Another day, another mass shooting in DC
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
Sure, but there isn't much they can do when existing laws make it so easy. Unless *certain* states tighten their laws to match other, more stringent, states, there won't be much legal authorities can do to actually reduce these purchases. Lax laws mean hands are tied. |
Anonymous
Sincere questions for you, “Mr Legal Gun Owner”: Would you support a law that banned your ability to possess a gun, to reduce gun crime? If not, why? If such a law were passed, would you abide by it? Knowing that you could no longer be a gun owner? If you wouldn’t abide by such a future law, don’t you agree that that makes you too dangerous to own a gun NOW? I’m genuinely curious to hear your answer. I’ve never in my life known anyone who had a gun, so I find you types of people curiosities that I’d like to ponder and learn more about. |
Anonymous
| Absent, uninvolved or uncaring parents are the main cause of their offspring behaving this way. Its not about race or income or education. I've seen really underprivileged people of all races doing the best parenting they can with whatever resources they have. |
Anonymous
DP, but for instance, when Virginia limited # of guns purchased per time period, suddenly local DC criminals had to source their guns from farther away (so Virginia is not the major source of trafficked guns anymore for DC) and Virginia is less likely to be a source when guns used in crimes are traced. So it's an indication of how gun control (cough) CAN work, but also how it CAN'T work without consistency across states. |
Anonymous
You should be genuinely curious to know that your question as phrased is a logical fallacy. |
Anonymous
| My parents had all odds against them but they raised their children in way that no kid of theirs could ever even imagine committing a crime against another human. You don't need no resources to teach humans to be humane. |
Anonymous
Leaving aside prescribed medication, it has been unlawful for decades to possess, transport, purchase, sell, manufacture or import a huge number of drugs. The authorities regularly confiscate huge quantities of those very drugs. What makes you think that more laws infringing the rights of decent people will work any better against criminals who misuse firearms. If criminal enterprises can import tons of drugs, they can import tons of weapons, including military hardware that currently is not often seen in criminal hands. If you think “lax laws” are the reasons criminals have and misuse firearms, you haven’t been paying attention. Straw purchase is a federal felony, punishable by ten years in prison and a quarter million dollar fine. A felon or other prohibited person in possession of a firearm likewise is a federal felony, and also punishable by ten years in prison and a quarter million dollar fine. It is a federal crime to purchase or sell a handgun outside the purchaser’s state of residence, again punishable by ten years in prison and a quarter million dollar fine. The problem isn’t guns. The problem isn’t “lax laws.” The problem isn’t straw purchases. The problem is criminal psychopaths, and the authorities that refuse to prosecute and imprison them. |
Anonymous
If gun laws weren't a *part* of the problem, then criminals wouldn't resort to obtaining them from states with loose gun laws. The simple fact that they go to such states to obtain guns shows that in fact, gun laws work - but the problem is, they are not applied consistently. |
Anonymous
Absolutely, straw purchases have always had strict laws. But *finding* or *preventing* them - well, laws can't work unless we can hold gun sellers accountable. Frankly we don't. We make it easy for gun sellers to make illegal sales. |
Anonymous
It's me, the DC gun owner, again. Just for the record, that wasn't me above saying your question was a logical fallacy. With that out of the way, I'm not sure I understand the premise of your question. Are you asking if I'd support a law that banned my ability to possess a certain type of number of firearms, or are you asking if I'd support a law that made it illegal for me (and millions of others like me) from possessing ANY firearm at all? If it's the latter, it's really not a question based at all in the reality of public policy. I'm not accusing you of asking it in bad faith, but it's more from ignorance of the issue, which is understandable. If I understand what you're asking, it sounds like the implication is that making someone a felon by possession through no action on their part (law abiding one day and a felon the next due to a change in the law) is morally equivalent to someone who's a felon as a result of using the same firearm in the commission of a crime. I reject that premise. Also, I doubt many people would accept the premise that going door to door to confiscate firearms would actually reduce violent crime in a meaningful way, particularly without creating a whole new set of problems at the same time. It's a bit like arguing we should reduce the speed limits on interstates to 40 mph to save lives. It wouldn't really do what was intended in the end. Finally, I'd just add that I seriously doubt you don't know any gun owners. I believe you don't think you do, but I bet you do. We're not all a bunch of rednecks and/or right wingers. If I'm misinterpreting your question, please clarify, and I'd be happy to address it further. |
Anonymous
Why do you only care about the end criminal, and not the start criminal? States without universal background check laws export crime guns across state lines at a 30% higher rate than states that require background checks on all gun sales Many gun dealers are still willing to knowingly make sales to straw purchasers. A national phone survey of retail gun dealers found that half of the gun dealers indicated a willingness to make a sale under circumstances of questionable legality. States without universal background check laws export crime guns across state lines at a 30% higher rate than states that require background checks on all gun sales Susan B. Sorenson and Katherine A. Vittes, “Buying a Handgun for Someone Else: Firearm Dealer Willingness to Sell,” Injury Prevention 9, no. 2 (2003): 147–150; Garen Wintemute, “Firearm Retailers’ Willingness to Participate in an Illegal Gun Purchase,” Journal of Urban Health 87, no. 5 (2010): 865–878 |
Anonymous
DG gun owner here again. I'd be in favor of a laws banning non-FFL sales at gun shows. In other words, all sales at gun shows had to go through the NICS background check process. |
Anonymous
Gun owner here again. The first bolded statement doesn't surprise me, and I'd be interested in ways we can all get that number to be lower. What I don't get is where "expanded" NICS checks would help if it's gun dealers (i.e. FFL sales that are required to do NICS checks) that are making straw purchases. Is it just lax monitoring and enforcement by states and/or ATF of gun dealers in certain states? Or is there a more fundamental issue with state laws in those states? |
Anonymous
Go poke around on the Giffords website, unless you're so worried their info is biased, you'd prefer not to look. I find their site helpful and straightforward, and most importantly, DATA DRIVEN. |
Anonymous
I’m all for prosecuting unlawful sellers. If they are that easy to identify, why hasn’t BATFE done something about it? And do you seriously believe that if criminals can’t get guns from straw purchases they won’t get them by theft, robbery, burglary, black market manufacture and/or the same people regularly moving tons of drugs into and around the country? Despite the childlike faith of what seems to be an appreciable number of persons, laws are not magic. Things, particularly profitable things, don’t stop because they are “illegal.” |