Pugwash

I didn't have to give anything up. And just like they'll never ban drink in the UK, they'll never ban guns in the US. You're never going to have that glorious armed stand off in your home. Same slippery slope, they're not going to take your handguns if you agree you don't need grenade launchers. Almost all of the fear of gun control in the US is politics. It's got nothing to do with what is possibly ever going to happen. You're never going to be allowed to buy the highest-end Military hardware, so stop pretending it's a travesty, and no-one is going to take away your handguns. Let's face it, sometimes, some Americans stockpile a few too many weapons and their intentions are not good - if this is still legal, granny's Smith & Wesson Model 10 Snubnose is certainly safe, and would continue to be, even if LMGs were banned.

Slippery Slope arguments are fallacies. If alcohol were banned, the UK would be a much safer place and much less fun. You can be 100% certain that will never happen in our lifetimes, so your point is invalid.

It's a regular ETA GMT rep I picked up off a member on this very forum.

Unfortunately, being in the UK, the game starts at 11:28pm, so I'll likely only watch the beginning. If it looks like it's going to be a good game, I may watch the first half before bed. If it looks like it's a great game, I may even try to stay up for the whole thing. Watch? Rolex GMT to keep track of the timezones.

Banning guns hasn't made it any worse. I believe it's made it better, but there are no statistics that can conclusively prove this, obviously.

It helps to make it easy to spot a criminal. If they're armed, the police can shoot them dead. There are less guns over here, and not every criminal that would use one has one. I'm willing to not be allowed guns if it means less armed criminals on the street. Let's not forget, until very recently (one terror group just handed over their guns this week) the UK was a country with armed domestic terrorists waging war on the streets, murdering and injuring innocents and bombing buildings. That's what most adults think of guns here.

All guns start off legally owned.

I don't want to turn this into a gun control debate as they've been had on this forum before and nothing is decided until the real gun nuts turn up and shout everyone else down. Having said that, the studies I've seen about the crimes in Texas after the concealed carry law was introduced, the only change was a slight increase in assaults. Immediate, violent death doesn't seem to be as much a deterrent when you're armed. However, knowing how it works in Britain, I think legalising firearms would not be a good thing.

We're all guessing here, though. So, what you're saying is that crime doesn't exist in Texas? Everyone's armed there.

How can you be sure that the ban hasn't made the UK safer? You were wrong about knife crime, who says you're not wrong on guns too? I enjoy shooting and am still undecided on the ban, but I'm not going to go as far as to say it's not made the UK safer.

Davis is the Shadow Home Secretary. His job is making the Home Secretary look bad. However, in London, gun crime is up. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/8473029.stm But it's safe to say in most of the country, it's almost non-existant. There is currently a huge debate over the violent crime statistics the Conservative Party are using to 'prove' the current government is losing on crime. It's a very long story, but the upshot is everyone is massaging figures. The one thing that is clear is that our gun crime is so low, especially compared to the US, that our entire crimes could be a rounding error in US amounts. When there's just a handful of Ex-IRA (and I'm not going to mention they were paid for by Americans) guns cross the Irish sea to Liverpool, the stats are drastically altered. We're at such low levels that any changes appear huge. "Contrary to public perception, the overall level of gun crime in England and Wales is very low

Stats to back up your assertion, please?

I don't. Right to bear arms in the US works because they've had it for so long. Gun control wouldn't work (although I think there should be limits - no-one needs a bazooka or nuke) in the US if you tried to introduce it, but there's no need to reverse the situation in the UK or countries where it's working well.

@b16a2 I suspect we'll be seeing that one a lot.

Today, just to make myself look like an idiot, I'm wearing a working graphited Portuguese Chrono. Apparently this one hasn't died yet. ... and here's a low-quality but convenient iPhone wristie.

Excellent taste in watches. I really like the Railmaster and I think it's that strap that makes me want one. Damn it. I don't need another watch! Photos? Love 'em. Sure the white balance is a little off, but the warmth works well with the leather strapped watches.

Assault Rifle is a made-up term? Sure, made up by the US military. "Assault rifles are short, compact, selective-fire weapons that fire a cartridge intermediate in power between submachinegun and rifle cartridges." Army intelligence document FSTC-CW-07-03-70, November 1970 http://gunfax.com/aw.htm

Sapphire.

Speaking from personal experience, I've got two Portuguese Chronos and think they're one of the finest-looking watches out there, but they don't work. I've graphited both of them and the result is that they run very well for a while, and start to degrade in performance, until one day they just stop. If I were less scrupulous, I could clean them out, graphite them afresh and sell them as working watches, letting the new owner enjoy them for the few months they'd get, but that would be very dishonest. Instead, what I do is every time I'm doing lots of watch work, I'll strip them to the front plate and clean and graphite them. Then, when they die, it's back in the drawer until next time. Not ideal, but that's what it takes. So, if yours is running smoothly, that's excellent. If one day the second-hand starts jerking slightly, you know its time is nigh: Don't rely on it; it's going to die.

Can't be done. Try finding an Aston Martin with good gas mileage.

I'm taking the lack of results as failure to find a comparable laptop even close to under $1000.

The Swiss 7750 has a better drive train so less power is lost. More power means friction affects it less. It'll take longer to die. It's still not perfect, though.

Tasty work.

Of course this isn't normal. Get on to your dealer.