zulumoose wrote:

I get real squeamish at federal registration

How is it possible to have any sensible laws at all concerning the distribution/ownership/use of guns if it is not compulsory to register/licence them? This is step one of any logical gun safety programme.

My guns are all registered. I have to do a federal background check to purchase a firearm. That's not the same as 'requiring a federal license'. I don't like the sounds of that prickly bitch. I'm guessing that targets poor people with a 500 dollar license of some sort and a whole fuck-ton of bullshit paperwork.

I have to wait six-twelve months to get my medicare back from the feds because of a payment snafu. The feds don't accept debit or credit cards. Only paper checks or a form that you fill out to use a card account. Guess what? That was precisely the payment snafu. I did the form and they fucking lost it.

It took me twelve months to get a payment plan with the irs.

Silencers require an inexplicable 200 or so, dollar federal stamp.

Trump is the president! FFS!! I would have to prove ethnicity and religious affiliation to boot. Atheists wouldn't get a gun.

aban57 wrote:... You're repeating the exact same argument used ad nauseum by gun nuts : if a solution doesn't solve the entire problem, I don't want it. It's at the same time very stupid and totally dishonnest, as you very well know that no single law will change overnight the gun culture in the US. You're using this argument to prevent any law from being passed. This situation, like any other societal problem, will only be solved by an adition of law over time.
...

So now let's' look at the argument that you are suggesting that I use.

The 'gun culture' in the US is going to change if we pass your suggested laws? And then what? Murder-suicide is due to the gun culture in the US? Got evidence for that?

What exactly is this 'gun culture' that you are imagining?

SpeedOfSound wrote:

aban57 wrote:... You're repeating the exact same argument used ad nauseum by gun nuts : if a solution doesn't solve the entire problem, I don't want it. It's at the same time very stupid and totally dishonnest, as you very well know that no single law will change overnight the gun culture in the US. You're using this argument to prevent any law from being passed. This situation, like any other societal problem, will only be solved by an adition of law over time.
...

So now let's' look at the argument that you are suggesting that I use.

The 'gun culture' in the US is going to change if we pass your suggested laws? And then what?

Well yes, over time. That's what happened in pretty much the entire developped world.

SpeedOfSound wrote:

aban57 wrote:
Murder-suicide is due to the gun culture in the US? Got evidence for that?

I don't need to provide evidence for that, as you are the only one saying this. Again, I didn't claim laws will prevent 100% of guns related deaths. Only you is pretending that not solving the entire problem is not worth doing anything.

SpeedOfSound wrote:

aban57 wrote:
What exactly is this 'gun culture' that you are imagining?

This question is so stupid it doesn't even deserve an answer.
As for the "imagining" part just type "gun culture" in google, and see how many thousands of people used it before me.

That is what this thread is about. How many people out there that don't think and engage in under-specified sheep behavior.

There is no fucking gun culture. The US is a blob of people that are divided into so many ethnicities and types that there is almost nothing at all that one can say about us in general. I know a couple of segments that might be said to be gun people. Those I grew up with who were farmers who actually fed themselves with their guns and I know two of my sons friends who do gun shows and have assault rifles.

No one else that I know carries a gun. All but a handful don't even own a hunting rifle. No one that run into in my neighborhood is the type to have a gun in the house.

That farming community that I cam from is now a mining/meth-head community and only the gang members have guns. Though about three-fourths of the housholds probably have a hunting rifle.

So I don't understand what the world is imagining about gun cultures. That idea is so fucking stupid that it doesn't deserve the long answer I just gave it.

On my other question. The meta. How did both of our closing paragraphs above serve to solve the problem of world peace? Hwo did it get better gun control into our communities?

BTW. In MN if you want to buy a gun you need to obtain a permit to purchase from the Sheriff. Then you go to the gun store, after about a week (they are freaky fast for this kind of like JimmyJohns), and they do a background check. FBI background check. Then you get your federally registered gun. Essentially you get a one year state license to purchase a firearm. If you are known to be mentally ill then you do not get a gun.

If you want to carry it you go through a process that takes about three weeks or more. You get trained and tested then get a permit that is only valid if you stay squeaky clean and don't drink any alcohol. You get a card that essentially a state license to carry.

Cito di Pense wrote:

aban57 wrote:Why do you still need to have this explained to you ?

Because of your death grip. You're not American, as far as I can tell, so you may be getting a kick out of bashing American firearms lobbies and legislation. American gun violence doesn't affect you nearly as much as suicide bombings and vehicular mayhem do, and those get condemned, too. To figure out the process that led to that sad state of affairs, contact your own legislators.

I'm not counter-protesting here because I love firearms. I am uncomfortable around firearms and would be loath to carry one myself, because I'm feeling a bit suicidal these days. I'm not feeling suicidal because my life is crummy, either. But I'm sick almost to death of ground apes and their incessant finger-wagging.

aban57 wrote:Ban people who have mental health issues from having a gun.

When you figure out how to implement this shit, I will applaud, because then you should be a legislator, too. Where I live, every resident is registered, and so they might be able to identify such people from public records, but I still see people sleeping in doorways, and they may not be registered, which is the tip of some kind of iceberg, and public safety is the Titanic.

I'm scared to death of guns. One of the reasons is the one you mention. I am also scared to death of standing on a ledge. Also really fucking scared of set mouse traps for some reason.

A gun is like a mousetrap only much louder, smokier, and it's element of unleashed destruction much much faster and damaging.

That standing on the ledge thing that happens to us all is a bit of a human condition. We can imagine actions and these things are so fucking easy to do that we hardly trust ourselves not to jump or pull that trigger.

It is precisely this fear and paranoia about danger that every gun owner needs to be trained in if he doesn't have it already by nature. Fortunately this same kind of imaginative paranoia makes you want to have a gun for protection in the first place.

SpeedOfSound wrote:It is precisely this fear and paranoia about danger that every gun owner needs to be trained in if he doesn't have it already by nature. Fortunately this same kind of imaginative paranoia makes you want to have a gun for protection in the first place.

Hey, I fired a rifle on a range at summer camp and had no problems. I was eleven years old or something. But there have been fewer weird experiences for me than firing a few rounds out of a hand cannon at some beer cans a couple dozen meters away. There were five or six of us in the quarry, and I liked those guys, so even though I could have, I didn't turn around and wave the gun at them.

I don't know how anyone develops that sense if they don't do it while they're young. By the time you're older, a gun is not a magical thing. Just a deadly thing.

I don't want a gun for protection. I'm so world-weary, I sometimes wish something would come along and kill me, hopefully not too slowly. At this point, I'm too old to die young. A lot of people my age kill themselves, usually with firearms, because they had it good in younger years and acutely feel it all slipping away. Maybe you could say they got fed up.

The nicest thing about owning guns is knowing that I have the means for a quick exit if necessary. Well, assuming I don't stroke out or dement or otherwise lose the capability to do so. Ain't gonna be pretty for whoever cleans up the mess, but I've promised Mrs. Lak I'll do it in the garden where she can just use a hose. The second nicest thing is knowing I have the means for someone else's quick exit if necessary. Subject to the same constraints as above.

Registration and licensing, sure, why not? The oliphant in the room is how you gonna find all those pre-background check ones? Now, the Feds claim they don't keep those background check records, but I'm skeptical, so they know about two of mine (plus there's the concealed carry license). The others aren't on anyone's list. I've no idea how many of the estimated 300+ million firearms in the U.S. fall into the same category, but I'm betting it's a substantial percentage. With approximately 125 million households in the U.S., how you going to find them? House to house serach? Somehow I can't see them looking in every septic tank or tearing up every couch. I've heard suggestions that we restrict ammo sales to only registered owners, but that's a bit of a red herring too. I'm not considered even an entry-level gun nut by my true gun nut acquaintances, but I've got several thousand rounds of ammunition stashed. Some of them have, literally, 10s of thousands of rounds. All with no records of any kind. No matter how you slice it you're not getting rid of them easily, particularly since most of the aforementioned true gun nuts would go out in a hail of bullets, taking a few Gestapo ATF agents with them.

As long as there is the Second Amendment and the NRA there will be no successful attempt to truly limit gun ownership
in America. With one gun for every man and woman and child it could not be regulated anyway. So the only way it shall
ever change is if the American people decide that it is time for one but that is not going to be happening any time soon

We have been through this over and over. Other countries do not have a problem.

Step 1- registration of all firearms. After a deadline all unregistered firearms are illegal. Voluntary hand-in of any you do not want to bother registering. Immediate reduction.

Step 2 - ramp up the requirements to a standard national level for licencing, purchase and transfer of ownership. Continue with voluntary hand-in. Hold an occasional amnesty day for hand-in of unregistered firearms, no questions asked.

1&2 by themselves will lead to a massive reduction, firearms will no longer be inheritable without application for licence and registration, people will be responsible for the whereabouts of all their registered firearms. Any firearms found by police (in the course of their normal duties) will be verifiable and traceable, or destroyed as unregistered. Those who want to retain firearms will be able to as long as they go through the process, and do not have a disqualifying history - such as a previous conviction for a violent offence. The hassle involved with sale of a firearm may also radically reduce private sales and hence ownership.

Not rocket science, no need to come up with nonsense like "With one gun for every man and woman and child it could not be regulated anyway", that's crap, the onus is on the owners to register, hand in, or hold illegally and risk prosecution any time it comes to light. What use is a firearm you can't use legally to a law abiding owner?

A step in the right direction leads to a reduction, and the spin-off benefits begin. National search and seizure has never been attempted anywhere I have ever heard of, and would never be proposed by anyone, that's a smokescreen scare tactic by gun nuts.

zulumoose wrote:We have been through this over and over.

No, what we've done is waved our hands at the problem, which is why it's so easy for you to say so wearily how many times we've been over this.

So if you want to get beyond that, quit waving your hands at the problem and show how much you know about US society and government. For example, explain what kind of agency should handle this universal registration. I can imagine something like the motor vehicles departments, which are run state by state, and I start to giggle uncontrollably. One of those is enough for most USians, even the ones you wouldn't call 'gun nuts'.

USians are rightfully wary of the creation of agencies to regulate recreation, even dangerous recreation. The US created the Department of Homeland Security to prevent terrorist activity (mainly in air travel) and it does pretty well, but most USians (and lots of folks from elsewhere) do dread going through airport security in the US. That's what you get when you create a big agency to handle a big problem in the US.

When you do give the design for such an agency, and it contains even the tiniest evidence of insight on your part, I will applaud, because I am skeptical of many excuses people give for owning firearms beyond saying it feels good to them to own (and use) a gun responsibly. Some of the excuses head in the direction of resistance to what I've tried to explain to you about massive US bureaucracies. Regulation is not a bad thing, per se, but the US fucks it up badly every other time they try it.

I can imagine something like the motor vehicles departments, which are run state by state, and I start to giggle uncontrollably

Yet does there exist a situation where the car ownership and driver's licence is so different from state to state that it is possible to legally own a car and drive it on a major freeway/interstate in one state but not another?

Is it possible for a U.S. citizen to own a passport which is more or less valid than the passport he would hold if he lived in another state?

zulumoose wrote:
Not rocket science no need to come up with nonsense like With one gun for every man and woman and child it could not be regulated anyway that is crap the onus is on the owners to register hand in or hold illegally and risk prosecution any time it comes to light. What use is a firearm you cant use legally to a law abiding owner

And what about those who have illegal weapons and have absolutely no intention of registering them? Do you really think
that professional criminals are going to be deterred by the risk of prosecution for something as minor as non registration?

And what about those who have illegal weapons and have absolutely no intention of registering them? Do you really think
that professional criminals are going to be deterred by the risk of prosecution for something as minor as non registration?

Fewer guns flooding society results in fewer guns in the hands of criminals. More careful owners due to added responsibility results in fewer guns in the hands of criminals. Responsibility of reporting theft or loss results in fewer guns in the hands of criminals. Ability of the police to check registration and easily identify and confiscate results in fewer guns in the hands of criminals.

Carrying an unregistered firearm can be made a very serious offence, once awareness and registration is universal.
https://www.new-york-lawyers.org/new-york-criminal-possession-of-a-firearm-ny-pl-265-01-b-1.html Apparently it is a 4 year sentence in New York.

In the U.K minimum sentence was 5 years in 2004, and is apparently on the increase.

zulumoose wrote:

I can imagine something like the motor vehicles departments, which are run state by state, and I start to giggle uncontrollably

Yet does there exist a situation where the car ownership and driver's licence is so different from state to state that it is possible to legally own a car and drive it on a major freeway/interstate in one state but not another?

Is it possible for a U.S. citizen to own a passport which is more or less valid than the passport he would hold if he lived in another state?

Passports are federal. It can take weeks to turn one around on renewal; if you don't think gun registrations should be time-limited and renewable, you should say why. People's capacities to handle motor vehicles and firearms can both improve and degrade. My point is not simply that systematic registration would be state by state, not a problem by itself, but would vary in how stringent might be the qualifications for ownership. The point is that bureaucracies like state motor vehicles departments fuck things up regularly, costing users of their services in many ways, not just financially. Nevertheless, please go ahead, and design your dream bureaucracy, and make sure it's suitable for US clients. Your proposal so far shows some ignorance of the society for which you're prescribing it, such as your ideas about US passports.

I'm not defending the way gun ownership is handled in the US at present, but if you propose fixing it, please know what you're about, or is this just more anonymous advice handed out on the internet? If all you want to do is discuss the problem, I'm all ears, but your post went well beyond that with your Stage 1 and Stage 2 stuff.

Your proposal so far shows some ignorance of the society for which you're prescribing it, such as your ideas about US passports.

It was you who implied that firearm registration would be done state by state

like the motor vehicles departments

. My question about licence validity and passports was to query whether those are valid examples of things that can be done to a nationally accepted standard and still work. Apparently they are, so why the uncontrollable giggling? Seems like I have made my point.

What the government can't do, insurance companies can. Make proof of insurance required to have a gun in your possession or within your property. The insurance companies will make it so damn expensive to own a gun, no one will bother.

Prosecutions will be for violation of the POI law and not for gun ownership, thus skirting 2nd amendment protections. I would also make it a civil, not criminal, violation, allowing impounding of the fire arm until POI is obtained.

scott1328 wrote:What the government can't do, insurance companies can. Make proof of insurance required to have a gun in your possession or within your property. The insurance companies will make it so damn expensive to own a gun, no one will bother.

Prosecutions will be for violation of the POI law and not for gun ownership, thus skirting 2nd amendment protections. I would also make it a civil, not criminal, violation, allowing impounding of the fire arm until POI is obtained.

But that would mean that only well regulated militias could afford them! How is that within the 2nd Amendment?!!????!!!

Oh wait...

scott1328 wrote:What the government can't do, insurance companies can. Make proof of insurance required to have a gun in your possession or within your property. The insurance companies will make it so damn expensive to own a gun, no one will bother.

Prosecutions will be for violation of the POI law and not for gun ownership, thus skirting 2nd amendment protections. I would also make it a civil, not criminal, violation, allowing impounding of the fire arm until POI is obtained.

Has that been tried anywhere else? It certainly looks good on paper.

Cito di Pense wrote:

scott1328 wrote:What the government can't do, insurance companies can. Make proof of insurance required to have a gun in your possession or within your property. The insurance companies will make it so damn expensive to own a gun, no one will bother.

Prosecutions will be for violation of the POI law and not for gun ownership, thus skirting 2nd amendment protections. I would also make it a civil, not criminal, violation, allowing impounding of the fire arm until POI is obtained.

Has that been tried anywhere else? It certainly looks good on paper.

I thought I was terribly clever with this idea, but alas, apparently the question has been mooted before.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/should-pe ... their-guns

What I know for sure, is that neither the GOP nor the Dems actually want to solve the gun problem. It gets too many one-issue voters on their side.