How do we feel about this?

[mmoore]

Murderous violent criminals will hopefully adhere to the specific and courteous rules you have specified.

the criminals of the world wont care about any kind of rule.

What would be gained if everyone (for a rhetoric, lets assume every single person - even young kids) was carrying? violent criminals will still be violent criminals. The remaining gun related issues pertaining to heated battles when someone cant control themselves, accidental misfire, misuse, etc would HAVE to be reduced.


I have a little story...which is true.
As a Canadian, we don't really do guns like you do south of us. We had a visitor for dinner one night who believed heavily that his gun was required for their safety. Another guest waltzed into the house and he went for his gun first reaction (which he didn't have because you don't carry here).
Do you think our other guest should have had the chance to get shot because they weren't expected?

[davids]

Murderous violent criminals will hopefully adhere to the specific and courteous rules you have specified.

Dramatically controlling access to weapons would help prevent these "murderous violent criminals" from getting guns. Or an angry scared teenager who proceeds to fire wildly into a group of people hanging out in front of a house. Or a despondent depressed person, alone in their living room on a dark night. Statistics demonstrate that guns account for a very large number of suicides - almost 2/3 of gun deaths are suicides.

Mass shootings are horrific spectacles. It's impossible not to be shocked and disgusted by them. They represent - like the guy with a gun stopping a shooter - a tiny fragment of of the picture of American gun violence.

It's way too easy to get a gun, legally or illegally. If they were harder to get there would be fewer of them. If there were fewer of them fewer people would be killed by them.

[Saab2000]

Very few of the proposed laws about firearms are in conflict with the 'sacred' 2nd Amendment. Making it harder to get them and requiring training and holding owners accountable for what happens with their guns if they were left unlocked makes a lot of sense in my mind.

Automobiles require training and registration and licensing. I need an FCC radio license in my job, which also requires training and licensing to operate airplanes that are licensed.

Why the paranoia about similar common sense steps with guns? After all, it's about accountability, something conservatives claim they hold dear.

[dgaddis]

I have a little story...which is true.
As a Canadian, we don't really do guns like you do south of us. We had a visitor for dinner one night who believed heavily that his gun was required for their safety. Another guest waltzed into the house and he went for his gun first reaction (which he didn't have because you don't carry here).
Do you think our other guest should have had the chance to get shot because they weren't expected?

That guy sounds like he has some of that mental health problem people keep talking about. His behavior isn't indicative of every gun owner in the US, even those that carry every day.

Seriously tho, if his first reaction when someone walks into someone else's house is to reach for his pistol, he shouldn't be carrying a pistol.

EDIT to add :: I do think some gun owners are just straight up scared to leave the house. Why, I don't know, but I do feel like that's an issue with some people. Especially the folks that open carry.

I'm all for making guns harder to get. But an outright ban simply won't ever happen here, and it shouldn't IMO.

[Corso]

How about enforcing laws we currently have?

In MA, there is a mandatory 1 year jail sentence for carrying a unregistered handgun.

Recently a repeat criminal, was caught transporting drugs, and had a unregistered handgun.

MA judge reduced his bail, (so he could afford it) and said scumbag a few weeks latter, shot and killed a Police officer in Maine.

Mandatory 1 year sentence? it’s NEVER enforced here, so why expect any other newer laws to be enforced by the courts?

If Scumbag started his one year MANDATORY sentence the day he was caught, a Police officer would be alive today.

Frustrating.

[taz]

How about enforcing laws we currently have?

In MA, there is a mandatory 1 year jail sentence for carrying a unregistered handgun.

Recently a repeat criminal, was caught transporting drugs, and had a unregistered handgun.

MA judge reduced his bail, (so he could afford it) and said scumbag a few weeks latter, shot and killed a Police officer in Maine.

Mandatory 1 year sentence? it’s NEVER enforced here, so why expect any other newer laws to be enforced by the courts?

If Scumbag started his one year MANDATORY sentence the day he was caught, a Police officer would be alive today.

Frustrating.

So we should disregard the presumption of innocence for criminal trials? Or just forego trials altogether?

BTW, bail is not a punishment. It's to ensure that an accused appears for trial. Got any other helpful legal insights?

FWIW - and I'm not familiar with Mass criminal code - if your 'scumbag' had violated probation he would likely not have been eligible for bail. So it appears that although he had a previous conviction, he was entitled to a reasonable bail (per the 6th amendment) and wasn't considered a risk for failure to appear at court.

[Corso]

So we should disregard the presumption of innocence for criminal trials? Or just forego trials altogether?

BTW, bail is not a punishment. It's to ensure that an accused appears for trial. Got any other helpful legal insights?

FWIW - and I'm not familiar with Mass criminal code - if your 'scumbag' had violated probation he would likely not have been eligible for bail. So it appears that although he had a previous conviction, he was entitled to a reasonable bail (per the 6th amendment) and wasn't considered a risk for failure to appear at court.

To answer your question, if caught with a unregistered gun, yes, straight to jail to start serving the MANDITORY sentence, then the other charges can go at the pace of the legal system.

That’s my "legal insight”, since you asked. I’m sure the family of the Police officer he killed would love to debate you on scumbags rights.

My LARGER point I was trying to make before the legal lecture, is that you can go ahead and ban anything you want, the lawless don’t care, and even those who are supposed to enforce the law pick and choose which ones they feel like enforcing.

Doping in cycling was “illegal”, yet everyone did it. It wasn’t policed or enforced, so what’s the deterrent? Why bother making rules no one follows?

[taz]

To answer your question, if caught with a unregistered gun, yes, straight to jail to start serving the MANDITORY sentence, then the other charges can go at the pace of the legal system.

That’s my "legal insight”, since you asked. I’m sure the family of the Police officer he killed would love to debate you on scumbags rights.

My LARGER point I was trying to make before the legal lecture, is that you can go ahead and ban anything you want, the lawless don’t care, and even those who are supposed to enforce the law pick and choose which ones they feel like enforcing.

Doping in cycling was “illegal”, yet everyone did it. It wasn’t policed or enforced, so what’s the deterrent? Why bother making rules no one follows?

I don't know how to discuss a legal issue, like umm... incarceration or um... what constitutes 'possession', without discussing the laws that pertain to either. If that's a legal 'lecture', maybe you should listen or just state upfront that your views are uninformed and you don't want to have them challenged.

As for the family of the fallen police officer, they've suffered a tragedy but it's no more a tragedy than that suffered by families of the wrongly accused/jailed and executed. Yes, it happens. And from what I've read, most law enforcement personnel support some type of gun-control legislation.

Following your logic, we may as well get rid of existing laws because the lawless are not going to heed them and God-fearing, upstanding, gun-toting Americans don't need them.

I know this is falling on deaf ears, but the laws and procedures that protect the 'scumbags' also protect average Joes, aka 'due process'. Real life requires compromises like this.

Or do you believe law enforcement never makes a mistake? <- That's a rhetorical question.

In the end, I know where this debate leads for you. Guns are never the problem - it's always someone/something else's fault when gun violence occurs. And the status quo continues...

[Corso]

In the end, I know where this debate leads for you. Guns are never the problem - it's always someone/something else's fault when gun violence occurs. And the status quo continues...

Your statement above defines where you stand. Don’t assume you know where I stand.

In review, I share an opinion on this site, you don’t agree, so I’m wrong and you’re right.

The status quo will indeed continue, but I guess you can’t see you are also part of that equation. Discussions welcome participation, trying to be the smartest guy in the room doesn’t really impress anyone.

[jclay]

Very few of the proposed laws about firearms are in conflict with the 'sacred' 2nd Amendment. Making it harder to get them and requiring training and holding owners accountable for what happens with their guns if they were left unlocked makes a lot of sense in my mind.

Automobiles require training and registration and licensing. I need an FCC radio license in my job, which also requires training and licensing to operate airplanes that are licensed.

Why the paranoia about similar common sense steps with guns? After all, it's about accountability, something conservatives claim they hold dear.

We largely retain our frontier mentality; reasonable ideas like that have no truck with Marlboro Men.

Yeah, the old personal accountability thing; you be tempted to think that those who self identify as conservative would be all over that. Sadly, however, personal accountability is only for others, needs dentures and is never applicable to firearms. You'd think its writ in the bible.

And other advanced countries putter along, complete with in-tact democracies, freedom (and even universal healthcare....heavens!), free speech and with about two orders of magnitude less firearms violence than we.....and, weird, they aren't swimming in guns. The arithmetic seems pretty obvious to me.

[taz]

Your statement above defines where you stand. Don’t assume you know where I stand.

In review, I share an opinion on this site, you don’t agree, so I’m wrong and you’re right.

The status quo will indeed continue, but I guess you can’t see you are also part of that equation. Discussions welcome participation, trying to be the smartest guy in the room doesn’t really impress anyone.

I'm not trying to be the smartest guy in the room. But both of us have participated in a gun topic thread here previously so your views as well as mine are known. The new twist from you that tweaked my interest was throwing away due process rights. Otherwise, please continue with your guns for everybody except scumbags discourse.

[theflashunc]

There's been enough bloodshed. Time to ban guns imo. The Dodge City nonsense of a white hat stopping a black hat from doing more badness is dumb and bad and anyone who ascribes to that as a way to create a safe society needs to watch fewer John Wayne movies.

The rest of the civilized world has figured it out. It ain't hard. No guns.

[Corso]

I'm not trying to be the smartest guy in the room. But both of us have participated in a gun topic thread here previously so your views as well as mine are known. The new twist from you that tweaked my interest was throwing away due process rights. Otherwise, please continue with your guns for everybody except scumbags discourse.

Taz, I simplified the entire story to make it shorter. I’ve never, NEVER said guns for everyone, nor am I an NRA member, nor have I taken a “No gun control” stance. Just my facts. If you gleam anything from my past post, it’s that I believe in following the law. Before name calling and stone throwing, reply to what I type, not what you project on me.

My point - which you have pivoted away from - is this: Since 1975 my state has had a law about unregistered handguns (minimum 1 year jail sentence) and in the 43 years it’s been in place, less than a dozen people have served the year.

So as everyone screams for more gun control, I use Bartley-Fox as an example. Why have the gun law if you don’t enforce the gun law?
And why scream for more gun laws if you don’t enforce the one(s) we have?

Here’s an outdated wikipedia on the law: Bartley-Fox Law - Wikipedia

Googling will get you more info, about how few people actually do time, as the 1 year becomes a bartering tool between lawyers; “tell us what we want and we’ll drop that 1 year”... and a friend of mine who is a Mass Judge, has pretty much said , "yeah, maybe a dozen”. And thousands have been “caught” with illegal hand guns over the years.

Let’s see if the Commonwealth drops the one year, after the State of Maine lock Scumbag up for killing a police officer while he was out on bail.

Now my drift: I find it a bit sad that you came out straight away in defense of the “accused” and his rights--and showed a lack of empathy for the Police officer he murdered:

"As for the family of the fallen police officer, they've suffered a tragedy but it's no more a tragedy than that suffered by families of the wrongly accused/jailed and executed.”

You can apply “but it’s no more a tragedy than” fill in the blank to anything and everything: "Your house burned down, but look at the apartment building that also burned down", “Dog got hit by a car, sad, but no sadder than those dogs abandoned", etc, etc.

I think you know what I’m saying. It’s pretty dismissive.

[jclay]

There's been enough bloodshed. Time to ban guns imo. The Dodge City nonsense of a white hat stopping a black hat from doing more badness is dumb and bad and anyone who ascribes to that as a way to create a safe society needs to watch fewer John Wayne movies.

The rest of the civilized world has figured it out. It ain't hard. No guns.

Exactly.

Until a couple of years ago I often wondered what death & maiming rates would be required to get our gun culture folks to agree that guns actually are the problem and that serious firearms control was necessary. Sadly it appears that there isn't one. The empowerment fantasy they provide is simply too strong.

It's quite remarkable; as with universal health care there is a large body of real world data that makes the case for approaches that work. Yet we continue to ignore it.

[vertical_doug]

Exactly.

Until a couple of years ago I often wondered what death & maiming rates would be required to get our gun culture folks to agree that guns actually are the problem and that serious firearms control was necessary. Sadly it appears that there isn't one. The empowerment fantasy they provide is simply too strong.

It's quite remarkable; as with universal health care there is a large body of real world data that makes the case for approaches that work. Yet we continue to ignore it.

Why Your Health Insurer Doesn’t Care About Your Big… — ProPublica

And hasn't the Texas official identified the real problem in US schools- too many doors. oh, and i almost forgot, Ritalin

[jclay]

Why Your Health Insurer Doesn’t Care About Your Big… — ProPublica

And hasn't the Texas official identified the real problem in US schools- too many doors. oh, and i almost forgot, Ritalin

Ya have to be impressed with the imagination and creativity that folks like that bring to bear on the issue. If you could direct it in ways that are reality based and actually work, and towards just a few of our larger problem areas, we'd solve them all in about five minutes.

[mmoore]

That guy sounds like he has some of that mental health problem people keep talking about. His behavior isn't indicative of every gun owner in the US, even those that carry every day.

Seriously tho, if his first reaction when someone walks into someone else's house is to reach for his pistol, he shouldn't be carrying a pistol.

while I likely agree, it was more of a fluid thing that not everyone would have noticed.... he didn't run to the bedroom to grab it, he put his hand on his hip and only when questioned he mentioned that's where the pistol normally sits and he was embarrassed. just a normal reaction to put a hand on it "in case"?

[dgaddis]

while I likely agree, it was more of a fluid thing that not everyone would have noticed.... he didn't run to the bedroom to grab it, he put his hand on his hip and only when questioned he mentioned that's where the pistol normally sits and he was embarrassed. just a normal reaction to put a hand on it "in case"?

Normal for him, maybe, but certainly not normal.

Most of the folks I've worked with in the last ~6yrs or so (mostly engineers, most in their 40's or 50's) have concealed carry permits. I'd say not even half of them ever actually carry on their person. Some occasionally carry a pistol in their vehicle. I do know a few that carry all the time. I have a few riding buddies that carry, quite often, even on the bike.

None of these folks are looking to get into a gun fight though. They don't reach for a pistol when someone walks in the door. They all go to the range to practice every so often, some even do recreational competitive shooting. They carry because they feel like, if some sh*t goes down, at least they'll have a chance to defend themselves. And I get that. Here in Macon (a small city with a population of about ~90,000 people) there's quite a bit of crime, shootings happen regularly. We had our 18th homicide of the year a day or two ago. So, I understand why people want protection, or at least the feeling of protection.

And I also understand that if guns were harder to get, there wouldn't be so many damn shootings in the first place. The local gang bangers aren't criminal masterminds importing weapons on the black market. They're uneducated poor folks with no jobs and no prospects and not enough to do (it's been raining like crazy the last two weeks, and someone commented on a news FB post 'anyone notice there's been no shootings since the rain started?'). The guns used in these shootings are either stolen or at some point were purchased legally.

I personally don't carry a gun with me. I feel like it would be more of a distraction than anything else, I'm not proficient enough to do so safely, and I also don't feel like it's really that unsafe to leave my house. Most of the violence here in town happens in certain parts of town, and generally late at night/early morning. I don't hang out in the housing projects (tho I do ride through on my bike some as it's often the best way from A to B without riding in heavy traffic), and I'm not out and about at 2:30 in the morning clubing, so I'm not too worried. Also, the violent crime rate has been going down basically my entire life (I think).

I'm all for tighter "sensible/reasonable gun control" as it's been called. I wish every state required training to purchase or at the very least carry a weapon. Here in GA the only thing you have to do to get a concealed carry permit is fill out some paperwork, not be a felon, and pay a fee - that's too slack IMO. But I wouldn't support an all-out ban on firearms.

Also, an interesting thing I wasn't aware of until recently, gun and ammo and hunting related sales a huge part of the money used for conservation of wild places and wild life. Pittman–Robertson Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Act - Wikipedia $1.1 BILLION dollars last year alone.

As for the 'he was found with an unregistered gun so he should go straight to jail for his mandatory 1 year minimum sentence' I'm not in support of that either. Due process IS important. There's been quite a few cases lately of police getting caught planting drugs on people, so...yeah, I'm all for due process.

[sine]

edit

So as everyone screams for more gun control, I use Bartley-Fox as an example. Why have the gun law if you don’t enforce the gun law?
And why scream for more gun laws if you don’t enforce the one(s) we have?

First and foremost........I would like all driving laws enforced in the USA.

Back to programming.

Weapons involved in several US mass shootings were legally obtained.

Follow Australia.

[bigbill]

I'm conservative and I'd like to see Congress and state governors sit down and review the current gun control laws before we create any new ones. Layers of administrivia is not the answer, just some common sense and enforceable laws. If it's not effective, replace or delete it. As long as the Second Amendment exists, we have to allow people to own guns, just who gets to own, purchase, and carry a gun needs clearly defined rules.

I live in a heavily armed area, in this county of 30K people, there are over 4K concealed carry permits and the ones that don't carry often have a weapon in their vehicle which doesn't require a permit. It's not the wild west that people imagine. There are frequent shootings, almost exclusively drug or gang related and usually involving two people who can't legally have a gun.