you could OWN pretty much
anything you wanted but must keep it in a controlled armory and
apply in writing to take it to wherever you proposed to use it for
target shooting, hunting, or perhaps a collecting show.

In The Netherlands we have a law too that allows some people wearing
guns. But they all should have a license.

We call that a CCW, Carry Concealed Weapon. Rules for that vary quite
widely amongst the "several states" but here in Michigan, one must
first get a permit to buy the handgun or other concealable firearm or
other weapon but that's relatively easy. Then one must submit to a
somewhat more rigorous background check for a CCW and be absent any
felony convictions but this requirement is often side-stepped or simply
ignored so people in Michigan should ASSUME that everyone they see on
the streets, in shops, in cars, anywhere are armed to the teeth.

Interstingly, one cannot carry a long gun such as rifle or shotgun in
the open or concealed, barrel length is limited to 20" or more so
sawed-off shotguns are illegal about everywhere, and one cannot even
throw a long gun into their rear seat. It must be either disassembledd
or stored in a secure case in the trunk of the vehicle or other wise
not easily visible from outside the vehicle. What makes this such a
peculiar law is that NO permit is required to buy a long-gun except to
fill out an application at the store and show a simple photo ID.

--
HP, aka Jerry

"If it waddles like a duck and quacks like a duck, it must be a duck"

"HEMI-Powered" schreef in bericht
...
Bouler added these comments in the current discussion du jour ...

Which part do we have in common? Does The Netherlands have some
equivalent to our 2nd Amendment or do you just mean you think we
share views on guns, specifically gun control?

Thats the part I meant.

The latter, I'll assume.

Yep.

I'll just crack the door open
just a bit. If I were running things, I'd hardly ban guns except
for the kind which only are used to commit crimes or terrorism,
such as automatic weapons, assault rifles, etc. But, I'd strengthen
the laws similar to Great Britain where you could OWN pretty much
anything you wanted but must keep it in a controlled armory and
apply in writing to take it to wherever you proposed to use it for
target shooting, hunting, or perhaps a collecting show.

In The Netherlands we have a law too that allows some people wearing
guns. But they all should have a license.

We call that a CCW, Carry Concealed Weapon. Rules for that vary quite
widely amongst the "several states" but here in Michigan, one must
first get a permit to buy the handgun or other concealable firearm or
other weapon but that's relatively easy. Then one must submit to a
somewhat more rigorous background check for a CCW and be absent any
felony convictions but this requirement is often side-stepped or simply
ignored so people in Michigan should ASSUME that everyone they see on
the streets, in shops, in cars, anywhere are armed to the teeth.

Scary, I think I'll stay where I am;-)

Interstingly, one cannot carry a long gun such as rifle or shotgun in
the open or concealed, barrel length is limited to 20" or more so
sawed-off shotguns are illegal about everywhere, and one cannot even
throw a long gun into their rear seat. It must be either disassembledd
or stored in a secure case in the trunk of the vehicle or other wise
not easily visible from outside the vehicle. What makes this such a
peculiar law is that NO permit is required to buy a long-gun except to
fill out an application at the store and show a simple photo ID.

I never can get a licence, only when I am a member of a "shootingclub".
But I'm not so fond of guns.
--
Greetings
Bouler (The Netherlands)