Charleston - shooting in church!

[donquixote99]

Originally Posted by JCricket

Common sense legislation with out a doubt or hesitation. But there is the problem. What is common sense legislation?

Take all hand guns away, I don't think so. Limiting how many cartridges in a pistol or rifle - good intentions but I don't think it wouldn't help much. Require all gun owners to obtain a license for ownership that requires written psych, mental evals - maybe, definitely maybe.

Seriously, on gun control, we have a catch-22. There's no way we can disarm the criminals to any degree unless we disarm the general population. But we can't disarm the general population while there are hordes of armed criminals out there.

Jim, I've advocated what you advocate for a while, as far as background checks. They must include an in-depth psych evaluation. If you don't have one, you have to get one.

I'd also like to see a public service ad campaign that works long-term to stigmatize gun ownership. Make it a marker of low class status, like cigarette smoking has largely become. Do profiles of gun-obsessed people who are looser idiots.

Eventually, we may get opinion to swing in favor of repeal of the Second. The Second Amendment just hasn't worked out well. Like, how often have armed groups of civilians rallied as 'militia' and done anything good? Most of they time they've been shooting up black-town or lynching somebody, or fomenting violent tax evasion.

And once we do that, we can begin a process of eliminating a great amount of the guns out there, making it harder for criminals to get them. Couple that with an automatic 50 years for using a gun in a crime, and you'll get a lot of crooks to avoid using them. (I like 50 years better than 'life,' as a deterrent--it's more definite, more concrete.)