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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Lots of blah blah blah about semantics and minor nuances of weapon functionality in these last two pages.  But no action.

That's unacceptable.

One mass shooting is too many mass shootings.

We need action, not words.

If you don't want confiscation and you want to preserve 2A that's all fine and good but you still need to come up with a proposal that will make America safer, because without one you are failing America and you are standing in the way of people who want America to be safer.

So what's your proposal?  (Hint: "the existing laws" clearly aren't working.)[/quote]

What's your alternative to "existing laws"?  Confiscation?  The Second Amendment exists to prevent this very activity.

Any proposal requires an honest, clear-eyed view of the root cause of mass shootings.  But let's not stop there.  How about we look at the root cause of shootings in general?  (Hint: It's not the availability of guns - just ask the Swiss and other countries that have relatively high gun ownership rates).[/quote]

What’s the root cause? And what’s the solution?[/quote]

The root cause is behavior, not whether tools or technology are misused.  Endless varieties of crime occur using endless tools or technology, or just exploiting human physical weakness or gullibility.  Identify and neutralize bad behavior.  [/quote]

So you want to regulate the behavior of gun owners? Psych profiles, extensive background checks, etc? Makes sense. [/quote]

We do,  Plenty of laws on the books relative to firearms, as well as to other activities.  The problem is enforcing the laws, all the laws, in the face of bad behavior.  If penalties are neither sure nor impactful, they don't deter anyone.  Criminals in jail cannot commit further crimes against the public.  Criminals who receive trivial sentences, are released without bail, or who are enabled by policies imposed on law enforcement which limit its effectiveness, remain criminals.  The mentally ill who are not dealt with effectively can, depending on their specific issues, become violent if unsupervised.  We can deal with violence and crime, we just don't want to, often because we characterize the criminals as somehow not responsible for what they do, so we leave them to it.  We could end carjacking by outlawing cars, how about that?  Or, we could deal with carjackers in a manner which denies them access to cars in the future, by leaving them in jail.  Ditto for gun crime - commit a crime with a gun, you should be done, but all too often such criminals receive light sentences and are back on the street.  [/quote]

"We already have gun laws" is not an answer or solution; it’s a shrug disguised as policy.

Yes, we have existing gun laws. But they’re a loose patchwork, full of of loopholes, weak enforcement, and wildly inconsistent standards across states. And criminals know how to exploit that patchwork and its loopholes.  Chicago may have some of the strictest gun laws in the country but a criminal can just drive 30 minutes across the border into Indiana where the gun laws are among the most lax, including buying a gun via private seller with no ID, no background check, no paperwork, no waiting period, no questions asked.  Yes, the private seller is technically responsible for ensuring that the buyer isn't a felon or mentally incapacitated but that's easily dodged.  So, the existing gun laws don't work.

Nonetheless, the data is clear: that states with stronger gun laws do typically have fewer mass shootings and lower gun death rates.  https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/news/research-supports-tighter-gun-laws-reduce-mass-shooting-violence

Let’s break some of those proven results down:
Large-capacity magazine bans are associated with a 49% lower rate of fatal mass shootings.
The expiration of the federal assault weapons ban led to a 183% increase in high-fatality mass shooting incidents and a 239% increase in deaths.
States with more permissive gun laws experience significantly more mass shootings than those with tighter regulations.

So no, in many places the "existing laws" aren’t working, and places with weaker laws are undermining those with stronger laws.  Nobody is saying laws don’t matter or don't work at all, we are saying they aren't working because in many places, we’ve gutted and undermined the laws that do work, and in other places, we refuse to pass the laws that have already been proven to work.

Saying “we already have laws” is like watching a house burn and insisting the fire code is fine while the hydrants are dry and the exits are blocked.

If you oppose confiscation and still claim to care about safety, then the burden is on you to propose real reforms: universal background checks, red flag laws, licensing, safe storage mandates, and yes: restrictions on weapons designed for mass killing.

Otherwise, you’re not defending liberty. You’re defending inertia. And America is bleeding for it.[/quote]

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