How to get the sniper

[russotto]

Originally posted by hermit22

I've seen the NRA try to use scare tactics a hundred times, but the most blatant was a recent report saying that mandatory waiting periods were inherently bad because they would not allow newly independent battered wives to protect themselves.

Yep, they've been using that line for quite a while.

What it doesn't say, though, is that these waiting periods are just as exclusionary toward the pissed off husband.

Actually, some NRA writing on the subject addresses this point. They point out that an abusive husband is usually physically larger and stronger than the abusee. The person being abused is, as you later point out "weak" (in the physical sense), and might very well need a tool like a gun to impose her "disproportionate will" (to be left alone) on her abuser.

It also doesn't consider the idea of a newly single woman who is completely clueless about a gun. Would it not be advantageous to train someone? Obviously, it would have to be a graduated program; first time gun buyers would go through something more intensive than someone with his third or fourth gun.

There's something which gets lost in all the 'training' propaganda put out mostly by anti-gunners, but also by well-meaning pro-gun people. And that's that the gun is a very simple machine to operate. Particularly a revolver, but it doesn't take a genius to figure out how to load a pistol either, or even load and cock a single-action pistol. And once that's taken care of, actually using the thing is just release safety (if applicable), point, and shoot.

there's no point in having guns. There are statistics to prove that most gun owners don't know how to use them, and that a significant percentage of robberies where the owner has a gun result in the owner's injury.

There are? The figures I've seen show that resisting a robbery with a gun results in LESS injury than most other actions, including not resisting.