Debate following rejection of the new gun legistation

@stonyman65: It wouldn't have done anything in that specific case but the hope is that in the future, it would stop things like it from happening again.

The assault weapons ban in 1994 was garbage. In 1994, the bill focused on 18 gun models. This new one listed 157. The new bill would add to the definition of what an assault weapon is making it harder for manufacturers to work around it, which is what they did with the old bill. The new bill would add background checks to any weapon grandfathered in, the old one didn't do that. The buy-back program is new. And the new bill was designed to be permanent while the old one sunsetted after 10 years.

Well, when you ask 900 people in three anti-gun states what they think about guns and say that represents 90% of ALL Americans, that isn't accurate at all. If you did the same poll in Arizona, Utah, or Texas (to name a few states) that are pro-gun, those results would flip around completely. The poll isn't valid when it's so biased like that.

@milkman: It still wouldn't make any difference. The things that make up an "Assault Weapon" vs any other rifle is negligible at best. And just as before, people would find a way around it, and it still does nothing for the hundreds of millions of guns and magazines already in circulation.

@stonyman65: Okay, that's what I figured you were saying. That's a valid point. Polls in general shouldbe more transparent in the actual demographics and locations where they were conducted, as well as what the reasons were for picking the locations. I don't know why there isn't a guideline to at least pick people from every state to create a more balanced number, but I suppose that's because polls are conducted by third-parties and therefore are inherently going to be weighted towards whatever end that poll is supposed to serve.

At the same time, that door totally swings both ways and the NRA has been spreading its share of misinformation and skewed statistics as well.

You took the words right out of my mouth.

They all do. That's what politics is dude.

The thing you have to do is read through all of the bullshit and find the real facts. You can switch around polls and statistics as much as you want... that doesn't necessarily mean that they're accurate.

"It wouldn't work because reasons" isn't an acceptable answer. One of the main points of the new bill is defining assault weapons. "Semiautomatic rifles, handguns or shotguns that can accept a detachable magazine and have one or more military characteristics" (like folding stocks, pistol grips for rifles and threaded barrels) would be banned. Any rifle or handgun with fixed magazines of more than 10 rounds would be banned. The old bill was much looser in its definition. It's undoubtedly better than what we currently have. Just blindly saying "oh, well they'll figure something out" is completely senseless and just the kind of attitude that allows for nothing to ever get done.

@milkman: Those definitions are so broad that it would ban basically everything.

And to prove my point even more, there are states currently that have bans that are just as strict as what was being proposed, if not stricter, and IT DID NOTHING. Illinois, New York, New Jersey, California, Connecticut, Massachusetts... Before you start generalizing, you should look at the facts and the laws that are already in place.

The mass shootings are a drop in the bucket as far as our gun problems go in the US. While it certainly wouldn't have prevented every mass shooting, it sure as hell would have slowed down deaths by gunshot across the board.

Even if this legislation isn't 100% perfect, it's still a step forward that we absolutely need.

Does anyone know how to synthesize ricin? Anyone?

Okay, I'll look at all those states.

They're all in the bottom half (most the bottom third) of gun-related deaths by state.

I own a gun. It's pretty swell. Practically mandatory for living in the boonies.

@milkman: That's true, but look at their violent crime rates and gun-related crime rates. Way higher to most other states.

As for the whole gun death thing.... 2/3 of the total are self-inflicted suicides, the rest are made up of justified shootings via police and self defense, the rest after that are crime.

So your logic here is a little flawed.

I don't think you have to be insane to live in fear of gun violence every day. If your home is in the 'hood in Chicago or Detroit, I think it's perfectly sane to live scared.

@stonyman65: A lot of violent crimes have nothing to do with guns so that's not really relevant. And obviously, the crime rate in New York is going to be higher than a place like Wyoming simply because its an urban environment. Not sure where you're getting your information about suicides and such but unless there are a ton of people blowing their brains out in Montana, it shouldn't skew the stats that much.

By the way, here's some required reading from Senator Gabrielle Giffords who was shot point blank in the head during a mass shooting Tucson, Arizona.

Actually crime seems to be at all time low where it turns out that the advent societal stabilizers like agribusiness food supply and birth control had more to do with it than arming or disarming people. Raise kids in families who want to have kids instead of the "shotgun wedding" approach and people grow up into happy and well adjusted people that don't automatically hug their guns more than other people. Who knew?

I live in Chicago. Know what else is illegal in Illinois? Fireworks. Know what people shoot off on the 4th of July? Fireworks. It's almost as if they can drive 30 minutes to go to a neighboring state to get the things they want that are illegal here.

Having a rule be nationwide is different from having it be state-by-state. And they've actually pinpointed a few gun shops just across the state border that are the major source of guns used in Illinois crimes. So that point is pretty moot.

Might not prevent your psychotic mass shootings, but considering the majority of all gun homicide, according to federal statistics, is caused by suicide, making guns harder to get would probably result in more living non-criminals.

Mass shootings are certainly good for wake up calls, but they are a tiny fraction to people actually killed, and the latter is where gun legislation can be more effective in cutting down on.

@milkman: You can read all the suicide stats you want over at the CDC and FBI websites. It's all there under the statistical section. According to them, 2/3 of all gun deaths across the country annually are a result of self-inflicted wounds.

The reason why I say to take crime into account is because the majority of gun-violence is a direct result of other crime (drugs, robberies, gang activity...etc...)

The population and demographics definitely has an affect on gun violence, but you can't really relate the amount or type of guns with the amount of gun crimes. If that were true, places like Washington state, New Hampshire, Oregon, Maine, and Nebraska would be warzones, but infact they have some of the lowest gun crime and gun death rates in the country.

Also, a lot of laws fail to stop crime but that is never the point of passing laws. I mean if we complain that we shouldn't pass laws because they fail to stop bad behavior we need to throw out stuff from jaywalking to murder. Laws are passed because of the ideal and a guideline for punishment where I'm never sure why people think deterrence works.

Laws are rules where treating them as some sort of "compliance" list is silly and stupid since ten of thousands of years human history the chieftain didn't want the tribe to do something and someone did it anyway. Asking for background checks is not a terrible burden. We do it for a bazillion other things where suddenly it is a huge issue with buying weapons because it doesn't stop crime is a stupid reason.

And my point is that when IT WAS a national law it did nothing to stop anything.

And then there is the whole thing about criminals not following the law anyways... because, you know, they're criminals.

I know, lets make it illegal to do something that's already illegal! That will work!

This is not a problem that can be solved with legislation, however we cannot let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

If I want any kind of decent cold medicine, the pharmacy records my drivers licences and I have to sign out when and where I bought it because I could potentially use it to make meth. Is there any kind of similar procedure for purchasing ammunition?

We already have background checks though. The only thing that doesn't require a background check is private sales through individuals. Once you trow an FFL into the picture, everything has to go through a check,

I understand what you mean about laws being guidelines for punishment, but that isn't going to do shit when you don't know if they have done anything illegal yet.

that's the whole thing here - we can't do anything unless they have already done something that has been deemed illegal. Until then, there is no law or punishment that would do anything. It's innocent until proven guilty, not the other way around.

@stonyman65: I'm just saying, using Chicago and DC as test cases for national laws is disingenuous. It's a different situation. Nothing more, nothing less.

It's also harder for criminals to bring illegal guns in internationally than from another state (though admittedly far from impossible).

And we don't set our laws based on whether criminals will obey them or not. That's a flawed argument. Making things illegal for everyone makes it harder for criminals to do it. "Cooking meth shouldn't be illegal, because meth cookers are still going to cook meth."

Part of building up law like this is that it also refines and adds penalties. Of course trafficking weapons across state lines is illegal where adding more laws on top of it isn't an attempt to make it "more illegal" but to heap on more penalties.

Which reminds me, one of the biggest things we export to Mexico are weapons and ammo. Mexico complains about this to our ambassador and government for years where it doesn't appear that either heavy restrictions or a free flow of weapons has helped make Mexico safe nor do I believe that giving them MORE GUNS will help them nor do I believe they want that. But we hamstring ourselves because people complain the absurd "WHAT IFFFFFS!" and so on it goes.

That's where the argument always goes, and that's where it always falls apart. Studies have already shown in the past that a family with a firearm has a higher chance of injuring themselves than a criminal, from the American Pediatrics Society to Harvard. Lets drop that crap shall we?

Yeah, in households with children aged 7-15. I read that study too. It doesn't apply here. Try again.

Have any of you watched the Senate hearings? Politicians are even more clueless about guns than the general public. It's really embarrassing. I'd bet dollars to dinars that the majority of the people who will post on this thread with an emotionally charged opinion will have done so without even having read the bill. Ignorance is bliss I guess.

Casual observation of unbiased statistics should make it pretty obvious to everything that we don't need additional federal legislation. The majority of unjustified homicides using firearms take place in concentrated pockets of the country. Let state and local governments handle the issue.

@you_died: Weapons from other states easily effect their neighbors.

@wrighteous86: It shouldn't be illegal for everyone though. That's the whole point I'm trying to get here. Is taking the rights away from everyone worth the small possibility that it may stop something?

NO! That's the whole foundry that our country was founded on.

What's the worst is that the baby boomer generation hasn't passed on basic gun handling/training from their parents to their children. So young adults are coming of age to purchase firearms with no training. There are no target shooting classes in school anymore, and they are getting rare in collages. It's pretty apparent to anyone that has been to a range.

Since when is a background check taking away rights from everyone? We do background checks for all sorts of state and federal government purposes but this one is wrong?

So does everything else. There is no way to stop it unless we get rid of ALL guns and that isn't going to happen.

@stonyman65: What would you do to try and make a difference to gun violence?

Nobody ever said it was wrong. It's not the checks that we are against, it's everything else that goes with it that would turn us into criminals.

It was NEVER about background checks at all. If you read the original bill, you'd understand that.

Chicago and Illinios can't pass laws nor ask the federal government for help because rights? That seems to imply that Indiana industry rights are more important than public safety in Chicago.

On the other hand I might see what you are talking about....the way to get Indiana to stop flooding Chicago with guns is to arm everyone in Chicago? Your ideas intrigue me and I would like to subscribe to your news letter. :)

Firearm transactions that cross state lines already require an FFL (and thus, background check) intermediary. If you bring up smuggling then you might as well bring up Chinese AKs brought in through opium lanes via drug runners. Look at Mexico to see how well those have worked out.

good to know everyone's willing to submit to searches at the airport, drug tests for employment, alcohol tests while driving, background checks for those working with children, etc. but going a bit further with guns is clearly out of the question and unamerican.

You do realize that there are existing federal laws that limit your ability to purchase and bring firearms from out of state, right?

@milkman said:

@stonyman65 said:

@milkman: Those definitions are so broad that it would ban basically everything.

And to prove my point even more, there are states currently that have bans that are just as strict as what was being proposed, if not stricter, and IT DID NOTHING. Illinois, New York, New Jersey, California, Connecticut, Massachusetts... Before you start generalizing, you should look at the facts and the laws that are already in place.

Okay, I'll look at all those states.

They're all in the bottom half (most the bottom third) of gun-related deaths by state.

That's not at all what those graphs represent. Those are gun-related deaths per capita. I'm being lazy by using wikipedia and their population figures are estimated from 2012. But based on the scatterplot and 2012 population figures:

Wyoming had about 104 deaths.

Montana had about 161 deaths.

Alabama had about 819 deaths.

Louisiana had about 828 deaths.

New York had about 979 deaths.

Illinois had about 1130 deaths.

California had about 3043 deaths.

@stonyman65: I'm just saying I think rules like that should be consistent nationwide. Like fireworks. It's dumb that they are illegal in Illinois because then people just buy fireworks in Indiana.

Background checks are not an infringement on your rights, in my opinion.

I think gun owners should be legally responsible for their guns. If their gun is stolen, they are responsible. If their gun is used in a crime, they should be held responsible. That would cause gun owners to be much more careful with their guns. I think there should be mandatory gun safety classes for anyone that owns a gun. I think anyone living in a house with weapons, even if they aren't an owner, should be examined by professionals to make sure they aren't a safety risk. I believe every gun owner should own a gun safe.

I believe any time a gun changes hands, from stores, to shows, to the internet, to family and friends, the government should know who "owns" that gun (going back to being responsible for what is done with that gun". If someone with an FOID card buys a gun and then gives or sells it to their gangster friend (probably the most common way gang members in Chicago get guns), then the person that bought that gun can be linked to it and charged.

These won't prevent gun crimes, or massacres, but they will make guns safer, and gun owners more responsible, which isn't a bad thing and may influence the way we view our firearms in this country (which I think is the real problem--the fetishization of guns in America).

Me? I'd end the war on drugs, I'd try to stabilize the economy, I'd crack down on gangs were the majority of this gun violence comes from, and I'd do what I could to give those people a chance who have nothing to look forward to in their life than gang-banging.

The reason why this hasn't been done before is because it costs too much time and money, and the police don't have the manpower to do it. Rather than solving the cause of the problem at the root, they decide to do the easy thing and try and ban everything. It's a society issue, not a gun issue.

Then you've missed a lot of studies. Like this one for example. Or plenty of researchers who have found similar results only to have their studies stopped via NRA pressure. Its not like the Federal government also had found similar results only to have the funding for further research completely frozen.

Bottom line is, if you're saying the data is either out of date, or not enough, the finger of blame lies on only one side of the court.

You need to look at intentional homicide data, not 'gun related deaths'. The aim of any new legislation would be to prevent criminal gun violence, not suicides or justified homicides by police.

I also live in Chicago, and am glad you made this point. Our guns come from surrounding states (looking at you, Gary, Indiana) with lax laws and flood our black markets. There is no legal action we can take to minimize this, and pro-gun activists use it to paint a picture of failed gun policy. Bullshit.

It's not really about rights on a state level, it's about rights on a national level. Chicago can pass as many laws as they want for their city, or within their state. That shouldn't effect anything else but them.

What was the percentage of people who support background checks? 80%-90%? How do Republicans justify their inaction? Is it because they are going to lose the gay issue and immigration issue? It's clear that once they got voted out from standing against those other issues gun legislation will finally be allowed to pass.

Isn't the ATF woefully undermanned because of politics, and not because they're just lazy?

I don't see anything wrong with accidents/injuries though. I'm sure people who have fireworks are more likely to burn themselves and people with hammers are more likely to crush their thumbs. Guns are inherently dangerous, and their ownership obviously coincides with increased rates of accidents and even suicides. This in no way obviates their alleged efficacy in reducing crime to the rate to the point that you are more likely to hurt yourself than be hurt by another, nor is it reason enough to legislate them away.