The FAST Approaching Gun Ban

[bobvela]

I go away for a few days and clear schizophrenic folks like thombergeron start projecting other peoples views on to me (emphasis mine):

And yet, less than 24 hours later, the gun nuts are out in force, fronting the plainly absurd notion that this never would have happened if Clinton hadn’t disarmed the military.

So really, Bob, who’s dancing on graves here? Who’s misrepresenting the facts in a ham-handed attempt to score political points?

You and your mouthbreather buddy bobvela didn’t come up with the “Clinton-era policy makes military bases gun-free zones” argument on your own. You got your cut-and-paste orders from various right-wing dittohead sources like this

That's fine. But you, bobvela, and hordes of other mouthbreathers didn't even wait for the gunfire to die down before blaming Bill Clinton for turning military bases into "gun-free zones." Which is just a blatant lie.

Thanks for letting me live rent free in your head for so long... or would you like to cite where I blamed Clinton for making military bases gun free zones? Also, do not make the mistake of thinking that because a place is a 'gun free zone' that no one can carry there. Your average K-12 school is a 'gun free zone' and yet your average local police officer doesn't think twice when carrying there... so clearly, a limited # of people are able to carry there.

Actually, this virtually never happens. I’m willing to bet that you can’t come up with a single unambiguous case of an armed civilian stopping an armed assailant.

Really? Not a single case? Oh right... you add the needless measure of 'unambiguous' because you will demand a rather impossible level of proof and poo poo any case I provide... shucks for you, this is a topic I've followed for many years.

Does a 'former police officer' count as an armed civilian? http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/12/us...ed=print&_r=1&

The gunman who killed four people in two church-related attacks on Sunday committed suicide after being shot “multiple times” by a volunteer security guard at a church in Colorado Springs, the El Paso County coroner said.

No? Then we've got a principal in Mississippi: http://content.time.com/time/magazin...136736,00.html

Luke Woodham walked into Pearl High's commons, an enclosure created by the school's buildings. He then took a .30-.30 rifle from beneath his blue trench coat and opened fire, wounding seven schoolmates and killing two
...
He was subdued by assistant principal Joel Myrick, who pulled a .45-cal. pistol from his car and ordered the gunman to the ground.

A bar patron: http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/th...winnemucca-bar

Winnemucca Police Chief Bob Davidson said a man entered Players Bar and Grill and fatally shot two members of a rival family before he was shot and killed by a patron.
...
The patron was in possession of a valid concealed-weapons permit issued by the Washoe County sheriff's office, Davidson said.

A guy visiting a local mall with a friend and the friend's baby: http://www.kgw.com/news/Clackamas-ma...183593571.html

The break in gunfire allowed Meli to pull out his own gun, but he never took his eyes off the shooter.

"As I was going down to pull, I saw someone in the back of the Charlotte move, and I knew if I fired and missed, I could hit them," he said.

Meli took cover inside a nearby store. He never pulled the trigger. He stands by that decision.

Or a dance hall owner: http://articles.philly.com/1998-04-2...cience-teacher

Yesterday, Andrew Wurst, 14, was charged with fatally shooting John Gillette, 48, a science teacher at James Parker Middle School, as Gillette was chaperoning a prom for Wurst and his eighth-grade class at Nick's Place.
...
Wurst shot and wounded two students and another teacher, police said, then fled from the hall. None of the three was seriously injured.

As the 240 youngsters and teachers ran for cover - some diving into a closet for protection, singing and praying to stay calm - hall owner James Strand grabbed a shotgun and followed Wurst out the door, police said. Strand caught up with Wurst, who lives in nearby McKean, and held him until authorities arrived.

Ending a mass shooting doesn't always involve the police arresting or killing the subject, but come in several different ways:

1. Shooter is killed or subdued by armed response (Navy Yard)
2. Shooter gives up on attack and gives up to armed response (shithead #2 in Boston bombing)
3. Shooter thinks they've done enough and doesn't want to be taken alive without immediate threat to themselves (VT Tech)
4. Shooter offs themselves rather than be taken alive after a perceived immediate threat to themselves (Calacumus Town Center shooting)

There are countless examples of each, and I cited 5 above, would you like me to cite more? Or would you like to admit that you were wrong?

[bobvela]

Bobvela -maybe the issue here is not to try and 'control firearms for the masses across 50 states' but to take guns away from people who have shown they ought not to have them, because they are on medication, have a record of violence, uncontrollable rage etc

I wish it was that easy... and while many of my posts here can be seen in a sarcastic and/or confrontational way... I mean the following in the most serious way... how do you want to implement such a system?

I doubt you will find many firearm owners, NRA members or leaders who think that every single nut should have the right to a firearm... the issue is about how to we choose or legislate who can and who cannot legally own?

What constitutes 'have shown they ought not to have them'? Who decides that? Is there a process for determination? What of a process for appeal in case of error?

Which medications are on the prohibited list? What happens when the medication taker ceases them because they are no longer needed? What if the medication no longer has the negative effects on the taker due to the length of time it is taken?

When it comes to 'record of violence, uncontrollable rage etc'... what kind of record? Police report? Arrest? Conviction? How many such 'record's?


I was thinking this week... that under such a potential line of thinking... one could make an argument to prohibit just about any transsexual (MTF of FTM) from legally owning a firearm.

Transsexualism (under several different names) is considered a 'mental disorder' by the DSMV-IV: http://www.genderpsychology.org/transsexual/dsm_iv.html

Often those suffering from this 'mental disorder' will pursue medications in the form of hormones to help offset or correct this disorder in some way.

Such medications (hormones) are very powerful drugs which can drastically effect brain chemistry. Estrogen can cause massive mood swings, while testosterone can lead to strong feelings of aggression.

It is also said that transgendered persons have a higher than average rate of suicide, http://www.lauras-playground.com/tra...emorial%20.htm, further suggesting a link to a mental disorder (suicide not generally being a rational response to adversity), and if someone is so susceptible to showing such a blatant disregard for their own life... viewing someone else's life with such a disregard is not far from the realm of possibility (ie murder-suicide).

Note... I am not supportive of any such policy based on the above, nor even the ideas mentioned in the immediate section above, it is simply a thought experiment based on available data which can be used to paint a given picture.

-if this man had been deprived of his weapons following earlier incidents, he may still have been able to get hold of weapons illegaly, but it would at least have been harder for him to do so.

Ideally yes, only he passed a background check just a few days before for the single shotgun he purchased and began the attack with, the rest it seems he took from the body(s) of those he killed.

Otherwise you are not going to stop these incidents from happening again, even if people in the location -shop, school, mall, cinema, are armed.

Short of a giant super magnet in space, which is somehow set only to "gun"... you can never fully prevent such acts... at least with a firearm.

Aren't most of the people who have committed these crimes shown to be nutters?

With limited exception yes... the only recent one being that of Anders Behring Breivik (2011 Norway attacks) who it disturbs me to say sounds rather rational in his views, even though I disagree with his actions & motives.

It's easy to say after the fact "clearly so and so was a nutter"... though not all nutters are violent, let alone to this level, and sorting those who are from those who are not is an absolutely herculean task that even the ACLU I think would have a problem with, consider this... While Fox News has focused more on the 'security clearance' angle than the gun angle with regards to the Navy Yard shooting, there is an interesting thing to consider... I have a Concealed Pistol License which enables me to legally carry in 27 states, with my non-resident Utah Concealed Firearms Permit that # expands to 33. While the state I live in only requires a periodic check every 5 years to make sure I'm on the up and up, Utah CFP carriers have their record hit about every 90 days to look for anything that doesn't seem right. The federal government does not automatically do such a routine check for security clearances, nor do they do so for firearms (in the latter case because the ATF & FBI are prohibited from maintaining a list of those who have undergone background checks as a result of an ATF form 4473 for more than a couple of days).

As a first step... shall we start with a master federal database of all firearm owners (which would require outright registration) so that those who are flagged with sufficient issues & known to be owning a firearm can be disarmed?

To expand a bit, while it may seem like a simple task to simply have a large database of those under indictment or information in any court for a felony, ever been convicted of a felony, are fugitives from justice, is an unlawful user of or addicted to marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug or any other controlled substance, has been mentally adjudicated mentally defective, dishonorably discharged from the military, subject to a court order against harassment, stalking or threatening a their child, intimate partner or a child of such a partner, been convicted of domestic violence, renounced US citizenship, is illegally in the US (all items taken from a 4473)... how well can you trust this data?

I come from an extensive IT background and can talk at length about dirty data... it exists everywhere, triply so when you are accepting data from multiple disparate sources which may not have the same quality controls or schema as you and that you do not have the resources to validate every entry in to.

Turn it around... we have a no fly list that will occasionally flag a US Senator as being barred from flying, http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-224_162-610466.html, we have a congress that wants to require photo id to vote (with the fear that some voters will be disenfranchised because they cannot afford an id or cannot prove their identity to get an id)... we also have a federal government which is less than two weeks away from rolling out the Health Insurance Marketplace as part of Obamacare, and despite several years of lead time, are having massive issues with preparedness & security.

I'd mentioned the ACLU earlier... and While not generally a friend of the second amendment, I could only imagine that the degree of data collection & non-adjudicated data processing & cateorigization would upset even them as once you have a database that contains those who should not be allowed to own a firearm (and so should be checked from time to time to make sure they've not illegally acquired one) would easily be turned to other purposes that they would be staunch opponents of.

Again I say, like many, I do not want nuts who are going to commit acts of violence to own firearms... the issue is preventing them and only them from such acts and not affecting the larger population... something we cannot do reasonably without getting into a degree of profiling that most would find offensive, because that degree of profiling would not just logically apply to firearm ownership but a multitude of other aspects of life.

[Stavros]

I wish it was that easy... and while many of my posts here can be seen in a sarcastic and/or confrontational way... I mean the following in the most serious way... how do you want to implement such a system?

I doubt you will find many firearm owners, NRA members or leaders who think that every single nut should have the right to a firearm... the issue is about how to we choose or legislate who can and who cannot legally own?

What constitutes 'have shown they ought not to have them'? Who decides that? Is there a process for determination? What of a process for appeal in case of error?

Which medications are on the prohibited list? What happens when the medication taker ceases them because they are no longer needed? What if the medication no longer has the negative effects on the taker due to the length of time it is taken?

When it comes to 'record of violence, uncontrollable rage etc'... what kind of record? Police report? Arrest? Conviction? How many such 'record's?


I was thinking this week... that under such a potential line of thinking... one could make an argument to prohibit just about any transsexual (MTF of FTM) from legally owning a firearm.

Transsexualism (under several different names) is considered a 'mental disorder' by the DSMV-IV: http://www.genderpsychology.org/transsexual/dsm_iv.html

Often those suffering from this 'mental disorder' will pursue medications in the form of hormones to help offset or correct this disorder in some way.

Such medications (hormones) are very powerful drugs which can drastically effect brain chemistry. Estrogen can cause massive mood swings, while testosterone can lead to strong feelings of aggression.

It is also said that transgendered persons have a higher than average rate of suicide, http://www.lauras-playground.com/tra...emorial%20.htm, further suggesting a link to a mental disorder (suicide not generally being a rational response to adversity), and if someone is so susceptible to showing such a blatant disregard for their own life... viewing someone else's life with such a disregard is not far from the realm of possibility (ie murder-suicide).

Note... I am not supportive of any such policy based on the above, nor even the ideas mentioned in the immediate section above, it is simply a thought experiment based on available data which can be used to paint a given picture.




Ideally yes, only he passed a background check just a few days before for the single shotgun he purchased and began the attack with, the rest it seems he took from the body(s) of those he killed.



Short of a giant super magnet in space, which is somehow set only to "gun"... you can never fully prevent such acts... at least with a firearm.



With limited exception yes... the only recent one being that of Anders Behring Breivik (2011 Norway attacks) who it disturbs me to say sounds rather rational in his views, even though I disagree with his actions & motives.

It's easy to say after the fact "clearly so and so was a nutter"... though not all nutters are violent, let alone to this level, and sorting those who are from those who are not is an absolutely herculean task that even the ACLU I think would have a problem with, consider this... While Fox News has focused more on the 'security clearance' angle than the gun angle with regards to the Navy Yard shooting, there is an interesting thing to consider... I have a Concealed Pistol License which enables me to legally carry in 27 states, with my non-resident Utah Concealed Firearms Permit that # expands to 33. While the state I live in only requires a periodic check every 5 years to make sure I'm on the up and up, Utah CFP carriers have their record hit about every 90 days to look for anything that doesn't seem right. The federal government does not automatically do such a routine check for security clearances, nor do they do so for firearms (in the latter case because the ATF & FBI are prohibited from maintaining a list of those who have undergone background checks as a result of an ATF form 4473 for more than a couple of days).

As a first step... shall we start with a master federal database of all firearm owners (which would require outright registration) so that those who are flagged with sufficient issues & known to be owning a firearm can be disarmed?

To expand a bit, while it may seem like a simple task to simply have a large database of those under indictment or information in any court for a felony, ever been convicted of a felony, are fugitives from justice, is an unlawful user of or addicted to marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug or any other controlled substance, has been mentally adjudicated mentally defective, dishonorably discharged from the military, subject to a court order against harassment, stalking or threatening a their child, intimate partner or a child of such a partner, been convicted of domestic violence, renounced US citizenship, is illegally in the US (all items taken from a 4473)... how well can you trust this data?

I come from an extensive IT background and can talk at length about dirty data... it exists everywhere, triply so when you are accepting data from multiple disparate sources which may not have the same quality controls or schema as you and that you do not have the resources to validate every entry in to.

Turn it around... we have a no fly list that will occasionally flag a US Senator as being barred from flying, http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-224_162-610466.html, we have a congress that wants to require photo id to vote (with the fear that some voters will be disenfranchised because they cannot afford an id or cannot prove their identity to get an id)... we also have a federal government which is less than two weeks away from rolling out the Health Insurance Marketplace as part of Obamacare, and despite several years of lead time, are having massive issues with preparedness & security.

I'd mentioned the ACLU earlier... and While not generally a friend of the second amendment, I could only imagine that the degree of data collection & non-adjudicated data processing & cateorigization would upset even them as once you have a database that contains those who should not be allowed to own a firearm (and so should be checked from time to time to make sure they've not illegally acquired one) would easily be turned to other purposes that they would be staunch opponents of.

Again I say, like many, I do not want nuts who are going to commit acts of violence to own firearms... the issue is preventing them and only them from such acts and not affecting the larger population... something we cannot do reasonably without getting into a degree of profiling that most would find offensive, because that degree of profiling would not just logically apply to firearm ownership but a multitude of other aspects of life.

You have given an extensive reply to my queries, but it leaves me with a sense of despair about the situation because you are suggesting that in practical terms nothing short of a comprehensive ban on the ownership of weapons would make a difference. Even with tight controls, I assume it would be possible to sell firearms to someone in 2013 who has no history of mental illness or criminal activity but who, a year later, has experienced a breakdown and thinks the world is against him and uses those arms purchased when 'normal' to go ape in a mall, a school, a subway train, or the US Congress.

Not sure about the classification of gender dysmorphia as a 'mental illness' as many/most transexuals believe they are completely normal and that is is their body that is the cause of their unhappiness.
It seems to me that we -because these problems of men going mad with guns does happen in the UK as well- need a cultural shift away from the use of guns as solutions to problems, or the view that guns are an essential personal accessory, like a mobile phone or a handbag. And, indeed, that killing people is a solution. In age of violent video games, forensic or lurid cop and murder shows on tv and in film, and of course the real thing in news reports, I fear that cultural shift is a long way away, though we can do it within ourselves.

I don't know if this chart has been seen in the USA but it offers an interactive map of gun violence in the USA -doesn't work on an iPad.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...-by-state.html

[trish]

To get a background check and then buy a gun in the U.S. takes under five minutes. What kind of background check is that? Currently, any information gathered during a background check must be destroyed within twenty four hours. It cannot be shared with any government agency or law enforcement. There is no electronic record available to law enforcement of who bought what gun. When investigating a crime, agents must track the gun to the manufacturer, hope to find out from the manufacturer which group of stores might have been sent that gun, and then question individual store managers and clerks in hopes that they might have a record or a memory of who bought that firearm. The NRA pretends to be anti-crime, but this sort of obstruction to criminal investigations exists only because of NRA lobbyists.

Who should decide who shouldn’t have guns? The American people through their State and Federal legislatures of course. We don’t need a message from God or orders from SkyNet; we decide. If you’re legally blind Iowa, the Legislature and Governor have granted you the right to carry. Sweet, right? There is simply no danger that any regulation is going to be so sweeping as to curtail the intented freedom guaranteed by the Constitution. The only additional regulatory measures that have been seriously proposed are those in the bill recently voted down (in April 2013) not long after the Sandy Hook tragedy where 27 people were killed, most of them primary school children. That modest proposal (voted down by 41 Republicans and 5 Democrats) would have limited the capacity of magazines and expanded background checks at gunshows and elsewhere.

[bobvela]

You have given an extensive reply to my queries, but it leaves me with a sense of despair about the situation because you are suggesting that in practical terms nothing short of a comprehensive ban on the ownership of weapons would make a difference.

Even an outright ban would be ineffective as building a firearm is trivial in the form of a zip gun, and with a little machining experience a far more complicated & deadly weapon can be built in the garage... but this still assumes that an outright ban did still collect all firearms (hence the giant super magnet in space) and people were left only to build their own. Even in nations that have high bars limiting personal ownership, illegal guns can often be found.

Even with tight controls, I assume it would be possible to sell firearms to someone in 2013 who has no history of mental illness or criminal activity but who, a year later, has experienced a breakdown and thinks the world is against him and uses those arms purchased when 'normal' to go ape in a mall, a school, a subway train, or the US Congress.

Again, which mental illnesses do you want to put on the prohibited list? More so, are you prepared to have a federal database not just of firearms and who their owners are, but the entire mental health history of all US persons whether they own a firearm today or not (just in case they opt to purchase one in future)?

When one seeks help for mental issues, they are struggling with something and looking for a way try to get better, should they automatically fear that they will end up on a federal mental health watch list that could haunt them for the rest of their lives?

We do have a limited system today where those who adjudicated as mentally deficient are prohibited from ownership, however a whole slew of privacy laws prevent a massive database of them... and those are just those who have a court order to that effect.

Not sure about the classification of gender dysmorphia as a 'mental illness' as many/most transexuals believe they are completely normal and that is is their body that is the cause of their unhappiness.

I am simply playing devils advocate with that analogy, you do not have to accept it, just consider how easy it is to lump it in with other mental illnesses the suffers of you wish to prohibit from lawful firearm ownership.

It seems to me that we -because these problems of men going mad with guns does happen in the UK as well- need a cultural shift away from the use of guns as solutions to problems, or the view that guns are an essential personal accessory, like a mobile phone or a handbag.

But they do happen in the UK, just not as frequently admittedly: Hungerford massacre - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Monkseaton shootings - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dunblane school massacre - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Cumbria shootings - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

More so, you focus on the culture of the firearm vs the cultural in general. While we share a common language and legal system, Brits & Americans are quite different culturally. Here in the US there are about as many firearms as there are persons... yet the vast vast vast vast vast vast vast majority of them are never used to harm other people.

To repeat an old line "Ted Kennedy's car has killed more people than my guns"

And, indeed, that killing people is a solution. In age of violent video games, forensic or lurid cop and murder shows on tv and in film, and of course the real thing in news reports, I fear that cultural shift is a long way away, though we can do it within ourselves.

There we agree. I too am saddened to see the degree which in many forms violence is seen as an acceptable or normal outcome, but another part is that of poor parenting in many cases where children are not taught healthy ways to deal with adversity or stresses.

At the end of the day the gun is just a tool, without it, someone who is keen on doing evil will find another tool, be it a blunt object, a sharp object or even an flammable or explosive one.

I don't know if this chart has been seen in the USA but it offers an interactive map of gun violence in the USA -doesn't work on an iPad.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...-by-state.html

Charts like that don't work well at the state level, instead digging into the city & even block levels are telling.

While there is certainly a great deal of gun violence in this country, the distribution is not equal between or within states, instead are often contained in very specific areas, like certain parts of the war zone that is called Chicago, and then with largely random blips elsewhere across the larger map.

[bobvela]

To get a background check and then buy a gun in the U.S. takes under five minutes. What kind of background check is that?

Um, an instant one? Hence the name 'National Instant Criminal Background Check System' (NICS)?

Currently, any information gathered during a background check must be destroyed within twenty four hours. It cannot be shared with any government agency or law enforcement. There is no electronic record available to law enforcement of who bought what gun.

You realize that is by design right? It was one of the conditions of the pro-gun lobby agreeing to the mandatory background checks at FFLs.

When investigating a crime, agents must track the gun to the manufacturer, hope to find out from the manufacturer which group of stores might have been sent that gun, and then question individual store managers and clerks in hopes that they might have a record or a memory of who bought that firearm.

Again, are you actually this ignorant or are you just pretending? Because what you said above is a big ole whopper of a lie.

As a type 7 or 10 FFL, the manufacturer knows EXACTLY which distributor or store a given firearm was sold to.

As a type 9 FFL, the distributor or store knows EXACTLY which customer purchased which gun and on which day.

The form 4473 that the buyer fills out as part of the background check MUST be retained (physically, not digitally) by the FFL for at least 20 years, while the manufacturer or importer must permanently keep records of their transfers... both of which must be available to the BATFE or other law enforcement on request.

In the case of used guns you do not necessarily have such a clean path from A to B to C... however FFL record keeping requirements do not discriminate between new & used guns and sales information can still be found with some searching.

The NRA pretends to be anti-crime, but this sort of obstruction to criminal investigations exists only because of NRA lobbyists.

At last check... the ACLU is against the FBI doing undercover operations in Mosques. Does this mean we can label them as not actually being anti-crime because they are obstructing tools which are useful in criminal investigations in the name of privacy?

Who should decide who shouldn’t have guns? The American people through their State and Federal legislatures of course.

Always fun when an ignorant liberal not thinking through their arguments... now to play a typical Trish card and play the part of a parrot:

• Who should decide who should be able to marry? The American people through their State and Federal legislatures of course.
• Who should decide who should be able to vote? The American people through their State and Federal legislatures of course.
• Who should decide who should be able to own slaves? The American people through their State and Federal legislatures of course.

I'm sorry to hear/see that you think that fundamental rights are subject to the whim of the voters. Clearly then you agree with the voters in most states which have prohibited same-sex marriage.

There is simply no danger that any regulation is going to be so sweeping as to curtail the intented freedom guaranteed by the Constitution.

Liar. Absolutely false. Or would you like provide a time machine with which we can see that a law/regulation that is passed today is never altered or made unduly restrictive in the future... after all, no law has ever been ratcheted up in the history of this nation, no abuses of freedoms at all, never.

The only additional regulatory measures that have been seriously proposed are those in the bill recently voted down (in April 2013) not long after the Sandy Hook tragedy where 27 people were killed, most of them primary school children.

Do note how you failed to cite the specific bil, as well as ignored all of the other measures seriously proposed (and in some cases passed see CO & NY) in different states.

That modest proposal (voted down by 41 Republicans and 5 Democrats) would have limited the capacity of magazines and expanded background checks at gunshows and elsewhere.

You keep pointing to these so called 'modest' proposals and yet fail to even suggest how they would stop ANYTHING. The Navy Yard shooter legally bought his shotgun (clearly taking advice from Joe Biden) after a background check from an FFL, while you seek to expand laws which would not have prevented this or most other shootings in the name of making yourself feel good and attempting to create a false sense of security.

[broncofan]

Always fun when an ignorant liberal not thinking through their arguments... now to play a typical Trish card and play the part of a parrot:

• Who should decide who should be able to marry? The American people through their State and Federal legislatures of course.
• Who should decide who should be able to vote? The American people through their State and Federal legislatures of course.
• Who should decide who should be able to own slaves? The American people through their State and Federal legislatures of course.

I'm sorry to hear/see that you think that fundamental rights are subject to the whim of the voters. Clearly then you agree with the voters in most states which have prohibited same-sex marriage.



Liar. Absolutely false. Or would you like provide a time machine with which we can see that a law/regulation that is passed today is never altered or made unduly restrictive in the future... after all, no law has ever been ratcheted up in the history of this nation, no abuses of freedoms at all, never.

The Supreme Court has not recognized that there is a fundamental right to same-sex marriage under the 14th amendment due process analysis. They have said that the federal government should not super-impose its own definition on the states when it struck down portions of DOMA.

The passage of the 13th amendment meant that there did not have to be any due process analysis for slavery under the 14th amendment. I imagine a simple due process analysis would come to the same conclusion you seem to regarding slavery, that it's both a violation of due process and equal protection.

This last paragraph beginning with the sentence liar is also illogical. You are saying that a law should not be passed in the present because in the future there is a risk that more restrictive laws will be passed by the legislature. Or that because of the risk of abuse in the enforcement of the law, it should not be passed. Clearly there shouldn't be work safety laws because the Department of Labor might enforce them in such a way that shuts down all business.

If you are saying that placing some restrictions on the sale of guns in order to curtail gun violence is unconstitutional shouldn't you be citing District of Columbia v. heller or McDonald v. City of Chicago?

Heller makes clear that permissible restrictions include those to "prohibit...the possession of firearms by felons or mentally ill" and "laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms".

According to the existing precedent, the American people through their legislatures should be able to decide who gets to own guns. There is no Constitutional conflict with placing qualifications on the commercial sale of arms as Heller and McDonald make clear. BTW, it wasn't until McDonald that the 2nd amendment was even considered incorporated into the 14th amendment due process analysis.

[trish]

You realize that is by design right?

Yes, designed by the NRA.

Again, are you actually this ignorant or are you just pretending? Because what you said above is a big ole whopper of a lie.

Thanks again for your thoughtful invective, but it's not a lie to claim "When investigating a crime, agents must track the gun to the manufacturer, hope to find out from the manufacturer which group of stores might have been sent that gun, and then question individual store managers and clerks in hopes that they might have a record or a memory of who bought that firearm."

The form 4473 that the buyer fills out as part of the background check MUST be retained (physically, not digitally) by the FFL for at least 20 years

Exactly. To track down any information about a gun's record of ownership the investigator has to wade through boxes and boxes of paper. An electronic data base is by law unavailable.

At last check... the ACLU is against the FBI doing undercover operations in Mosques. Does this mean we can label them as not actually being anti-crime...

Unlike the NRA, the ACLU doesn't claim that it's actions manifestly makes life tough for criminals. The ACLU supports Miranda rights, it presses for due process, and yes the free practice of religion. But how one chooses to characterize the ACLU is a side issue; i.e. a distraction.

Who should decide who should be able to marry? The American people through their State and Federal legislatures of course.

Who else is there to decide? It's people who make all the decisions, guided by past practices, law, precedent etc. Yes, sometimes we make the wrong decisions. That's why no decision is ever set in stone.

Liar.

Really? We were discussing who right now (not five hundred years in the future) has the right to say who should and who shouldn't be allowed to have guns. I pointed out that blind people in Iowa can now carry. In that context I concluded, "There is simply no danger that any regulation is going to be so sweeping as to curtail the intented freedom guaranteed by the Constitution." Your response is, "Liar." Once again, our laws are human laws. They are constantly in flux. That's why there are legislatures and amendment procedures. Suppose I jump into a time machine and discover that five hundred years in the future blind people will be able to "see" using implanted quantum sensory technology. Does that mean we can't prevent them from carrying a concealed firearm in the present day?

You keep pointing to these so called 'modest' proposals and yet fail to even suggest how they would stop ANYTHING.

They obviously will make it harder to legally acquire firearms. Otherwise, why are they so vociferously opposed? One might make less modest proposals, but why bother when gun-radicals won't even agree to the gentlest suggestions.

[Stavros]

Even an outright ban would be ineffective as building a firearm is trivial in the form of a zip gun, and with a little machining experience a far more complicated & deadly weapon can be built in the garage... but this still assumes that an outright ban did still collect all firearms (hence the giant super magnet in space) and people were left only to build their own. Even in nations that have high bars limiting personal ownership, illegal guns can often be found.

Again, which mental illnesses do you want to put on the prohibited list? More so, are you prepared to have a federal database not just of firearms and who their owners are, but the entire mental health history of all US persons whether they own a firearm today or not (just in case they opt to purchase one in future)?

When one seeks help for mental issues, they are struggling with something and looking for a way try to get better, should they automatically fear that they will end up on a federal mental health watch list that could haunt them for the rest of their lives?

We do have a limited system today where those who adjudicated as mentally deficient are prohibited from ownership, however a whole slew of privacy laws prevent a massive database of them... and those are just those who have a court order to that effect.

I am simply playing devils advocate with that analogy, you do not have to accept it, just consider how easy it is to lump it in with other mental illnesses the suffers of you wish to prohibit from lawful firearm ownership.

More so, you focus on the culture of the firearm vs the cultural in general. While we share a common language and legal system, Brits & Americans are quite different culturally. Here in the US there are about as many firearms as there are persons... yet the vast vast vast vast vast vast vast majority of them are never used to harm other people.

To repeat an old line "Ted Kennedy's car has killed more people than my guns"

There we agree. I too am saddened to see the degree which in many forms violence is seen as an acceptable or normal outcome, but another part is that of poor parenting in many cases where children are not taught healthy ways to deal with adversity or stresses.

At the end of the day the gun is just a tool, without it, someone who is keen on doing evil will find another tool, be it a blunt object, a sharp object or even an flammable or explosive one.

Charts like that don't work well at the state level, instead digging into the city & even block levels are telling.

While there is certainly a great deal of gun violence in this country, the distribution is not equal between or within states, instead are often contained in very specific areas, like certain parts of the war zone that is called Chicago, and then with largely random blips elsewhere across the larger map.

Reading your reply does not lighten my sense of despair, because it seems to me that you take it as an immutable fact that Americans have a Right to own firearms and that no law will prevent someone who wants a gun from getting one. You place an awesome weight on the judgement of salesmen whose interest is primarily, perhaps solely in making a profit, rather than public safety. And you also can't deal with the 'reality' that there are bad people out there who want to, and will continue to kill. But your refusal to introduce any kind of limiting mechanism because of a violation of 'rights' or because it creates layers of regulation and government which soak up tax dollars and are a restriction on freedom offers a green light to all the wackos out there who can't tell the difference between Grand Theft Auto and Grand Central Station.

Even if you think Americans have an inalienable constitutional right to own firearms, clearly none of them have a right to use them to threaten or injure or kill, and if you see 'gun ownership' as a public health issue, then yes, an individual must accept that his or her privacy is not absolutely protected from the law -just as checks (I hope) are made on people who want to adopt children, to ensure that they meet a set of reasonable requirements and are not adopting a child who is going to sleep in a metal box in the basement and be fed dog biscuits. Absolute freedom does not exist, and ought not to exist, because individuals for all their quirks, are part of a social network they can't get out of, unless they live alone in a cave or on a desert island -it's part of the bargain which means if you live in society, you abide by the rules society makes, and as you indicate, most Americans, most of the time never use their firearms to threaten, kill or injure others, because most people most of the time feel secure in a society protected by the rule of law.

So it isn't just cultural attitudes towards violence it is also a deep acculturation to the values associated with the rule of law in general. You might object to specific laws, but the rule of law as an organising principle in society has been fundamental to social peace for a very long time, and where it is absent, or is abused, social conflict often erupts and let's be honest, for all the bluster of Alex Jones, the USA does not resemble the USSR, North Korea or present-day Syria.

If you are taking the libertarian argument then you are faced with the dilemma of enabling acts as a commitment to freedom which have the potential to deprive others of that same freedom. I find it hard to believe that the USA cannot develop legal and social mechanisms that will lead to fewer people being allowed to own firearms, because it has happened in your past before, such as the origin of restrictive legislation which was passed after the Civil War when there was a panic over the volume of arms (allegedly) being used by 'free slaves' (ie Black Americans) to (allegedly) rob and kill -in those days it was simple enough -if a person is Black, they don't get sold a gun; yet what was couched in the language of crime, was more likely a fear of retribution for past wrongs rather than an actual crime spree by newly free Americans. The same problems of post-war gun-related crime erupted in the UK after the Napoleonic Wars in 1815, and particularly after the Second World War -for a society supposedly not used to guns, there was an 'epidemic' of gun-related crime in the UK in 1946 climaxing in the Craig-Bentley murder trial of 1953 when a policeman was shot dead and one of the accused hanged as a result (although the hanged man, Derek Bentley did not actually fire the weapon).

If you look at the history of the NRA, you will find that they consistently supported the creation of laws to limit the availability of firearms, and that it is only since the 1980s that they have become such an aggressive opponent of controlling laws, and I feel much of that has more to do with a 'libertarian' or 'anti-Big government' agenda, than it has to do with firearms as such. It seems to me that much of this debate gets skewed because of the confusion of two different agendas. Meanwhile, the guns go off, and lives are wasted. You really can do better than this.

[maddygirl]

School shooting after school shooting, but you still need guns? Yeah, makes sense.