The Perpetual Gun Control Thread

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92tide

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There are lots of different kinds of tyranny, and an appropriate response to each.

An overly intrusive Census questionnaire is a very minor type, and the appropriate method of resistance is to refuse to cooperate by not filling it out.

No-knock warrants are a more serious type, and the appropriate response is debatable, but there is a case to be made for self-defense.

Then there are all the uncontrovertibly egregious violations that people say could never happen here, which widespread firearm ownership makes sure of, and action against which will be either classified as treason or patriotism, depending on your view.

To lump them all together is to commit the fallacy of equivocation.
i guess we are guaranteed that everyone will respond appropriately to these "levels of tyranny".
 

G-VilleTider

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Just some statistics for perspective as the trees seem to often get in the way of the forest.

*numbers are rounded*

13,000 homicide deaths by firearm last year

65,000 drug overdose deaths last year
In comparison, more than 58,000 US soldiers died in the entire Vietnam War, nearly 55,000 Americans died of car crashes at the peak of such deaths in 1972, more than 43,000 died due to HIV/AIDS during that epidemic's peak in 1995, and nearly 40,000 died of guns during the peak of those deaths in 1993.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/6/6/15743986/opioid-epidemic-overdose-deaths-2016

38,000 deaths due to car crashes last year
Initial estimates, which may be revised when more information becomes available, indicate that 38,300 people were killed on U.S. roads in 2015, and roughly 4.4 million sustained injuries that resulted in medical consultations. The number of deaths rose 8 percent from 2014, compared with a less than 0.5 percent increase between 2013 and 2014 and a 3 percent drop the previous year.

“We haven’t seen a jump like this in 50 years,” says Deborah A.P. Hersman, president and CEO of the NSC. “It’s a big change. This is not statistically insignificant. And we’re talking about human lives.”
http://www.newsweek.com/2015-brought-biggest-us-traffic-death-increase-50-years-427759

45,000 deaths due to suicide per year https://afsp.org/about-suicide/suicide-statistics/

I hope we can all agree that all of these deaths are tragic. I also hope that we can agree that there is a limited number of resources available to combat these problems (I know vast disagreement on the specific amount of resources and in what manner they would be best used, but still a finite number).

It seems to me that the most logical choice would be to address the issues that cause many times more deaths than firearms and are rising both in actual numbers and by percentage and then address the deaths from firearms issue which is smaller in number, percentage and with rates that have been falling for decades. Yes, mass shootings get all the headlines and emotional outrage, but numbers aren't emotional and if one's goal is to save lives, then there are much more pressing issues that also can be addressed more easily than the firearm issue.
 

Tidewater

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This is one of my fears and it's largely media-driven. I'd bet 95% of the public now believes there is something unique and deadly about an AR-15, which is basically just a .224 (or similar) semi-automatic rifle. There is one exception but it's critical - the AR-15 and similar rifles will accept large magazines. We limited mags once and it worked to some degree. It's not perfect, because mags can be exchanged quickly. There wasn't the political will even to keep that limitation in place. The technology-based assault weapon ban, which also depended on cosmetics, was largely ineffective. The reversing a year ago of the inclusion of mentally ill in the data base was a huge step backwards...
This is, to my mind, the heart of the issue. The folks committing these mass murders tend to be mentally ill (go figure). If people known to be mentally ill had at least a temporary hold on owning a fire-arm, at least until a mental health care professional can examine them and clear them, that would be great.
A hot line folks could call in and warn cops/mental health professionals about guys like yesterday's shooter might have eliminated this shooting. Lots of acquaintances believed this guy was suspect and if cops had known, maybe the gun seller would not have sold the gun.
The problem would be who determines who must be screened. It does not take a lot of imagination to imagine an estranged wife in the midst of ugly divorces would threaten her ex-husband with accusing them of being mentally ill, just to inconvenience him. Or a cop whose wife was a psychiatrist might say anybody who wants to buy a gun is mentally ill and must see his wife and get cleared before buying. I don't know how to keep the mentally ill from getting guns without having a system that can be abused.
 

92tide

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I get it, again, I feel for them. I wish I could *blink* and make this tragedy disappear.

My point is if we really want to fix gun violence, we need to dig deeper than the superficial. yes, the families and this community will be rocked, some will be forever changed, but this horrible act. But emotional reactions shouldn't dictate policy - we need to make sure we're addressing the issue, not just throwing a bandaid on a gushing wound.


Agreed. My point is we need a systematic set of answers. All to often we react to something and it results in unintended consequences. We as a country need to work to gather to figure out why this is happening and what solutions are viable.

Sure, we can ban 'semiautomatic rifles that look like military weapons', but we all know these broken souls who kill people will simply use the next available tool. And we also know that a ban on these rifles will have very little affect on the overall gun violence numbers in the US.


Sure, I know folks who think the 2A has absolute, that citizens should be allowed to have anything they can carry. I don't feel his way, personally, but I do think we have to tread lightly when we're talking about something that has been enumerated as an individual right.

The real question no one wants to discuss is what is wrong in our society now? Heck, half the kids in my HS had hunting rifles hanging in the rear windows of their pickups -16 year-old kids with rifles that would go hunting after school, yet I never once heard of any gun violence. Something has changed, as access to firearms is more difficult today than it's ever been in the US, yet these mass shootings are becoming more common. We need to answer the 'why' before we start trying to fix it, otherwise, we're just bandaging up someone who is bleeding out with trying to determine why they're bleeding in the first place.
what i am saying is that dealing with high capacity weapons that seem to be the weapon of choice in many of these mass shootings is only one of the many things that need to be dealt with to address gun violence. i realize mass shootings are a relatively small number of the total gun casualties, but they are still horrific and need to be dealt with. there is nowhere else in the world where mass shootings happen with the regularity that they do here.

the something (or at least one thing) that has changed since i was a kid is that guns are being sold like a consumer good which you should buy that can be tricked out like a motorcycle or you can get the latest greatest technology like with your big screen hdtv or whole house sound system.
 

Blueguitar

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I think you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who isn't sick of the violence.

I think we all know the answer is multifaceted, but the 'gun law' solution is particularly tough - so I'll ask you, what laws do you propose we pass that will help curb the violence while not getting immediately struck down by the courts? I've said it over and over, the AUS solution is simply impossible here without a Constitutional Amendment, so what do you propose?

This isn't directed at you, but I get so tired of people acting as if we gun owners don't care or don't want to see this problem addressed. We're called names and attacked across the internet as being selfish, heartless, evil - yet when pressed, the solutions that are given are almost always "uhh, I dunno, it worked in Australia..."
I disagree that a constitutional amendment is necessary to deal with the issue. It might be to go as far as Australia went, but most of the proposals being made by gun control proponents don't go nearly that far. The Supreme Court's decision in Heller v. DC, which is the leading case on the matter, made it clear that the government has a lot of latitude to regulate firearms, including licensing requirements, outlawing certain categories of weapons, etc., it just can't ban them outright. The federal government and most states are not even close to what Heller suggested the limits might be on their ability to regulate.

Second, since you say you want to see this issue addressed but it would require a constitutional amendment, I'm just curious if you are saying you would be in favor of a constitutional amendment?
 

TIDE-HSV

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but when you present the idea to folks that guns are a guard against governmental tyranny, you can't assume that only like minded folks will agree with you about what constitutes tyranny. hell, there were folks on this board swearing up and down that we were the victims of tyranny because they had to sign up for healthcare.
Perceived governmental tyranny is immaterial to probably 97% of this type of shooter. He probably would respond "Say whut?" to the term "Ruby Ridge"...
 

Displaced Bama Fan

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what i am saying is that dealing with high capacity weapons that seem to be the weapon of choice in many of these mass shootings is only one of the many things that need to be dealt with to address gun violence. i realize mass shootings are a relatively small number of the total gun casualties, but they are still horrific and need to be dealt with. there is nowhere else in the world where mass shootings happen with the regularity that they do here.

the something (or at least one thing) that has changed since i was a kid is that guns are being sold like a consumer good which you should buy that can be tricked out like a motorcycle or you can get the latest greatest technology like with your big screen hdtv or whole house sound system.
Sort of reminds me of the scene in The Sum of all Fears:

President Fowler: We gotta update these fire drills, Billy. I mean, if the .... ever hits the fan, I'm not going underground. This place is a gd tomb down there!

Bill Cabot: We've also gotta choose someone else to face off against besides the Russians all the time.

President Fowler: Really? Let's see. Who else has 27,000 nukes for us to worry about?

Bill Cabot: It's the guy with one I'm worried about.
 

crimsonaudio

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I disagree that a constitutional amendment is necessary to deal with the issue. It might be to go as far as Australia went, but most of the proposals being made by gun control proponents don't go nearly that far. The Supreme Court's decision in Heller v. DC, which is the leading case on the matter, made it clear that the government has a lot of latitude to regulate firearms, including licensing requirements, outlawing certain categories of weapons, etc., it just can't ban them outright. The federal government and most states are not even close to what Heller suggested the limits might be on their ability to regulate.
Good point. My point wrt the 2A is that those holding up AUS as some sort of goal don't seem to understand that you can't get here from here.

Second, since you say you want to see this issue addressed but it would require a constitutional amendment, I'm just curious if you are saying you would be in favor of a constitutional amendment?
Potentially, it really depends on the details.

To be honest, with the 'leadership' we have in DC now, I'd likely be opposed to it, as I have zero faith that they could do something actually beneficial to We The People.
 

Tidewater

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Second, since you say you want to see this issue addressed but it would require a constitutional amendment, I'm just curious if you are saying you would be in favor of a constitutional amendment?
How about this:

"Each state shall have the plenary power to regulate the possession or ownership of firearms as the state authorities see fit, restricted only by the constitution of that state. The Federal government shall have no power to restrict the states' power to regulate or restrict ownership or possession of firearms, and the Federal judiciary shall have no jurisdiction over the subject."
 

bama_wayne1

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I disagree that a constitutional amendment is necessary to deal with the issue. It might be to go as far as Australia went, but most of the proposals being made by gun control proponents don't go nearly that far. The Supreme Court's decision in Heller v. DC, which is the leading case on the matter, made it clear that the government has a lot of latitude to regulate firearms, including licensing requirements, outlawing certain categories of weapons, etc., it just can't ban them outright. The federal government and most states are not even close to what Heller suggested the limits might be on their ability to regulate.

Second, since you say you want to see this issue addressed but it would require a constitutional amendment, I'm just curious if you are saying you would be in favor of a constitutional amendment?
The volume of sales the AR platform has enjoyed would make it difficult agree with your interpretation as the ruling was that DC could not ban a class of weapons that were commonly used for self defense. I would bet the majority would insert that was their reason for purchase. I don't own or want to own one but nothing has sold them better than the left's insistence that they be banned.
 

selmaborntidefan

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Well that's just not true. I'll stick with Australia because they're the closest analog to the US. Whether you agree with gun control or not, the rate of gun violence dropped after the buyback. Statistics would tell you that at least one shooting was prevented.




Cool strawman, but no one has suggested outlawing guns.
Remind me AGAIN how many countries BORDER Australia where these laws can be circumvented?

That's the second time I've basically asked that question.

And you have NO EVIDENCE it prevented EVEN one. You're assuming that.
 

CharminTide

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Good point. My point wrt the 2A is that those holding up AUS as some sort of goal don't seem to understand that you can't get here from here.
See, I'm not convinced of this. Australia didn't, for instance, ban semiautomatic weapons. They're still legal, they just require a more difficult license to obtain, and we already license firearms here. Now granted, any such law would be immediately challenged and stayed until SCOTUS ruled on it, but I don't think it's obviously any less constitutional than a federal ban on fully automatic rifles.

Perhaps the more tricky issue, as TW alludes to, is federal vs. state gun licensing.
 

chanson78

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Here is an idea. Specifically targeted for school shootings.

Make a law that puts some responsibility on the purchaser/owner of the firearm for the actions that a minor takes with that firearm. If the kid steals it, I don't know. Burglary is already against the law, but say a kid steals from his uncle. I am not really sure that the uncle should bear responsibility for the actions of a child he had no input on bringing into this world. It is difficult to determine where to draw the line.

If you choose not to keep your guns locked up, then you bear some responsibility. I don't know exactly what such a law would look like, and don't really know how you would quantify in the eyes of the law what would be constituted as a reasonable attempt to keep weapons safeguarded. But people are asking for what kind of law might work, and there is my stab at it. Poke holes in it or make it better, have at it.

I have no idea for a law on what to do for someone who can legally purchase firearms after going through the background check. Murder is already a fairly big no no but that still doesn't stop some people.

Two anecdotes:
Sandy Hook shooter's mom bought him the gun he used to carry out his shooting. Could her knowing that if he did anything with that firearm, that she would share responsibility, have changed whether she bought it for him?

Someone my wife works with had a son going through mental problems. Instead of ignoring the responsibility, he made the decision to get his firearms out of his house. We bought a couple, but the father recognized that it was a potential problem which is admirable.
 

CharminTide

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Remind me AGAIN how many countries BORDER Australia where these laws can be circumvented?
I have no idea what you're getting at here. Do you think the majority of guns in the U.S. come from Mexico or Canada? They don't, and criminals actually smuggle guns from the U.S. and into Mexico. LINK

And you have NO EVIDENCE it prevented EVEN one. You're assuming that.
I'm saying that if you run statistics based on the graph I provided, I'm certain that the rate of Australian gun deaths before and after 1996 will be significantly different (to a confidence of at least 95%). But if you think there are confounding variables not being considered, feel free to point them out.
 

Bazza

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Here’s what we know. The shooter used an AR-15, the most common rifle in the United States. The shooter was on the radar of school authorities, and he was reportedly in frequent contact with the police; he was reported to the FBI as well, but follow-up was apparently insufficient. People warned authorities about him, and they didn’t do anything or couldn’t do anything. That’s probably the best place to start looking for answers.
The shooter's gun was obtained legally. He had never been arrested; it’s difficult to think of a way to prevent the sale of a gun to a person with a clean record without a mass gun ban or confiscation. He also had a gas mask and grenades — and it’s unclear where he obtained the grenades. We could look at stronger prosecution of straw buyers, as Jim Geraghty of National Reviewsuggests, but that wouldn't have helped in this case.
Good article:

So, What The Hell Do We Do Now?

 
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