Another school shooting

[glatt]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

But don't you see that the precise reason smuggled drugs can fetch a high price is because they are completely illegal?? If guns were banned, you could not buy one for $50 and toss it. The economics would shift such that smuggling was by definition profitable. A car trunk full of guns would be just as expensive and just as easy to sell as a car trunk full of cocaine.

That's true. Drugs are worth a lot of money because they are illegal and because they can be sold for an affordable price once you cut them into smaller portions. You can't cut up a gun to spread the cost around. If the cost of a smuggled gun is $1000, who will buy it?

My point that I'm arguing is that gun regulation will, in fact, reduce the number of guns in criminals'* hands. A more expensive gun will mean fewer criminals will be able to afford them. Criminals are usually poor.

*criminal=someone who is a criminal because they commit a crime and the gun is just a tool to use in that crime.

[JayMcGee]

You're all missing the point.


Columbine, the more recent shootings and the amish massacre were not committed by criminals with illegal guns.

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by JayMcGee

Columbine, the more recent shootings and the amish massacre were not committed by criminals with illegal guns.

Since it's illegal here to have a gun in a school without a legal purpose, the perps were in fact criminals, and the guns illegal.

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by JayMcGee

Columbine, the more recent shootings and the amish massacre were not committed by criminals with illegal guns.

You do understand that stealing a gun from someone else A.) means you almost certainly do not have a permit for a gun, and thus it is illegal for you to own; and B.) makes you a criminal, both for having possession of it at all and for stealing it in the first place?

[JayMcGee]

were you ever in the military? you have all the attributes of the barrack-room lawyer...

[Undertoad]

A leadership sighting this afternoon. Gov. Rendell was served up the opportunity to connect the Amish shooter's crime with new gun control legislation. Ed Rendell is one of the most anti-gun politicians you will find. But instead of taking the political road, scaring the public in order to move the legislation, he flatly shut the connection down with his honest response: no, even our hardest gun control won't stop the crazies.

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIP...03/cnr.03.html

QUESTION: Governor, the state legislature is debating some gun control (INAUDIBLE) the next couple of days. Has...

RENDELL: The question, the state legislature is debating some gun control measures in the next several days, will this change the dynamic? I'm not sure what the thinking of the state legislature is, and I believe, with all my heart, that Pennsylvania needs stronger gun control legislation.

But, I think we should all understand no proposed law, none that I would think of or none that I've seen, could have ruled out this situation. This individual, as the Colonel said, has never had a criminal record, has no evidence on record of mental instability that would barred him from going into a gun shop and buying a handgun or a shotgun, et cetera. So he could have purchased these guns lawfully. We don't know that.

QUESTION: We do know that he purchased the 9-millimeter lawfully?

RENDELL: He purchased the 9-millimeter handgun lawfully. So there is no law out there -- I mean, our biggest push in the legislature is to eliminate straw purchasing. But no one, a month or anything, would have stopped this from happening.

We have -- you know, we have real problems in our society, because we tend to be so much more violent than almost any other country in the world, but -- and I think there are laws that can improve that. But it would be disingenuous for gun control advocates, myself included, to say that this demonstrates for better, stronger laws.

[Undertoad]

Once he's got them bound he doesn't have to use the zip gun at all.

[Flint]

So...we need to outlaw . . . rope? (Or duct tape?) oops I meant "regulate" not "outlaw" . . .

[Undertoad]

Would have been able to move the people he couldn't overpower physically out, using the threat of the zip gun;

Would have been able to bind the remaining weak young girls without even using the same threat;

Would have been able to kill them quickly using a knife, ballpeen hammer, plastic bag or many other means;

Use your imaginations folks, the bad guys do.

[glatt]

The conversation is about guns because guns are the best tool for the job. Just ask the gun enthusiasts on the board why they are enthusiastic about guns, and not ball peen hammers.

[Elspode]

Everyone who wants to live in a country where only the cops and the military have guns, raise your hands...

[Flint]

Originally Posted by Elspode

...raise your hands...

BANG! ha ha ha

[Elspode]

[wolf]

You're missing the point again. It's over there, off to your right, about ten feet away.

Obeying the law isn't all that hard, Spex. Don't steal from others, don't do physical harm to others, don't damage property not belonging to you (if it's your own car you want to smash the window of and steal your own stereo just for kicks, go right ahead).

The movie gunslinger hairtrigger shoot a varmint fer lookin' atcha funny Old West is, as far as I know, the stuff of Hollywood fantasy, although, based on recent news reports, that's what owners of illegal firearms are doing in our urban settings.

Didn't you read the crime stats Maggie provided regarding folks registered to carry firearms legally?

An armed society is a polite society, so saith the sage, Robert A. Heinlein.

[Spexxvet]

Originally Posted by wolf

You're missing the point again. It's over there, off to your right, about ten feet away.
...

The problem is that your point is constantly moving. You address one aspect of the debate, which conflicts with other aspects of your point. You talk about easy access to guns. An armed society is a polite society. Keep the guns away from criminals. Punish those who misuse guns. Legal gun owners have to go through a rigorous process to get licensed and don't want to loose that license. You can't have all of these things - many are in conflict with each other.

Now, describe the system that you'd like in place. Don't address a specific of my post, describe your all-encompassing plan where there is easy access to guns without abuse by non-licensed gun riff-raff. Where you can protect your life and property, but not shoot your neighbor, whether on purpose or by accident. Let's hear how you can accomplish all of these things.