Setanta wrote: But you're choosing to ignore my central point, which is that this situation arises from unfettered gun use and ownership over a long period of time, and a culture which happens to glorify murderous psychopaths. It will take a long, long time to change that--but the inability to solve the problem immediately is not a good reason not to attempt to solve the problem, even knowing it could take a long, long time.
I don't disagree with the concept of long term solutions (look at my M.E. politics, my one world immigration thoughts or my desire to provide food and clean water and a basic right of self determination to the planet.)(None of which can or will happen anytime soon). I just don't see hand-gun bans having any direct impact in the near future, nor how different choices in the recent past would have helped here. Let me switch sides for a moment, and provide a makeshift battle plan for the Anti-Gun folks, in hopes of clarifying my point.
Hand guns in criminal and/or crazy hands are a bad thing. We all agree.
What do you do about it?
1. Pass legislation that criminalizes ownership of any weapon not registered with the ATF, complete with ballistics test firings and #engraving and establish a database not unlike the fingerprint database of the NCIC for every known weapon in existence. Said legislation should be written to assume non compliance with this measure constitutes conspiracy to commit first degree murder and stipulate that all parties to the crime of trafficking, owning, selling or otherwise knowingly handling said weapons are thereby guilty of this offense.
2. Pass legislation that automatically promotes use of a firearm, be it registered or not, in commission of a crime is treated the same way.
3. Pass legislation that allows a large segment of the "law abiding community" to carry weapons at will; providing they have met strict criteria and undergo periodic training to obtain and maintain a license that both allows them the continued privilege AND obligates them to use their discretion according to their training (not unlike a life-saving certificate obligates one to save the drowning man).
4. Pass an amnesty bill that allows owners of weapons who cannot or don't want to own weapons under the new guidelines. Full appraised value should be paid for guns and ammunition by the federal government.
5. Pass extremely harsh mandatory penalties for all forms of Violent Crime to get and keep the A-holes off the streets, before they graduate to cold hearted killers. This kid was just a freak; but the bigger problem stems from gang violence.
6. Eliminate the idiotic legislation that seals childhood records from juries during criminal proceedings. If a 19 year old violent offender has a long history of violence; the jury needs to know about it.
7. Abandon the idiotic Drug War in favor of concentrating 20% of its current resources on treatment facilities and awareness campaigns, and the other 80% on Ending Violent Crime as we know it.
Among the many side effects of this idiotic attempt at prohibition; is that the illicit drug trade establishes and maintains a vast network of otherwise law abiding citizens who know who they can trust in the outlaw world. The guy who sells weed for a living turns the blind eye to the guy who sells crack, who in turn turns the blind eye to the guy who sells AK-47's, who likely turns the blind eye to the really bad guys.
That is why I'm confident I could buy an AK without any difficulty whatsoever, without regard for legal paperwork. Decriminalize the drug trade and the underground network of criminals practically evaporates since it is a relative few druggies that are otherwise interested in criminal activity. I would wager few people know who to call for an unregistered gun, and fewer still who know who they can
trust. Most know who they can call to "hook um up a bag of weed"... and generally you're talking about the same guy, through the grapevine. The local liquor store is unlikely to provide this kind of referral.
Notice; even in the gun-ban I described; there exists a means for Joe citizen to enjoy his constitutional right to bear arms. For the century or so that the worst of the worst, who will not be taking advantage of the amnesty period, are "the only one's with guns" there needs to be
some kind of equalizer. I think it could probably be done IF the criminals knew that even as the overall numbers of guns in the hands victims decreased; their chances of running into armed resistance remained fairly constant. By and large; I think Doctors, Teachers, Pilots and other professionals who are already charged to some degree with maintaining our well being can and should be trusted to act as pseudo-law enforcement in case of an emergency... if they volunteer for the task... and should be encouraged to do so.
A
straight ban on guns, on the other hand is like spotting criminals HOR in a game of HORSE.
Setanta wrote:I'm no fool, though--i understand that likely nothing effective will be done, because handgun owners who are or allege themselves to be "law-abiding citizens" and the NRA represent a powerful lobby, whose particular interest will be to see that nothing is done about the proliferation of handguns.
I honestly think it's too late to address the problem at the "proliferation" stage. We're plenty proliferated.