GUNS GUNS GUNS!

[Jrecee]

Chris Mathews made a total ass out of himself. The gun guy however wasn't the sharpest tack in the box. That said I couldn't help but side with him most the time just because of Chris Mathews' tirade. In fact I agreed with him somewhat. . . until his last remarks about how "it would have been a safer place if every person there had a gun".

An argument I hear from gun owners a lot is that even if we outlaw guns, criminals will still get them illegally, and then the ordinary citizens won't be armed.

But what exactly is an "illegal" gun? Does that mean the person in possession of it doesn't have the permit to have it? Or is it the gun itself? And if so, is that gun illegal because it was manufactured illegally? Or was it manufactured legally, sold legally, and then transported across state lines and resold?

I have to imagine that the majority of weapons that are used by criminals were built and sold following every inch of the law, but are then transported and resold illegally. If this is true, then stricter gun laws would limit the amount of guns sold legally, and therefore less guns would be resold illegally.

Or something.

[MrPopo]

They way I look at it is this: if it was made illegal for a civilian to own a standard firearm (I'm not going to get into antique pieces) then you would probably see a decrease in the number of gun crimes. They wouldn't go away, as you still have all the guns still in the wild at the time of the law, plus all the weapons stolen from police and army armories. It would, however, be more difficult to obtain a gun and ammunition. The latter is less important, as I would imagine that one doesn't tend to question whether a gun is loaded or not when it's pointed at you.

This proposal, however, raises a lot of questions. Hunters would have to switch back to bow and arrows and potentially crossbows (there's some interesting laws around those). Or do you allow long hunting rifles due to their cumbersome nature for most gun crimes? What about things like antique pistols that certainly can work, even though they're a few hundred years old? What about grandpa's service pistol from World War II which has immense sentimental value for the family? Every exception you make increases the number of weapons in circulation.

Another thing to consider. Yes, we've now potentially reduced the amount of crimes committed with a gun, but I doubt it would reduce the number of crimes. We'd just see a regression back to means such as knives and other melee weapons. Which potentially could be more dangerous for civilians, as now they might start fighting back with bad results. When you're confronted with a knife you can immediately start planning how you might defeat it, while with a gun you know that it's faster than you are, so you don't do anything stupid from the get-go.

I really don't see a point in trying to eliminate guns. It doesn't solve the root causes of crimes and mostly serves as a way of inconveniencing the ordinary citizen who happens to find a gun to be an interesting device that's useful for blowing off stress at the range on a weekend. Similar to how some guys get power tools and just build shit for the hell of it. You can use pretty much anything you can think of to commit a crime. If you're worried about the crimes then target the root cause of the criminals, not the tools they use to commit the crimes.

[wip3outguy7]

^^brilliant post! Bravo!

[Incognito D]

I don't like that guy on the left. He keeps shouting at the other guy for no reason all the way through the interview. He should lower his voice. There's no need to yell.

He keeps asking the guy why he took his gun to the rally as well, and the answer's obvious - the guy was wanting to excercise his right. Just for the sake of showing that that's his right. It was clearly a statement.

However, the idea that any average Joe can go into a shop and buy a gun terrifies me.
Does it not worry you guys that even the most unintelligent members of society can be walking about with loaded weapons?
Are there not far too many people that can't be trusted to own such a dangerous weapon?
That's the case where I live anyway. Far too many idiots around and the concept of them owning guns doesn't bear thinking about.

[Chickensuit]

I don't like that guy on the left. He keeps shouting at the other guy for no reason all the way through the interview. He should lower his voice. There's no need to yell.

He keeps asking the guy why he took his gun to the rally as well, and the answer's obvious - the guy was wanting to excercise his right. Just for the sake of showing that that's his right. It was clearly a statement.

However, the idea that any average Joe can go into a shop and buy a gun terrifies me.
Does it not worry you guys that even the most unintelligent members of society can be walking about with loaded weapons?
Are there not far too many people that can't be trusted to own such a dangerous weapon?
That's the case where I live anyway. Far too many idiots around and the concept of them owning guns doesn't bear thinking about.

That's why you carry as well. The "idiots" will think twice before pulling a gun on you if you are open carrying! It's funny to me to see some of these anti gun people, putting stuff like, "this is a gun free house" on the window like its a badge of honor. Might as well put a big giant cross hairs your home!

All my life, I have never seen someone pull a gun on someone and shoot them (except on tv... which people are now many times associating with reality . I really do think our society would be safer with a larger group of people trained and carrying guns, it would definitely give the thugs that have self preservation on their mind a second thought. It wouldn't protect you from the crazys that are going to do something stupid anyways though, but at least you'd be ready to handle the situation and not just cower and beg for mercy.

[Incognito D]

That's why you carry as well. The "idiots" will think twice before pulling a gun on you if you are open carrying!

Yeah if I lived in America I think I'd have a gun, basically for the reason you say - I wouldn't want other people to have that advantage over me.

However, I'd rather live in a place where rather than everyone having a gone, no one owns a gun.

[puke_face]

I agree with mr. popo, if guns were made illegal, they wouldn't be any different than drugs... still easily obtained, but supply is curbed. Anybody who was a professional hitman would still have a gun. What pisses me off the most is the fact that the right to bear arms was given to the American people for a reason, and that reason WAS to fight off an oppressive government. Well, its a little late for that. One other thing is if ANYBODY tried to do a land invasion of America, I really think the opposing army would be surprised at how many people have guns, and of almost every kind.

[Hatta]

Someday we're going to have another American Revolution. The People will need guns to fight for their freedom. Gun crime is insignificant compared to tyranny.

[Ivo]

We'd just see a regression back to means such as knives and other melee weapons. Which potentially could be more dangerous for civilians, as now they might start fighting back with bad results. When you're confronted with a knife you can immediately start planning how you might defeat it, while with a gun you know that it's faster than you are, so you don't do anything stupid from the get-go.

If there was a regression to melee weapons that is a huge upside IMO.

You can run away from those. Confrontation is in general a bad idea against any weapon - but running away would be possible in a large number of "melee" crimes compared to when facing a gun (or, when cornered, defense - not all crimes are for monetary values, so I won't give a blanket statement of it always being stupid to offer resistance).

Ivo.

[Funk, E]

Guns are not as bad as people overseas think in America. I live in Vermont--we've got very lax gun laws, and I think we maybe have a total of two or three gun-related crimes a year. Then again, Vermont is like a different country than the rest of the US in a lot of ways.

In any case, gun laws wouldn't do us much good. It's not the laws that are the problem, it's the climate, the mindset, of our populace. More fundamental changes need to be made in order to reduce violent crime.