StrangeSox

So if it's not from thefts, where are gangs getting their guns? Because we should care about cutting down on that violence as well. I would be interested in some backing for the claim that most people own their guns for self-defense as opposed to hunting or recreational target shooting or just collecting, but it's not irrelevant if I believe that's reasonable or not. In fact, it's central to this issue: is your desire to own a gun and the ease with which we let you fulfill that desire a reasonable trade-off for the increased gun violence we experience as a result of the saturation of guns in this country? edit: 10-15% of guns used in crimes are stolen. The majority of the rest are from straw-purchases, which are possible because we make it easy to get guns in this country.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:54 AM) And an astronomical percentage of the time, people who breaks these laws, get away with it. That's my point exactly. What percentage of times do you get caught speeding? A law unto itself isn't a significant deterrent. Threat of punishment is what stops people from breaking laws. Just saying that if we had a law on the books, none of this would have happened is about the ultimate strawman. Reality dictates something completely different. Only if these are laws they would normally break, which is quite a big assumption. I don't refrain from shooting up heroin because it's illegal, along with numerous other laws. If I had guns, I wouldn't need a law to keep them safely locked away. But for some who may be more lax about gun safety, a law can be persuasive, even if enforcement is rare.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:52 AM) The other part that is interesting in a historical context is how the national government treats any militias now. They pretty much send the FBI to wipe them out. That's why they are hard to find. It isn't that people don't believe in them or their usefulness anymore, the government that we were warned against has crushed them... right or wrong. People are allowed to organize into armed groups anymore. There are plenty of militia groups out there. The FBI gets involved when they start actually threatening violence, and even then, the cases can get tossed. If anything, the government pays too little attention to these groups.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:48 AM) You can't be serious here. Speed limit laws? Drug laws? You're pointing out two sets of laws that are routinely enforced.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:47 AM) Frequent is bulls*** and you know it. These events are increasing at an alarming rate, but generally violent crime is on the decline and the majority of gun crime is still being committed by gangbangers and other criminals. The heat of passion killings and random acts of violence are still rare. The desire to reform our gun laws isn't based solely on mass shootings. Gangs can get guns because it's so damn easy to get guns legally, meaning that there's a large supply to steal from or an ability to have easy straw-purchases.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:44 AM) http://blogs.findlaw.com/blotter/2012/09/b...ou-in-jail.html 27 states do. Those all only apply to households with minors, not a general requirement to keep guns locked and secured and separate from ammunition.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:43 AM) How exactly would that law have been enforced in this case? People don't only follow the law based on enforcement.

a reason to curb someone's constitutional right: random-yet-frequent acts of violence.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:36 AM) Why would he have to be a safe cracker? She took him shooting on multiple occasions. He's 20 years old. It's pretty reasonable to assume he would know the combination. Is the law going to be that only owners can know the combination? GMAB. Yes, only the legal, Law Abiding gun owners should have unlimited access to both the weapons and ammunition. Why do I need to give you a f***ing break since your solution seems to be "welp! that's life!"

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:37 AM) Most states probably have those laws to begin with, that doesn't mean people follow it, especially when everyone in the house is an adult. No, they don't.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:31 AM) Unless someone went into her house and found them that way, that wouldn't have really stopped anything. Stacking up strawmen on this issue really doesn't do anything either honestly. It just makes it easier for the 2nd amendment advocates to win the day. Strawmen? I'm sorry, that seems like a perfectly legitimate requirement for Law Abiding Citizens to follow, and one that could have prevented this massacre.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:27 AM) So he breaks into it or knows the combination. This is a family that uses guns. He was 20 years old, not 6. And you've just curbed people's ability to protect themselves in their home in the case of an emergency over a random act of violence. And capacity and rate of fire would have meant dick in this situation since he's an armed guy with multiple guns going up against children. Oh I'm sorry, he's a safe-cracker now? Yes, I've curbed peoples' ability to protect themselves in their homes (or accidentally shoot a family member, whatevs). I've also seriously curbed the ability of guns to be stolen or taken from Law Abiding Citizens and used against other citizens in random acts of violence. Like taking unsecured guns from the owner, shooting them in the face multiple times while they sleep, and then using the same unsecured weapons to kill 20 children and six adults. Capacity and rate of fire would not have meant dick. An shooter can be stopped by unarmed adults, of which there were numerous in the building. But more to the point, these are restrictions that can solve not one specific incident but the larger epidemic of gun violence in this country.

She wouldn't be a law abiding gun owner in Canada. She failed completely to store her many weapons and ammunition separately, and failed to store both weapons and ammo securely, with at least 2 locks between an unauthorized person and the dangerous s***. So saying that tighter gun controls can't possibly have prevented this tragedy or numerous others is, frankly, apologetic bulls***.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:21 AM) That's still not stopping this tragedy. He might have had to take more time killing those kids, but a single shot rifle or shotgun will still get the job done, especially when no one else in that school had anything to fight back with (not saying they should have, just saying he didn't have any resistance so timing wasn't an issue here). The Tuscon shooter was subdued by unarmed civilians while attempting to reload.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:18 AM) More restrictions doesn't stop this from happening. I don't understand why people believe that. She did everything by the book (allegedly) and even with more difficult restrictions she still could have obtained guns. Shotguns, handsguns, rifles, whatever. A deranged, mentally unstable kid stole his mother's weapons and went on a pre-mediated murder spree. No new law you want to impose except an outright ban would have stopped him. I don't know how you can say that more restrictions could not possibly have stopped this from happening. If the restrictions and regulations are onerous, perhaps she never goes through the hassle of getting guns. If there's requirements that they remain unloaded in a combination-controlled safe, perhaps he can't even get at them. If the guns were restricted based on rate-of-fire and capacity, maybe less people are dead.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:13 AM) Again, that is pretty much a fantasy in 21st century America. It also ignores that fallacy that if something is illegal, it doesn't happen anymore. The United States has a pretty impressive history of completely ignoring the laws it doesn't like. Because of decades of loose gun policy, we can't magically take hundreds of millions of guns out of circulation. But if you want to curb the number of guns in circulation, you need to start somewhere. I'll again point to the restrictions on automatic weapons and suppressors of evidence that gun control actually can work. The supply of new guns was limited, meaning that there's less of them in circulation now than when the law was enacted, they're very expensive to get, and they are rarely used in crimes.

who gives a s*** about voting rights? it's an irrelevant distraction from actually discussing gun control policy.

QUOTE (Alpha Dog @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:01 AM) read up on hate speech laws in the UK lately. Hell, they are even branding opposition parties as hate groups and trying to remove kids from families that register as belonging to that group. They are in a decent away from freedom. UK has some pretty crappy speech laws, especially their libel/slander stuff. But that's completely irrelevant to gun rights. Argue gun rights on their own merits and stop making all of these terrible comparisons and analogies.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 10:00 AM) Short of a constitutional amendment, I have yet to see any real valid change that could have been made to restrict the mother's purchase of the handguns. Even if a successful argument can be made about the assault weapons, there really isn't one that will stand up to constitutional muster for handguns. This is exactly what Chicago just learned the expensive way. Court decisions have been overturned before and can be overturned again (e.g. Plessy), but you are right when you say that, under current law, a handgun ban likely is unconstitutional.

QUOTE (Alpha Dog @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 09:59 AM) The mother herself screwed up here. he was removed from school because she didn't like the way the school was treating him. there are records of him having 'difficulty', and not in the learning sense. There is a person on record saying that he used to babysit the kid when he was 8 or 9 and was told by the mom to never turn his back on him. She knew even then he was a potential time bomb, but did nothing. There were signs, but the mother covered them up. Yet this law abiding citizen was allowed to purchase multiple weapons and keep them unsecured in her home. Perhaps her ability to buy such weapons should be examined.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 09:58 AM) I'm just laughing at the flopping back and forth on the generalities here. Sometimes it is OK for municipalities to over ride, sometimes it isn't. Sometimes it is OK to listen to the constitution, others it isn't. Even when it is in direct contradiction of what was just said at times. Well people need to be clear if they're arguing for the policy they'd ideally like to see regardless of the 2nd or policy that can actually be implemented with our current rulings on the 2nd. There isn't a contradiction if people are arguing for laws that would infringe the 2nd if they think the 2nd should be repealed/modified or that the recent court rulings were manifestly wrong and that there's no individual right to own whatever weapons you want.

QUOTE (Alpha Dog @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 09:55 AM) The only defense needed is it is my right per the constitution to own a gun. You don't like guns and want to restrict that or outright take it away. If I want to legally by a Glock 19, I can do so. I should not have to prove to you, or anyone else, WHY I NEED it. I want it. I went thru background checks, waiting periods, have no criminal record, I got my gun. More paperwork than it took to vote. You want all these restriction on a right. Take away this one, and the next one becomes easier. Talking bad about the government? Well, we need to put a stop to that! You see it in dictatorships all the time, and even now in the UN where Russia, China and others want to seize control over what is on the internet as they are tired of their people seeing truth out there. That's descriptively true, but not if we're actually trying to have a discussion on the validity of that right and of the Supreme Court decisions granting you that right. We've fixed rather egregious mistakes in the Constitution in the past and can do so again. I believe that you should have to prove why you need a deadly weapon. Possibly the 2nd amendment limits what restrictions we can now impose, but future court rulings or an amendment could change that, so it's useless to point to that as a shield. Is every other government that has stricter gun laws than the US just like Russia or China? Or are many of them, like Israel for example, rather like the US? Does our possession of guns really protect infringements on our 1st amendment rights? Why hasn't it stopped the assaults on our 4th and 5th amendment rights?

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 09:54 AM) So you're admitting that your new requirements would have done nothing. Good! Glad we agree. If nobody could have purchased handguns or assault rifles*, or if the process was sufficiently restricted, Nancy Lanza likely would not have owned these weapons. Her son would not have been able to take them, shoot her in the head multiple times, and then proceed to a nearby elementary school, where he then shot and killed 26 more people, 20 of whom where children. *I realize that this isn't a well-defined category

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 09:48 AM) And you still would have the right to vote... why are you guys so interested in restricting the right to vote? is that causing you demonstrable harm?

QUOTE (Alpha Dog @ Dec 17, 2012 -> 09:50 AM) You are aware that the current shooter did not acquire his guns legally, aren't you? So no matter what rules you had in place, he would have still got them. There ARE background checks, which stopped him from actually purchasing one himself. Unless we had rules that wouldn't have allowed his mother, whom he took the guns from and then shot to death, to own those guns. She was a law-abiding citizen.