its quite easy to create events, such as the fire, to exploit the common default behavior in such things.

ergo my pointing out what happens when you reverse the exit and entrance signs in a building and yell fire… they go into the fire..

same as with ideology… they reverse the signs so that they fight for freedom (slavery) and for peace (war) and so on..

If I were rich, I would have a plaque made up, and sent to every judge in America, bearing a statement made by Adam Smith more than two-and-a-half centuries ago: “Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent.”

In 1987, Michael Ryan went on a shooting spree in his small town of Hungerford, England, killing 16 people (including his mother) and wounding another 14 before shooting himself. Since the public was unarmed–as were the police–Ryan wandered the streets for eight hours with two semiautomatic rifles and a handgun before anyone with a firearm was able to come to the rescue.
Nine years later, in March 1996, Thomas Hamilton, a man known to be mentally unstable, walked into a primary school in the Scottish town of Dunblane and shot 16 young children and their teacher. He wounded 10 other children and three other teachers before taking his own life.
Since 1920, anyone in Britain wanting a handgun had to obtain a certificate from his local police stating he was fit to own a weapon and had good reason to have one. Over the years, the definition of “good reason” gradually narrowed. By 1969, self-defense was never a good reason for a permit.
After Hungerford, the British government banned semiautomatic rifles and brought shotguns–the last type of firearm that could be purchased with a simple show of fitness–under controls similar to those in place for pistols and rifles. Magazines were limited to two shells with a third in the chamber.
Dunblane had a more dramatic impact. Hamilton had a firearm certificate, although according to the rules he should not have been granted one. A media frenzy coupled with an emotional campaign by parents of Dunblane resulted in the Firearms Act of 1998, which instituted a nearly complete ban on handguns. Owners of pistols were required to turn them in. The penalty for illegal possession of a pistol is up to 10 years in prison.
The results have not been what proponents of the act wanted. Within a decade of the handgun ban and the confiscation of handguns from registered owners, crime with handguns had doubled according to British government crime reports. Gun crime, not a serious problem in the past, now is. Armed street gangs have some British police carrying guns for the first time. Moreover, another massacre occurred in June 2010. Derrick Bird, a taxi driver in Cumbria, shot his brother and a colleague then drove off through rural villages killing 12 people and injuring 11 more before killing himself.
Meanwhile, law-abiding citizens who have come into the possession of a firearm, even accidentally, have been harshly treated. In 2009 a former soldier, Paul Clarke, found a bag in his garden containing a shotgun. He brought it to the police station and was immediately handcuffed and charged with possession of the gun. At his trial the judge noted: “In law there is no dispute that Mr. Clarke has no defence to this charge. The intention of anybody possessing a firearm is irrelevant.” Mr. Clarke was sentenced to five years in prison. A public outcry eventually won his release.
In November of this year, Danny Nightingale, member of a British special forces unit in Iraq and Afghanistan, was sentenced to 18 months in military prison for possession of a pistol and ammunition. Sgt. Nightingale was given the Glock pistol as a gift by Iraqi forces he had been training. It was packed up with his possessions and returned to him by colleagues in Iraq after he left the country to organize a funeral for two close friends killed in action. Mr. Nightingale pleaded guilty to avoid a five-year sentence and was in prison until an appeal and public outcry freed him on Nov. 29.

The article has a similar history for Australia. One result of the handgun ban in the UK is that burglars have much less to fear from housebreaking than they do in the US. Moreover, homeowners who retaliate against housebreakers may be prosecuted. Sorry, I prefer the US.

Our penal system needs work, to say the least. But I’m not sure we’ve ever gotten this one right. We’ve gone from punishment to reform to warehousing, and recidivism has stubbornly stayed high, possibly about the same. Add this to plea bargains a la Spengler, violations committed while on parole/probation, and judges who never met a criminal they didn’t like, and it amazes me that we don’t have more violent crime, to include mass murder. And if I knew how to fix (as in repair) the system, I’d be selling it big-time.

Liability insurance does not seem like a great idea. Criminals steal guns or buy them illegally. If someone steals your gun would your liability insurance go with the gun? That would increase the incentive to steal guns or buy them illegally. Have you been following the argument here that keeping violent criminals in prison is part of the solution? Or that would be murderers look for soft targets and making yourself one does not make you safe? Politicians want armed security for themselves right?