Age limits for buying semiautomatic weapons and bump-stock bans are adequate. Throwing people who seem “off” into mental hospitals is correct.
I am no fan of our current president by any means so I am not coming to his defence. However when he has been criticized, rightfully, for making use of scare tactics about a rising tide of violent crime in America, it is somewhat strange to see one of his critics use the words 'epidemic of gun violence to further criticize him.
There is either an epidemic of violence or there isnot. You can't have it both ways to make a point.
"A social studies teacher barricaded himself inside a classroom at a Georgia high school on Wednesday and fired a handgun" Comments?
MASS SHOOTING. Thinking about Parkland? Not the Everytown study in the article; for 2015:
• The shooter (S) fired at a recruitment center; killed 5 injured 2. Suicide (D)
• S entered a residence & fatally shot 2 girls (G), an adult male (M), & an adult female (F) & injured a child (C)
• S killed 9 people at the Emanuel AME Church.
• S killed a M, the M’s daughter, & 2 other victims inside the M’s home; shot & injured a 16-y/o G
• S killed his wife & their 3 C (1,4, & 5) in home; set the house on fire, D
• Rival biker gangs…shootout… 9 bikers were killed & 18 others were injured. Police fired on bikers.
• S fatally shot his parents, brother, niece, in the family’s home; D
• S fatally shot mother, 2 brothers, & a sister-in-law at home; D
• S killed a F, a cousin, her 18 y/o son, & a friend of the family at mom’s home
• S went door to door, shooting & killing 4 of his cousins & shooting 4 unrelated neighbors, killing 3; D
• S went to the home where his ex-wife lived & fatally shot her, their 9 & 7 y/o sons, ex-wife’s boyfriend; shot & injured 2 other C; D
• S killed his wife, mother-in-law, father-in-law, & a teenage family friend in home; S also strangled & killed his stepdaughter.
• S killed 4 young men while they were in a parked car on the street. Police say at least 4 guns were involved in the incident & 2 guns were recovered inside the car.
Only 1 involved an assault rifle.
Mental illness & evil are factors above. Changing gun laws will affect neither.
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The author doesn't mention large capacity magazines. Large capacity magazines significantly increase a shooter’s ability to injure and kill large numbers of people quickly because they enable the individual to fire repeatedly without needing to reload. The time required to reload can be critical in enabling victims to escape and law enforcement or others to intervene. Magazines were limited to 10 rounds under the previous assault weapons bans. This limit should be brought back. Additionally any modification to increase the rate of fire (bump stock and the like) should be banned. To ban semi-automatic weapons doesn't seem to accomplish the purpose and would seem to include banning things like semi-auto shot guns, whose magazines, in general, only hold 5 rounds, and can only hold 3 rounds if used for waterfowl hunting
How have we come to read in the 2nd things that never were there?
* Expanding its reach to states and municipalities (and private owners). It's understandable that Federal law cannot restrict ownership and carry of firearms because they are needed by State. But how did we get tgat States cannot restrict? I know, they say, the 14th. But the context is widely different. Further, if my police station can post "no firearms inside this building", how/why can't my city post "no firrarms within city limits"? My state?
* Nowhere was ammunition mentioned because when the 2nd was written one could make one's own. Why cant that ingredient be banned (but not the DIY kits, maybe; takes time to accumulate enough rounds, etc.)
I would think that logic would result in the Feds not having any gun control laws, at all. States and below do what they want. Doesn't restrict interstate commerce if properly used.
Include licensing and inspection, just like cars - at the state level. Feds have no say.
Too simple, sure. Have a shot. Oh, alcohols are regulated; too bad. Have a 2nd.
So true, so true. We MUST demand gun control that includes getting ALL guns off the streets. We MUST use OUR ammunition: the power of the vote, and the power of the wallet.
The NRA (Not Real Americans) has a stranglehold on all Republicans and a few Democrats. Vote them out of office and starve the NRA.
I hold the NRA and its political enablers for the problems we are facing today and find it extremely ironic to hear their champions propose solutions that completely defy its and their own policies, such as preemptive institutionalization, as if there existed the means or even the "institutions", something that ended in the Reagan era, to seriously consider such a crackpot proposal.
I don't think the majority of Americans are aware of the extent of the NRA's toxic influence on legislation and legislators, including warring against ATF with disinformation campaigns, successfully lobbying to prevent doctors from bringing up gun ownership and congress to study gun violence and that's a very abbreviated list. You wonder why cops can't just confiscate guns from dangerous people or why people on the no fly list are free to buy any weapon they want, again, thank the NRA.
Then there are the hypocrites in congress who reliably come out to discuss mental illness as they pass grotesquely top heavy tax cuts and slash social services that might possibly help to deal with people living on edge in every sense of the word. Talk about doing everything but face problems head on and you have exactly the kind of perfect storm we are seeing with the inane level of gun violence and mass murders taking place in this country. Shame on all of them.
Then there are the legi
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Andrew, I agree 150%. This awful thing like arming teachers says allot about our society and none of it is good. Your right about the fact that there are too many guns in America. No person needs a semi-automatic weapon or fully automatic weapon. It's time to ban them. Also bump stocks or any other lethal and insane invention that allows one person with one gun to be a mass murderer. Why are people allowed to carry concealed weapons? If they are that afraid then they brought it on themselves in this out-of-control gun. culture that we should be ashamed of.
Interesting stats if you look them up on the FBI site. Murder rates/ 100,000 in the U.S. 1960- 5.0, 1970- 7.89, 1980- 10.24, 1990- 9.45, 2000- 5.5, 2016- 5.3. Now I ask you were there more semi-auto handguns and AR-15s in circulation in the 70s and 80s and 90s than in 2005-2016? Property crime rates/ 100,000 in U.S.. 1960- 1726, 1970- 3625, 1980- 5333, 1990- 5080, 2000- 3622, 2016- 2446. Rapes/ 100,000 in U.S. 1960- 9.6, 1970- 18.7, 1980- 36.9, 1990- 41.3, 2000- 32.0, 2016- 29.6.
So make the argument again that the proliferation of semi-auto handguns and "assault rifles" over the last 15 years has had a devastating effect on crime, assault and murder in America. Because I could look at these stats and make the argument that the decline in the core family and general morals in the country that came after the 60s had more of an effect and the proliferation of weapons in the hands of law abiding citizens since 2000 has helped counteract the trend of the previous 30 years. And I could also make the case from these stats that what we need is more women NRA certified and trained to carry a concealed handgun to protect themselves against would be rapist.
In many cases of mass murder families and friends report that the gunman never gave any indication of mental illness. This could be because we humans can keep our serious mental or emotional problems well hidden or because family or friends tend to be unaware of what constitutes a serious problem.
We see efforts to educate the public about the signs of heart disease etc. etc. But aside from some ads for antidepressants and one ad recently for manic illness I don't recall any public service type ads showing us how difficult it can be to spot the early onset of psychosis.
Perhaps a PBS documentary series on various mental illnesses could be of some help. Maybe David Attenborough could narrate.
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The problem is that too many irresponsible or criminal people or crazy people can and do get guns, and do kill. And a lot of other people kill themselves with guns
But the truth is that the American people as a whole, both democrats and republicans, are unwilling to give up any of the rights they have in order to make the country safer. They value personal freedom over the collective good of the country
That’s who we are. And we are decades and maybe forever away from changing that.
Maybe we should have gun purchasers sign an affidavit that says “I recognize that in exercising my right to buy this gun I am contributing to the deaths of thousands of people a year. And I don’t care”
Justice Scalia repeatedly said that the reason the US allows all citizens to have guns and to carry them was because we had jointly decided that we can trust our fellow citizens to have guns. That trust is wavering a bit. But at least until the boomers die out there is insufficient will to make meaningful change. Get over it
How dumb are we as a country to not understand that it's the guns. Everything being discussed is secondary. Mental health and the other things are all problems - that are made lethal when guns are added to the mix.
Unjustified police shootings & black lives matter: made worse by guns
Road rage: guns
Drug/gang conflict: guns
Home or business robbery: guns
Bar fights: guns
Domestic disputes: guns
School conflict: guns
Suicide: guns
Mental illness: guns
Workplace grudges: guns
On and on and on.
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All you have said here is true, rational and cogent. There is o important thing missing. Where is the passion, the rage, the calling out of stupidity in appropriate terms? As long as anti gun advocates are more worried about being measured, proper, and not willing to insult anybody, they will always just be whispers in an empty stadium.
People keep trying to solve "guns" as the issue when what's really most upsetting people is "massacres with guns." We can solve the massacre problem, particularly in schools, a long time before we can solve all the other problems involving guns and their misuse.
It's a lot like trying to address exploding cars, people dying needlessly for lack of seat belts in cars, underage driving, drunk driving, driving on bald tires, and texting while driving all at the same time before we address any of them sepraately. In real life, we started with putting seat belts in cars and moved on to recalling cars that explode or suffer from other major defects.
Let's solve the problem we can solve and then move on to the others.
I would think it would be in President Trump's self-interest not have people committed for being a little odd.
The NRA terrorizes politicians, everyday citizens, and even its own members with constant warnings of doom. They are in effect a ‘terrorist’ organization, if you will. Maybe we should expand the war on terror a bit further. After all, our ‘well regulated militia’ kills way more Americans than do international terrorists.
Sorry Mr. Rosenthal but having worked in acute psychiatric settings for many year as a psychiatric occupational therapist, I can attest to the fact that one of the major problems in this country with securing adequate services for a person who is having an acute psychiatric break (or is descending further into dementia) is usually not related to the family or loved one's concerns for unwarranted incarceration of that individual by nefarious authorities or a scheming psychiatric team, but rather the sad case of an individual who is not aware that he or she is starting to lose their minds and needs to be in a longer term type treatment setting to get well.
The process of securing a locked treatment setting for an individual who may not be capable of making that decision or is floridly psychotic and dangerous (like a the gunmen who just killed those innocent children at Parkland H.S.) is currently hugely complicated, and sometimes can be frustratingly arduous and ineffective for staff, family and law enforcement personnel who may realize the danger that individual is presenting. I want to remind you that usually a person who is beginning to exhibit decompensating behavior or who is having violent fantasies about hurting others can usually keep it together for the normal 48 hr period that most states can hold them in a locked facility against there will (without presenting legal charges or a firm example of violent tendencies to hurt themselves or others, to a judge).
That is true. More often than not the patient is at best 302’d, sending the patient back on the streets, just when family and institutions such as the university a patient attends, is least capable of caring for him or her.
The holding period really needs to be extended for a period beyond 72 hours, based on a thorough assessment by the attending psychiatrist and adjudication panel.
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The Soviet Union also had gun control.
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Most countries, democratic or not, have gun control.
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So, again, assuming all of the semi-automatic guns in citizens' possession right now were banned, how would you propose going about getting them? Are you confident that they would be eagerly and willingly turned in? What would be the social impact of doing so? It would be huge and terrifying, with major loss of life across this country. This is not a small matter that can just be tossed aside.
Could someone at the Times please address the idea from David French at the National Review (other have also talked about it) of a Gun Violence Restraining Order?
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There is a gun for nearly very man, woman and child in the country. Are we any safer? More guns are not needed. Limited access is.
Please, gun enthusiasts, stop peddling that rubbish about the right to bear arms. You have that right. It's not being taken away. The militia part of the Amendment is intact. It is the "well-regulated" part that needs attending. The people who are opposed to guns also have rights. Not to live in fear simply by living in the United States. We have a right to make sure those who claim they cannot live without a gun will not hinder our right not to be killed by one.
That is where the "well-regulated" part comes in. Other First World nations deal with their citizens right to own a gun without banning them, just making it awful hard to get one.
The US needs national standards implemented. It cannot possibly enforce the laws of 50 states. That is as ridiculous as the days when each railroad has its own gauge of track. There would be no transcontinental rail transportation if each state regulated the railroad. In similar fashion, we cannot enforce gun laws according to each state. Guns can be easily transported through interstate commerce.
Something can be done. It can be done now or later. The school kids of today are the adult voters of the future. Compromise with them now, or pay the consequences of their obstruction later.
DD
Manhattan
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If "throwing people who have not committed a crime into mental hospitals" is objectionable -- and make no mistake, I agree it is -- how do you rate "throwing people who have not committed a crime onto a secret government list whose members have different civil rights from everyone else"?
If we're making Soviet comparisons, please do include the idea that you can be denied air travel because a neighbor anonymously dropped a dime on you. Or are you okay with that?
I'm mentally ill; Donald Trump is CRAZY.
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If we believe something is off with an elected official, can we expect him/her to be nabbed and thrown into a padded room? Just wondering.
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Guns do not kill people, people using guns kill people, trite, yet true.
Mr. Cruz was not caught by any tripwire. THAT is insane. The school failed. The police responded to his home repeatedly and did not escalate effectively. Social Services did not find a way to help him, but justified NOT helping him. Not arguing for Cruz’ institutionalization, but with his record of documented occurrences, maybe 5-10% of his bad acts overall, there was an overabundance of fact-based and demonstrable cause that could be articulated such that a tripwire to stop his decline should have been effective. We really do need to focus on that. He could have acted out in some other manner and killed 17 people without a gun. Car at dismissal?
Now people are very willing to opine on 45s mental condition on the regular. Does ANYONE think Cruz is not mentally ill? NOT saying he is criminally insane, a different standard, but he is assuredly mentally ill.
I have looked at the sources cited in the NYT. They are invariably unreliable and misused by writers. Cherry-picking most often. Consider Teens Shot http://www.gunviolencearchive.org/teens-injured?page=10 look over the “sources” (BTW the database is unsearchable). Drive by shootings. Teenagers shot in groups by other teens. WAY TOO MANY teens who do not know how they got shot (telling would get them killed). All this points to gang-related criminality.
In the Everytown source, 44% of the killers committed suicide, how is this not mental illness?
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I am a Constitution Originalist.
Let's go back to the founding fathers.
Everybody can buy a musket.
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By banning bump stocks, 45 is throwing a bone to people who want sensible gun laws. This article begs the question, too, why didn't he suggest this after Las Vagas when a guy who probably qualified for AARP snapped. And that's what happens...people who pass for "normal" SNAP...and do horrible things. This guy gave no indication he was about to gather an arsenal and slaughter so many. The NRA is pulling 45's strings. I recently learned that Russia...yes, Russia, donated millions to the NRA and they, in turn, donated that money to 45's campaign. He owes them, Bigley.
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Mr. Rosenthal may have missed some of the bulletins. The teachers at Cruz's high school his tried to have him sent to another school with smaller classes and experience dealing with mental health problems. Multiple calls to the sheriff's office and to the FBI were ignored, In one of the warnings the person calling worried about a school shooting. In Colorado the psychiatrist who saw James Holmes warned law enforcement. Nothing was done. At VPI the soon to be killer was under a court order to have mental evaluation. He didn't. Instead he bought a gun. The laws have been changed there correct the reporting problems. The Navy Yard killer had a history of mental illness. Even Charles Whitman had a history of mental illness. To talk about involuntary commitment is just a deflection. That isn't even a suggestion. It is reporting those that shouldn't get their hands on a gun. It is following through with a thorough evaluation when a warning comes in to law enforcement. In an ordinary citizens world, what the FBI didn't do could be seen as negligent homicide. Because of negligence by the FBI people died. They had the information and the authority but didn't use either. This is also what happened in Boston when the Russians had warned them at least twice that the soon to be bombers were dangerous. Nothing happened and people died.
This back and forth about mental illness is a red herring for the right to hide behind while claiming to "do something". Most research I've seen shows that those with mental health problems are more likely to be the victims of violence, not the perpetrators. Can anyone argue that a person who CHOOSES to acquire an AR-15, arm themselves to the hilt, and then proceed to slaughter random fellow citizens is NOT mentally ill?! It would seem to me that the action precludes being mentally healthy. Most of these shooters slip through life acting "normal" until they don't; and then all hell breaks loose. Locking up anyone who displays abnormal behaviors won't solve a thing besides providing profits to what we all know would be privatized mental health institutes. It's the same mentality that exists around prisons and immigrant detention centers - now that corporations are profiting from providing these services, we've got to keep a stream flowing in no matter what. And honestly, if we take this Parkland situation specifically, the perpetrator's "mental health" issues were practically slapping officials upside the head, begging for action and no one did anything. Who is the most mentally ill - the man with the gun? The officials who repeatedly ignored all pleas to intervene with said man with gun? Or the society that tolerates such an extreme worship of guns above any other right?
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You're confusing mental illness with evil, or freely making a truly awful choice.
what about for hunting? I'm in favor of tighter gun laws but I think law-abiding hunters would be a casualty. especially people who hunt small game - such as coyotes - and need a semi-auto rifle.
Luke, you don't need a semi-automatic to hunt.
And you sure don't need one to hunt coyotes, because you never get a second shot. Many who hunt them in woods favor a shotgun.
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Lol- my grandad certainly didnt need a military weapon to shoot a coyote in Texas. Lordy!
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Trying to find "the answer" or "the problem" is a foolish exercise. Their isn't just one answer but so many variables to sort out. The NRA stands on what they believe the 2nd Amendment says. However, even Justice Scalia in The Dist. of Columbia vs Heller reminds us that the right to bear arms is not unlimited..."it is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose..." "...prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons" he posits, is a good idea. There is more in the complete statement, but it is obvious that Scalia could not justify the current fanatical ideas of the NRA to be Constitutional.
Agreed that simply nabbing people and throwing them into asylums is a dizzying concept, yet when there are Anger Management problems it seems wise to address them. There are some psychological tests that can be administered, the MacArthur Violence Risk Assessment being one. There is still much work to be done in this area. Perhaps Dr. Carson would return his desk and support funding for more research, since much of this problem seems to reside among the HUD constituent. (sorry, couldn't resist that one) In any case, the funding for CDC studies in this area needs to be reinstated and until we have more information, it would be prudent to ban assault rifles of all ilks.
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As long as the Supreme Court mis-interprets the 2nd Amendment because of a little comma after the clause 'A well regulated militia', nothing will change.
At the time of the writing of the Constitution in 18th century language punctuation rules did not exist.
A comma was nilly willy inserted in texts where a speaker might make a little pause reading it.
It is time that our oh-so-learned members of the SCOTUS and Congress apply the 2nd Amendment to its original intent.
The Founders were strictly opposed to form a standing army after just having defeated one of the mightiest in the world with a people's army, aka Militia.
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A general comment here in reference to the source of what can only be seen as blood money.
There is no NRA any more, this was an organization that once supported sportspeople who hunted, shot targets, and skeet, had an interest in the history (and yes artistry) of firearms.
This is undoubtedly still representative of a significant part of their membership.
But at the top this is no longer the case, instead the organization now sells fear, fear of the 'other', fear of the 'government', all based on lies.
Perhaps if we instead changed their name to the 'National Radical Armsdealers' and enrolled them as the corporate financed lobbying group they are, we could then discuss them in real terms.
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I often wonder if there could be an alternate association of gun owners--the responsible ones who are not these frightening paranoid extremists. Perhaps then, people who enjoy hunting, skeet, and target shooting could be a reasonable group that would outnumber the scary radical lot.
You write, correctly that "The real problem is that there are far too many firearms in America — more than 300 million, according to Congress. They are too easy to obtain and they are becoming ever more lethal." Besides making them harder, if not impossible, to obtain why not tax them very heavily?
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The gun nuts keep saying that the more guns we have the safer we will be. The US has a far higher ratio of guns per 100,000 than any other country. Yet, your chance of being killed by a firearm in this country is vastly higher than in any other advanced country. If having more guns is supposed to make us safer, you'd think we would have the lowest ratio of gun deaths per 100,00 people, while the countries with very strict gun restrictions & little private ownership should be far more dangerous - yet the reverse is true. Even from state to state, the fewer restrictions a state puts on guns, the higher the ratio of deaths by gun. Also, each time a state has removed restrictions, gun deaths immediately climb while states that impose new gun restrictions almost always see significant drops in the ratio of gun deaths.
And now, Trump wants teachers armed with concealed carry handguns to counteract someone with a weapon of war & mass slaughter. Unless the teacher already has gun in hand, she is going to be the next target the moment she tries to get at it.
When SWAT teams storm an active shooter scene, ANYBODY holding a weapon is going to be shot on the spot, including teachers. Even if they do get their guns out, the teachers are more likely to kill kids than the shooter. In a real firefight, coursing adrenaline & other changes cause loss of fine motor control & the shots could go anywhere. To the shooter, anybody is a legitimate target - but not to the teachers.
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Unfortunately, we have a metastasizing "well regulated militia" arming itself at speed to foment rebellion, and they are the ones Wayne LaPierre is demagoguing.
This is not funny and I'm not making it up. A well known physicist who promotes climate science denial and has a chip on his shoulder threatened a friend of ours, who was born here but has oriental origins, explaining that "we are coming for you".
The Bundys, the various "militias", they regard themselves as patriots.
Trump has worked on them too, suggesting "second amendment solutions" if he is thwarted.
It's a well armed cult, and every time there is another shooting they go out and buy more high-powered rapid-fire guns and ammunition.
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Today I took my car in for an oil change, my old friend Gerry (since 1982) has solved every mechanical trouble and more. He's a hunter and has a few guns. He's also one of the kindest and most gentle and considerate people ever born.
He said: "I have one of those, but I'd gladly give it up" - an assault-type rifle. We agreed that it would be better not to have them around.
I bring in this story to explain that I have nothing against guns in the hands of people who are in the habit of considering and respecting other people and their lives.
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Several years ago, I was involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital here in Florida. First of all, there were no biological tests performed on my brain. It was just objective tests. I think it was the same way with the other patients too. So one can be misdiagnosed.
Although they got my diagnosis of major depression right, I actually had doubts about a teenager in there who was diagnosed as being dillusional. He was spaced out and socially awkward, but everything he said made sense.
Secondly, although this teenager was not violent at all, he was transferred to a long-term mental hospital, whereas another patient in there who had punched a staff worker in the stomach was released only about 4 days later.
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"...Rather, it is an example of the incoherent, insincere and inadequate ways in which the president and others on the right are suddenly claiming to be dedicated to addressing the nation’s epidemic of gun violence.
"They are playing a cynical game of misdirection."
I won't attempt to address "others on the Right" Mr. Rosenthal, but as for this President, based on his behavior since his teen days, and underscored by hundreds and thousands of statements and acts since, it's safe to simply say that his are not games of misdirection. Donald Trump IS this person, he does believe what he says, and he does live in the ir-reality he exhibits and speaks from and would impose on this nation.
If we were allowed to simply put people away because they are "a little off" Donald Trump would be a primary candidate for isolation.
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We need a new tool to use against the NRA that will comport with current SCOTUS rulings on the 2nd Amendment: nationwide state -- or better, federal -- laws requiring that ALL gun owners carry liability insurance. The market can decide how expensive it should be for a citizen to own the most risky vs. the least risky firearms, based on their age, health, training, and other factors. Public sector insurance firms will then likely require that guns and their owners and possibly their ammunition be registered (or on record, at least with the firms) and that owners are trained in gun safety (especially if they want lower rates). We treat cars and other dangerous tools this way, and SCOTUS' 2008 Heller decision supports "laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms." Mandatory liability insurance is a far harder type of law for the reactionaries to argue against -- don't they support the free market and big profits for the insurance industry? Improving mental health care to reduce gun violence is a red herring until such time as the reactionaries accept a federal single payer health insurance system, and legally "sane" people use guns to commit crimes every day. Raising the age at which you can buy a "tactical rifle" by three years won't meaningfully reduce gun violence, nor will banning rarities such as bump stocks. We need a set of serious restrictions that will work to control ALL guns under our current SCOTUS.
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Mr Trump repeatedly demonstrates the benefits of staying in school beyond the 4th grade. His understanding of the world around him, his depth of understanding, his bravado, his bullying, his lack of appreciation for the complexity of real life are all characteristics one would expect to find in a not very well adjusted boy in the 4th grade.
Any statement coming out of that orifice under his nose must be taken in that context lest they be treated as having any actual meaning rather than the poses of a little boy desperate for 'respect' and eager to demonstrate how "grown up" he is.
There is a reason that the US Constitution requires that the President has attained an age of (relative) maturity. A child's brain in the body of a 71 year old man is running the country and has control of the world's largest military as well as its nuclear arsenal.
smart.
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You insult children. He has always been selfish and greedy and enjoyed hurting people. He took that straight through military school and college. "Evil, be thou my good" is one path to "success" but when you're done, there's nothing there. Don't cut him slack: what he does is by intent.
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He did stay in school beyond fourth grade and he is over 35. What is your point?
Abolish the NRA in God’s name. It is an irreligious money making organization responsible for the murder of thousands of Americans. The 2nd Amendment does not sanction their criminal activities. Congressman taking money from the NRA
are as guilty of murder as the group itself and that includes Paul Ryan, a no account Christian and shameful Scoundrel who has dared to defend the NRA so that Wisconsin hunters can carry weapons of war merely to hunt deer. Necessary? I think not. Is he necessary? I think not. There is a good democratic candidate ready to replace this gun crazy loon.
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I understand wanting to ban the AR 15 because it is used in all these mass shootings, but that is like banning Dodge Challengers after some idiot drove one into a crowd in Charlottesville. Any semi automatic hunting rifle could do the same damage. Even a bolt action could, It might drop the carnage from 17 to 12, Maybe.
The problem is larger than the AR 15.
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Sorry, it really is not bigger than that. The he 2nd amendment doesn't guarantee your right to weapons of mass destruction. Ban assault rifles now.
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Wrong metaphor.
It is not like driving a car into a crowd. These kinds of excuses are not helpful.
Look at the wounds from this type of weapon- there is often no tissue to repair.
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Rosenthal's rational article is antithetical to the irrationality of the NRA, gun lobby, and legislators who are in their back pocket.
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The first person they should 'nab' and throw into a mental institution, should be Trump. He is clearly off his rockers.
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Listening to the NRA's high school grad Dana Loesch and the pip squeaking voice of Wayne LaPierre and their fact-free paranoia rants, a reasonable person would conclude they had gone mad. Where is the rubber room for them?
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Right, Kay, where are the critical voices that could skewer this college dropout, with her pouty face and nasty mouth?
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How many hundreds of gun-related deaths have occurred since Parkland two week’s ago? How many of those were children? The death odometer rolls on no matter what the chit chat du jour may be. Accepting crumbs for the issue at hand postpones a broader solution.
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I think I would argue that anyone interested in even buying an AR15 is, BY DEFINITION, a little mentally off.
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"...The risk is that the passage of a few partial measures will take our eyes off the bigger picture...
Two things, Andrew:
1. Spot on...Totally correct...On the side of the angels...
Poignant that we're the ones causing immigration issues here - too many young US residents crossing the river into Heaven these days, under cover of darkness...
2. In the good old days, your own NYT would ensure that we kept the bigger picture in view...
Imagine we're in 1955, and that Congress was proposing that blacks more than fifty years old didn't have to sit in the backs of public buses...Or that only the first three rows could be reserved for whites...I think your predecessors would've weighed in on such nonsense...
And bigly...
*ttps://www.nytimes.com/1955/12/06/archives/buses-boycotted-over-race-issue-montgomery-ala-negroes-protest.html
But do keep in mind, blacks still couldn't reside in Stuy-town at that time...
*ttp://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/22/nyregion/22stuyvesant.html
So, you do have to atone for some historical ancestral trepidation...
Mr Rosenthal has eloquently stated that the problem in America is that we have too many guns. That is certainly true. But that too misses the mark. The real problem in America today is the abandonment of intellect.
Our entertainment and social media society has abandoned rational, intellectual discourse. Unless we can restore in Americans ultimate respect and drive for the truth, regardless of its source, we can never address the problems that will are destroying our society. That has to start in our schools, teaching our youngsters how to distinguish between fact driven analysis and tribal opinions designed to present a phony version of the truth.
We can start by undertaking a comprehensive study of Guns in America. Can America’s elected officials muster the patriotism and national duty to authorize that study in the face of the NRA?
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Bump stock ban is not enough to stop the killing. Now, throw rifle slings and trigger guards in there and you have the problem solved, right, Wayne?
1
Age limit is a nothing-burger. Stop patting yourselves on your backs. Do the right thing--ban weapons of war.
4
If you want a really good example of smoke and mirrors, I would suggest the shameless dance of Sheriff Israel before the media and the nation, dissembling the mortal failures of his team and himself behind the facile demonization of the NRA and gun owners. What a piece of work!
2
I am for gun regulation. achieve our results. We need to change our tactics to achieve our goal. Let us adopt Paul Ryan who said that any rational gun owner should be able to his Second Amendment right. SO every gunseller should be required to verify that his gun customer is a law abiding citizen. So define exactily what law abiding means. Any signs of intentional or unintentional probability that a person will commit crime against society or himself should not be able to own oor buy a gun.
1
Sure. Committing people to mental hospitals when they have not committed a crime is wrong.
However, taking away people's right before they have committed a crime is no different.
So, you my friend, is a hypocrite.
1
Next proposal by Trump will probably be to use precogs (see Minority Report)
A well-written column - thank you.
What are the odds that Trump recently watched the Tom Cruise movie "Minority Report" before making his statement about nabbing people off the streets and placing them in mental hospitals in order to prevent future mass murders?
In such a scenario, though, he would be the first to go followed by Pence, McConnell, Ryan, Sessions, et. al. Hmm...gives one pause, does it not?
4
The old axiom suggests that we should not let Perfect get in the way of
Good Enough, but the NRA has turned this this general wisdom on its head.
The very idea that all human destructive behavior can be headed off before it manifests serves only one master, that arch-salesman for gun manufacturers. If we want achievable perfection
assault weapons are Perfectly identifiable and can be Perfectly dispatched to rubble. No need to lock it up, feed and house it indefinitely and unconstitutionally, and no need to pay for background checks.
Immediate assassination for all assault weapons would really be a manly thing to do.
"Banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians would be a better approach." That approach would never work. Even worse, attempting it might strengthen the resistance to gun control. A more feasible approach would be to ban the possession of high-capacity magazines which make mass slaughter possible. In my opinion, 10 round magazines should be the largest allowed. Larger ones should have to be surrendered to be destroyed, with the owner receiving compensation.
At least Rosenthal has the honesty to state what he wants, "Banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians would be a better approach." Too bad he doesn't pursue the idea a little further. How would that come about? Repeal the Second Amendment" Confiscate the millions of semiauto long guns & handguns?
1
The NRA isn't hampering gun safety in order for gun stores to make more money (OTOH, the Gun Owners of America is predominantly a lobby for the manufacturers & sellers). The current NRA is very different under Wayne LaPierre than before his little putch almost 30 years ago. Karl Frederick, NRA President in 1934, during congressional NFA hearings testified "I have never believed in the general practice of carrying weapons. I seldom carry one. ... I do not believe in the general promiscuous toting of guns. I think it should be sharply restricted and only under licenses." [wikipedia].
LaPierre is one of a large minority of conspiracy nuts who believe that our democratic government is really part of an international plot to disarm and enslave "Real Americans," a white, evangelical, Protestant, male-dominated country. Unfettered access to arms has nothing to do with personal safety in his mind - though it is a constant theme in NRA propaganda. He believes that he & his fellow extreme conspiracy nuts are going to have to fight a war against our government if the democratic process strays too far from the alt-right's view of what America should be. It is not the guns used in spree killings, suicides (by far the largest number of gun deaths), accidents (the second largest), or to protect yourself from the "bad guy with a gun," but the gun loonies' belief that they have to be ready to go to war against the rest of us at a moment's notice that is the biggest threat the NRA poses.
2
A quick google search of massacres 2009-2015 reveals that four of the first eleven shootings listed was a gunman that had illegally possessed firearms
https://everytownresearch.org/documents/2015/10/mass-shootings-analysis-...
Also, Trump's vetting process and putting people in a Soviet style rubber room are not the same thing.
Invention is the sincerest form of perjury.
The NRA tells Trump what to say and do about guns. The Russians very likely funneled money to Trump's campaign via the NRA (where is the audit?). He owes them bigly. Children, schools, teachers..the American People..not so much. This has nothing to do with Second Amendment rights..it has everything to do with providing excuses for the failure to keep weapons under a sane level of control. It is all about Corporate Greed!
3
Raising the age is a meaningless gesture. Biologically speaking, there's no difference between an 18 y/o brain and a 21 y/o brain. Psychology considers 18-22 years old to be late adolescence. If lawmakers were really serious about it, they'd make the age at least 25 and BAN ALL ASSAULT WEAPONS. #Neveragain #Enoughisenough.
1
How is it, that the gun industry, which represents less than 1% of the GDP, has effectively controlled the political environment for the past 50 years in the US? Think about it. Since the Nixon era, US politics has veered to the right thanks in no small part to conservative rallying points like gun control. America seems to have lost track of its goal of making a society better for all, while paying homage to our sacred guns.
2
the NRA and GOP has made the argument that any regulation is a dangerous slippery slope. I always countered by arguing that the slippery slope goes both ways. For example, the lose availability of guns will increase fatalities (it may reduce crime but it will make it more fatal). And arming teachers talk about another slippery slope; where does that end? Whom does society arm next. Also If we don't even do reasonable regulation of certain weapons than we will do unreasonable regulations of other things to make up for it. Like throwing innocent people into a mental hospital.
Gun rights are infringing on other people's rights most of them law abiding citizens. Having mental illness is not a crime. Even general threats of harm are not neccessarily a crime.
There is a meme going around about the options a parent takes when their kid beats someone with a stick. do you give everyone a stick, give certain adept kids sticks or do you take away the stick? With the NRA and GOP taking away the stick isn't an option.
Another costs that guns owners pass onto non gun owners is the cost to treat the victims. Very few private insurers pick it up, medicaid, hospitals, and social programs usually do. There absolutely should be a requirement of insurance for each gun owned. The external costs of guns everywhere is an expensive tab for non gun owners to pick up; besides owning insurance is the responsible thing to do.
1
What I find interesting is the fact that, when looking at the prevalence of mental health disorders across the world, there is not a big variation in the rates between the US and other countries. Yet, when mass shootings happen, everyone seems to point the finger at mental health as the issue. However, the number of mass shootings is far greater in the US than in other countries. What does the US have that other countries don't, then? Access to guns.
The other thing about this issue that grabs my attention is the hypocritical stance by Republicans. First, they support the right to own guns. When mass shootings happen, they blame mental health and say more needs to be done to help those with mental health disorders. However, after Trump took office with Republican control of congress, the first item on their agenda was to attempt to repeal and replace the ACA, a program that provided insurance for millions of Americans that did not have it previously. How are we supposed to diagnose those with mental health illnesses if they do not have insurance and thus don't go to the doctor because of the inability to pay? Without insurance, how would they afford any medication that may help them control their mental health?
Is this article states, it's all smoke and mirrors to distract until something else grabs the attention of the American public while no, or very little, action is taken on gun control.
3
Cognitive dissonance is big with Republicans and a specialty of Donald Trump.
Did banning illegal drugs end drug abuse? As long as there are black markets, internet instructions for making bombs, and trucks to drive into crowds, mass killings will remain possible. We need to promote prevention, civility and respect for human life.
1
This is not an excuse. If you would like to shoot military wares, you need to join our armed forces.
You will notice that a military base is one of the most gun-controlled spaces around.
"Civility" would not have made Mr. Cruz not buy a military rifle. "Respect for human life" can be manifested by good and reasonable America Law.
Not having access, having a background check, having to have a waiting period and having a cross-check to the 30 or so complaints about Cruz would have 17 people alive right now.
There's a difference - maybe too subtle for Mr. Rosenthal to recognize - between denying a gun to someone about which there is any question and throwing someone who is "off" into a mental hospital. Doctors work under the promise "First do no harm." Gun sellers (both registered dealers and private sellers) should do the same. The seller of any gun - rifle, shotgun or pistol) - or ammunition should be responsible for performing a background check on the purchaser. Better to deny a worthy person a gun for a time than allow a gun sale to someone bent on mass murder. What's missing is a discussion of due process for correction of error. Someone denied a gun purchase should have a standardized, simple and quick process for presenting an evidence-based case for redress. This proposal would not take guns away from anyone nor present an undue burden on sellers of firearms and ammunition. A few dozen innocent victims prevented each year might be thanks enough for implementation.
Great synopsis thank you. "I’m not bringing this up to suggest that Trump is a disciple of Snezhnevsky, despite his bizarre affinity for Kremlin autocracy, or merely to point out that the president was once again making things up. Rather, it is an example of the incoherent, insincere and inadequate ways in which the president and others on the right are suddenly claiming to be dedicated to addressing the nation’s epidemic of gun violence.
They are playing a cynical game of misdirection"
And so blatant and gleeful about it.
Meanwhile real things are happening like the judicial attack on union fees for union services - Trumps declarations in response to the parkland massacre may as well be fake news - yet again drowning the real news out
All of the points in this letter are points I made last week when I sent a letter to my Republican Senator, telling him that as an Independent registered voter, I would never vote for anyone who takes one cent from the NRA. In order to enact changes, we need to stand with the teenagers in Parkland who have been so impacted by this tragedy. We need to let our politicians know that we will hit them where it hurts in November (the ballot box). Now if someone would just take the necessary measures to protect us from gerrymandering and Russian interference....
2
The odd thing about this article is just that it tells the truth. This begs the question of why smart people are left to argue against contortions of realty. In truth this is an old story. Even Copernicus was criticized for pointing out that the sun, and not the earth, was the center of the solar system. Calculations are so much easier when starting with the right assumptions, and not ones that are tethered to the sinister interests of others.
There are too many guns too easily and it is 100% clear that some gun owners are going to kill. That has been proven so it is a given at this point. In particular young men who buy assault weapons should automatically be looked at as suspect. There is no other way to see this. But once this type of transaction looks in any way "normal" society is taking too much risk.
But, where the author is wrong, however, is in arguing that few killers are mentally ill. In fact, every killer is a sociopath, which is a mental health problem. We are not going to ban guns, at least not yet, so the concern is that you have to figure out a reasonable way to reduce the riskiest buyers. You have to talk about how to identify those potentially at risk. This is not easy and you will necessarily scoop up some reasonable people as you try to find true killers. The key here is not to deny, but to insist that the right tells us HOW THEY ARE GOING TO DO THIS a priori. It means very strict definitions and taking away the rights of some sane people.
The NRA is a gun manufacturers' lobby, not a gun owners' lobby. Everything they do is designed to maximize market size and profit for manufacturers, and rock-ribbed anti-gun-control citizens are duped into carrying NRA water with all their bleating about the second amendment. That very foundational point too often gets lost in the blizzard of commentary and social media blather.
1
People are looking for any way to stop killings except dealing with why people need guns. People don't buy guns to show their belief in the second amendment. Some do it for hunting, the rest must have some fear or insecurity, since if they are not hunting, the gun is being used to make them feel secure. In the old West, the six gun was called the "great equalizer", today it is the AR 15. Whether it is an honest person or a criminal, the gun is acquired to give the person confidence where it is lacking. The President and NRA play on the great undefined fears to move their people to action. We slowly have made cars safer, reduced smoking, made certain drugs illegal all to protect people from themselves. When will the death toll from guns, now about 25,000 to 30,000, be painful enough for something to happen to protect us from ourselves.
2
Wonderful column, thank you. All of this is a colossal distraction from the fact that there is access to military-style semi-automatic weaponry when there shouldn't be.
The NRA is, I believe, composed of about 5 million people; though there are, according to Pew, about 14 million people who claim to be members who aren't, so one assumes that the extra 9 million just support their ideas. That isn't that many people, but politicians are afraid of them because of a) the money they donate, but more importantly, b) they are fervent in their beliefs and tend to be single-issue voters. Politicians and the NRA are assuming that proponents of sensible gun control will be less fervent and also that the furor will die down-until the next horrific shooting.
Gun control advocates wildly outnumber NRA supporters and yet, somehow they always win. So, the clear lesson here for people that care about gun control is to become fervent single issue voters.
Boycott FedEx. Demand to know what other airlines offer discounts to NRA members. Why should my full-price parcel or airline ticket price go to subsidize NRA members? And if a candidate accepts one thin dime of NRA blood money, vote for his/her opponent. Period.
I have always felt that single-issue politics led to bad governance and increased political polarization, which is bad for everyone. But the lesson is clear.
Give no quarter. This is a public health emergency. Don't be distracted. And for heaven's sake, vote.
3
The student spokespersons from Stoneman Douglas High School are highly motivated and articulate spokespersons. If they can maintain their focus and keep their message simple, they have a rare opportunity to effect change in America's gun ownership regulation. Many issues being discussed, such as mental health issues, 2nd Amendment rights, ownership age, and gun registration loopholes are secondary issues that just cloud the discussion. The fundamental question to be addressed is "Where do we draw the line for weapons that American citizens may legally purchase under the 2nd Amendment?" For example, should we be allowed to legally buy rocket propelled grenades (RPGs), rocket launchers, hand grenades, and semi-automatic and fully automatic weapons. Or, should some or all of those weapons be designated as outside the intent of the 2nd Amendment and therefore be illegal to buy or at least be very, very, very closely regulated and controlled from here on? None of these are hunting weapons used by any rational wild game hunter in my experience.
5
The NRA and their political henchmen are complicit in the deaths of 36,000 Americans per year. Mass murderers to be precise. But their henchmen just make a fuss about DACA kids and illegal immigration as a distraction.
9
Sure, don’t blame the shooters.
Are deaths during mass shootings going to go up or down if 30-clip assault-style weapons are banned?
Is an aggrieved or mentally deranged person going to feel more or less emboldened by an inability to obtain a military-style assault rifle?
Is banning such weapons going to hurt in any way America's hunting traditionalists?
Oh, and... Just about every law made in this country or another, was deemed necessary because at one time someone abused their civic freedom. We have speeding laws because people abused common sense and endangered others. We have stop signs because people once abused all sense. We need slow down, corner coming, because people driving fast cars generally behave like idiots out of their self-awareness range. Good grief! We even need signs that say "Stay away from the edge." And some people don't! I just saw that in Yosemite!
And yet virtually all the people can purchase an infantry weapon to use as they please, with no license in many cases, no training and no sense needed. All because the NRA has lost the plot of its own founders, who said they wanted to: "...promote and encourage rifle shooting on a scientific basis." Meaning that now, to the NRA, someone's ability to kill and maim as many people as possible, in as short a time as possible, is positively scientific and an ability that should be preserved.
In that case, I want a Bugatti Veyron and old-fashioned Montana speed limits (none), and no stop signs across America. All okay with that?
9
The N.R.A. leadership, especially Wayne LaPierre, are the opposite of patriots. They perversely claim he "right" to own assault rifles, weapons of war,in spite of the fact that they are the weapon of choice for mass murderers. They, along with our cowardly Draft Dodger -in-Chief, blame "mental illness" but the real mental illness is theirs. Anyone who puts weapons of war on our streets and in our schools is himself seriously mentally ill. Even many N.R.A. members support a ban on assault weapons, but not our GOP. They prefer the money and the support of the gun nuts on the far right. If they had their way there'd be a bazooka in every garage and land mines on every front lawn.
N.R.A. members: throw your leadership out or quit if you care more about kids than AR-15s
Voters: vote against ANY politician who doesn't support an assault weapons ban. Make this a litmus test.
In November vote against Guns Over People.
10
It's time to enact the "well regulated" part of the second ammendment.
8
And yet the Left Coast thinks it can choose which laws can be enforced. Why don’t you regulate yourselves?
By observation - my own eyes and ears - of the few "Forever Trumpers" I know, there is absolutely no doubt they would condone calling a Never Trumper "a little off." Slap that guy in a mental slammer! What a cool way to repress the opposition. "Put a few away, and the others will just shut up," said one guy just after saying, "They are coming for your guns, fool." He was completely serious.
5
If Trump wants to throw people who seem "off" into a padded cell, I'm sure one can be found with his name on it, writ large in gold.
10
Why on earth is there such a thing as a "National Rifle Association"? Yes to "National Basketball Association", "National Football League", "National Curling Association", etc, but "guns"? Really? To what end?
5
If you can’t rent a car until you’re 25 because the auto industry has decided that our frontal lobes aren’t developed enough to protect lives and property until that point, maybe we really should consider raising the requirements of firearm acquisition.
The rental age requirement means that people who rent a car may have had up to 9.5 years of experience before renting a car. That’s in addition to the requirements of getting a permit (being known to the state), taking some sort of education or training prior to applying and testing for a license, and paying for insurance. And we have been convinced to pay for this all on our own dime.
Any idiot with a fistful of cash and zero training can purchase a handgun. Where’s the logic in that?
If we’ve been convinced to pay for and insure nearly 10 years of training to rent a car, surely we can walk this road with firearms.
8
Your very first sentence saying Trump was "blathering" identifies you as one of those who will only be satisfied when all guns are taken away. This is verified by your objection to "partial measures."
1
We have many laws regarding the operation of cars. You can't text or have open containers of liquor while driving. Can't drive drunk. Must be licensed, car registered, inspected annually, must wear seatbelts. Must obey traffic laws. So when the NRA and certain of their brainwashed followers try to say that guns should not have the same degree of regulation (and in fact, more so!), and then just yell '2nd A', it's clear that they realize they have no valid argument and are simply 'arguing' in the style of children, putting their hands over their ears and repeatedly yelling '2nd A, 2nd A'! It's just simple logic. If we regulate cars, and the operation of them, why on earth would we not do the same for items that are designed solely for one Deadly purpose?!
We need multi-pronged approach. Better mental health care. Everyone needs to remind themselves to pay attention to those around them. Go with your gut and speak up (how many times have we read of people who KNEW something was 'off' about a person, yet said nothing?!). National database to record every single weapons purchase and flag individuals (a la Stephen Paddock) with disturbing purchasing patterns. Remove all gun show, etc loopholes. Offer buyback of newly-illegal items and then make new law that anyone later found with such items is arrested. NO grandfathering for those who possessed ARs etc.
4
"...are calling for raising the age to buy a semiautomatic weapon to 21 from 18."
Federal law already forbids those under 21 from possessing a handgun...semiautomatic or not. Those over 18 can buy a rifle...semiautomatic or not.
Get the terminology and facts right, it doesn't help your position if the other side can argue that you don't know what you are talking about.
2
Wonderful article and very insightful! Truth is that if people bothered to do the research as Everything For Gun Control did, they would find that same result, most killers are not mentally ill! But the far-right-gun-nuts do not believe in research nor in facts, they simply want what they want!
We must keep the momentum up, and make sure that we fire NRA owned politicians and elect those who will create sane gun laws and ban assault weapons, once and for all!
5
Trump and the Republicans know their ideas are a pack of lies. Just as they know their tax plan sold as a middle class tax cut was also a massive lie.
They have no regard for the welfare of the American people. They exist solely to stay in power which is why they will never cross the NRA. Better that hundreds of children get butchered every year.
5
We want to rationalize these violent acts because they violate our sense of normal behavior. Regular sane people don't just get up one morning and decide to kill people. They must be crazy. But the problem with that is they're not crazy in any medical sense. Being off or weird is just being human. We can't lock everyone who seems not right. If that was the case most people would be in a padded cell.
The problem is guns, so many guns. It's not the "crazies" because these people weren't crazy till they decided to murder dozens of people.
3
I bet the NRA is reeling, stunned by the silence of its paid proxies in Congress.
1
Men should be banned from owning guns. Young men commit the majority of gun homicides in this country and old men commit the majority of gun suicides.
4
Smoke and mirrors; more dangling bright shiny objects. What we need to do is ban automatic weapons and large capacity magazines. There is no sane or logical reason why someone should own these. "It's my right" is not reason enough.
3
Amen, and thank you.
Typical of the NYTs, every problem seems to have some relationship to Russia. Here, the author minimizes the plight of the mentally ill in this country and presents the implausible concept that mass shooters do not have mental illness just to "misdirect" the attention of the reader back to the effort to pass more laws to take guns away from law abiding citizens. The one fact that people like the author downplay is that all of the laws needed to prevent the Florida tragedy were already on the books, except the FBI and local law enforcement ignored the specific warnings that they received. So, yeah, let's pile on to Trump and the made up affiliation of him with Russia and then complain that HE is engaging in a propaganda effort!
How can one mistake this cult of perpetual insurrection as a welcome contributor to democracy?
2
They really should call it the NRMA -- National Rifle Manufacturer's Association. That's what the NRA leadership has made it. It really has little if anything to do with the 2nd Amendment rights or hunting or sport shooting. It's all about selling guns and ammo.
3
"Now comes Trump, urging the nation’s governors to return to a time when he said the states could “nab” people and throw them in a padded room because “something was off.”
The ones who deserve to be locked up in a padded cell is President Trump along with the rest of his dysfunctional cronies.
2
Tax the bullets at prohibitive rates, say $100 per bullet. If it is extremely difficult to amass any kind of quantity it'll be extremely difficult to commit mass murder in a matter of minutes. It's the only way to begin to control this problem. With over 300 million guns already in the hands of Americans, we can't buy them back or make people give them up. Use the bullet tax proceeds to provide for mental health care for any and all comers.
2
There are good crazies (hey, Leonardo daVinci was one) and there are bad crazies (anyone who kills innocent children in a school). The issue isn’t about who are the “crazies,” it’s about bad and good. Once again, the US President displays his incredible ignorance and moral indifference, if not turpitude.
2
Wouldn't a reasonable person think "something was off" when they saw that a relative, friend, acquaintance was spending hundreds of dollars on military style firearms and ammunition for personal protection, posting comments on Facebook about needing to be prepared to defend themselves and their families from their own elected government, making comments that the youngsters whose school had just been shot up resulting in the deaths of 17 classmates were somehow involved in a conspiracy to bring down the Trump administration?
2
Trump will be the first one through the door of the mental facilities under the new “a little off and a little odd incarceration” law.
3
How ironic that Mr Trump should suggest that states could nab people and throw them in a padded room because something was off. To the multitudes who feel that something is definitely off with Mr. Trump, he would be an obvious candidate to be thrown in a padded room.
3
If we were going to lock up someone because "something was off," I have no doubt about who should be locked up first.
3
Your first sentence is precise in its accuracy: Trump blathers.
5
I guess the gun advocates would rather be summarily thrown in the hospital when trying to buy a gun than be denied their constitutional right to buy a semi-automatic weapon. Oh wait... they won’t get a gun either if they’re in the hospital. And Trump uses “sicko” to describe citizens with a mental illness. One more example of his cruel and unkind attitude toward the disabled.
2
The NRA is misrepresenting their law abiding membership with their insane stance on assault weapons. The bulk of NRA members are farmers and/or sportsmen who are passionate about their 2nd amendment rights. They have no use for an assault weapon and absolutely do not want one. LaPierre should immediately change his tactics to fight for the rights of these people and forget protecting the criminals who want to shoot up American school children.
2
Elect anti NRA politicians , ban assault weapons ., ban the NRA , harden schools , elect a sensible president . There... job done .
3
The 2nd Amendment is a nonsense: everyone knows that (especially the NRA)
5
When government is able to show conclusively that they are capable of and actually enforcing the current laws on the books is the time to begin looking for new legislation that can solve the problem.
To ignore, as Mr. Rosenthal is trying hard not to appear to be suggesting, the need of better psychological screening of prospective gun owners, however, is being willfully obstructionist.
No one is suggesting that people be thrown in mental institutions, although the reprise of mental institutions for other reasons could certainly be put forward for debate. So a good portion of Mr. Rosenthal's objections are nothing more than straw men designed for emotional blackmail.
What appears to be the problem with the left, matching a similar problem to the one that faces the right. is that no one has a real solution and no one is willing to discuss the trades necessary to achieve legislation that can pass through the Congress, be accepted by the Executive, pass muster with the courts, and actually be enforced.
While these seem like heavy lifts, and in many ways they are, but with the objective of all being to reduce the chances of school shootings, and attacks in entertainment venues being something on which we all agree, it is reasonable to assume that we might, just might, achieve the end if our politicians stop playing to the cameras and microphones and start legislating for a change.
Barack Obama offfered: "Yes we can".
Let me add a codicil to that: "Let's get started/
2
The Russians are back channeling with the NRA. Putin can not resist the opportunity to provoke gun enthusiasts.
Putin can't believe how well things turned out with Comrade Trump.
He is a bit concerned with the sheer stupidity of the Trumps but he knows Ryan and McConnell will prop him up. Even the moderate Romney embraced Trump's endorsement.
Putin knows Trump may not last so he needs one more gambit to spike the price of oil for his broken economy and needy oligarchs.
The Saudi CP is preoccupied with Kushner and building movie multi-plex's when he might want to pay closer attention to Putin's cozying up with Shia dominant Iran and Iraq.
How do you know all this about Putin?
semi automatic weapons : 2nd Amendment :: shouting fire in a crowded theater : 1st Amemdment
2
I actually think Mr. Rosenthal doesn't give these "ideas" enough credit. I have a proposal to implement both throwing the insane into prison plus solving the automatic weapon problem -- plus build a wall for extra credit!
Here it is -- if you want to buy an automatic weapon, you are approved on demand, but with a catch. You are deemed insane. If you are deemed insane for weapons purchases, you are escorted into a prison. But it will be open air. Let's give them a state. Say Wyoming. (Inmates there of course have no voting rights, so it is removed from the electoral college.) Those that currently live there can choose to stay and will also be armed with weapons. Those that are sane will be given free passage to leave. You can also voluntarily commit yourself there. Wayne LaPierre will be the governor. He'll live in a glass house. Of course, as a prison. it will need a retaining wall. It will be big and beautiful and be built on all borders. And of course paid by the inmates. Naturally.
Once the wall is built and the prison populated, we'll all step back and watch. And you thought Hank Rearden and Ayn Rand built heaven on earth. Behold. This will be the NRA paradise! What can go wrong!!
4
The GOP that controls our 3 branches blames shootings on the mentally ill. But would they reopen the closed mental hospitals? They prohibit the CDC compiling statistics on our gun violence epidemic. This censorship lets them spread lies more easily. We have little warning of the gun terrorist threats.
If we leave gun laws up to states, then what is the meaning of the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution? Our safety depends on where we live. since the GOP thinks natl laws mean big govt, anti Freedom, anti American.
A NYT 2012 op ed “The NRA Protection Racket” by Richard Painter, ethics lawyer for Bush, said:
“GOP politicians must free themselves from the N.R.A. protection racket and others like it.
He describes the NRA message: --- “We will help you get elected and protect your seat, spend millions on ads to make your opponent look worse than a holdup man robbing a liquor store.
In return, we expect you to oppose any laws that regulate guns--registration, background checks, … or anything that would diminish the firepower available to anybody who wants it. If you don’t comply, we will load our weapons and direct everything in our arsenal at you in the next GOP primary.”
“For decades, GOP politicians have gone along with this racket, some willingly and others because they know that resisting would be pointless.”
The NRA gun lobby is just a part of our whole big money election system that blocks any reforms. The Times op ed page has to focus on this now.
4
The private sector will have to take the lead in getting semiautomatic guns off the street. Any civilized country would have done this a long time ago.
2
While Trump's statements sound idiotic, it behooves us to realize that he is speaking on behalf of the Russian government. In Russia, we have seen no examples of mass slaughter because of that country's ability to nab people off the streets if they seem a little odd. Naturally, Vladimir Putin intends to see those policies enacted in his client state in order to "make us great again." Before we reflexively reject Russia's plan to mold our society into a more manageable form, let's give Putin's reforms a chance to work. If it turns out to be a mistake, we'll know soon enough.
2
It is a nice idea to prevent those who seemed to be a bit off looks to me like a cheap way to appease those ante gun freaks who seem to be upset at these constant massacres. so then everybody a bit off should be certified and incarsarated? but the problem is that authorites do not seem to be able to recognize those that are a bit sufficiently off until they have shot up a couple of dozen fellow citizens in the preferable age group of 6 to 18. come on get real. the pols are really just fighting for their earned payoffs. if their was this overwhelming desire for gun ownership the nra would not need to bribe the pols the way they apparently are required to do. just follow the money.
1
'The Gun Smoke and Mirrors' starts with the NYT and article like this. Less than 4% of firearm homicides were committed with rifles of any type per the 1026 FBI UCR, almost 90% were handguns on the victim reports. Per PEW using CDC data almost 75% of firearm homicides are committed by Blacks and Hispanics primarily with handguns in low income urban neighborhoods. Per CDC data 46 of the top 50 counties for firearm homicides in he US were Democratic per the last election, as state level rates effectively hide the problem in neighborhoods across the country. Even most mass shootings are committed with handguns, something that people don't know or at least won't acknowledge.
Instead the media is leading people to concentrate on assault weapons, something that will probably have an unmeasurable impact on the firearm homicide rate.
1
Trump is not able to carry out office of POTUS. He said he could 'shoot someone in the middle of 5th Ave and get away with it'. Plus he cannot tell the truth. There is evidence he cannot even understand the concept of truth. SO I guess he would be one of those "Off oddballs" that could be locked-up in the looney bin?
Also how come gun enthusiasts you know the people who enjoy firearms but likely this is just a morbid hobby. Why cant they give up this hobby? You know so there wouldn't be any more mass or smaller than mass or single gun killings? Seems like a reasonable sacrifice so that others would not have their lives, at whatever age 14 or 45, destroyed. Their loved ones remaining year struck full of endless pain. Scotland made that choice and had only 2 gun murders in 2017.
4
I would venture to say that 99% of the people alive in America today who attended public schools and for that matter parochial or private schools had a classmate or classmates with similar mental, societal, emotional, problems or other alienations or aberrations as the shooters in Columbine, Sandy Hook, or Parkland. Those students that we all when to school with were a little different, maybe a little scary and generally disappeared from our lives after we left school. Many of these people probably led uneventful lives. Some did not. Until recently these different students and other different people (almost all men) did not have access to military assault weapons, M2 Carbines, BARs, AK-47s, Tommy Guns, CAR-15s, M-16s, AR-15, UZIs and a variety of others. They do now and the mass killings are endemic because of this ready access. All rational people the way to end gun violence in America is to get rid of the guns. The second amendment allows citizens the right to keep and bear arms based upon the need for a well regulated militia. How hard is that ti understend
3
Our represewntatives are in the pocket of the gun lobby.
DC, 24th of March
Follow the lead of our nation's youth.
4
If you listen to the nyt daily podcast (link below) you will hear a mental health professional explain how most people who become school shooters, including Nicholas Cruz, would not qualify as clinically ill so they could not be institutionalized or diagnosed as mentally ill and therefore would not be legally required to be on lists disallowing them to purchase weapons. While Nicholas Cruz is clearly a distraught, angry, probably depressed person, that doesn't make him clinical. What we need is a way to see warning signs of this kind of behavior and a clear path to treatment as well as removing guns from a person's life who exhibits this kind of behavior. The failure of the police and the fbi are compounded by a lack of legal options in Florida like 'Red Flag' laws and the reason those laws don't exist and any kind of person can buy an AR in most of the country is clearly due to a concerted campaign by the NRA over the last forty years to open markets to gun sales and the best way to do that is to prevent laws, defund mental health and profit from tragedy.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/23/podcasts/the-daily/gun-access-mentall...®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=4&pgtype=collection
2
The belated, woefully inadequate, and oh-so-tentatively proposed fixes coming from the Republicans is little more than straightening the fringe on the dresser doily while the house burns.
5
Ban semi-automatic weapons, both long guns and pistols.
But not semi-automatic cross bows and catapults.
Another liberal post-Soviet activist, who cares more about the rights of dangerous people than the rights of law abiding citizens. Nobody is talking about involuntarily committing people to mental facilities for expressing views or anti-State sentiment, as it was back in Russia. But stripping rights to have a weapon from people who are professionally evaluated and considered dangerous is a the right thing. Stop scaring Americans of Trump-type a-la-Soviet repressions; better think of why you (and I) came running from Russia to US - that is to have rights allowed by the constitution.
Folks here's what I want you and the author of the article to answer. And be honest. Ban all semi-auto rifles and handguns tomorrow. There are currently 300 million in circulation. How do you get them out of the hands of criminals and others who will harm someone with them? Over 500 people have been shot in Chicago just this year... and it's February. Chicago has some of the most strict gun laws in the country. Cross the southern border. Mexico has every gun law liberals have proposed. They also have a higher murder rate than the US. Mexican people are terrorized daily by criminal cartels which have any and every weapon imaginable. How do you get those that aren't following the law now to follow your new gun control laws and when you can't how will you protect my family after you disarm me? Until you can give a really believable answer to those questions you will never have my vote to disarm me. And that is the real reason the NRA has 5 million members and even more supporters.
Answer:
1. It will take time. Proliferation didn't happen in a day, and it won't be fixed in a day.
2. Require all current gun owners to either register their guns, or turn them in. Despite all the hot air to the contrary, the vast majority of gun owners are legal gun owners and will comply with the laws of the land. Not least because many if not most of the 3% who own half the guns are cowards first and foremost.
3.There are a lot more rational people - gun owners and non gun-owners alike - than there are gun nuts. The votes of the latter are not needed. Most "gun rights" voters are anything but progressive on any issue, so it's an invalid argument anyway.
4. Mexico is a good example of what happens in a country that has a gun-manufacturing neighbor which has trouble keeping track of its guns.
childofsol, you didn't answer my first question. How do you get guns out of the hands of criminals? By definition they aren't following the law. The vast vast majority of gun crimes in Chicago, Cleveland, D.C. etc. etc. etc. are committed with illegally obtained guns. And as you cited if you pass new laws it will mainly be the law abiding that follow them. But because I don't want to break the law and I don't think you can effectively take them from criminals, I won't vote with you to disarm law abiding citizens. And I'm not alone. If you don't believe me, recommend that Congress pass the items you listed and a ban of all semi-auto firearms, see if it passes. My bet is it won't because politicians know a large segment of the electorate that show up at the polls don't agree with your gun control bills. I have guns, my neighbor doesn't. They have never taken mine and committed a crime. Mexico is a good example of what happens in a country that has a rampant criminal element that the corrupt government can't/ won't control. The victim is the innocent, law abiding citizens who can't defend themselves.
Anyone who wants to own an AR-15 is "acting strangely", and probably should not own any guns. Anyone who carries a side-arm to go grocery shopping is "acting strangely" and should probably not own a gun. Anyone who owns dozens of guns and spends half their income to buy more is "acting strangely" and should probably not own a gun. And what exactly is the thrill of sneaking up on a wild animal you dont intend to eat and slaughtering it violently? When the 8-year old does it to the neighbor's cat we sure take notice. Good Heavens, people, though mass shooters have been all of ages and races and political and psychological stripes, the one thing they had in common was that they were gun nuts. The problem isn't guns or nuts, it's gun nuts
3
This is all getting a little overblown. Firearm homicides in the US are 10 to 15 thousand a year, mostly young gang-bangers and well down from the levels of the 80s and 90s. Mass shootings are a few hundred a year, so probably less than slips and falls in the shower. Like terrorism, plane crashes and shark attacks these attract a disproportionate amount of attention while more significant causes of death go unremarked. Readers may be interested to know that 1,000,000 a year worldwide die in vehicle crashes; in the US 30,000 or so. Cigarettes in the US cause around 500,000 deaths a year. Drug overdose 60,000.
People should relax. Whatever happens to you it won't be a mass shooting. Blow off some steam in the comments section if you like - but beyond that best advice is do nothing. It's so much easier, and the problem isn't going to get fixed anyway. Just get used to it.
1
The mass shootings will not end till the war weapons are collected. . Guns aren’t designed to protect but to kill. Furthermore you would need far less protection if there were NO GUNS. The NRA logic makes no sense whatever. Their logic spells death upon death. Follow Australia’s example and stop the killings. They did that and it worked!
2
You write that " the gun lobby, led by the National Rifle Association, has stopped every effort to reduce the number and lethality of firearms ". In truth it is the elected representatives who are supposed to serve the people who have bartered away their conscience for the sake of funding from NRA. It goes without saying that if you are in the pay of the devil you have to obey the commands of the devil. It is true of all lobbying in Washington.
3
Amendment II
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
The second amendment does not say or mean what the NA has conditioned so many to think it says/means. The first four words clearly state that the right to bear arms will/should/shall be regulated. It is in essence the right to join the army (services) not the right to pretend that you are the army.
3
If we were to put people that are "off" into mental institutions, then Trump would be the first to qualify. Followed by those who believe that you need an assault rifle, followed by those who believe in conspiracy theories like Trump, and the list goes on and on. Beware of what you wish for, Mr. President.
2
"Banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians would be a better approach."
Since most of my firearms and those of my friends are semiautomatic, good luck with that. Out of 350 million guns in the US, I dare say that most are semis. To try and carry out something like this would confirm to gunowners their worst fears, that democrats want to take away their guns. In the end, however, no one knows who owns what and where they are. Most are not registered. As a result, we gunowners would never comply with such a ban om possession and will keep our firearms. In others words, we'll disobey such a law. We can apparently do that according to the democrat party. Don't believe me? Ask any illegal alien.
You have to attack the problem at its roots by repealing and rewording the Second Amendment. Everything lesser is just a bandaid.
3
Let's start by throwing the truly insane people in mental institutions, most of our politicians and all of the GOP. There would be no room at the inn if we include the fact denying deplorables, the people who relish Reality TV and the people who think that pro wrestling is real i.e. most of the tRump voters. These people are quickly moving us backwards and we have run out of patience with their dangerous and insane behavior. They need a wake up call and that would be to take away their guns.
1
Gun control is appropriate for those age 2-99. Anyone able to steady a gun can kill and many have—including small children. Gun control is a good for the whole nation. Guns are for killing—but only game. Such are the rules in civilized countries unlike gun crazy America.
1
Worldwide, the incidence of mental illness is statistically similar in all industrialized nations. America has comparatively more deaths from guns. The problem with America is guns. This is another bait and switch by our elected officials, selling out to the NRA, which will pad their coffers in 2018 and 2020, disgusting.
1
Guns in America have made a simple walk down the block dangerous —even in the nicest neighborhoods. Looking behind you is a way of life in the gun crazy world the NRA has created. There is no peace just plenty of fear for we who face the NRA guns pointed at us any given day.
We live in a lawless country, shameful. Europeans one speaks to do not understand and tourism to
America I s becoming a losing business here.
Let’s face it would you live in this wild country if you weren’t born here? I fear everyday for my kids and grandchildren. Staying alive in the US has become the luck of the draw.
We need freedom and we need protection from the NRA!!
1
Rosenthal is guilty of his own "blathering" demonstrating that the epidemic of "blathering" is a nonpartisan affliction.
Progressives "blather" about stricter gun laws but oppose the enforcement of exisiting laws that would incarcerate illegal gun carrying criminals.
This discordant and contradictory position is deafening "blather".
1
Not once in this article did you mention the responsibility of parents to raise their children to adulthood. Not once did you point out where the overwhelming majority of all killings are occurring (in a few major cities, controlled by Democrats, who have done nothing to fix the root cause). Those parts of the problem, you omit because they do not fit your agenda. And if you really cared about innocent children and their safety from violence, they you would certainly protest the 3,000 abortions each and every day which kill our children, almost entirely for the reason of convenience.
Mass murders with guns are good for business, at least if your criteria are increased gun sales after every mass shooting. The logic of more guns making us safe is as mistaken as more heat making us more comfortable on a winter's day. A thermostat? No regulation needed. Have a fire blazing in your fireplace? Throw gasoline on it. More flame, more heat.
Our nation is held hostage by a minority of gun nuts-- it is arguable that they are the people afflicted with being "a little off." When will the vast majority of our people rise up and put this minority in the place they deserve? Have we hit that threshold finally? Are we coming to our senses? I'm not holding my breath.
2
All we, as sensible people have to do is keep reminding the NRA:
Canada. Australia.
One hasn't had a double-digit mass shooting since 1989. The other, since 1996.
Neither are concentration camps for gunthusiasts, nor are they denying their citizens the vote, or rounding up previously-armed people as undesirables.
All they did was come together and make it harder for killers to kill vast numbers of people with ease.
No, no gun law will stop murder. No gun law will stop insanity. But good gun laws make it harder for murderers and the insane to kill great numbers of people in a short amount of time. Why does the NRA want to keep murder easy? Because easy murder equals equal profit.
Canada. Australia.
There's no reason, aside from stupidity, we couldn't be among them.
1
Yeah, let’s make it harder for law abiding people to defend themselves, that’s a great idea.
2
Thank you for stating what should be obvious to everyone, but somehow seems not to be. Instead of taking a band-aid approach to this, let's fix the root causes once and for all, which includes having current owners turn in their assault weapons.
1
The only thing that will stop the guns is money. People from other countries should stop vacationing in the US. When money dries up something will happen, but not until then.
1
This is as clear-headed as clear-headed gets, honest and valuable signal amid a mess of other points of view that are all or nearly all noise.
The more vehicles you have available, the more people are going to travel using them. The more programs you have on your computer, the more you'll do with it.
etc etc
The more firearms you have floating around -- regardless of types, legality of purchase, sanity or craziness of their owners, whatever else -- the more firearm activity you're going to have. "But not all firearm activity injures or kills people." Of course not, but some does. Back to the numbers: Is some arcane insight needed to see that incidents of gun violence will increase with the number of guns out there?
1
If parents were held responsible for the actions of their kids you'd see more examples of police being notified before violent crimes were committed. Children go from being under parental control to being fantasy adults where no one has any control over them. When they go beserk their parents just shrug their shoulders and claim they didn't know. Why not?
If the United States were to adopt policy "to imprison people on the ground that they were on their way to becoming insane," then President Trump would be on the cross-town asylum express bus with a critical mass of his cabinet members along for the ride. Wayne LaPierre would be the greeter decked out like a Wal-Mart or Costco door monitor with an armless vest, tightly bound against his torso.
But maybe not. These worthies are hardly "on their way" to anywhere. They've already arrived, but they're still running free as far greater dangers to society-at-large than almost any resident of a psychiatric hospital, especially given that our national government would have had hospital personnel packing heat, just like the nation's teachers and librarians.
2
"In fact, the law has required court-ratified findings of actual mental illness for involuntary commitment since around 1881, said Dr. Paul Appelbaum, a professor at Columbia University’s medical school. “It was never the case that people could be involuntary committed for being a little odd, or even for that matter thought to be dangerous to other people unless they had evidence of mental illness,” he said."
Not quite true in the sense suggested. I worked as a psychiatry resident in a large southern state mental hospital in the 70s. A patient could be committed by the county coroner upon petition by the family or other interested person-I don't know but a "judge" may have signed off on the coroner's recommendation. The hospital would then make an assessment and determine whether or not the person needed to remain.
There were good and bad points to the system. People who needed help but would otherwise never get it did. On the other hand there were abuses of diagnosis that sometimes landed people who were inappropriately institutionalized with a life long diagnosis of psychosis (almost always "schizophrenia"). The real point however is that until they had been committed there was no evaluation by anyone qualified to make the determination of mental illness.
1
This is true. Kids were locked up and given shock therapy and other dubious treatments because they didn't live up to their parents expectations. Different times, for sure.
Agree. Until 1970 the signature of any two doctors could commit someone involuntarily in Pennsylvania, without either doctor even having had a course in psychology. Three hundred people walked out of the Philadelphia State Hospital within days. (Another thousand had no place better to go, having become institutionalized.)
Garry Greenberg has written more recently about the utter unreliability of psychiatric determination of mental illness, even when an actor has been coached to show clear signs.
From either perspective, locking odd people up is arbitrary.
Under his own criteria, Trump could be “nabbed” and thrown in a padded room since so many things are so clearly off.
"Hell is empty and the devils are all here." - William Shakespeare
16
Guns are a health problem, akin to cigarettes and alcohol. Let's treat them that way. Research has shown that taxes reduce smoking and drinking, especially among children.
If we're not going to ban guns, then we should at least tax them at a rate commensurate with the damage they inflict on society. Assault rifles should have a very steep tax. High-capacity magazines should have a high tax. Ammunition should be taxed according to its lethality.
Gun owners should be taxed for each gun they own, the same way car owners are taxed for each car. They should be required to have liability insurance, like car owners.
These taxes should be used to finance the "hardening" of schools that Donald Trump and the Republicans are calling for, which would otherwise come out of school budgets that are already stretched far too thin.
8
The next logical step is taxing CNN all its profits from mounting a national fear campaign over an easily-prevented shooting that happens to serve to frighten the masses. Can you imagine working for such a shaky enterprise?
1
Just curious: Do you think that your proposed tax also make it financially more difficult for an aspiring mass murder to use one or more firearms in that manner?
Right - guns should be looked at from an epidemiological/public health point of view.
And that is what the NRA is likely most afraid of -- and why they pushed for the Dickey amendment in 1996 that effectively forbade the CDC to conduct such studies.
You can endlessly nitpick the details of an individual shooting -- that it really happened just because of this and that special circumstance -- and say that you don't want your gun rights taken away just because of such and such individual.
It is much much more difficult to argue hard numbers that prove a devastating, large scale societal impact.
I can think of one person who appears and acts "off" on a daily basis. That being said, if our Presidents irresponsible blathering about more things that he does not understand - e.g. "mental institutions" are not free and most of the citizens "deinstitutionalized" over the last 50 years receive Federal and State health subsidies; you do the math because clearly Trump cannot - results in any meaningful discussion about the ridiculous lack of health care for people with mental illness, then good for him. I am alright with giving Trump credit for bringing a "Being There" quotient to the Presidency.
6
First of all, Trump doesn't read, he shoots from mouth! Remember that the CDC, since 1996, has not been allowed to do gun violence research due a decision by our own Federal government. The CDC by law is not permitted to study gun violence or to use federal funds for research on gun violence. This is thanks to the NRA. It's the law!! So, consequently, we are all just letting off steam with all our ideas on what will work! We don't really know. Some things, I believe are a no brainer - background checks, training, licensing, no assault weapons of war, removing guns from known individuals with a history of mental health, and perhaps other laws passed in states that have a proven track record to work. But saying it's people under 21 or it's immigrants is just convenient for some people. I am disgusted with the rhetoric and absence of thought coming out of our presidents mouth.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/10/04/gun-violence-rese...
6
If more guns for good guys is the solution to our gun violence problem why is it illegal for people to have guns when they go into the places these politicians work?
"It was never the case that people could be involuntary committed for being a little odd, or even for that matter thought to be dangerous to other people unless they had evidence of mental illness,” he said."
Not that I disagree or want to divert from your excellent points, but tell that to Francis Farmer and the millions of other anonymous free spirits locked up doped up and often lobotomized and or sterilized for not conforming to the desires of those able to gain illegitimate authority over them here in the good ol USA. There is a very dark history of psychiatric medical care hidden within the well intended efforts that are pointed to in the USA, starting not long after that 1881 law you mention. It was called Eugenics. It is an insidious belief that human reproduction should be controlled in the same ways that animal breeding is. A good example of how insidious the idea is the Times columnist David Brooks even tried to revive the discredited theory (maybe he did not realize it?) with a column a few years ago that posited the possibility that generational poverty might be a genetic trait.
The original point I was making is that less guns = less gun violence. Don't let the NRA use the fact they created for the purpose of there being so many weapons we cannot track out there as an excuse to keep the status quo.
6
In between involuntary commitment to mental hospitals and indiscriminate selling of assault rifles to people that torture small animals and espouse white supremacist terrorist talking points are logical, fair, just policies that could make many people lives better.
Two days before Parkland, Trump unveiled a budget that would slash mental health spending.
There are lots of people in this country that want help with their mental health, including drug treatment, but came afford it.
Democrats should be using the Republican excuses that guns are a mental health issue to demand far more funding for mental health. There should be far more money for school guidance counselors who can help kids find healthy ways to deal with their problems. Anyone that wants drug treatment should be able to find a program within days. And people with histories of violence, should be unable to buy guns.
Trump is an expert at distracting the media with nonsense. When sheriff deputies are to afraid to confront a gunman, most teachers will be too. Randomly locking up the mentally ill is a recipe for abuse, including locking up the sane, inappropriate care for the sick, possibly even political persecution by people that think anything left of fascism is a mental disease.
The media needs to stop focusing on Trump's distractions and start talking about the smart policies between the extremes used by Trump to drive the narrative.
1
"... more than 300 million," ... The "elephant in the room."
"The real problem with gun violence is not about mental hospitals, armed teachers, bump stocks or age requirements. The real problem is that there are far too many firearms in America — more than 300 million, according to Congress. They are too easy to obtain and they are becoming ever more lethal."
Sadly, I think we are stuck with all those guns. But let's at least insist that Congress fund the CDC to treat the symptom of gun violence as a public health problem which manifests itself in mass shootings and thousands of deaths each year because of suicides and accidents. Who knows? Maybe the CDC can develop a "gun shot."
Or we as a nation can let things continue as they are, wringing our hands in despair at the news of yet another murderous event, cowed by the NRA, the politicians who take their money and a small number of so-called "gun rights" extremists.
Maybe we will get lucky and the epidemic of gun violence we are experiencing since at least the shootings at Columbine High School will burn itself out like many medical scourges of the past.
3
The author does not know what a semi-automatic weapon is. Olympic shooters use semi-automatic pistols, also called "self-loading." If you want to get enough support, you need to get it from both sides, but lacking a basic understanding of what you want will not accomplish this.
So it appears that Mr. Rosenthal is yet another "progressive" that believes that in an active shooter event at a school the only one who should have a gun is the shooter. That ensures maximum casualties, which I guess makes sense from a "progressive" perspective where victims are currency and the "progressive" position maximizes victims.
Europe, which banns these guns of mass murder have comparable rates of severe mental illness but have very few mass murders. Could it be that in Europe it is very hard to purchase military style weapons? BTW, trained police officers who practice on the range every week, have a hard time hitting an active shooter. Wake up! It's the guns not the mental illness.
Gun laws abroad are sensible and widely accepted in their societies--- a sharp contrast to US. They need more publicity here.
The CBS Eve New reported Tuesday on Israel’s gun restrictions. Their teachers aren't armed and schools have armed security guards.
"Gun laws in America are much more loose than gun laws in Israel. In Israel it can take up to three months to get a gun. You have to be over 27, unless you've served in the military. You must prove that your job requires a gun, and get a doctor to sign off. Doctors also check for mental illness. The final step is at the gun range.
“Every gun owner in Israel has to go through training. For security guards, they have to undergo training every four months.
The GOP would see this as intolerable. And it dominates our politics with corporate mega donors who call the shots (so to speak). They see sensible gun laws as Big Govt interference in our Freedom and Liberty, thus as UnAmerican. The GOP is dominating our democracy with a warped and self serving definition of our own history and Constitution.
4
It is simple; just ban and outlaw the use of guns.
Then consider banning Donald Trump and sending him off to the Kremlin to establish a new Trump hotel there.
It is just madness to have Donald Trump as our President.
He is not only incompetent but he is a little deranged and totally unthoughtful and dishonest.
4
Would you nationwide ban of firearms include a mechanism to pay legal owners fair market value for the loss of firearms, but also ammunition, magazines, slings, optics, etc., that are rendered useless by their absence? For maybe 100 million plus firearms?
So what Trump seems to be saying is that an old man who lies constantly, holds onto a delusion in the face of a tragedy whereby he is a hero who can save the day, threatens a nuclear-weapons- holding dictator with taunts and name-calling, has a bizarre fear of sharks and has serious sexual abuse allegations made against him should be in a mental institution. Hmmm...
4
I like this idea of people who are seen as a danger to society being thrown into a mental asylum. We could start with Trump and continue on with most of the GOP.
8
I think the only people who should be allowed to own semi-automatic weapons are the men and women who fought for our country. I see too many loud mouthed, gun-toting, NRA supporters who’ve never stepped onto the battlefield, screaming about their constitutional right to own weapons of war. They’re an embarrassment to our country.
8
The Republicans are happy to strip people of their right to live outside of a mental hospital, but cannot tolerate stripping the same people of their right to buy assault weapons.
Only in America.
4
Call me crazy and lock me up, but I say repeal and replace the Second Amendment.
7
Time to repeal the 2nd ammendment.
4
A very sane article in an insane world! Thank you.
4
Trump is reeling off a bunch of fear based, ridiculous ideas followed by, “this needs looking in to”, has become a daily occurrence. As always, he plays to American fears of losing their guns, of government, of those other scary people, of their neighbors, of the unknown. If putting away the insane (that other guy) will make me safe, put him away. Any proposal Trump has that harms someone else will be popular with too many.
1
The Las Vegas killer was over 21.
This "reform" is just an illusion/deflection from the NRA. In fact, everything it and its enablers say is nothing but.
3
If the fundamentalist christians would all cancel their NRA memberships we could get some where's with gun control but all the bible owners think it's compatible to own a bible and a gun ? Don't turn the other cheek just kill anyone who breaks in to your house.When will we start taxing church's like scandinavia does ?
3
Isn’t it galling when people discuss the god given rights of hunters and hobbyists. Bizarro world politics at its finest. Arming teachers, perpetual lockdowns, endless wars with a morphable enemy so Billy and Dad can obliterate a raccoon with an assault rifle.
2
Please look at the Canadian application for a license to own a gun.
This is what civilized countries require for the right and responsibility to own a gun.
http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/cfp-pcaf/form-formulaire/pdfs/5592-eng.pdf
2
Hey how’s about this for sacrilege in America.... let’s repeal and replace the second amendment. To a much narrower allowance for firearms ownership. Ya know switch it over from a “God given right”, which is how the NRA and gun zealots perceive the second amendment, to one of a much more stringent nature. Honestly the way the second amendment is worded the term “arms” has no definition or constraint. Why can’t I own an Abrams tank or a missle launch battery? Those are indeed “arms”. This entire gun control debate is absurd and indicative of a mass psychosis that grips American society. Enough with the guns already.
4
No an no.
Quit blaming an inanimate object for the actions of people.
Fix the people or lock them up.
2
Not that simple. People who need "fixing" constitute an inherently slippery slope, a sliding scale, what have you. These inanimate objects are more cut and dried: either they're readily available or they're not.
1
Hey Randy, Belgium blames the guns. As a result the number of mass shooting per capita in Belgium is miniscule compared to in the USA. It is the guns.
1
Under the president's proposal he himself can be committed to a mental hospital.
1
I wait in vain for someone, anyone, to suggest that severely restricting the purchase of ammunition might be the approach to take.
There are, as the essay says, over 300 million weapons out there. We will never get those back. But once the ammo dries up and the black market price skyrockets, maybe then we will see a real reduction in injuries and fatalities.
An empty gun is just a phallic symbol.
" something was off ". Ok, NYT readers. THIS is MY nomination for the most ironic statement of the Year, so far. Donald, of all people, commenting on the mental state of another, by saying " something was off". My God, Man, people have been saying that about you, your entire life. Oblivious, much ? This reality show is now completely absurd AND unbelievable. Seriously.
2
If we're going to have a law that says we can “nab” people and throw them in a padded room because “something was off," then the first person to get "nabbed" would be Donald.
Bravo, Mr. Rosenthal!
BRAVO, Mr.Rosenthal!
On the up side, something is definitely a little off with Trump, so maybe this policy would allow us to quickly put him in a padded room of his own.
Can you imagine for a minute, some person in the next cubicle to you at work whom everyone thought was "off", who maybe ranted about politics (like I do), and seemed reclusive, never really engaging with others was suddenly taken out of the office by "authorities" because he was deemed a potential danger to others? Think it couldn't happen? The professor, a non US citizen who had been in the US for 30 years and never had a complaint against him, was dragged off his front lawn while putting his children on the school bus. All the time believing he wouldn't be a target. The "problem" with mentally ill people is they have rights. Conservatives yell"Second Amendment Rights" whenever gun restrictions are discussed. But I guess just rounding up people who have violent or paranoid thoughts it's acceptable to them. What about all the paranoid white supremacists who "play warrior" on the weekend and yell "Death to all Jews" at rallies. Where do they fit in with that? Oh, that's right......They are all nice people and patriots.
Thank you for sharing what would seem to be obvious, but is seldom spoken. It is unreasonable if not impossible to think we can do anything to substantially change the ongoing carnage of mass killings unless we ban civilian possession of weapons that are meant for war.
This is much more than a conservative/liberal issue. It is a human rights issue. Americans have come to the point where we are much more intimidated by having these weapons of mass destruction in the hands of civilians than we are intimidated by the NRA and we want something done.
It is time to stop hiding behind the 2nd amendment, stop protecting the gun manufactures and start listening to the vast majority of Americans who want change.
2
A good, well functioning, advanced mental health system is a laudable goal, but it will not stop people with anger issues, jealousies, short tempers, and/or undiagnosed mental illness from buying guns.
Improving the mental health system, making the schools secure, banning automatic-type guns with magazines holding more than a certain number of rounds, requiring extensive training to own a gun are all improvements that should be made, but in the long run it's all so much construction on sand in the effort to stop mass shootings if we don't fix the two core problems. They are: the flood of money that has corrupted our politics, establishing de facto legalized bribery, and secondly, the very poorly written and outdated 2nd Amendment. It is extremely open to interpretation, from one extreme of saying guns are only for the military ("militia") to the other extreme of saying the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. Read it. It's only one sentence. Laws should be written so as not to be open to interpretation. The result of this flaw is that you can legislatively and judicially maneuver back and forth for another 5, 10, 50 years or more, and still have problems because of the fact that your starting point, the 2nd A, is so open to interpretation. Another result of these basic flaws is that organizations can exploit the flaws for selfish gain, like the NRA.
So, we must overturn Citizens United and repeal and replace our 2nd Amendment with good law.
1
Good essay and spot on. But not to worry; republican gun sponsors only throw that issue out to obfuscate. For some its even a way to rationalize their NRA sponsored position that needlessly costs the lives of men, women, children, policemen, etc. every day. They know rights and mental health experts won't allow such hap hazard 'commitments'. What they won't do is ban the infantry weapons from civilian ownership, tighten the approval process for ownership of other guns and actually solve most of the problem. Their own campaign funds are just plain more important. It can't be the voters because the vast majority of citizens want these changes. In the next election cycle, besides refutation of trumpism, voters should vote according to candidates position on guns. Keep it simple this time, solve the top two cancers in this nation first.
The biggest single obstacle to sensible regulation of guns is the Second Amendment. It can and should be repealed. Why aren't we talking more about this?
1
May be better to offer competitive donations to Congress people as an alternative to NRA support. In the scheme of things they seem to be purchasable for comparatively little money. Ryan after all traded a $1.5 trillion increase in the deficit for $400,000 donation to his campaign fund. Money is what they really care about--or at least it is more important than the lives of children.
If Tom Steyner and the like would spend money on countering the NRA instead of on "impeach Trump" TV commercials, it could make more of an impact.
1
In the America I grew up in, school shootings were unheard of. Austin, Texas was a stark anomaly. The gun laws have gotten more restrictive, but what has really changed is society. Gun laws won't fix this problem. We need to work on fixing a broken society that has no cohesion, or foundation. The left is as much to blame as the right. The "fickle majority" is really to blame. We need a functional society. Otherwise, school shootings will continue. Even if you get rid of every gun, we will then have school knifings, or whatever weapon they move to. Conceivably, it will be explosives. Calls for more gun laws are the misdirection. The solution will have to be a social one.
1
I have a number of school teachers and a school nurse in my Book Club. This month’s book was “Defending Jacob”, the story of a boy accused of killing a classmate. (Although not with a gun).
But the ensuing discussion was enlightening. According to the school teachers in my bookclub, there is almost no psychiatric help available for teenagers. And when help is finally found for a diagnosis the cost is prohibitive. One of my friends told me the cost of getting a diagnosis for her child was $180,000.00 dollars.
So not only do we need gun restrictions for assault type weapons we need a universal healthcare system for all, including mental health. Everyone in this country deserves healthcare regardless of their ability to pay.
And for those who don’t want to pay for everyone to have healthcare, I’ve got news for you. You are already paying for it, one way or another.
I have too much experience with mental health problems, which were directly caused by violence, bullying, unfairness, parental neglect and emotional abuse, familial dysfunction, scapegoating, blaming, and organized ostracization. This was followed by institutional stigma, lack of access to appropriate care, misdiagnoses, more blaming, criminal justice profiling, exploitation, domestic abuse, poverty, rejection and buck-passing by all agencies and society in general. While my family of origin, powerful and wealthy, call me dangerous for what they did to me.
I am also a person who cannot watch television or mainstream movies due to the inability to consume the violence without disastrous after-effects. I abhor guns and weapons. But the anger which is a symptom of the disorder resulting from my experiences serves as evidence to allow anyone to treat me however they please, including making false accusations for which I have been prosecuted with nobody to defend me, while the perpetrator was called a victim and given sympathy. How could a person not be angry. Do I deserve to have this life, and these problems, which were forced upon me?
I don't think so. But in the eyes of society, and abusers of power and privilege, I deserve everything I get, including being locked up as insane.
I am not insane. I am very lucid and very sane. But it is so much easier to point fingers and say: lock her up, she does not deserve anything but that.
We are in an ironic situation where those arguing that they require guns (really big ones) to keep their liberties from being infringed upon state we need to deprive more people of liberty. Committing someone against their will is a HUGE deal. It is absolutely necessary and effective in many situations such as psychotic episodes and suicidal depression. Where it can NOT be effective is in temporary incarceration of misanthropic, angry, and misguided citizens- there is no medical treatment for these conditions and as such there is no end date for their incarceration.
I FULLY embrace expanding mental healthcare because I, an infectious diseases physician, spend as much time talking about mental health complaints as I do infection. I have come across multiple patients in my time who were desperate to have an intensive, inpatient psychiatric stay and would likely benefited from it but there were not enough beds. We do not have enough psych beds or psychiatrists but even more we need therapists and case managers. These things can and should be embraced and supported. But they should be supported and reserved for True. Mental. Illness. They cannot and should not serve as a catchall for those who truly are, or perceive that they are, disenfranchised and/or enraged by the world they find themselves in. There is no medical treatment for this. So while America works to rebuild community and fund mental health, limit the weapons. Heal thyself America.
Trump and the Republicans in Congress are one or two school shootings away from a ban on assault weapons and more comprehensive background checks.Why not pass this Legislation now and save the lives of the students and teachers who will be killed as a result of politicians who are more beholden to the NRA instead of the protection and safety of US citizens.
I agree with everything said. However the problem lies even deeper. Americans - and the broader world - need to take a hard look in the mirror and ask why it is that so many end up resorting to violence, violence against others and violence against themselves. Youth suicides in the Western world have reached crisis levels in many countries. Why is violence a staple of mainstream media? Why do we glorify war and violence? And why do we not teach our children that it's okay to be different, that we shouldn't ostracise others for it. A former neighbour whose young children used to play with Cruz and his brother recounted how gradually she saw his demeanour change, he became troubled. More should be done to root out bullying. Hazing is a form of barbarism. Mental health officials can do little when it is society at large that is the problem. Is it surprising that people who are under stress channel their thoughts into violence when society itself values violence so greatly? As to the 2nd Amendment, there may have been a time when it was justified but that time was long ago. Americans have become a prisoner of their own history and it has warped their culture and outlook generally. It's clear from the outside, but when you'r part of it you can't see it.
It’s ironic that America spent over 70 years trying to change Russia into a democracy. Instead we’re becoming an autocratic kleptocracy just like them.
Short of committing everyone who seems off, there are 5 states with "red flag laws" that allow courts and police to remove guns from people who are less than an "immediate danger to themselves or others" but still too unstable to own a weapon.
The NRA/Trump strategy depends on dots that cannot be connected. Who is supposed to determine "insanity?" Would such a diagnosis be based on objective clinical criteria and require care-givers to violate patient privacy? How would authorities know whether a person who is "a little off" owns guns--since there is no registry of firearms or firearm owners. Into what mental hospitals would "off" people be thrown--since public facilities barely exist anymore.
My over-arching question: Why do the supposedly law-abiding gun owners categorically refuse to abide by any law regulating gun ownership?
A small but important point: laws to avoid sales of assault weapons will have minimal impact on reducing gun violence because there are already so many in circulation. What is needed is a federal law to ban ownership of assault weapons, enforced by a national buyback program and tough penalties for violators.
3
So you want a law that is in opposition to the second amendment and instantly creates millions of criminals? Not the greatest of all ideas.
No problem, Jaco. We hear constantly that almost all gun owners are law abiding. They’ll simply follow the law. Problem solved.
"Banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians would be a better approach. So would repealing lax concealed-carry laws, stand-your-ground laws and other rules that are proliferating around America to make it easier to shoot someone and get away with it."
Another problem in America is our increasing reliance upon technology for communication. Try to apply for a job in person and you are told to apply on line. Apply on line and you often get nowhere no matter how well qualified you are. If you need welfare of any sort, apply on line. If you want to communicate with your elected officials: do it on line. Talk to customer support: stay on hold or go on line. You can, without trying very hard, go through an entire day with no human contact. Then, when you make that contact, because of technology, it can be more frustrating than banging your head against a wall. Information is incorrect, the person on the other end of the line can't help you, you didn't respond the right way, etc.
In America technology is being used to keep people away, not to help. The Second Amendment is being used as an excuse to own weapons designed for war. Weapons in the wrong hands are bad. So is refusing to spend money to help someone like a Nikolas Cruz before he commits a crime. We ought to be listening to the students and other victims who want weapons like an AR-15 kept away from civilians. The NRA is not the National Reasonable Rifle Association: they're rabid.
2
Your whole second paragraph is actually an intentional situation. Created by design to suit the people who own our politicians. It is the root cause of the frustration disaffection and dystopian POV of mass shooters.
I immediately thought of Joseph Heller too. The starkness of the comparison is unavoidable. I agree with the author's suggested solutions as well. I'm just not sure they are the best solutions. The way I see things there are two essential problems with gun ownership. Imagine a sink.
1) The faucet is still running.
2) The sink is already overflowing.
The tap is current and future gun sales. The sink is existing ownership. First, we need to turn off the tap. Second, we need to drain the excess water.
There are many ways to accomplish these goals so I won't speculate here. I'll only suggest the legality of shooting someone is not the most direct approach to solving either problem. I don't think the victim much cares about the legality of a bullet wound once the bullet goes through them. Just saying.
3
I would go so far as to say that if all males had fathers in the home, had no innate testosterone laced, anger, and risk taking, if there would be no 24-7 violence on television, the movies, and video games, people were machines, and they made no mistakes, were not in gangs, selling drugs, rebellious, wanted no revenge, no male was angry with their partner or spouse, no children were angry with their teachers, or parents, or school mates, no males were angry at their workplace, no one was angry with their neighbors, no one had road rage, no one wanted any attention, etc., no one would be using guns to kill anyone. However, that is not the case, and we have too many guns, too many really dangerous ones with magazine clips that can kill many people in a few minutes, too many suicides with guns, too many innocent children killed in the home accidentally with guns, and about 35,000 deaths last year from guns. Enough said!
5
Are you suggesting that the huge share of gun deaths from suicide would not show up in deaths from other weapons, or opiates, or car crashes, or jumps from high places, if the guns were removed?
At least you don't accuse the NRA from breaking into school classrooms to shoot up the innocent and thus frightening CNN.
The AR15/M16 is a destructive device. It has exactly the same capabilities as the gangster's 'tommy' gun outlawed in 1934. No one proclaimed democracy was going to fail, the skies didn't fall, we didn't lose our precious rights, in 1934. The AR15/M16 is designed with the capability to kill people in batches and groups quickly, exactly like the Thompson Tommy gun. There is not one bit of difference in the capability, the AR15/M16 has all the capability of the outlawed Tommy gun and more. Yet, one is illegal and the other isn't.
The National Firearms Act of 1934 that outlawed the Tommy gun is certainly Constitutional, it is absolutely legal. So how is it such a Constitutional law can be ignored when it's an AR15 we're discussing? Ban the AR15, classify it as a destructive device, get them out of the hands of the general public. Amend the 1934 Act and get it done.
The Constitution clearly links 'arms' ownership with military service, 'well regulated' service. Let anyone who wants to own 'arms' serve, first and foremost, and that service will define responsibility and qualification for gun ownership.
It's sickening and revolting to see stumblebum civilians who have never and will never serve mouth off about their 'rights' to own arms when they will never know what sacrifice and duty are, hear them twist the Constitution, conflate meanings, and vomit all over themselves in their self righteousness. Go serve, first. Put in a few years. Then get back to me about your rights.
7
Your lack of knowledge about guns shows well. "The AR15/M16 is a destructive device. It has exactly the same capabilities as the gangster's 'tommy' gun outlawed in 1934." The Thompson is a fully automatic weapon; it keeps firing as long as the trigger is held down. The AR-15 is a semi-automatic weapon; a separate pull of the trigger is required for each shot. That is why one is illegal and the other is not.
It's sickening and revolting to see stumblebum civilians who know little or nothing about firearms spouting opinions about them.
If I heard local news correctly last night, my Congresswoman, Elise Stefanik, proposed legislation to have schools wired into local law enforcement agencies so they'd have immediate access if disaster strikes. Is this pathetic measure the best our legislators can do for gun control?
My son wants a pistol permit and has to go through many clearances to get one. How about instituting the same measures for anyone purchasing a gun?
1
Exactly, this all makes perfect sense. In addition, we need to have stricter responsibility laws for gun owners - similar to those that hold people liable for drunk drivers leaving their house, for reckless drivers borrowing their cars, or for the mail carrier slipping on a porch they did not clear for ice. If gun owners faced huge financial and/or criminal penalties when their firearms were used, accidentally or on purpose, in a murder or mass shooting, they would probably do a much better job of keeping them away from others. They might also think twice about even owning certain weapons, such as semi-automatics. Isn't the Right always yammering on about personal responsibility?? They need to step up or face losing certain gun rights.
2
Until we as a society decide to go back to civilized notions of what a society is this, and many other problems, won't go away. A shared sense of community and commons has been getting devalued by republicans (mostly) since the days of Reagan. Sure he talked a good game about "Shining Cities of the Hill" but that is when we began moving into the dystopia that we are witnessing now.
Caring for the mentally ill was deemed too expensive and not a federal problem. Hospitals closed and street corners started to fill up with homeless people and their cardboard signs. Instead of designing a solution we just put them in jail.
We are trying to run this vast enterprise of a Nation on the cheap; instead of taxing the hoarded wealth of billionaires we finance governments with fines and license fees and speeding tickets.
It is insane to imagine that in only 6 1/2 years there were 133 acts of mass murder in this Nation.
I was very happy, though, to see the front page headline about Dick's Sporting Goods stopping the sale of these long guns. That is a good start.
Locking lalaPierre up in one of those Soviet era "sluggish schizophrenia" wards would be a good second move.
Voting in November would be the best move, however.
4
The gun-control group Everytown for Gun Safety studied 133 acts of mass murder committed between January 2009 and July 2015 and found that only one of the murderers had been “prohibited by federal law from possessing guns due to severe mental illness.”
Clearly the other 132 mass murderers had sever mental illness too, no?
1
Those concerned about their gun rights don't seem to be so concerned about the rights of their fellow citizens to due process.
1
If "mental health" is really the issue and the easy availability of guns is not, how come it is usually white males -- often younger ones -- who go on these shooting rampages? The data shows that more women suffer from mental health issues -- especially depression -- than do men. And ethic groups other than Caucasians also are subject to mental illness. So why is it that a disproportionate share of mass killers white males? There are deeper social issues at play here, and the easy availability of guns only provides a means for those with mental health issues to lash out in their anger/frustration/paranoia. Whatever happened to Americans' right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"? Daily life in the U.S. of A now has been reduced to and includes a fear of being killed or having to kill, and guns are at the root of that fear. How sad that such a great nation has been reduced to this. The worship of guns = a moral cancer that is destroying American society. .
1
Excellent concluding point.
In fact, we are seeing a massive, coordinated (even if informally) and multifaceted push back against any effort to control or limit guns. We have propaganda magicians and liars at work at every level from state legislatures through the growingly fascist NRA (not just on guns) to to the Trumpster himself. None of these using misdirection and deflection cares one whit about how many people are killed, so long as it isn't their own children or themselves.
Suppose all of the mass murders in America were taking place in Congress or in the home neighborhoods of members of Congress. Would we get action? How long would it be (42 minutes?) before some sort of comprehensive bill were passed?
My proposal is this: no one gets any gun before the age of 28 without extensive training in handling, using and storing deadly weapons. As for assault style rifles, do we really need those at all except for the mentally deranged and those who get a special thrill from shooting a rapidly firing gun?
The "rule of 28" would likely pass the Constitutional test. After all, the amendment says "a well regulated militia". It would also lessen the ease with which young and often violent men can get guns.
As for the 300 million weapons, turn-in and buyback programs work well. In the name of the students killed in Florida, and hundreds of other victims, the time to reduce guns voluntarily is now.
1
The second amendment needs to seen from the perspective of our modern times, to be entrapped with the archaic concept of a “well regulated militia” is utterly irrational, the killings in these times demands a severe limitation to gun access for the public.
2
To add a relevant detail to the debate: whether one likes or hates the NRA, the public should know they were the group that lobbied for instant background checks in the late 90’s.
1
Exactly right.
The real problem is TOO MANY GUNS. There is nothing else to this debate.
All you have to do, no matter what someone tells you, is compare the US to other countries. Are they afraid of government enslavement? Do they not feel safe in their homes, only armed with hunting rifles and shotguns? Do they think their "freedom" is being taken away from them because they can't own any weapon they want?
You cannot use the Second Amendment as an excuse anymore.
The real task for the Parkland kids and the #NeverAgain movement will be going from state to state to state and empowering all the high school kids there to keep it going and VOTE when they all turn eighteen.
This is the only sane way out of the gun problem in America.
Why is there little to no focus on MEN? What do mass shooters all have in common? They are MEN. There is a continual effort to dance around the shooter's gender when analyzing mass shootings. Why is that?
We are living in such a down is up country right now that arming school teachers is not considered a completely insane idea that is immediately rejected by every lawmaker in the country. The cult of gun culture and gun ‘rights’ by a minority of the public has become so bizarrely accepted as sacrosanct by the Republican Party that their solution to too many people with too many guns is to provide more people with more guns and on and on and on. We must stop this madness. Vote for candidates who want big changes!Imagine a country where only law enforcement are legally allowed to possess guns. Imagine!
1
American myth imagines gun fighters, vengeful civilians and rogue cops bringing order, justice, truth and the American way via a well aimed bullet and gun smoke. The reality is more simple and sobering.
Of the 33,000+ Americans who die from gun shot every year about 2/3rds --21,000--are suicides. And 80% of the suicides are white men who tend to use a handgun. Active military and veterans are disproportionately represented in this deadly cohort. There is no "good guy" with a gun while their mental health is clearly an issue.
While homicide by gun is at lows not seen in decades. Cops shoot and kill substantially more civilians than the reverse.
With 5% of humanity 320 million Americans have 300 million guns which Is 48% of the world civilian owned guns.
Mass shootings including schools while rising are a minority of shootings in America.
The N.R.A. single issue gun lobby focus under the cover of the Second Amendment right to bear arms insures that legislative and executive candidates in primary and general elections are motivated to aid in the making, marketing and sale of more guns and bullets.
1
This opinion is spot on. Thank you for clearing away the smoke and mirrors. Shame on the cowardly politicians and the cruel NRA leadership. Many of their members are in favor of common sense laws and controls but NRA extreme fear mkngering is more important than what their membership feels is the right thing to do. Thank you again.
"They are playing a cynical game of misdirection." No kidding
People get shot and killed in the latest mass murder du jour. Sane people call for action. The NRA and gun manufacturers funnel huge sums of money, both directly and indirectly, to Republicans. Nothing happens, or, as is more typically the case recently, Republicans pass laws that encourage, and sometimes mandate, the sale of more guns.
Bottom line: Dead children = rich politicians. As long as that equation is true, nothing else matters. Mass shootings are good for business for both the NRA and the Republican Party.
1
If the states start “nabbing” people and throwing them in a padded room because “something was off,” we need to begin by looking no further than the man who is occupying the White House. Many people, including mental health experts, have said that they think there is something seriously off with him. Maybe when he is questioned by Muller he can plead insanity.
2
Now comes Trump, urging the nation’s governors to return to a time when he said the states could “nab” people and throw them in a padded room because “something was off.”
If such were to happen, Trump would be well advised not to leave Washington DC. Trump should be encouraged to pursue such a plan.
Meanwhile, I will go out of my way now to fly Delta on my 50,000 Air miles or so per year.
Bravo to the company for standing up to NRA. And if lawmakers in Georgia remain so stubborn about gun rights, I hope Amazon withdraws Atlanta from contender cities.
Well stated and spot on. Let's look at why someone would want a gun. You want to hunt? Use a 30-30 or 30-06 bolt action, lever action or pump action long gun with a magazine capacity of 5 rounds. If you can’t hit the animal with 5 rounds, go home and find a new hobby. Alternative is a shotgun with a 5-round magazine — .410, 20 gauge, 16 gauge, 12 gauge or for ducks, 10 gauge. Want to target shoot. Get a good .22 and ban away with a bolt action, lever action or pump action rifle. Want to sight in your hunting rifle? Put a scope on it and go to the range. Home and personal protection? Nothing says “Stay Out” like the sound of a 12 gauge shotgun racking back 00 buckshot rounds. Or, a .45 or .357 caliber will pretty much put anyone down. The problem with handguns is the bullet may pass through the wall and into your neighbor’s house, which tends to upset them.
Assault rifles, .50 caliber sniper rifles are good for one thing — killing people. Outlaw assault rifles and magazines larger than a 5-round capacity, and buy back the assault rifles that are out there. Former Marine officer with three combat tours in Vietnam, a tour in Iraq as a DoD contractor, and a one-year tour in Afghanistan as a USAID Field Program Officer embedded with the Marines in Helmand province. I own a .22 caliber pump rifle, a .45 caliber pistol, and a 30-06 long rifle.
Most homicides and suicides are committed with your recommended firearms. You served in Iraq. How many people died from weapons of mass destruction and how many were killed with available ordinance left untouched while the search for those weapons went on. It's kind of like that with respect to gun violence, now.
You recall the Soviet Union having the power to throw people in mental institutions? How bout here? While I think the pendulum swung too far, there's a reason all those "insane asylums" are gone: wives were committed by husbands, kids by parents for non issues but "hysteria" and recalcitrance etc largely behavior issues that didn't fall in line with the people dominant in culture (yes, white males)..... So let's not go back to that era.
Martin Daly (below) is right to say the media has fallen for GOP/NRA spin. This became obvious when Jake Tapper hammered Sheriff Scott Peterson during a recent interview, accusing Peterson of attacking the NRA (at the CNN townhall) instead of doing his job. Peterson may or may not have personally dropped the ball on stopping the shooter (we need a fact-based investigation to find that out: remember facts?) But Tapper was in full Wayne LaPierre mode as he grilled Peterson and, when Peterson tried to ridicule a hypothetical question Tapper asked, reminded Peterson that 17 people had died on his watch (because, Tapper implied, of Peterson's negligence). It is good to ask tough questions, but not good to ask them from the point of view of one of the sides in a bitter debate.
A Wall Street advertisement states, "Past performance does not guarantee future results."
Oh, I think that in this case it does.
The GOP and its pernicious sponsor, the NRA, should be indicted in multiple localities for depraved indifference.
Just remember, it's always too soon to discuss solutions to gun violence. Also remember that our friends on the right whip up smoldering resentment in the easily armed day after day. Parkland survivors who have spoken up have been castigated on the air waves as the "enemy."
I've had enough. How about you?
It's time for the "responsible" gun owners to demonstrate to the rest of us why this country shouldn't pass laws restricting gun ownership to (1) hunters and (2) those who can prove a need to keep a gun on the premises.
The American two step of (1) sending thoughts and prayers to the most recent massacre victims and then (2) venting outrage at anyone who suggests that such massacres can be prevented is getting old, so old that those cavilers on the right seem to think at this point that they need only to mail it in.
For the Oath Keepers and other dissembling fools, here's a pledge:
"I hereby wager my immortal soul, in which I believe, on the God-given right for just about anyone to purchase and keep weapons whose sole apparent purpose is to kill and maim other human beings. If my decision to subject my fellow Americans to the serial consequences is in fact evil, I hope that I rot in the Ninth Circle for eternity."
Sign here.
1
We have listened to the constant scare tactic of those opposed to any sensible gun control telling us that "they" would then come banging down doors, seizing all guns, and revoking the 2nd Amendment. Is it not some other kind of mental illness (or mass hypnosis )whereby supposedly sane people are lead to believe that some imaginary paramilitary force set up by the "evil" government (Liberals?) will come bang down their doors and take away their hunting rifles if any sensible gun law is enacted? Where is the sanity our lawmakers who forbid research dollars for studying gun violence because they depend on campaign contributions from the NRA?
No one who ever kills is sane in that moment.
Killing is irrational but you don't need to pull a trigger to be condemning others to death.
"Banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians would be a better approach." Hear, hear! Semiautomatic handguns kill far more people than semiautomatic rifles, but they should all be banned. Period. There is nothing you can do with a semiauto that you can't do with a lever or bolt action rifle, or revolver. except kill masses of people before someone has a chance to intervene.
AR 15s and AK 47s are rifles. From the FBI Uniform Crime statistics more people are beaten to death with fists and feet than are killed by ALL rifles.
That the left is attacking the right to own this particular class of weapon shows that their intention is the total elimination of private ownership by citizens of firearms in the US.
This is a link to the FBI webpage that quantifies the different methods of homicide:
https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2014/crime-in-the-u.s.-2014/tables/...
More people are stabbed to death than are shot to death using rifles.
More people are beaten to death with clubs and hammers than are shot to death using rifles.
The left's goal is the elimination of civilian ownership of firearms. Its subset of that goal is outlaying semiauto rifles. You know, the way you eat an elephant - one bite at a time.
1
The November 23, 1924 cover of the New York Times is an example of a common representation of cars during the era — as killing machines. "In 1898 that the first car insurance policy covering liability was issued to a man named Truman J. Martin. In 1927, Massachusetts passed the first law making it mandatory to have liability car insurance. Decades later, liability car insurance (or some form thereof) is required in each of the 50 United States." Shouldn't we do the same for guns? After all, no one would deny our right to bear cars.
1
Prestidigitation, or NRA talking points, Trump is on board with his diversionary teachers as enforcers sleight of hand, until this episode blows over.
Politicians, money and guns, should be a common sense fix, but it's the Parkland kids turn this time, and they have real weight in the conversation, but they will need help from kids like themselves from around the country.
I support making concealed carry laws more strict since there. Are now at least a few states where no permit is required. The number of concealed permit holders in states with strict laws who have ever been found guilty of using their weapons in an illegal fashion is miniscule.
I do not support banning semi-automatic weapons as a class.
One of Trump et al.'s other misdirections is their focus on the Parkland shooter's signs of impending violence, thus shifting the blame for the Stoneman Douglas carnage to failures of law enforcement and mental health systems.
But the shooter was chronologically an adult with no criminal record who had never been adjudged insane. So under American law he had an absolute right to buy an AR-15 and enough ammunition (and in large enough magazines) to decimate the entire student body of Stoneman Douglas High. Indeed, even if he had been judged mentally incompetent to manage his own affairs, one of Trump's first official acts had preserved his right to buy whatever guns and ammunition he chose.
And though he was terribly emotionally disturbed, the shooter would not likely have been adjudged insane, no matter how big his talk of killing somebody or even lots of somebodies. So under our law he had the absolute right to walk free and the absolute right to talk as big as he wanted--and law enforcement had precious little recourse beyond keeping a watchful eye. And despite Trump et al.'s 20/20 hindsight, my guess is that neither Broward County nor any other law enforcement agency has enough resources to watch every emotionally disturbed person who talks of violence, even mass violence, 24/7.
So it comes back to access to the means to carry such violence through. Dick's Sporting Goods gets it. Why can't Trump and the NRA?
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The shooter was never "adjudicated insane". Two problems. one is that a kid who is posting on the internet that he wants to kill is definitely insane, especially one that has brought weapons. And moreso when this is occurring in full view of the entire community. The fact that we can't see this as truly INSANE is on all of us. And we can't because our societal, new normal is itself insane. Like, we can no longer seen the truth because we have all gone mad.
The second thing is that these laws really do talk about being an "immediate" danger to society. Immediate means he is locked and loaded. So, it is true that you can't act. That has to be changed. I had a patient out here in California who had been diagnosed with a type of dementia that causes marked disinhibition. He was walking around with a concealed weapon and it seemed like a risk we should not take. We called the local Sherriff and they balked. Said they could not do anyting. We worried and kept at it. It took an act of god to get the gun off of him and the Sherriff did the right thing at the end. Police and communities cannot and should not fail to act because of the word "immediate".
The fact here is mistakes were made as well as having bad laws.
It seems pretty obvious that the NRA would want teachers armed. With about 33 million teachers in our schools, that'd be another 33 million guns they could help sell for the manufacturers for which they lobby.
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Age restriction could be a panacea. If the age were rage to 25 or 30 to legally own, it would make a noticeable difference without taking away the 2nd amendment right.
Focusing on the assault rifle is a mistake. There was an assault rifle ban in place during Columbine, all the weapons used there were legal under that ban. There are millions of super deadly guns that are not assault rifles.
if we ban assault rifles they will use shotguns or PDWs.
A totally new strategy might help break the long-standing deadlock on gun control. Although amending the Constitution is normally much harder than merely enacting legislation, in this case the opposite is probably true, as I explained in a column proposing that we amend the Second Amendment published yesterday. https://www.newsmax.com/paulfdelespinasse/rifles-nra/2018/02/27/id/845705/
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Congress and especially Trump are impotent.
No participant in our constitutional convention conceived of the right to bear arms as defined by today technology or capacities.
No early congressional participant could imagine the strangle choke the NRA has on our collective political will.
Your right, my right to life supersedes your or my right to bear arms. That’s not a constitutional declaration it’s common sense.
We all have an inalienable right to ‘life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness’. If guns make you happy but they threaten my life the gun is the problem.
It’s time we take this debate out of the government and make it a private. We must denounce all things NRA. There is common sense gun ownership balance but until the government, NRA, gun lobby and gun manufacturers are out of the picture reasonable people will not be heard.
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Why do we need more gun laws? There are over 20,000 on the books today. Ban so called “assault rifles” we tried that from 1994-2004 and according to the CDC report there was no effect on crime or violence. Too many guns? Over the last 20 years the number of firearms in the United Stares as increase by approximately 50% while at the same time the incidence of crime with a firearm has gone
down by about 50%; according to the FBI. So perhaps the issue is not firearms but something else. In the 60’s and 70’s students brought there firearms to school and left them in their locker or vehicles and went shooting or hunting after class. And there weren’t any students shooting up the school. So again, I ask: what has changed?
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Virginia Tech's gun violence should have closed the mental health issue years ago. Virginia Tech and the Commonwealth of Virginia failed to push hard enough, so the noticeably sick Cruz was still able to get his guns. Criminalize assault weapons and demand a government buy-back program to get the hundreds of thousands already out there of the streets and destroyed. Do not back down. Bump stocks is nothing. Age limit is a pitiful "concession" designed to placate and distract. Teachers with guns is an insane idea on its face, and cover for a way to make even more gun profit, because they will insist on a firearm common across the country -- A Schoolhouse Special. The NRA and the gun makers would LOVE to get that contract. Do not let that happen. No Schoolhouse Special, and melt every assault rifle out there and use the steel to bridge, something useful, not murderous or "entertaining."
Since neither Trump nor the Republican Party will ever do anything about gun control, let's give up and continue to sell to anyone and everyone with a heartbeat and a check, as we do now - but add a 500% tax to help those who are mentally ill, recovering from gunfire, shellshock, or mourning the loss of family members due to the irresponsibility of our present government.
Background checks, registrations--yes. Banning gun ownership--no. And we need to give teachers the option of training and carrying. I am sick and tired of these hysterical male and female teachers getting on TV and saying, " I don't want to have a gun." Then don't have one, but get out of the way of those teachers who do want to pack.
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Whether or not our current system of providing mental health care is adequate, two glaring issues come up when one tries to turn the mass shooting problem into a mental health problem: First, people with mental illness have been struggling for years to live with dignity despite their illness, to avoid laws that limit their freedoms, and to not be stigmatized by society. All the proposals to put people with marginal mental illness in hospitals, or to remove them of their rights go against these efforts, and the stigmatization it would cause actually exacerbates mental illness, futher fueling anger and paranoia in those who suffer from it. Second, the field of mental health right now does not "cure" most mental illnesses and with issues such as anger and paranoia is only marginally successful and furthermore is notoriously poor at predicting dangerousness. The stark truth is that other countries with similar rates of mental illness and comparable treatment systems don't have the frequency of mass shootings we do in the U.S. because such dangerous weapons are not available to anyone—not just those judged to be mentally ill.
The very broad, no restriction reading of the Second Anendment probably doesn’t comport with what the Founding Father’s intended although the Supreme Court not too long ago effectively separated it from the state militia part of the same Amendment. If this was to be pure without regulations, why wouldn’t it have had its own separate Amendment so it would clearly be understood to be a pure, untouchable right. Further, good mental health care available at an early time could save people and help them become useful citizens. Throwing them into mental hospitals when their illness is full blown or throwing in political dissenters because one must be crazy not to support a particular leader is a waste of humanity. I volunteered in one such facility when in college. Seeing the warehoused people rotting propelled me into history, policy and law. This is not a black and white problem
Easily solved but resources should be aimed toward fixing it in order to save our kids and our future
Instead of passing more silly new laws which, in essence, say "this time we really, really, really mean it" we should enact Federal legislation which will require all gun owners, from manufacturers to dealers to final customers, to carry firearm insurance and hold them STRICTLY LIABLE for ALL harm caused by their guns regardless of who uses them. That's vicarious liability, as with cars.
We need all guns and ammo to be traceable. As with cars, guns should have Certificates of Title so we know who owns what gun at any given moment. And the ammo? When I buy eggs at Trader Joe's each egg is imprinted with a code. We can't do that with ammo so we can see who is buying what and in what quantities?
Do this and people will safeguard their guns and transfer them legally. Of course if the guns and ammo are stolen and the owner was not complicit or negligent in allowing the theft to take place the gun owner would be off the hook. You're not fool enough to leave your car parked on the street with the windows open and the keys in it are you?
Nothing that I have suggested conflicts with that pesky Second Amendment.
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The comment is absolutely true. There are mentally ill people all over the world, but there aren’t so many people dying by gun violence in the rest of the civilized world like in the US. The difference? Gun laws and the number guns owned by people.
Mr. Rosenthal has correctly pointed out a major obstacle to solving unfettered gun ownership and possession in this country.
The NRA and it’s minions are trying to defend the indefensible.
I just read this morning that Vice President Pence is speaking about the progress made by abortion opponents in limiting access and how abortion could be illegal " in our time". If only this same fervor was being applied to assault rifle bans.
Of course do everything but remove the means by which these executions are carried out. In a nation with 300 million guns and 9.8 million people diagnosed with mental illness severe enough to interfere with daily activity, limp proposals to tweak the process send a clear message. These kids are an acceptable level of collateral damage.
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What kind of society thinks the logical solution to gun violence against children is more guns everywhere?
I assert it is a failed society by any standard of civilization.
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The shooter in the Las Vegas massacre, the largest mass shooting by an individual in US history, was 64. He bought his weapons legally. Assault rifles simply don't belong in the hands of private individuals for any reason.
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If mental health is the problem then Wayne LaPierre should be locked up in a padded cell. Hearing him talk and seeing what he writes in NRA publications -- I think his latest headline was "All Democrats are Socialists" -- one has to conclude that he is unhinged. And gun control advocates should stop trying to compromise with the NRA and its Congressional stooges by agreeing to half measures. The NRA does not represent hunters or responsible gun owners. It represents the firrearms industry. The solutions are simple. Ban semi-automatic assault weapons, limit rifle magazines to five or six rounds, forget background checks and require all gun owners to be registered and licensed. You have to be licensed to drive a car and it has to be registered so why not a gun? You have to be licensed to hunt, and younger hunters can only hunt if accompanied by an adult. In certain states you have to be licensed to to be a hairdresser, for goodness sakes, so why not be licensed to carry a gun?
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Banning semi-automatic rifles is needed but we need to understand why and how it might be done. To do that we need to see what makes the so dangerous.
The first reason is that a bump stock can turn a semi[automatic into a machine gun. Ban them.
The second reason is that large capacity magazines of forty to fifty bullets permit mass casualties without reloading. Ban them and institute a buy back program.
The toughest problem is rapid reload where a shooter can change mgazines in a few seconds. To address this the production, sale or importation should be banned as soon as possible. Then mandate that all semi-automatic rifles have a fixed magazine with modest capacity (10-15 bullets) that cannot be removes and must be reloaded one bullet at a time by a set date. Unmodified weapons would then be illegal. There may be other solutions that could be developed such as mechanical or electronic devices that had a time lag after the magazine was emptied before it could be reloaded
These measures would defang the semi-automatic rifles without denying their use for valid sporting purposes.
Would these measures end their use in school or other mass shoutings. Unlikely. But they would greatly reduce the carnage.
The fact that many people desire to carry a firearm demonstrates how unsafe many feel in their own community.
Statistically, we are much more likely to die by car crash or by shooting ourselves than by using a gun successfully in our own defense.
But, it is this perception of an unsafe world that will keep American "clutching" their guns.
Anything short of a ban on firearms with detachable magazines is worthless. As long as a shooter can slap in 30, 50, or 100 more rounds in less than 1 second it won't matter if you ban semi-automatics, bump stocks, pistol grips or bayonet mounts, these kinds of massacres will still occur. The shooter at Virginia Tech, once the deadliest mass shooting in American history and still in the top 5, used pistols with detachable magazines. Even an inexperienced shooter with a bolt action rifle can shoot 30 - 45 rounds per minute, as long as they can get them in the gun. Detachable magazines facilitate that. Until we outlaw firearms with detachable magazines and limit fixed magazines to 5 - 10 shots, we've done nothing to protect ourselves or our children.
The whole, "gun issue," for the Republicans has nothing to do with the NRA, or funding from them. Their "contributions" are minuscule compared to big Pharma, or oil companies. It's simply a wedge issue, that works perfectly.
People who are against guns won't vote Republican anyway. But, people that are pro guns ALWAYS vote Republican. Same is true with abortion rights, lower taxes, or military spending. If you string together enough single issue voters you get elected to office in the U.S.
Of course, demonizing "Liberals" aka, Democrats, just adds to the thumb on the scale.
People that are pro gun don't care if there is a school shooting every day. They are the most loyal of Republican voters, and Republican leadership will never give that up.
California, Washington, Oregon, Indiana, and Connecticut all have "red flag laws" which allow the seizure of guns before people can commit acts of violence. These statutes allow a judge to temporarily take away guns from people who are deemed a threat to themselves or others.
Make our schools safe.
#Never Again
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So the government failed at every step leading up to the shooting. School staff failed to act, police and FBI weren't interested, 4 school cops ran as fast as they could from the shooting. Most of all, the shooter's parents are to blame.
Now some people want the government to step in again, this time for a gun ban. With government on all levels failing here, this to will be another smoke and mirrors disaster. A gun ban will go nowhere like the war on drugs.
Guns aren't going away in this world. A ban will just do for guns what prohibition did for alcohol.
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You had me until the end, Mr. Rosenthal, when you threw the baby out with the bath water.
First, what do concealed-carry and stand-your-ground laws have to do with mass shootings? Almost nothing, but you don't like those laws, so they are on the menu.
Second, I can see myself eventually agreeing with "assault" weapon bans, but suggesting that we ban POSSESSION of ALL semi-automatic weapons is ludicrous. These firearms have been on hardware store shelves for over 100 years! Why do you think we suddenly can't handle them? Who will financially compensate all those who made legal purchases in good faith? Why should I have to turn in my skeet semi-automatic shotgun because you and others can't be bothered to make a nuanced proposal?
I am a gun owner who is very much is in favor of additional gun control measures. The only point that I will make is that there isn't one simple law that would make all the absurdity stop; at least not in a country with 300 million guns. Rather, if we are going to get to a better place we have to start somewhere. It isn't clear to me that banning semi-automatic weapons has any chance of passing nor is it clear to me that doing so would save lives. When you are massacring unarmed people, while AR-15's clearly have been the weapons of choice, it's not clear that a 12 gauge shotgun would result in any fewer casualties. Both are military weapons.
Changing the age to 21 is a good first step. Regulating semi-automatic weapons like handguns, is also a good move. Requiring gun owners to own physical safes, I think makes a lot of sense. Close the secondary market, (to get around background checks) absolutely. However, I would argue that the most important gun law we can pass is to provide some easy mechanism to take guns away from people who have any warning signs of mental problems. No questions asked! A family member, friend, wife, girlfriend, coworker, or school reports you, for whatever reason, you lose your guns and you have to undergo a mandatory psychological evaluation (paid for by you) to prove you aren't a danger and submit affidavits of good moral character, before you can get your guns back.
It's a shame that Mr. Rosenthal didn't visit East Berlin in the early 1980's while he was there. The incarcerated serfs were disarmed by the State, and the only men with guns were the soldiers with AK-47's, which is what I saw.
While no fan of bump stocks, disingenuous of the author to wax poetic about stopping an autocracy regarding mental illness incarceration while stating President Trump could eliminated a legal product with an Obama dictate pen. The law needs to be changed.
And the entire concept of having an armed person at a school is more dangerous than not during a shooting is utter liberal lunacy. First, the shooter is likely shooting their if he knows there's an armed person, unlike now where liberal's post "Gun Free Zone," aka "Nothing but Defenseless Victim" signs there. Plus, shooting a moving target is really hard, when someone is shooting at you! That's the point! Standing there with a rifle picking off kids is pretty easy when you're not being shot at, a lot harder if just one person fired at him from cover ending his free reign of terror giving kids time to run for cover.
265 million defenseless people slaughtered by their own gov't in the last 100 years (not counting wars), and the author thinks banning guns is the better approach. Certainly not for those millions was it?
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Remember, when you use the simple phrase "ban all semi automatic guns" (or something similar) you implicitly include most pistols and also many shotguns. By saying this you automatically alienate deer and bird hunters, skeet and trap shooters, and law abiding pistol owners from your arguments. Also, many .22 caliber rifles used at scout and summer camps are semi automatic. I can only deduce that what you really mean is the semi automatic assault style rifle. It is this lack of detailed knowledge by persons like yourself that is concerning to gun owners. It is interpreted by a knowledgeable gun owner as an insight into your true intentions. The reasoning goes as follows; "if you can't be bothered to educate yourself on the nuances of gun ownership then it means you don't have any interest in them. A person with no interest in something (here it is guns) is willing to give up another citizens right to that something because they themselves don't selfishly perceive a cost to doing so. This is why, strategically, gun rights group can't compromise on solutions with people like yourself because it is likely your personal disinterest in guns will only keep you asking for more and more control (and an ultimate ban)."
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That the idea of arming teachers is being taken seriously at all shows just how far down the rabbit hole this country has gone when it comes to guns and violence.
It's a sick idea that must be called out as such and repudiated. Schools should strive to be peaceful centers of learning, not armed camps. They should promote community, good will and harmony in the pursuit of kbowledge, their teachers armed with ideas, not killing machines designed to wage war.
Shame on the NRA, President Trump, and everyone else for promoting violence as a solution to violence, more guns as a response to too many guns.
Yes - repeal "stand your ground laws," concealed carry" laws, and ban specific weapons of war that were never meant for use anywhere else but on the battlefield.
For once and for all, let's put the lives of our children ahead of greed and extreme gun-fetishism.
Surely we can find a way to do that without taking away the right of law-abiding citizens to own guns.
What a cruel irony that we have a president who rants about immigrants entering our country and endangering people and the real enemy is us!In a country with millions of guns there is no safety and the threat is from within and not from terrorists.Our police and National Security agencies are very effective identifying terrorist plots and thwarting them.The NRA and their supporters in Congress want guns to proliferate and have no concern for the safety of American people because there can be no safety in this gun culture.
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Excellent article! Misdirection and distraction are part of the daily parade of American politics. The control exerted by big money is almost irresistible. Yes, stop selling military toys to civilians. Stop pretending we are all gun addicts. And let's go on hoping that sensible gun owners will throw more weight behind gun safety measures. In that regard, sensible gun owners should reject being claimed by the NRA as supporters of every greedy, hypocritical measure the NRA proposes. BTW: In Georgia, we have an example of a bought and paid for politician acting as agent of a special interest group (the NRA) to put pressure on a private corporation (Delta Air). Now, we have two for-profit groups, the NFL and the gun-makers' lobby, the NRA, granted the right to define patriotism. Should football players hold AR-15s when they stand for the anthem?
How many shootings have been attributed to Concealed Carry laws? It seems there are plenty of statistics cited otherwise but none supporting the author's conclusion. In fact, most states require training in safety and firearm protocol, thus placing a CHL license further out of reach of those who would do harm.
Indeed we might consider requiring a CHL as a condition of handgun ownership.
And while we're at it we can require some kind of training to vote. Maybe a requirement to take and pass a basic citizenship test? Or taking a passing a class to exercise free speech. Oh, wait SCOTUS has specifically ruled such requirements to exercise constitutional rights are explicitly unconstitutional. So are the 1st and 2nd (or 4th or 5th or...) Amendments different? Are voting rights different than other constitutional rights? And I'm sure many on this thread will say that people don't kill people with their vote, but aren't half the arguments on here blaming the NRA and their voters and the politicians that give in to them for the deaths of these school kids. Haven't we heard that the NRA, their voters and their politicians have blood on their hands? Safety training for a CHL may be defensible under the Constitution. For handgun ownership... probably not.
The mental health issue we should be looking at exists at the nexus of gun ownership addiction and paranoid conspiracy theory. Really, stockpiling guns and ammo in defense of “freedom” is not sane.
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A short time ago Democrats proposed that the most seriously mentally ill be banned from gun possession. The Republicans rejected that and the Democrats heavily criticized them. Now the message is to forget mental illness and just talk about the guns. I’m not a conspiracy theorist, but there had to have been a memo directing all Dems to change their tune. I didn’t get the memo. Did you?
"Now the message is to forget mental illness and just talk about the guns."
Wrong. Democrats have been talking about both all along.
It is not true that “a bad guy with a gun” can be stopped by “a good guy with a gun”.
If a good guy goes in alone, he has a 1 in 4 chance of being killed.
It takes at least three “good guys”, acting together in highly trained cooperation, to stop one bad guy.
And a lot of things slow the good guys down, from fake boobie traps, to bleeding victims.
Maybe because it is too raw to discuss, but why has there not been a comparison of the obviously mental ill man, age 23, in Massachusetts who killed a young woman with a hunting knife in a local library. The man was known to police and neighbors for his erratic and often violent behavior. But, although the loss of one woman is of course a tragedy, the reason it was only one person? He didn't have a gun. Massachusetts has "some of the strongest gun laws in the nation, as well as the lowest gun death rate," according to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence.
You can put all kinds of things in place, better background checks, guards at school, armed teachers, metal detectors everywhere, drills, live in a police state, etc.
But the one way to make sure it doesn't happen, fewer guns and fewer guns of war like the AR-15. No other way to make the problem go away as fast as possible. Look at Australia.
Following up on Daniel Patrick Moynihan's suggestion, I am in favor of banning the sale of and manufacture of ammunition for military-style weapons. I'm guessing that the existing supplies of it would be used up in about ten years
after this happens.
Gun nuts would then be forced to choose between manufacturing the ammo in their own basements, which entails the risk of blowing themselves and their houses up; or relying on ammo of uncertain safety and reliability smuggled into the country. There are no perfect remedies available to us, but failing to limit the now-endless supply of ammunition for these weapons is certain to make our already calamitous gun problem even worse.
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I just listened to the statement of a physician - in the WaPo today - about the difference between the damage caused by a smaller caliber weapon. fired at a slower speed, from an assault weapon, designed to do the most damage, to keep troops safe in the field from enemies that are trying to kill them.
The damage inflicted on the body from bullets fired from an AR-15 are geometrically greater than from a smaller, slower weapon - by design - as a killer.
The bullet leaves a tunnel through the body where it travels - the larger the bullet, the higher the speed, the more off kilter or yaw, the worse the damage.
This man said to envision a boat and its wake. The faster the bullet moves, just like the boat, the more "wake" behind it, the more damage. If the bullet tumbles, even more damage. And if the bullet hits a bone, the larger and faster round will shatter the bone, taking out joints, and severing arteries nearby because the shards of bone become missiles themselves inside your body.
The AR-15 and assault weapons should not be in the hands of civilians. Period. They are killing weapons, not for defense.
And if you kill a deer with an AR-15, you, sir or madam, are no sportsman.
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Correct. The typical AR-15 cartridge, the .223 Rem/5.56 Nato is not permitted for deer hunting in many locales. It is considered inadequate, and where it is allowed, many feel it is marginal at best. Almost all "deer rifles" used for hunting are quite a bit more powerful and deadly. BTW, there are many hunting rifles that are also semi-automatic and magazine fed; they just don't look scary like an AR.
Pardon my cynicism, but arming teachers across the country sounds suspiciously like “expanding the markets for firearms makers.” Perhaps that is what’s really behind the smoke, and the Second Amendment is just the smoke.
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This author is the fuel for the NRA. Advocating banning of laws allowing the possession of guns is all the NRA needs for its fundraising.
He is also being misleading. It is true that only 5% of mass killings have been perpetrated by someone under 21, but the definition used for those mass shootings capture more than the school shootings that are the first concern now. For those shootings the perpetrators have largely been under the age of 21.
There are 100 million households where there is a gun. Since most possessions in most households are jointly owned (i.e., my wife and I both own our lawnmower, blender, etc.) this means that iPhone ownership in this country is almost as common as gun ownership.
So, when people advocate what Rosenthal has written here it does not just galvanize the 5 million or so NRA members. Instead, it galvanizes the 100 million households. And then nothing can get done.
This morning I read that Dick's is no longer selling assault rifles to people under 21. That was a positive step. But if you want to get rich, buy stock in Cabelos because gun sales are going to skyrocket because of opinions like Rosenthal's.
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A big problem with Trump and gun control is that Trump really knows nothing about guns, or their controls.
Scapegoating the mentally ill and removing their rights is wrong. These people are getting medical care and should not be punished. Additionally they have a right to privacy like any other American.
Guns are constitutionally protected so we have limits to what can be done here. Angry young men who as of yet have committed no crime are protected by due process.
Privacy, gun rights, due process are making fixing this problem difficult. These things do not protect us from bad actors, they protect us from tyrannical governments. Tyrannical governments are real, a look around the world is all the proof you need.
Maybe we can stop making these people famous. No name, no photo. There are precedents for not giving people the attention they desire to discourage their behavior. It’s a solution both parties can get behind, and we don’t need a law, it is enforceable via social pressure.
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I'm not opposed to guns in general, although I think they are pretty limited as defensive weapons unless you walk around with them in your hand.
But the idea that guns are going to protect you from a tyrannical government is laughable.
If, say for example a bunch of white supremacist Neo-Nazis wree to take over the government, police, and military your gun will not protect you.
When they come to get you, you will hear something fall on the floor and when you look at the flashbang explode it will temporarily blind you and make your ears ring. Within seconds you will be surrounded by at least ten heavily armed individuals with bullet proof vests who will throw you on the floor and cuff you. A couple of hours later you will remember the gun that couldn't save you.
It is not the Second Amendment that keeps you free (to the limited extent that we are free), but the First Amendment. All of you that think protest is a waste of time and that protesters should be kept from inconveniencing the public, and that police should be allowed to use force against people exercising their First Amendment Right to lobby and seek redress from the government are putting all of the Bill of Rights in danger.
It is the freedom to speak, write, criticize the government and do so loudly in public that makes the right to bear arms possible. Once you give away the right to criticize the powers that rule is, you will never hear of the Second Amendment again.
It's the FIRST amendment for a reason.
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I live in rural Ohio where people love their guns whether it is for hunting deer or waterfowl or simply for the local gun club. I live in the reddest of the solid Republican part of Ohio and, while I would like to see stringent gun control measures put into place, banning sales of all assault style weapons, universal background checks, gun buy-backs, requiring gun owners to carry insurance, my neighbors don’t and would fight tooth and nail to prevent it but I believe we have to start somewhere. Arguing that some of these measures don’t go far enough is just as unreasonable as the camel’s nose under the tent argument against any gun control legislation that gun advocates make. Maybe it is just baby steps but let’s start doing something!
When there is no solution to the human condition, redecorating the room in which we dwell is about all there's left to do. If we'll constantly be changing the wall colors, probably best not to hang too many things on the walls.
If banning assault-style weapons doesn't happen, then raising the minimum age at which one can buy them might be effective. I suggest age 85. I don't think there's any instance of a person aged 85 or older carrying out a mass shooting.
Note that this age is negotiable; I'm willing to go down to 80.
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The takeaway from Trump’s comment is that institutionalizing people suits this administration very well, thank you, whether it be in a prison or “mental health” setting. But this is hardly about guns. Were we concerned at all about guns, we sure wouldn’t allow “terrorists” on the No Fly list to buy them (and we do). One must conclude that arming everyone to the teeth and having the little people pick each other off works for the 1% just fine.
There are millions of Americans, in fact more as a percentage, than any other country where our citizens take all manner of prescribed psychotropic medications. Besides that people are usually not so crazy as to tell a professional that they want to hurt others. They realize if they do, they get taken for a mental health evaluation at a medical facility for up to 72 hours.
So how do we stop those that aren't mentally ill enough or stupid enough to tell anyone they are so angry and despondent that they plan to take it out on others. The answer is you can't, and until we develop mind reading technology we won't. The answer in the immediate is not allowing people to own assault firearms. Their high velocity and lethality is far beyond any handgun. Handguns are enough for self defense, and more practical. Those who want to target shoot can keep them secure at shooting ranges. Beyond that they should only be in the hands of military personnel. At military bases around the country, our personnel are not allowed to carry around their M16s. They are kept under lock and key. Go ask a GI.
You never know for sure what the slightly or not so slightly odd ball neighbor/coworker/acquaintance is going to do next.
But you know exactly what happens when you point AR15 on children and pull the trigger.
The "everyone who act strangely" measures would open the door to abuse and chaos. Would it be of any help when "mass shooters" are usually "normal" people? The NRA is just like a religion. Their principal argument: "we have the right to defend ourselves". No contest we agree. But the debate is centered on "assault weapons" which is an attack weapon that can kill 20 people in less than a minute. That is an offensive weapon not a defensive one. Making them available for everyone cannot make the place more secure to say the least. This is common "no-nonsense" in every western country but the US because of conservatives and NRA. Very "bad faith" is involved here and the US kids are bound to continue dying because old men don't care.
By now it should be an Article of Faith to just about everybody that if a republican is moving their lips they're lying misdirecting or just plain being idiotic. Whatever the case it's almost certain they're being hypocritical about something.
A case in point is how they are dealing with two not entirely dissimilar problems: the opioid crisis and the gun crisis. Both involve manufacturers selling excessive quantities of a dangerous instrument to the point of absurdity for their own profit without regard to the human consequences; both involve a similar number of deaths; and both involve similar use, misuse, or error as the cause of their harms.
In the case of opioids Republican focus is on going after the pharmaceutical companies to restrict supply and also on tighter access, but when it comes to the gun manufacturers and their NRA Lackey they refuse even a modicum of control and restriction on the manufacturing, sale, or purchase.
How come they're so willing to go after getting the pills off the street but so unwilling to try and get the guns off the street as part of a solution to the problem? the difference is a reminder that in the Republican way of thinking you have a right to shoot somebody but not a right to be healthy or out of pain.
I’m sorry, folks, let’s just pause here for a second, think and speak the truth: if we are to throw one person who is “off” into a mental institution, I think most of us have an inkling of who should lead the pack.
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Rosenthal is illustrative of the mindset that allowed the Stoneman school killings to happen. Ignoring the patently obvious signs of mental illness and the potential for violence to maintain the politically correct rights of the perpetrator lead to his killing 17 innocent classmates. The left cannot have it both ways. Simply eliminating the sale of assault style weapons without also restricting the freedom of the mentally ill will lead to more mass killings as they find other ways to carry out their plans to kill.
Gun smoke and mirrors? I fear that no argument based on logic, empirical evidence, or morality will succeed in reducing the carnage. It will take time for the American people to wake up to the reality of wealthy gen manufacturers' and others' successful efforts to forestall sensible solutions through misdirection and lies. There is no guarantee that we will ever reach the point of saying "enough." Perhaps we don't really care about other people being killed. Perhaps we have been brainwashed by Fox News, action movies, and video games. Perhaps we are too lazy or stupid to actually try to understand how the gun laws we have actually work - or don't work. Perhaps we just don't trust the ability of government to do anything right. For whatever reason or reasons, we have lost the ability to respond democratically to this crucial and tragic issue.
This opinion page summarizes nicely the obvious: Unregulated guns and political acceptance of an escalating sick gun culture ("kill 'em before they kill you') are the essence of our problem.
To the first question, I believe the Supreme Court misinterpreted the 2nd Amend: Our founding fathers clearly wanted a home militia which at that time required men to have guns, and in my view, they limited the right to bear arms to a an organized mitlita. They would not have countenanced our modern slaughter with atomic age weapons. What is next: nuclear armed bazookas so citizens can play at being soldiers? THis misinterpretation of the consitution is analogous tto the Dred Scott descision, and somehow we must work to reverse this.
As to the assinine suggestions by Mr. Trump and others as to solutions , would the answer to a cholera epidemic be to pass-out antibiotics? No. The sane among us must attacked the root problem: unregulated guns. Take heart. The Dred Scott decision feel by the weight of its own iniquity. It took a while though.
Dred Scott didn't "fall by it's own weight" and SCOTUS didn't overturn it... the Civil War and the 14th Amendment did. Ironically, the NRA grew out of the Civil War when northern generals recognized the ineptitude of many men in the north to effectively shoot the "weapons of war" of the day compared to the men they faced in the Confederate Army. (The 5th President of the NRA was Ulysses S. Grant 1883-1884). Are you suggesting that D.C. v Heller be overturned in a similar manner to Dred Scott? If you are, good luck taking on the pro-2nd Amendment crowd with the unarmed, inexperienced anti-2nd Amendment crowd. I would suggest we have this Civil War in a more civil manner... at the ballot box. The NRA has a constitutional right to assembly and speech, its supporters have the constitutional right to vote. They will continue to exercise those rights. Make your arguments. Where you can successfully win them and affect legislation in a way that is upheld by the Supreme Court, more power to you. You have been very effective winning them at some state and local levels like D.C. and Chicago. How's it working out at curbing gun assaults and murders in those cities? Mexico doesn't have a 2nd Amendment and has gun control laws similar to those outlined by most liberals. How's it working out for them at curbing gun assaults and murders?
Understand, this is the same political party that passed a tax bill giving the vast majority of its benefits to the top 1% of the American people, but who insist that it is of great benefit to the rest of us. They thrive on the idea that if they give most of us a little tiny bit of the benefit, we will continue to vote for them.
In this case they will give us (maybe) an age limit, some social services money, and the end to "bump-stocks, and say they have worked great deeds for us. Meanwhile, the mass shootings will continue, but they will be able to collect huge donations from the NRA.
Republican leadership has sold out the American people. You really do need to vote them out in any election next November, really.
Everything you wrote is true. Almost. While it is the case that significant reductions in suicides, murders and accidental shootings will not occur without greatly reducing the number of guns, law and culture are mutually reinforcing. The news today that a major gun retailer will stop selling all guns to people who haven't finished maturing, and will stop selling assault rifles and high-capacity magazines - is both evidence and a driver of a change in public opinion and represents the leading edge of a cultural shift.
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While Trump, Ryan, Scott, Rubio,Yoho & other Florida and national GOP lackey politicians beholden to the weapons industry continue to spew NRA talking points, there are 17 dead in Parkland, and in another few weeks, there will be another dozen dead somewhere else. Anyone can today walk into a gun store or a “gun show", pay a thousand dollars and leave with an AR-15 used in Parkland, Las Vegas, Orlando, Aurora and Newtown. AR-15s killed 188 human beings and wounded another 662.
The Trump/GOP plan to arm 20% of teachers is just one more form of gun madness advocated by organizations like the NRA. If there is a deadly shooting the NRA’s perpetual solution isn’t fewer AR-15s, it’s always more guns in the schools and on the streets that supposedly will stop shooters like the one in Las Vegas.
Although the GOP is correct that there is a mental health care crisis in Florida & America, it's a crisis they helped to create and aggravate by insisting on policies that do absolutely nothing to address mental health problems or effective weapons control.
Reliable data are that there are 200 million legal American gun owners and 8.5 - 14 million "assault rifles". The vast majority of murders are by illegal gun owners in big cities. "Assault rifles" are seldom used. Mass shootings account for a tiny fraction of murders. What do these data tell us? These data tell us that "assault rifles" are an exceptionally safe product and that legal American gun owners are an exceptionally peaceful element of society.
Your stats are off.
It has been shown that when there is a gun present in a household - legal or not - that about 75% of the time if someone is killed with that gun, it will be someone in the household, and the majority of that 75% are suicides. The rest are accidental deaths and domestic violence.
I'll leave it to you though to explain to the parents in Sandy Hook, and Parkland, and to the widows and parentless children left after Las Vegas, that their children, parents, sisters, brothers, etc. were killed with a 'safe product'.
I am in favor of a Constitutional Amendment to go into effect immediately clarifying the circumstances under which Presidents can be removed from office; making it clear that the House and Senate may, by acting jointly and by simple majority vote, expel a President from office for no reason at all without any right of appeal, acting under the well established, frequently utilized, and repeatedly upheld legal principle “Happy Is The One Who Rids Himself Of The Pox.”
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"The gun-control group Everytown for Gun Safety studied 133 acts of mass murder committed between January 2009 and July 2015. . ."
A private group can study mass murder and find that some of the assumptions about what will prevent gun violence are untrue. But the CDC is prevented by law from doing any research on gun violence. If we want to talk about mental illness, there's an example: it's insane to prohibit large-scale research on one of the biggest threats to public health and national security. When will this country decide behave sanely?
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It has been shown for decades that treating people at the local level rather than in so-called mental hospitals is cost-effective. Yes there are some that need a closed setting, but they are a small minority. The problem is that Fed, and local governments have gutted the funding for such programs.
Simply put: 300 million firearms. You cannot buy them back.
The only channel left is to regulate their use. That is a practical way to begin facing the problem.
A second step would be to support groups that advocate such sane and healthy regulation
Third: Understand they posture of our current legislators. They are the silent ones, the complicit ones.
And, please make the connection: if one is pro-life, one cannot be in favor of the unrestricted use of guns and firearms. The US loses more lives to guns than any other country int he world EVER! Who needs 300 million firearms?
A call for sanity is desperately needed.
Would someone be able to find the clip of Trump rushing towards his security men when a demonstrator tried to mount the stage at one of his campaign rallies? That would show how he would have rushed in to confront the Parkland shooter.
I have yet to hear anyone, however conceptual or philosophical, address the core of the issue which is why do homosapiens kill so many of their own kind? After slaughtering over a hundred million of our fellow human beings in just the last century alone, why are we not examining the source of this behavior? Isn't acting on the unjustified impulse to kill essentially a survival artifact being triggered that is maladaptive in a civilized society? I would argue there is a direct correlation to our dominance as a species and the impulse to kill that is more powerful than our current attempts prevent the behavior by labeling it mental illness instead of going after its origin, so can it be isolated and addressed genetically? If so, perhaps we should be looking at CRISPR Cas9 for a solution and not gun laws or mental hospitals.
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Let's not forget, most healthcare, including mental health services require insurance. If you put work requirements on Medicaid, then healthy, able-bodied men like Nikolas Cruz can't get help. He was very unlikely to be able to find or keep a job, leaving him unable to receive any help until he met the standards for involuntary commitment in a psych ward.
Even with insurance, many people have high deductibles. If your deductible is $6,000, mental health services might be just as far out of reach as if you had no insurance.
State's rights! States require the annual registration, inspection and insuring of vehicles and the licensing of drivers.
States can and should require the same for guns and gun owners. The rationale is the same. Vehicles in substandard condition or improperly operated can cause harm. Guns can cause harm. Owners and operators must take responsibility. Responsibility is established by demonstrating competence and accepting financial liability for potential harms.
Financial responsibility is shared by owners by purchasing insurance. Uninsured vehicles cannot legally be driven. Uninsured guns should not be allowed to be carried or fired.
Insuring a shotgun or hunting rifle should not be onerously expensive because the potential for its causing harm is less than that of an assault rifle or semi-automatic pistol. Let the market determine the cost of owning and insuring semi-automatics.
Insurance payouts to mass killing victims and their families would elevate the premiums for semi-automatics. Fewer people would buy them or want to keep them. A voluntary buy back program funded by a tax on insurance premiums would reduce the number in private arsenals. The threat to public safety would be reduced by reasonable government regulation (not a ban or confiscation program) combined with market forces.
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Like the electoral college, was have our history of slavery to thank for the existence of the 2nd amendment; and the strange and ambiguous wording of it.
And no, the NRA backed mythology that the 2nd amendment was enacted to 'protect against tyranny' is pure hogwash.
The second amendment was actually enacted to *enforce* tyranny and oppression of black slaves. Slaves who often organized and formed revolts against their masters. Revolts that had to be put down. By state militias. Carrying firearms.
It was left to the states, because in the Federalist / anti-Federalist debate that dominated our nation's formation, the central government didn't want to be financially responsible for maintaining a standing force in the slave states to deal with the 'problem' of slave revolts. And yes, sadly, the issue was seen as more of a financial one than a question of morality.
A brief overview of American slave rebellions:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_rebellion#North_American_slave_revolts
Why, if it is okay to own military assault weapons, it is not okay to own a tank, howitzer or cruise missile? (Or, maybe it is legal in some states?)
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I have put this question to eight gun owner Republican friends, 3 with a daughter in grade school and five without but made to assume such a daughter: "Assume I showed you unassailable statistics that within the next 6 months a person of any age you choose, in Denver, would buy an AR-15 and shoot up your daughter's very school. Assume you have a choice effective this very moment between (1) a law against anyone's purchase of an AR-15s and (2) putting a Magnum 38 in every teacher's desk, what choice would you make? The score was 8-0. No need to say in favor of which.
Why is that not the choice we all actually face as citizens as well as parents?
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It's not the AR-15 that is the issue.
The weapon's design is deliberate to make it look "cool".
A competent design engineer could give you a semi-automatic firearm that looks like a crueller.
Your argument starts with a somewhat limited premise, particularly for the argument that you are trying to make.
The answer may lie in forcing gun manufactures to design and manufacture weapons that require some sort of shot-limiting feature that makes a shooter remove the weapon from the shooting position to reset the trigger mechanism.
They could also require that manufactures build refit kits that would be required to be placed on existing weapons.
Oh, and designing this so that bypassing the limiter would render the firearm unusable...
It can be done.
A "well regulated militia" is the only place for firearms according to the 2nd Amendment. Those three words terrify the NRA.
Any owner of a firearm who does not belong to the National Guard has no constitutional right to ownership.
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Our government is paralyzed; transfixed as if in the gaze of a cobra every time it attempts to do anything about the "gun issue". The endless lame and even silly excuses about what Congress can and cannot do have amazed me for decades.
Mr. Trump and the current Republican Congress seem to be very eager to strip some citizens of all of their rights to ensure that no mass killing ever occurs again. Of course, all of us know that this is pure fantasy. Just like Mr. Trump dashing boldly in to save those school students, it doesn't have a hinge in reality.
They also say that there is no way to ban assault rifles because "assault" rifle" cannot be defined. Clearly, what America needs is a more intelligent Congress and President who can define "assault rifle" and write a law that bans their open sale, and licenses their possession. We need a national database that tells us who owns what gun and where it is located.
Those two ideas would help to curtail gun violence in America. They would be a step. Lets get moving to elect a congress that will act to help the American people.
Andrew Rosenthal, right you are about Soviet Russia's "sluggish schizophrenia" issues, their tossing dissenters for their amti-communist opinions into mental institutions. Now Trump wants to commit 'odd' people into asylums on our side of the pond. And Trump wants to arm teachers. Weaponized teachers as sharp-shooters to prevent school massacres? Are we crazy or is our President? Are we in Gulag country redux here in America?
We Americans have suffered from Trump's misdirection and blatherskite, ignorance and unfitness for office (except for a TV howler) for 3 years (since April 2015).
What is in view for the near future is an upswing of demented gun violence and the continuing Hydra-headed rule of the National Rifle Association in league with Second Amendment advocates. Alas, not "Gun Smoker and Mirrors", as you claim, but real guns, no mirrors, and bloody deaths of many more innocents in real time. The gun lobby and N.R.A. are counting on Trump's horrific sinecure of our government to keep making moolah off of guns, any kind, anywhere, any price.
If people were thrown into a mental institution if "something was off" Trump would be the first to go. And should go, as he is certainly far more dangerous than an AR-15 in the hands of a single shooter in terms of the massive carnage his policies, and the policies of his supporters, cause.
As a mentally ill person, I always feel under attack when a shooting occurs. I'm certainly crazy - I hear voices and everything - but I also dutifully take my meds and regularly see my psychiatrist. Yet if people who are "off" could be committed, I'd certainly be one of the first to go, even though I'm the last person to even think of harming others. In fact, most of us mentally ill (properly treated) aren't violent. It's not fair to lump us with monsters like Cruz.
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One final addition to my plan for circular firing ranges for isolated semi-automatic weapon wielding men would be a Presidential Running Track inside the firing line so our Fearless Leader could demonstrate his desire to run into danger...
In the whole argument, the phrase expanding the market is the most revealing. I have been saying this for weeks in the comment section of many of the NYT articles on assault weapons yet very few people seem to pick up on this vital point. Because we no longer have the government run Springfield Armory to manufacture assault weapons for the military, it is the private sector that now builds for the military.
The military. of course, does not contract to every private Arms company in any given year but they want the whole industry to remain viable for contracting purposes. How to accomplish this is possible if there is a large civilian market for these weapons. In particular, the revenue from the civilian and military market combined is more than sufficient to fund the research necessary to keep our military equipped the best weapons possible to keep us supreme in war capability. I believe this has been discussed a lot in the halls and conference rooms of the Pentagon but not so much in the news.
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So the writer thinks we can have revolvers and bolt action rifles? Is this what he’s saying?
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Is that too much or not enough? Since AR-15 doesn’t appear in the 2nd amendment and “well regulated” does, seems like the meaning of “arms” is open to question.
Here in NY one day I was on a train when over the PA system a conductor said “he has a gun” and suddenly about 7 people in the train car that I was in pulled out weapons. At the next station was an army of police.
Of course there was no problem it was a drunken policeman threatening passengers.
They took him off and I never heard another thing about it.
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It's curious that these mass shootings occur virtually only in suburban and urban areas, almost never in rural areas, where you know there are plenty more guns. I'd like see that idea explored. Is it respect for guns in rural areas that doesn't bring these murderous ideas to mind? And black people are murdered every single day in our cities, especially in Chicago, yet there is no outcry until large numbers of white people are killed.
Switzerland, of all places, has a gun culture similar to ours, but a minuscule amount of gun crime. Indeed, all able-bodied Swiss men are required to be members of their Army, and keep assault rifles --- in their homes! And, upon retirement from the Swiss Army, get to keep them! Recreational target shooting, with those assault rifles, is common in Switzerland, as is hunting in some of their cantons. What are the Swiss doing right when it comes to guns?
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The Swiss are up there in number of gun deaths per capita. Of course US leads by a mile.
Aren't the majority of gun deaths in Switzerland suicides rather than the results of a crime with a gun? Perhaps I'm mistaken. Still, I think I'd rather walk the length of the worst neighborhoods of Bern or Zurich than stroll a few blocks through Southside Chicago, North Camden NJ, Compton or parts of St. Louis.
I smiled when I read Rosenthal’s (unoriginal) proposal that semi-autos be banned. I am a lawyer, and would never turn in my guns were such a ban to become federal law. Not that I am concerned about the prospect of such. Were such a law enacted, it wouldn’t be enforceable in “red” states as the only enforcers would be federal agents and there are too few of them. There would be fewer still after a few raids to confiscate guns. Even in “blue” New York, tens of thousands of upstate residents have refused to register their rifles under the SAFE Act even though failing to do so is a felony under state law. The sheriffs up there have indicated little interest in enforcing the act. The New York State Police have said that those registering late will not be prosecuted. Prosecuting regular citizens with no criminal record merely for failing to register a gun bought legally would work against gun-control efforts. Otherwise law-abiding gun owners are not afraid of the law as even hardened gang members with felony records barely register on law enforcements’ radar for illegal gun possession (unless some crime of violence or drug offense is also involved). There are not enough federal courts, prosecutors and judges to try as few as a million non-compliant gun owners, or the cells to lock us up. How about a million of us standing mute in front of federal courthouses across the country holding up empty 30-round mags with no ID in our pockets? Ask an FBI or ATF agent how that would work out.
Duane. Assuming you represent the sentiments of a significant number of gun owners, it's good to know we can dispense with the concept that gun owners are inherently law abiding. It sounds pretty conditional to me.
Should some type of gun ban go into effect, there are numerous ways to compel compliance short of jack-booted thugs going into homes. After a period of buybacks and voluntary compliance, fines could be levied at whatever level gave adequate compliance, and handled much like traffic tickets or IRS judgements. Wages or bank accounts could be attached and tax refunds blocked. Licensing, registration, and insurance of all guns could also be required with their own consequences. Professionals who fail to comply could lose their licenses to practice. We could even have a reward system for reporting illegal possession of the most dangerous guns. Of course, jail time should only be applied to the worst of the worst.
I think it would take a generation or so to remove the great majority of banned weapons. But as gun violence declines, each additional gun death becomes less and less tolerable, and 'harmless' possession less socially acceptable. Gun ownership is already declining in younger cohorts. Hopefully it's just a matter of time before our society becomes saner about guns.
"The real problem is that there are far too many firearms in America — more than 300 million,..." What if there are 400,000,000 guns?
Expanded background checks. What's that? A review of criminal records and a credit check? Background checks only work, if someone has done something that requires entry into a database. If there is no arrest, charge and conviction, there is nothing to enter into the database. Cruz should have dealt with long before he was 18. Sheriff Israel clearly dropped the ball.
I am a shrink. Do not try to make this my problem. Psychiatry is not particularly adept at predicting suicide or violence. Having said that, I am positive that a gun owner is infinitely more likely to shoot themselves or someone else, than someone who does not have access to a gun. In other words, the single biggest predictor of gun violence is gun access. But, unless you are asking me to lock up gun owners, do not make this my problem.
By the way, "means restriction", meaning making it hard for a suicidal person to access their desired method, has been shown to be helpful at decreasing suicide risk. So, again, do not make gun violence my problem because I can't stop it without separating people from their guns.
Oh, and my wife is a teacher. Now, in NY I have seen busy public places patrolled by LEOs in body armor with assault rifles. If we expect her to engage in firefights between classes, I expect nothing less for her. What, you expect her to engage an AR15 armed domestic terrorist with a little revolver in her purse when trained SWATman can't do it? But what dotard would want junior's chem teacher to have a M4 harnessed to her chest? America = Insane. I should know, I'm a shrink.
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I don’t support having weapon carrying teachers, but I do feel gun free zones extend an open invitation to someone wanting to kill as many people as possible.
ok, ted, you got me with my wording. that said, immaculate conception is more likely than shooting somebody without a gun, regardless of demographic(yes, i know about improvised firearms, sheesh). it is also inconceivable to me that gun makers are not profiting from illegal guns. most illegal guns out there were not donated from factory to street. even if not"owned", they were bought and sold.
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I completely agree that outlawing semiautomatic weapons would be a dramatic improvement, but the big question is this: would that violate the second amendment? The Supreme Court has already overturned the Chicago handgun ban, and the CA judiciary has blocked implementation of a ban on large capacity magazines on the grounds that the ban is unconstitutional. I agree fully with everything stated in this article, but I think the real obstacle is the second amendment. There are many countries that have solved this problem, Japan, the U.K., Australia, even our good neighbors to the North. Why? They don’t have a second amendment preventing any serious effort at gun control.
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The issue of guns and gun laws serves as a powerful reminder that our government has, once again, found itself unable to create a system for addressing a very complex problem.
We must begin with a fact-based, fully supported apolitical process which carefully weighs and considers Second Amendment rights, access to weaponry, background checks, etc. This will take time, laser-focused attention and a full command of the most pertinent and significant statistics.
Picking around the edges, or settling for whatever the current political climate will allow is a very poor method of problem solving. It will lead to, as it has, going back to this issue each time the next tragedy occurs.
We can do better - we can do more - if we decide to engage a process designed and likely to reduce the carnage occurring all too often across America.
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As a navy doctor, we regularly gave briefings when on deployment about the risks inherent in various ports around the world. Our focus was on the medical risks of course but the riskiest port in the world was actually our home port, Norfolk, mostly because our sailors were less aware, less cautious and more laissez-faire there.
1
OK, here is a simple proposal.
Let's set up a mechanism where someone can be declared unfit to own guns, although not necessarily mentally ill. The police can gather evidence, and present it to a judge. The judge can then rule. The individual or his lawyer can cross-examine witnesses and question evidence. There is a right of appeal.
Would this be constitutional? I believe it would be.
I call upon all to stop supporting the NRA. If they can not be cognizant of the harm they bring about, let's drain them of their resources. Kudos to all the corporations that have taken the first steps. Let the rest of society follow.
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When David Brooks wrote in his column last week that gun owners should be treated with respect, it reminded me of when I was an intern at a gun control organization in the 1970s. I’ll never forget the shockingly vile hate mail we received from people opposed to gun control. Clearly, respect needs to go both ways, including people concerned about gun violence in this country. In the 1970s, Americans possessed about 100 million guns. Now they own about 300 million guns. This raises the question, when will we have enough guns?
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And now the gun control advocates receive death threats and gun enthusiasts even show up with guns to intimidate gun control advocates.
We do not have the capacity to put so many people in mental hospitals. Prisons now hold so many of the mentally ill and they are not staffed to handle the mental health issues. Rikers Island in New York City is just one example of the improper care those people get. guards use brutal methods to control those people and have caused many deaths, protected by union contracts against criminal charges. We have an insane President who should top the list of being put away.
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While I agree that the authorities cannot "throw" someone who seems "off" into a mental institution, in this recent shooting in Florida there were a number of warnings of his instability and murderous thought processes that he should have been detained and evaluated.
The FBI admits this. The local sheriffs office admits this. Failure on a national and local level to see the possibilities with this man is not a failure to limit the purchase of semiautomatic weapons.
However, I agree that fully automatic weapons, e.g. the military AR-16 need not be available to the public. As I understand it, buying and owning one is illegal. Ditto, bumpstocks.
I grew up in Colorado many moons ago. Guns were a part of my life. My father was a gun collector and then a gun tradesman. We all felt safe and, even though I have no statics to back up this statement, I doubt there are more guns on the street now than then. What, then, could be the difference? I posit that it is a difference in the people on the street now vs. then. The societal question is--how did we get that way?
Therefore, I say that we ask the wrong questions. We need to seek not how to get all guns off the street, but why there are seemingly more people who want to pull the trigger?
Two hot potatoes- mental health and gun control. Both requiring thought, collegiality, and most of all, the ability to come to a consensus. At this time our government isn’t able to discern how to act as legislators let alone understand the 2nd amendment. They are only able to continue taking campaign contributions from the NRA.
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What you are suggesting as being requirements to achieving a goal has nothing to do with the existence of the NRA.
The same attends on any other issue and lobbying organization, too.
You end your excellent statement, sir, with a gratuitous straw man of dubious construction.
A well regulated militia. All gun owners should be required to participate in their state national guard for as long as they own a gun. They say they want to protect the community then they shouldn't fear being properly certified like other licenced individuals and professionals. If they just LOVE guns, there are other professionals waiting to help.
1
The NRA gets legitimacy and funding from its corporate partners. These corporations need to be shamed into withdrawing their affiliations with this subversive organization. Do they really want their name out there when the next slaughter of innocents occurs? It could be the children of one of their best customers. It could be some of their own corporate officers or employee's children. I don't think they will want to keep having to explain why they have an affiliation with an organization that is making these sickening tragedies more likely to continue by preventing effective solutions.
“The real problem is that there are far too many firearms in America — more than 300 million, according to Congress. They are too easy to obtain and they are becoming ever more lethal.”
I certainly buy the part about lethality, especially for the Assault Rifles. No numbers about how many are legally in the hands of law abiding Americans in this piece. Credible estimates run into the millions.
Critically not mentioned is the hugely nitty issue of not just how to remove these weapons from the legal market, but how to remove those weapons already in the hands of the civilian population.
No ban on future availability will likely stand while millions of these guns remain available to those who legally obtained them before a prohibition. The only alternative would be to require the surrender of those privately owned guns. No one talks about how that would get done.
Also, no treatment here of other weapons that pose high risk for mass shootings, say semi automatic pistols with large magazine capacities (15 rounds or more) that are far more concealable and capable of similar rates of fire.
The question of how many guns would be OK, and what types should be legally permitted gets very very complicated. Not something that many Americans or politicians want to hear about following an incident like the Parkland carnage.
In my opinion, a buy-back program would be optimal. But, if the sale of assault weapons was made illegal tomorrow, over time their availability would be drastically reduced. Those who already own them wouldn't be able to sell them legally, and their illegal ('black market') availability would become cost prohibitive to practically anyone looking to buy one.
In fact, if 'third party' sales of assault rifles were made illegal, it would almost necessitate a buy-back program, just in the name of fairness to owners of them who want to sell but can't legally do so.
Well Said.
There is only one viable course of action. Ban all semi-automatic guns, strictly regulate the rest with a registry, requirement to keep them in safes, unless for a legitimate use such as hunting.
More needs to be done to address mental health in this country. Here is an article about the difficulties that parents face finding help -->
http://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/Op-Ed/2012/12/23/I-am-Adam-Lanza-s-m...
Obviously, everything the Donald says is crazy, but this is no reason to completely ignore the real problems faced by mental health patients and their families. Some of these problems become all too familiar when associated with guns.
Mr. Rosenthal is correct and offers little new information on the gun violence debate before us now.
Og course Trump, Paul Ryan and the NRA are sitting still and waiting it out. This strategy always worked before and they are counting on it yet again.
The real question is will the American people let it happen. Will we once again fail to be persistent and loud and forceful and slowly fade to inaction?
Today we learned that Dick's Sporting Goods will no longer sell assault rifles.
Now this is a first for America. Along with other businesses now no longer extending discounts to NRA members, there is small movement to push back against the NRA propaganda. We need much more but a small start is better than none.
We need to maintain the energy. If we act as we claim to believe, Americans in the thousands would join the march in DC on March 24th.
"The risk is that the passage of a few partial measures will take our eyes off the bigger picture ..."
Ah, Mr. Rosenthal, how nicely in one tight pithy phrase you draw the map for the gun lovers of America, those deplorables who just happen to have the Second Amendment on their side.
You say "bigger picture". They hear confiscation. You say "partial measures". They hear a federal ban on all guns.
It is words like these that have sent waves of buyers into gun shops since the massacre, new buyers and old buyers, many buying assault rifles.
The unwise rhetoric on display here, that seems to leave actual reality unaddressed except in loony ways (yes, there already are 300+ million guns in America - those are the ones we know of; yes, we do have the Second Amendment and gun ownership is a constitutionally protected right), and the seeming desire, clumsily hidden, to relive Prohibition, is increasing the number of guns out there by the minute, is tightening the grip of the “cold, dead hands” of gun owners, and is making any reasonable gun law that much harder, if not impossible, to enact.
It is difficult to take a gun away from a person who has a gun.
So, by all means, keep going. The NRA loves you. So do the gun manufacturers.
2
Unfettered access to sate the paranoia of gun loving America. Grand plan. Thats what we have going on now. Grand results.
The U.S. can strengthen background checks ad infinitum, but it will have little impact. We can ban large magazines with the same likely result.
The only way to end the violence associated with civilian possession of horrifically powerful military-type weapons is to ban their possession by anyone other than the military and highly trained police SWAT teams.
The federal government should initiate a year-long buy-back program in which they pay local police departments a bounty for buying back these weapons. Then, after the opportunity to sell them has expired, mere possession should be a federal felony which includes forfeiture of the weapon(s) and a brief jail sentence.
Background checks are a bandaid on the cancer of these types of weapons. Only removing them, all of them, from the community will make any real difference.
A program like what's outlined above would be entirely consistent with the Second Amendment's requirement that the militia it envisioned be "well regulated".
90
A reasonable solution might be to limit the amount of powder that manufacturers are allowed to put in ammunition.
Another reasonable solution is to require that the slugs for ammunition sold to the public be redesigned to be less destructive on impact.
Maybe even limiting publicly purchased ammunition except to licensed hunters to having slugs made of rubber. Upgrading the hunting licenses to include regular psychological review would at least put something in between the shooter and the ammunition that could stop the carnage...
And hunters that aren't able to bag a deer or a duck in a year or two could be required to go back and redo their fundamental training, since obviously they aren't that qualified to be shooting at anything in the first place.
I cannot believe an assault weapon of this magnitude costs less than an iPhone. The commercialization of mass murder. Given they are so attainable and relatively cheap, I suppose we are lucky we do not have more mass assaults.
1
Credit where blame is due. Liberal politicians and thinkers for the past few decades have weakened the ability for physicians to medicate patients involuntarily, limited inpatient treatment, and encouraged community mental health for severely ill patients when medication and structure were needed. This along with the notion that these severe diseases were actually "cultural"and signs of unique personalities rather than illness (eg. See Homeland) have allowed patients to suffer without needed therapy. It is thus unlikely that mental health restrictions on guns will have a major impact until we actually work to identify and treat those in need.
10
Its the guns LBN. Europe has about the same percentage of mentally ill people who, if they could, would commit mass murder with guns. But, unlike America, military style weapons are forbidden by law. So, except for a few terrorist shooting, Europe doesn't have the mass murders we have. Instead of blaming every evil in society on the liberals, maybe you should be honest and admit that the problem is the guns, not the mental illness.
4
Better funding for mental health services would be helpful in many ways, but would not do much to reduce the number of mass shootings. Most mass shooters have not shown enough evidence (prior to their shootings) of a mental illness making them sufficiently acutely dangerous to meet the criteria for involuntary psychiatric hospitalization. That will always be the case unless we wish to utilize psychiatry as a tool for the oppression of one's political opposition, as was done for years in the USSR. Any psychiatrist will tell you that predicting dangerousness is exceedingly challenging for even the most skilled clinicians.
No, most mass shooters did not appear to be dangerous until after their crime. After all, everyone experiences rage of murderous proportions at some point in their life. Usually, this occurs for a very brief period of time. So there is a brief window of time when the risk of violence is greatest. During that window of time, the angry person will do a lot more damage if they have access to powerful firearms than if they lack a gun. So, of course, the only meaningful way to reduce gun violence is to a make it a lot harder for people to obtain weapons of mass destruction, such as the AR-15. Let's have really serious universal background checks, the way it's done in the U.K. or Australia. Let's have mandatory waiting periods for gun purchases, to reduce crimes of passion.
We can reduce gun violence if we attack the real culprit- guns are too readily available.
59
These semiautomatic weapons do not go on full auto. These weapons are not all that effective in close quarters. There are far better weapons available that are easy to buy. I have to think the constant video games and TV shows and movies with these assault weapons leave an impression on these inadequate individuals. This behavior is more about making a statement than killing people.....especially if they don't relate to people very well. Maybe there are people that need to be placed in a supportive environment under supervision for life. The old mental hospitals and I lived next to one did exactly that and the people were not unhappy. They were largely self sufficient. Not everyone can have an IQ greater than 90.
If you think that raising the age limit for buying firearms from 18 to 21 is even a step in the right direction, you're fooling yourselves.
The only way the age limit will help, is to reinstate the Assault Weapons ban.
1
Does Trump not realize the irony of his suggestion to put away people who were deemed "off"? After all, there has been speculation since he began campaigning that "something was off" with Trump himself. Lists of mental health professionals have written letters and circulated petitions claiming they perceived mental illness in the president. Does he forget that as recently as a two months ago there was such a hue and cry about it that his doctor was forced to issue a statement saying that Trump was able to pass a cognitive screening test?
WRONG! There are two kinds significant ways in which our failures of behavioral control have endangered the public.
First, it was better, much better, when the crazies could be locked up and medicated. This was not "Soviet-style" based upon political beliefs, but it was a combination of rational protection of the public and more humane than jailing or killing those who were a threat. I well remember when the anti-asylum activists met the cynicism of Ronald Reagan and we emptied the loonie bins, subjecting poor neighborhoods and many downtown streets to a scourge of homeless and dangerous crazies.
Second, we have become too lax in schools and neighborhoods on bad teen behavior. It used to be that we "leaned" harder on teens to behave, and the vast majority learned to behave, and the few who were too committed to bad behavior (or too crazy, see above) would end up being pushed out to the military service (I knew many who took judge-approved military enlistment at 16 rather than go to juvenile hall), or into other quasi-military settings or reform schools.
Finally, as I have written before, a nation full of guns that used to raise children with an emphasis on self-discipline perhaps can no longer let the public own guns if everyone gets to express their impulses and if they believe all errors can be cured with a re-boot. This needs wide societal discussion.
In any event, the asylums (emptied by Reagan) are a better option than padding the walls of the entire society.
Even if there was a complete ban on the sale of all firearms in the U.S., it probably wouldn't make any difference as there are so many guns already out there. And, in the improbable scenario that such a bill appeared likely to pass, there would in the interim be so many additional guns sold that it would make a mockery of the law.
The only thing that might make a difference is restrictions on ammunition sales. It's odd that years after Senator Moynihan proposed this, that it isn't being discussed at all.
The NRA must be laughing its head off over this.
I suspect Democrats and others whose views don't match Republican orthodoxy will be identified as having something "off".
1
Exactly!
The NRA and Republicans propose bogus, ineffective, and never-to-be-enacted measures that leave the homes and streets of America awash in the weapons for mass killing. They harbor the irrational notion that guns are necessary and effective for self-protection. They assume that the proclivity for indiscriminate murder can be detected early. They know that weapons like the AR-15 are not needed in shooting sports and competitive marksmanship. They deliberately misread the 2nd Amendment even though the objective is clearly stated in the first phrase of the short two-phrase sentence.
America has a cultural divide on guns that cannot be bridged but, with some regulation, must be endured. Millions of American boys and men are obsessed with guns. Let them have the hunting rifles, shotguns, and handguns they collect expressly for hunting and self-protection, even though the weapons may be used in family quarrels, drunken brawls, and suicides. It is logistically impossible to regulate the hundreds of millions of garden-variety guns.
Let’s focus instead on limiting the possession of tactical rapid-fire weapons to the "well-ordered militia", like the local police, state national guards, sworn-in posses, and licensed, insured collectors. Let’s confiscate unlicensed weapons like the AR-15. and prosecute those persons found in possession.
Any firearm can murder, but only a tactical, rapid-fire combat rifle promises the confidence and drama craved by a mass killer.
Excellent column. Mental health care and gun registries are massively understaffed, underfunded and will remain ineffective despite good intentions. Parkland showed that armed guards are fallible. Having President Trump at every school in the country ready to rush in unarmed- silliness. Raising the age of purchase to 21 is ineffective symbolism. Training school staff to "carry" is time consuming, takes them away from teaching and expensive
Start at the beginning. Ban assault/ military style weapons and ammunition. Protect our children in schools, at church, at concerts etc.
56
I, too, sometimes get cynical that small steps in gun control may take the eye of the ball of the real necessity, repealing the 2nd amendment. but then I think of the pro life movement. step by step, inch by inch, they are curtailing the right of a woman to choose the fate of her own body.
constant drop carves the stone.
be hard, be like water. ( Bruce Lee)
Andrew Rosenthal rightly critiques the partial and inadequate steps being proposed to reduce gun violence. But when focusing on what the real problem with gun violence in America is, we have to say that we don’t know as much as we should. In 1996, the NRA-directed, Republican-majority Congress banned the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from funding research into firearm injuries and deaths. This head-in-the-sand policy dried up money for almost all public health studies of the issue nationwide, and has left us 22 years behind in knowing what works. If we as a country can’t get policy makers to reverse this pro-dumb stance on gun violence, we’ll never get them to address the real problem – whatever that is.
1
The required first step is for liberals to follow David Brooks' advice and stop despising gun owners.
The real enemy is here is not law-abiding (if slightly misled) Americans: it is gun manufacturers, who have hijacked the NRA and spun a consistent, convincing story about how this is all about the Constitution and patriotism. It's not. It's about selling guns, stock prices, and profits.
If we don't find a way to convince gun owners that we are all on the same side, and profiteering is our common enemy, we will never make any progress. I'm sure it feels good to despise and denigrate Red Staters, but doing so is not helping us make progress.
---The government can engage in...as much preemptive commitment to mental facilities as they want, but...as long as these assault-style weapons can be legally obtained, these tragedies will continue. Period. Anything less than a ban on these weapons is simply paying lip-service to the gun lobby.
As to the opening sentence of the article, regarding the characterization of president trumps conferring with a group of governors as "blathering"...that's somewhat disrespectful language...and an apt description of pretty much anything that he might say, so...thanks for that.
2
Sorry ladies and gentlemen, we are not giving up our guns. It is obvious that is the result that the left demands. Move on and look to real solutions such as changing the standard for involuntary commitments when a person is dangerous but the danger is not “imminent”. What’s worse, three days of mental health care or 17 dead?
2
"The real problem is that there are far too many firearms in America — more than 300 million, according to Congress."
With the genie out of the bottle, new laws will have little effect to no effect on reducing the scourge of gun violence. Over 15,000 died by gunshots last year in the US excluding suicides. The daily carnage is over 40 men, women and children shot to death throughout the country. Confiscation is out of the question. Buybacks are ineffective. Our culture is rooted in the violence paraded by Hollywood, video games and the social media.
Focusing only on the tiny percentage of outrageous slaughter witnessed in high profile mass murders has led nowhere and will continue to fail until there is a national consensus that all shootings, including the 99% not related to mass casualty events diminish our national health.
Concentrating nearly exclusively on mass shootings places us on the doorstep of a new movement to incarcerate yet another population of offenders in what is sure to be privatized asylums fed by our school and court systems. Another means to take the poor, the homeless and the mentally ill of the streets for profit while the death toll continues unabated.
I for one would be happy to see the repeal of the Second Amendment. Short of that, I would say to all who stand by its sanctity, let's at least implement it in its true original intent. It talks of the militia being well regulated. Well ... let's bring in regulations that track these guns. Let's be aware as to who these "militia" are. Let's license them. The founders never intended these weapons to be semi-automatic or assault rifles. Let's stick with the original intent and confiscate the rest of the murderous weapons that have proliferated our society.
Let's start living like other civilized nations.
How quickly we have moved from “sensible” gun regulations to “Banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians”! Presumably, that would include firearms with legitimate and long-accepted hunting and target shooting uses. No wonder gun owners are in no mood to compromise. Compromising with people who try (poorly) to conceal their true agenda is the same as submitting to their control.
1
The current gun policy-related disconnect between the will of electors and the reflexive resistance of the elected leads to one clear conclusion - America now has the very best government that money can buy. When will that disconnect end? When will purchased politics end?
2
"Everytown found that only 5 percent of the mass shooters it studied (over the past decade) were under 20."
This makes me wonder why we are emphasizing the need for us to protect kids from each other by encouraging "if you see something say something" policies. It also makes me wonder if the emphasis on spending money on physical intervention (i.e SROs) and "protection" (i.e. door locks, surveillance cameras, and lockdowns) is as important as spending money on personal intervention (i.e social workers, psychologists, counselors, smaller pupil-teacher ratios, etc). Politicians seem to be willing to support money for police personnel and "things" to prevent violence in schools that would, presumably, be committed by students despite the fact that only 5 percent of the mass shooters were under 20... but those same politicians seem unwilling to support spending for personal interventions that might address the problems that ultimately manifest in the form of gun violence later. Mr. Rosenthal is correct: banning weapons designed to kill enemy troops is the best and most cost effective means of addressing school shootings.
46
There is a myth in the political arena that if a candidate does not support unrestricted gun ownership then he, or she, will lose the support of the base. Well, if both candidates (Dem & GOP) support gun control, whom are they going to vote for? If most voters abstain from voting (which I doubt), then the most respected candidate will win. Somebody WILL be elected.
4
I don't understand why there is no call to register all guns. We register all vehicles, and nobody says that the government is going to take our vehicles away from us. With every gun registered, police could regularly confiscate illegal guns, which would make a huge difference. We might actually cut down on the number of guns in the country. Then yes, of course, ban semi-automatic weapons. But note that mass shootings aren't the cause of most gun deaths.
26
Any well regulated militia maintains a roster of what arms are entrusted to which individual, and treats loss of weapons as a serious offense.
Would you register every word processor or printing press lest they be misused? (freedom of speech) Register ever Bible or Koran? (freedom of religion) Register or get a permit before every meeting or gathering? (freedom of assembly)
I often think that the republican party has elevated cynicism to a fine art, and that manipulation of public sentiment is an addendum to their charter. However, with President Trump I don't think he is savvy enough to understand this level of subterfuge and probably believes what he is proposing. Vote them all out.
17
I am not convinced that a "few partial measures" will remove energy from the protests being planned by high-schoolers next month. I hope not. There is reason to believe that college and university students will join their younger counterparts. They should.
It might be a healthy thing for this nation to see mass protests akin to what occurred to help force the end of the Viet Nam War. It is hard to imagine a more "pro-life" issue than trying to reduce our number one international status as a gun-crazed nation. We are killing more citizens with our mountain of guns than were ever killed during that war.
This issue crosses political and social lines for the general public--the Congress is a social laggard. Several states and major corporations are already beginning to act--while shaking their head at a virulent, minority group of entrenched political "leaders."
9
The problem is, and no one is talking about it, is the fallacy that has been perpetrated on us by the NRA that guns protect us. Guns make us less safe. There are few instances where guns are used for self protection, compared to the instances guns injure and kill. Convenience store owners and shop owners not withstanding.....We've know since the 1993 study published by the New England Journal of Med that guns in the home increase risk of homicide and suicide. This study so enraged the NRA it effectively lobbied congress to pass a bill that prohibited research funding for gun violence for the next 25 years. If guns made us safe we would be the safest country country and we're not, if guns made us safe Chicago would be the safest city. If guns made us safe war zones would be the safest places to be. One third of teens to late twenties participate in some form of delinquency before they grow up, so an age limit of 25 is much more reasonable to purchase a gun. Social studies also show that most people have at least one mental break in their lifetime. We need these studies to direct our policies in a rational manner. If we can't ban guns we can ban assault rifles, or at least ban them to age 25 , and register and restrict and license guns . Guns do not protect us , tobacco causes cancer and lead in gasoline poisoned us all....all of these industries fought hard to hide the evidence and it's the same here.
15
Ms. Schulman
The NRA is a political organization not an industry. Its strength derives from its members and their association. Anyone can make wild assertions to color an issue in their favor to win an argument and demonize the opposition. Using your logic I could assert that the Democratic party through its support of abortion is dangerous to humanity because it advocates the self-abnegation of the species due to a slavish and contradictory over respect for certain selfish individual rights versus the right of the species to the wasted potential of the eliminated healthy offspring, not to mention how those poor creatures might feel about their own right to live.
I could assert that The Democrats were behind the impetus over the last 50 years to empty the asylums and state hospitals so disturbed individuals like the shooter in Florida and the schizophrenic who stabbed an innocent medical student to death in the library last week ,consequently have no place they can be held away from "normal" people. We all suffer because the ACLU perpetuated the fallacy on the Democratic party that these types of people were harmless and needed to be freed. Maybe these people could have gotten help or been confined until they are better if we had local state hospitals in place.
Although I agree with sterner measures regarding the type of weapons available to the public, the idea of banning “semi automatic” guns is too broad an expectation simply because it would include most hunting rifles and such an initiative would actually play into the hands of the NRA, enabling their spokespersons to say that the government is trying to take away their guns. Were we able to focus on restricting high velocity long guns such as the AR-15, bump stocks and high capacity magazines along with tightening background checks we’d be heading in the right direction.
The larger and more difficult issue is dealing with the paranoid rhetoric of the NRA that’s responsible for large swaths of the country believing that the gun is just another option when solving a problem. The more this happens - and this is the only place it happens - the more likely it will happen again. Does anyone doubt that the next shooter isn’t already out there, looking at Florida or even Las Vegas and thinking” I can do better than that”? American exceptionalism writ large - we’re number one with a bullet.
9
Not to mention the US constitution and the simple sentence "The right of the people to keep and bear shall not be infringed."You might have a little problem with that. Pop culture bromides don't really have the slightest meaning to that declarative sentence, and they never will.
2
Hunting continues in the U.K. even though all guns - and I do mean all guns - are banned with the exception of double barrelled shotguns. Blimey even 90% of our police are unarmed. So it can be done.
@Walt Amses - Anyone who needs to hunt with a semi-automatic NEEDS his gun taken away!
The sheer amount of guns of guns in this country is obscene. But that is the first problem to be dealt with, but how? Australia bought them back, and seemingly. It worked. But really what is the most important aspect is this country’s attitude and treatment of the mentally ill. If we are still afraid of admitting we see psychiatrists to our employer, or even to our friends, how are ever going to address helping these people in need. We are so behind in our understanding and care.
4
It never ceases to amaze me that the right to own a firearm is considered more important than the right to life. Kids die and it's not a gun control issue. We don't want to infringe on anyone's constitutional right--since clearly, the second amendment is talking about semi automatic weapons acquired by obviously troubled people. It makes much more sense to just roll back the progress the country has made since the 1950's in deinstitutionalisation of psychiatric hospitals. Because, obviously, it's not the guns that are the problem. It's the mental health issues. Interesting that he is not proposing locking up white men aged 18-49 since the majority of mass shooters fall into that demographic.
Our country would be much better off if we took the time to listen to each other. Instead, the NRA has put an unreasonable fear into gun owners that any gun control would lead to taking away all guns. Seriously, we can lock a person up because they have a mental illness but we cannot put restrictions that would limit that same persons ability to own a firearm? That's sound logic. As a social worker who has worked with people with severe and persistent mental illness for many years, I can tell you, the majority are not violent. They are not mass shooters. They are people like you and I. They have lives, jobs, friends and families. Some are staunch advocates, many vote. It is despicable to imagine taking away someone's life on the minuscule chance they will be violent.
9
Right to life? Are you kidding me right now? How come that same “right to life” doesn’t apply to the hundreds of thousands of abortions performed in this country each year?
An excellent article by Mr. Rosenthal but, like others, by focusing the blame on President Trump and the NRA it does suffer from deflecting the blame from the Republicans in Congress, you know, those cowards whose lust for power and money has an infinitely higher priority than, the safety of our school children and their teachers. (Please excuse the run-on sentence.)
6
Another unrealistic, polarizing coastal elite screed. Please, for the love of all that's Holy, move to the middle. High cap magazines and universal background checks are attainable, as may be an age limit for semi autos. Going after the millions of people who own the most popular and prolifically manufactured rifles in history (thanks to the GOP allowing the 1994 ban to expire) is not going to work. Please stop making things worse. Help accomplish something while we have the chance.
5
We who support rigorous gun control are terrified of saying out loud "we want to take your guns" for fear of unleashing howls of outrage from gun rights advocates. But that is exactly what needs to happen if we are to reduce gun violence.
Not every gun. Not from every gun owner. But some.
Start by banning assault weapons. Make it illegal for a civilian to own one. Let people got to shooting ranges if they enjoy shooting this type of weapon. But get them out of houses and gun shows.
Make it easier for law enforcement to confiscate, at least temporarily, from those who pose a threat - perpetrators of domestic violence, the very rare individual with mental illness who has indicated a potential for violence.
We can't begin to address the absurd strict constructionist misinterpretation of the 2nd amendment -"All guns, all people, all the time" if we are afraid to say what we really want.
So I am saying it right here out loud. I want to take (some of) your guns.
6
police should be trained to go towards the gunman instead of seeking shelter. This specially if the sounds of gunfire is in school, church, or public place. In florida school shooting, armed guards took shelter and allowed gunman unimpeded access to kill children. I cannot imagine what the police instructors were thinking when they trained the florida armed guards, they should be held accountable as well as the guards.
The NRA is the main driver of the gun debate. It has resisted all measures to legislate the sale, purchase and models of guns and of gun ownership. The NRA has long enjoyed a tax-exempt status as a non-profit. It may well be politically unwise, or virtually impossible to do so, but in theory taking measures to revoke the NRA's privileged position as a civic-minded organization that doesn't send our government treasury a dime would certainly get its attention. The salaries, travel, lobbying, advertising, publicity, etc. are all paid for, directly and not, by what are practically public subsidies. We the people are being manipulated into paying millions annually for the upkeep of a service a majority of us don't want. Unconditional gun ownership is not good for us, but the NRA is having increasing difficulty asserting that it is.
Wayne LaPierre's total 2015 compensation of salary, bonuses and stock options was over $5 million. The NRA runs itself very much like a for-profit entity, with investments in equity securities, money market funds and CDs, fixed income securities, alternative investments, and real estate and other. The public is underwriting their tax-exempt success. The NRA proclaims their main mission to be firearms safety, education, and training. That may be so, but they are also a profitable agency for gun manufacturers, from whom the NRA draws many of its annual millions. We should demand that Congress re-evaluate this tax status.
7
Given the intransigence of the US Congress with regard to passing reasonable new gun control legislation, I believe we should use every means possible to pressure states with bad gun laws to do better.
The only real levers for us to use in other states appear to me to be financial.
I recently saw two proposals along these lines.
The first was from David Hogg, articulate young survivor of the Parkland atrocity. He suggested boycotting Florida for spring break and instead vacationing in Puerto Rico. Great idea.
The second was the draft of a letter, signed by a few dozen oncologists, pledging not to hold professional conferences or meetings in states with bad gun laws (defined by Giffords Law Center scores). I’ve been pushing this idea for a while (since Columbine, actually), as part of a general economic boycott of these states for vacations, investments, conferences, etc.
LGBT activists famously used the threat of an economic boycott to persuade the governors of AZ and VA not to sign anti-LGBT legislation. They got the NFL on board; this, in AZ at least, appeared to be the final straw.
In this spirit I have begun a petition to the NFL (although I am decidedly no football fan) asking them to pull Super Bowls 2019 and 2020 from GA and FL unless they pass meaningful state gun legislation. Worth a try, I thought.
The petition is here:
http://chn.ge/2EFfxSY
3
Why is no one talking about addressing some of the causes of adolescent angst? Why are we not talking about creating a mental health system that reinforces humanity rather than further stripping Independence and freedom from people who have a disease? Why would we give one iota of consideration to the inchoate suggestions of a serial bully?
1
Thank you for the straight talk. All exactly correct: ban the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians, repeal lax concealed-carry laws, and roll back stand-your-ground laws that make it easier to shoot someone and get away with it. Exactly. The Castle Doctrine has opened the a door to allow gun owners to play judge, jury and executioner based only on what they 'believe' at the moment. But really - it seems like it's too late to fix the problem. With 3-4 million AR-15 type guns floating around the country, it's hard to imagine a scenario which involves buying back all those weapons. At $3-4 billion dollars, what are the chances that or any other Congress would pass such legislation? What we have is a technologically advanced but basically uncivilized society. The basic structure of the problem is completely obvious: the more guns designed for killing people that are floating around => the more of these guns will be used => the more people will be killed. What is the cure for being uncivilized?
2
Maybe I'm missing something, which is not unusual, but ...
The policies and acts of the National Rifle Association (NRA) are often cited as a major reason firearms are so plentiful and efforts to control them fail.
The NRA is a membership organization. Some reports estimate it has 5 million human members (out of 300 million US citizens).
Do the human NRA members, by some form of voting, have the power to change its policies and its acts that impede gun control? If so, what percentage of ownership would it take?
How many firearm-control advocates would have to join the NRA in order to change its policies and acts?
Banning semiautomatic rifles and hand guns should be done. All other weapons should be limited to holding no more than three bullets/shells.
2
We must not focus on the AR-15 and other "assault rifles". Any semiautomatic gun with a large clip can do almost as much damage. We should do the following to try to prevent mass murder:
1. Have complete background checks for any person buying a gun
2. All guns must be registered
3. All guns must be kept in a gun safe
4. Expand the definition of people who are forbidden to own guns, especially to people who commit domestic violence
5. Limit the amount of be bullets that can be owned
6. Make the law for owning an illegal gun much tougher
7. Anyone convicted of committing a crime with a gun should be sentenced to a ten year prison term, with no plea bargaining!
2
“The risk is that the passage of a few partial measures will take our eyes off the bigger picture and drain the energy out of the demands for change”
The situation is not subject to energy nor common sense. The Congress is not responsive to the general public because its election doesn’t depend upon it. Re-election is certain only with the backing of a few bonkers billionaires of the Fox News persuasion, and they have arranged to install a majority of nitwit vassals who do their bidding without qualm or conscience.
3
I think this sums it up :
“The real problem is that there are far too many firearms in America — more than 300 million, according to Congress. They are too easy to obtain and they are becoming ever more lethal.”
With the calculated misinterpretation and manipulation of the 2nd Amendment, we have created a country where no one can live without fear - a military state with an armed ‘militia’ of millions.
At the very least and as a 1st step we must ban assault weapons - weapons of ‘mass destruction’ - the weapon of choice for massacres of a maximum number of people in the shortest of time.
The 2nd amendment does not guarantee the right to bear every type of gun, there is no reason why certain guns cannot be banned.
All other gun control measures are smoke and mirrors. Our political leaders should face the facts and take the tough decusion.
Itis time to Make America SAFE again!
4
In virtually every state, there is an involuntary commitment law and generally such commitment depends on proof or danger to self or others. Commitment to a mental institution is usually based on evidence supporting a prediction of danger. If you're OCD, bipolar, schizophrenic or if you suffer from some other mental illness, that is pretty much beside the point. What matters is your behavior and what can be predicted from it. If commitment to a mental hospital does not depend on mental illness, neither should the right to own a gun. What matters is the danger you pose, not what you see in a Rorschach test.
I agree with everything in this column except for the last sentence. The gun lobby is against even these minimalist steps that might at least to signal some disapproval of the wave of mass shootings that have swept the nation. The NRA is nuttier than even our president.
4
The NRA and LaPierre employ rabble rousing. That technique works on raising the temperature, which means installing instinctive denial of reason and fact, and instead reacting to waving red flags that trigger the reptilian part of the brain. In this knee-jerk frame of mind extreme reaction is spontaneous and problem solving is seen as subversion and misdirection.
There is no such thing as “dealing” with an insane crowd. The propaganda machine has to be turned off so the brains can return to normal. How do we do that??
1
I imagine Trump was talking off the top of his head when he lamented that people could not be put away on a vague suspicion of insanity. He's the model of the neighborhood blowhard whose turbulent waters run shallow.
The problem is that Trump's superficial musings receive public attention, which leads to his defending them and repeating them with added emphasis and detail. Then reporters raise the issue with the White House press secretary, who nonchalantly points out that "the president has every right to [say whatever he has just said]." Before long, Trump's irresponsible chatter has become the issue of the day, and the greater issue goes begging.
Donald Trump and the Republicans are certainly playing a "game of misdirection". Trump himself plays it without half trying. Having noted that game, let's proceed to carry on the national conversation about guns without undue attention to it. The gun lobby and its servants are free to talk, but the rest of us don't have to let them set talking points for us.
1
I don't want to over abstract this, but while the focus on guns is critical we're looking at a larger issue. I don't think anyone would argue that allowing a child into kindergarten with randomly poisoned candy would be a horrific idea, and that the candy should be taken away and the makers of it punished or forced to take it off the market. But, that in fact is the argument we're having now with gun rights advocates. How did this come to be?
First, the Supreme Court has essentially given over Congress to those who have the most money, including the NRA / gun manufacturers. In this context the gun lobby has set the agenda and argument as one of rights. Which brings us to the second primary component, conservatives and reactionaries. As a whole these are people who will not, cannot tolerate much change. It's not necessarily a bad thing but it does inform what ideas they are susceptible to and what pushes their backs to the wall.
When you encounter a snarling dog it doesn't do any good to hit it. It's already very afraid and the act of hitting it only increases that fear. Likewise, the adults in this country have to figure out a way of changing the argument from one of prying guns out of someone's cold dead hands to one of it's time for everyone to grow up here. You can have what you need, and sometimes what you want, but real grownups give up toys that kill other people.
1
It is possible to detain people who pose a risk to others without mental illness and it has been done in our history. The most famous detainee, Mary Mallon/Mary Brown aka Typhoid Mary, was detained on an island in the East River in New York for decades because of her refusal to give up her gallbladder. It was the source of bacteria which killed three people and injured many others in typhoid epidemics precipitated when she worked as a cook.
It could be argued that males under the age of 30 with access to semi-automatic weapons are ipso facto a risk to the general population and either need to give up their guns or their freedom just as Mary Mallon was. Of course, we would need a bigger island, perhaps even a region of the country.
I would be happy to assist in the construction of such compounds, complete with circular gun ranges so they could keep up their skills. We could build those around a new headquarters for the NRA so Mr. LaPierre and Ms. Loesch could be surrounded by good people with guns 24/7.
Or, instead of this "modest proposal", we could just ban semi-automatic weapons, stand-your-ground and concealed-carry laws. Either choice would make me a happy man...and a survivor.
7
The difference is Mary Mallon has a diagnoseable disease. We can still lock people up with communicable diseases such TB who refuse to get treatment for it.
Unless those young men with guns have a disease, we can't lock them up.
@Steve: I know it's a stretch, hence the reference in my post to "A Modest Proposal". We know suicides are "contagious" in the larger sense as they tend to cluster in time among the most vulnerable usually young people. Mass shootings could also be considered to be a contagious disease as they are occurring at an accelerating pace, particularly with the notoriety they accrete in the media--"if it bleeds, it leads"...
The NRA of today, under Wayne Lapierre's leadership, is one of the most extreme organizations in our country, advocating for weapons of destruction. Yet NRA representatives stand on podiums with our representatives and senators and have private meetings with the president. It's all about the money. The NRA succeeded in changing the reading of the 2nd Amendment - Heller, an example of judicial activism by the right. And we are paying the price. We no longer have security.
It is time to recognize what the NRA has become and to elect leaders who are not NRA lackeys.
7
The trend of public mass shootings is about the machine gun first and foremost. Society and the interests of the majority of the population should not have to move mountains to accommodate the product fetish of owning a machine gun. The only reason people buy machine guns is because they like the way it makes them feel. They buy into an image of themselves, like a soldier of fortune, or some gaming action hero. They think it makes them desirable, or tough, or invincible. That's why sales go up after a mass shooting.
Trying to prevent mass shootings by focusing on mental health issues and locking up everyone with depression or some other psychological, or drug induced malady is akin to the mass incarceration response in the war on drugs. It will fill asylums and prisons and do nothing more.
Focusing on what the potential victims must do to try and prevent the trend toward carnage in our society is choosing the herculean approach versus the simple one. Arming everyone will not prevent psychopaths and sociopaths that want to die in a hail of bullets anyway or by their own hand. Look at the stats on soft target killers and you will see that most of them wanted to die after they shot the world up Columbine style.
Eliminate anything resembling a machine gun altogether. This makes a shooter have to reload often enough to be taken out by someone with some courage that will have time to stand a chance. Then you will see the trend end.
6
I can drop an empty 5 or 10 round magazine and reload in about 1.5 seconds. it isn't enough time to 'rush' the shooter.
You misuse the term, machine gun. Please understand that there is a difference between machine gun (automatic) and the semi-automatic rifle.
My mother-in-law committed suicide. My new wife and I had just started our careers, 2500 miles away. As her mental state worsened, she moved in with us. We had had access to the best medical care, Cedars Sinai, with referrals from there. Through prescribed medication, she was able function normally. She returned home without us and, once again, often alone with her thoughts. Two years later, she was gone. Stopped taking her medication. A wonderful woman / a nurse / an incredible mother / a respected community leader who suffered from late-onset schizophrenia. A great loss to us and her friends.
From this tragedy, I had learned that society's, sometimes-expressed, toxic/divisive rhetoric of intolerance toward each other and our institutions can become someone's, like my mother-in-law, stark, very ugly, reality. Without her medication, she could be overwhelmed by such expressions feeling she was under siege by evil forces / feeling everyone to be against her / alone, dismissed, forgotten, ignored and unwanted.
I've felt that we cannot predict who might be the next person to commit an act of violence against themselves and/or others simply because we cannot identify why or when someone feels they are no longer able to cope. We can, however, modify our divisive rhetoric in ways that, generally, would be healthier for everyone.
It's us. Not them.
5
Well said.
The City of Chicago has traced 7,000 guns used in crimes. The overwhelming majority were acquired illegally. Outlawing a particular gun wouldn’t affect the illegal market. We need a strategy that not only outlaws guns but cracks down on the illegal market. It’s not enough to ban possession. You also have to ban production. If you do that, you’ve entered the age of gun prohibition and you would have to expand gun law enforcement 100 fold. That’s the kind of commitment it wold take to eliminate gun crime.
2
"Highly trained police officers frequently miss their targets, even at close range, in the heat of the moment. Having armed civilians at a shooting scene would just make their jobs harder."
Actually, police officers *are* armed civilians (unlike military police).
1
Treat guns like cars. Gun owners must assume a bit of responsibility for their protected rights. Ownership/transfer rolls; Liability insurance; 'rules of the Road for safe use and transfer.
4
The announcement 30 minutes ago that Dicks's Sporting Goods will stop selling assault-style rifles is stunning.
I have been living here in Italy for a number of years, and I never thought I'd see the day that a gun seller would step up and admit that assault rifles are a real problem and are doing something to positive to change the culture. If you read the Times article, the owners are quoted as saying that they no longer want to be part of the problem.
I'm shocked and amazed. I hope that Americans can embrace sane gun control. No one wants to ban guns, but I think a lot of Americans are ready to unschackle themselves from the tyranny of the NRA.
6
Has it been pointed out to Governor Scott that raising the age to purchase these guns to 21 is meaningless? Stephen Paddock, the Las Vegas shooter who killed 58 people and injured 851, was 64 years old. There were three others of mass shootings who were in their 60’s. Most shooters are in the range of 20-50 years of age. Any semiautomatic rifle should be banned. Can anyone explain why any individual needs this type of gun?
3
My sentiments exactly.
It is time for the responsible gun owners to step up and help create reasonable gun safety laws. Many comments here have different points against this opinion piece. They range from, "It can't be done." to "Almost all rifles and pistols are semi-automatic." The Parkland attack was very lethal in a very short period of time, apprx 6 mins. The weapon used had high-velocity ammunition and a very long range. This is what makes it so deadly and also so difficult to defend against. If the police, or as Trump would have it, the school librarian, hear a shooter in the building and the shooter has a long range rifle they will have to get close to the shooter to take him out. This is what makes the NRA so deadly to our children. They do not support reasonable gun laws. Where are the responsible bun owners?
3
From 1945 until about 1967, there were no mass murders. Guns were available. No gun control - only a license if one wanted to hunt. What has changed to cause the violence? If we can't answer that question, we haven't gotten to the root cause and we are just going down a rabbit hole with whatever salve we on our consciences to ease our concern about violence.
2
BRAVO ! A voice of reason.
Enacting sensible legislation that reduces gun violence will be a long hard struggle. The meaningful change is likely to come at the state level. The Parkland shooting would not have happened in Ct because CT enacted bans on certain types of weapons and clips. In CT the shooter would not have been able to purchase an AR 15 as he so easily did in Florida which has some of the most lax laws on guns in the country. The statistics on gun deaths are already starting to separate between states that are actually working to address the underlining problem (guns) and those states that are not.
Vote like your life depends on it. And call out the deranged extreme leadership of the NRA and the craven politicians that choose to enable the extremist NRA leadership at the expense of the rest of us.
2
Control the purchase of ammunition. And tax bullets on a per bullet basis. Beyond that require that gun permits be renewed annually and initiate per gun permits to control the illegal after market. This allows authorities to ask why someone is stockpiling vast amounts of ammunition. Gun collectors are different from someone stockpiling.
This article fails to note that the AR-15 bullet is designed to create a larger entry and more blood loss. They are killing machines not hunting riffles. Locally the NRA line is that these are no different than hunting riffles.
8
"...the AR-15 bullet is designed to create a larger entry..."
Nope. Entry wound is small but then the projectile tumbles destroying organs and flesh. On exit the wound is massive.
1
Good point.
I'm 65. When I was a kid growing up in a small town in Michigan, I knew about guns. I learned to shoot at the Rod & Gun Club, and I enjoyed it.
But when we left the Club we left our rifles there, in a gun locker. We never dreamed of bringing them home.
There were far fewer guns in circulation back then, and far fewer mass shootings - or shootings of any kind. We went to malls and parks and concerts and clubs and theaters and never once considered any possibility of carnage there.
The NRA was mostly known as a collegial organization that taught gun safety and the proper handling and operation of weapons.
Things are not better now - no one feels safer because of the proliferation of gun ownership - propelled by the NRA, now an openly political organization and right arm of gun manufacturers.
If the presence of guns - especially high powered ones like the AR-15 - make every environment safer, including schools now, then why are civilians not allowed to carry them onto the floor of Congress, into the halls of the Supreme Court, or in the White House.
Safely ensconced behind their protected walls, and with no conceal carry on civilians around them, the President and Congress deem to tell us we need to allow guns in our environments - our places of work and recreation - or we are restricting the "rights" of people under the 2nd Amendment.
My right to life, inalienable, trumps the 2nd every time.
27
Has anybody out there had to try and find urgent, professional and secular psychiatric counseling for a young person who has become suicidal- a danger to himself?
Even if you are willing to pay the bill, it is not easy to find.
And for those without a ready means to pay, quite difficult.
We should not let this situation distract us from the heinous reality that semi-automatic tactical military firearms are almost as easy to get as fishing poles.
But easily available and free psychiatric counseling would prevent some suicides and desperate aggressive outbursts, among us, here in our society.
And Is that not a good thing?
15
While improving the accessibility of mental health care can't possibly hurt, I doubt if an unstable person is weighing in on - "Should I buy an AR15 or look for a mental health professional?"
In fact, isn't it true that a person has to want to get well if any sort of therapy is going to work? I suspect many of these people think they are justified and perfectly fine.
Remove the availability of guns.
62
This country suffers from an dearth of psychiatrists and an overabundance of surgeons. If you want to know the reason for this, simply look at the comparative salaries of the two specialties.
And if it wasn't for foreign doctors coming to this country who have no desire to be psychiatrists but find it's the only training programs they can enter as so few American med students want to because of the money and don't have any understanding of American culture and often limited English language skills, both of which limit the ability of someone to properly practice psychiatry (I still remember the New Yorker story about a woman with schizophrenia whose foreign born doctor thought was doing well after she told him she was going to go out for a day with her friend Mary Poppins. It was only after the reporter told him who Mary Poppins was, that the doctor realized what he had been told wasn't such a good thing).
In fact, if we cut down on immigration unless we raise reimbursement for psychiatrists, we probably won't have any new psychiatrists at all.
1
Agree. This young man screamed for help for over a decade. The people who knew him screamed for help. No one could afford it. We all should be held accountable for not 17 lives lost, but 18.
2
I agree, a few measures will be enacted to make it appear our congress and president care. With the news cycles in our country we will all pivot to a different issue - the new flavor of the week and guns will once again be put on the back burner. Our only hope is for a new generation to come on board and show maturity and a lot or common sense when the current crop leaves office. The greatest generation has perhaps produced the worst generation. Leadership and courage have gone missing.
3
We might look at this from the perspective of how expensive public relations manipulate opinions. The NRA and a cohort of very wealthy people spend a lot of money on campaigns to develop "messages" that work to make people fervently believe certain things. This latest gun thing is just one manifestation of that phenomenon.
As long as the media can be distracted to follow the squirrel, this will continue to shape our politics. There are reasons this shooting has become about school safety and not about the obscene number of guns threatening society.
4
I think it must be admitted in this case that the media is culpable in following the bouncing ball thrown out by the NRA, Trump and pro-gun conservatives. The national conversation has been beguiled from the path so well articulated by the youth of Parkland. Also MIA are stronger and better voices from elected officials who can’t seem to hold a candle to the eloquence of these kids. The reality is the kids are going to need money, transport, guidance and permission from the adult world to sustain any sort of mission. Most of all they need us to remember the clarity we had, as we endeavor to regain it, and avoid the distractions. We could do worse than just do our part, and follow their lead.
4
If mental health issues are of concern then a comprehensive National Health Service which covers mental health should be a part of the conversation; Now where is the GOP in this issue? That's right, what little steps in that direction we were making they have attempted to repeal. It should not be lost on anyone that the young man who took the lives of 17 people in Parkland was in serious need of mental health treatment and that raising the age to purchase guns and suggesting preemptively locking him up while doing nothing to limit access to assault weapons or passing comprehensive background check regulations and a gun registry licensing system similar to how we manage owing and selling cars will do little check the proliferation of guns in America. Guns are the problem, their numbers and ease of access . . . pay attention when the conversation is shifted to mental health and know how many lives are lost to suicide because of this ease of access to guns. We need comprehensive mental health care as a part of a larger health care system, we also need comprehensive gun control legislation and to revisit District of Columbia v. Heller. If conservatives & the GOP are going to tie mental health to guns - lets have that conversation. Because we need both a national health care system which recognizes mental health as a crisis and gun control legislation which recognizes gun proliferation as a health care crisis.
3
It would probably be sufficient if insurance companies, Medicare, and Medicaid paid for mental health treatment at the same rates it pay for treatment of physical illnesses. At this time, they consider a life lost to mental illness is far less valuable than a life lost to a physical illness.
We have both a Constitutional argument and functioning agencies that can address the problem America has with deadly weapons. First the Second Amendment calls for a “well-regulated militia.” All states already have a force called the State Police/Militia that regularly screens, evaluates, trains and regularly qualifies people to keep and bear arms for the defense of the state and its people. There is no reason that all the states cannot make commensurate the keeping and bearing of arms with associate membership in the existing State Police/Militia. Bring them in, screen them for problems, provide training in both weapons and the laws regarding weapons, regular drills and qualification sessions, provide them with a badge and ID that says what weapons they are trained and qualified to keep and bear.
These state agencies are already setup to screen out problem people and thereby prevent them from building personal arsenals. The contact with other people will easily identify those who have issues and problems both real and imagined. They also know how to maintain basic discipline. Further the state, since these will be associate state officials, have a stake in making sure that the armed population is not a danger to the rest of the citizens.
The hardware is not the national problem – a minority of the people who are armed are the problem. All we need is the will to enforce the entire second amendment.
4
I think you are confused -- our modern state militias are collectively the National Guard. They are state entities, officers chosen by the states, but as established by the constitution Congress provides for their training and arming, and they may be called into action by the President.
Restrictions on military-style guns is yet another politicized issue where people on both sides will not have their passionate opinions changed by evidence, logic, or facts.
For legislators, any movement to enact new laws on the topic will only come if there is a threat to either their personal re-election prospects or to their party's majority in Congress. These are closely-monitored factors - focused heavily on expected voter turnout.
In the recent past, primary elections have been dominated by energized right-wingers who vote in disproportionate numbers. GOP incumbents are unlikely to risk crossing this segment, even with modest gun-control proposals.
As I see it, it's a waste of time trying to reason or compromise with these folks - the NRA pocket politicians and their base supporters. The one and only solution is to be found at ballot boxes.
Vote INcumbentsOUT.
5
Though it will never occur, installation of tracking chips in the barrels of AK rifles would allow security devices to beep loudly when there boundaries are violated in school settings and warn people to react before it is too late. That would not be expensive using existing technology. On the other hand it would mar the element of surprise in killing people and the shootists would never go for that.
2
To begin with every Gun Owner in this Country should require a License, a Registration, and Insurance for each Gun they possess.
This is Common Sense and it starts with the exact same maturity that is required for purchase of a Motor Vehicle.
5
I agree with you. Several nations do require insurance (under strict liability) for some classes of guns.
It is important however to understand that the cost of this insurance for handguns (and probably for assault rifles too) will be very high; this is another way of saying that the costs these weapons impose on society is very high.
At present almost all the costs of gun violence and stupidity are borne by the victims and the health insurance coverage of the US generally. Almost all of the perps are financially worthless.
Even $1,000,000 doesn't go far compared to the liability someone with a semi-auto weapon can create.
States that require armed guards be bonded provide the best estimate of what handgun insurance would cost, and who might be insurable. 25 and over, spotless legal record (particularly no DWI or violent misdemeanors), a history of stable employment ... and bonding costs over $1000 per year, far over if bonded for more than 100,000.
Gun industry advocates find this outrageous and fight it tooth and nail, because they know very few people would chose to own at these costs. But if they believe these costs are unrealistic then they are free to form mutual insurance associations.
1
I was listening to NPR yesterday when the guest pointed out that the average school can expect a student homicide once every 6,000 years. Schools are about the safest place our kids can be - much safer than at home. Maybe we should focus on more serious risks to kids.
And another quote from yesterday is appropriate. A legislator stated that if it was a choice between getting everything you want and nothing, you will get nothing. That's where Mr. Rosenthal finds himself. He wants to ban semi-automatic weapons, but that encompasses almost all guns sold today. So instead of getting the "everything" he wants, he'll get nothing.
Find a reasonable compromise that keeps guns out of the hands of criminals and the mentally ill (more broadly defined than just institutionalized) but doesn't infringe on the rights of law abiding citizens.
Jim, the fact that something is freely available today, in the USA, is no argument that it must be forever.
When I was young you could buy dynamite at rural hardware stores. I remember going with my grandfather -- he bought some to blow stumps -- as a 6 year old I thought this was grand fun.
Not today.
1
We should begin a serious effort at repealing the Second Amendment and banning possession of guns. Will this be a quixotic movement? Maybe at first (for decades) but it seems to be the only way to change things in this country. We should continue to push for incremental improvements. But when the NRA whines that we are coming for their guns, they should be right. Our negotiating position should not start in the middle. The NRA doesn't negotiate from the middle--they fight from the most extreme position. Those who care about advancing civilization and stopping this gun insanity must similarly adopt and internalize the most extreme position--repeal and ban.
5
Of course all these minor placebos are Republican misdirection. The mental health placebo is a classic. Consider the numbers. About 35% of American homes have guns. So that's roughly 90 million adults or near adults with access to guns. Please explain how you find likely mass murderers in the 90 million. Impossible of course. Most of the recent mass shooters had no apparent history of mental health problems.
6
Taking away weapons of mass murder from people showing signs of emotional distress or mental instability makes more sense than mass incarceration. A lot cheaper, too.
Maybe the parents or guardians who allow troubled young adults to collect a lethal arsenal should be put into mental institutions. And state legislators who are in a competition to see who can pass the craziest pro-NRA laws can join them.
4
It's a shame that the states closed mental hospitals? Well, perhaps it is a shame that the mentally ill now frequently end up in prison. That said, the issue with state mental hospitals was that they were mostly under staffed and under supplied warehouses where little to no treatment ever happened. States were unwilling and/or unable to properly fund those institutions so that the mentally ill got any decent care for their persons and for their illness. Anyone who thinks that anything would be different now simply does not understand the history of mental health care in this country.
Because we cherish individual freedoms in this country, the pattern was to hospitalize the person voluntarily or involuntarily, get him stabilized on medicines, the release him back into the community. Since psychiatric drugs have miserable side effects, it was common for the very ill to stop taking their medicine and again sink into illness. The gunman in the Aurora, CO theater was a schizophrenic off his meds. While most mentally ill are not violent, more hospitals would accomplish nothing.
17
in prison, and on the streets... and i totally agree with you.
I like what Dick’s Sporting goods stores are doing: banning sales of assault rifles and requiring everyone who purchases a gun of any kind to be age 21. That is one step of many that should be taken.
87
I just read that article about Dick’s Sporting Goods and it gives me hope! I cut my Cabela’s charge card in half today and will return it to the company. We have a Dick’s in our area. It will be our store of choice when purchasing camping equipment, shoes, clothing. It would be great if the other sporting goods stores would follow suit.
We've never been fans of Dick's, but this will make it our destination of choice for any sports-related purchases.
Gun control - really massacre and suicide preventions - should be the main focus. However, one cannot deny the kind hearted deinstitutionalization of the last century was half hearted.
While there are over indulgent parents letting their not so stable children running loose, many simply don't have anywhere to go. Just two days ago, a young man who has suffered mental health issues for most of his life stabbed a medical student, a complete stranger, to death in the Winchester library. The Winchester police is aware of the young man's mental state but could do nothing.
It is important to stress the above case doesn't excuse the banality of evil relating to the lack of gun accountability encouraged by the NRA. People who commit mass murder are pyschopaths beyond the reach of any mental health aide anyway. But the point is that you want a rational, methodical but also complete solution to mass murder. In that sense, banning assault weapons is just the first step to complete healing
12
Can't call ourselves the greatest nation on earth when kids are afraid to go to school because they might get killed. The inaction on guns ultimately falls on voters who continue to re-elect these people. This is a public health issue that everyone should be seriously concerned about. The best idea, espoused by others, is to license all guns and require training and liability insurance. An outright ban on semi-auto weapons would be better but that won't fly in the land of the free no matter how much logic you throw at it.
57
We need to be as organized as NRA supporters. Right now politicians fear the wrath of the NRA. We need to make them more afraid of those of us who want sensible solutions to this problem. This weekend with the boycotts of businesses in bed with the NRA is a good start. Make them afraid, very very afraid.
182
They fear not the wrath of the NRA. They fear the wrath of the NRA membership which votes for their own interests. The amount of money distributed to politicians by the NRA is minuscule compared to what the anti gun movement shared. I’m unmoved by the hysterical ranting softly the left. I’ll sit back and watch as AR-15 sales skyrocket because of the dishonest Rhetoric from the left.
1
Absolutely!
Make sure not to include hunting firearms in any ban. You’ll lose much support for the real culprits.
21
I'm for greater gun control, absolutely. But a call for banning semi-auto guns isn't realistic as most guns are semi-auto. Practically every handgun is semi-auto. Non-semi-auto single-shot, lever-action, and bolt-action rifles are pretty much exclusively hunting rifles. A call to ban semi-auto guns must sound a lot like a ban of all guns to the NRA and other gun rights supporters.
Instead, purchase and possession of a military style semi-auto gun should require training, a license, insurance, and a comprehensive background check.
14
With the exception of target shooting, pretty much most non-hunting activity with a gun is illegal - so restricting them is no skin off "law-abiding gun owners".
I get that semi-automatic is convenient, but most hunters sneer at city-folk who can't take an animal down with a single (bolt-action) shot - and don't ask what bow-hunters thing of their armchair-hunting brethren
The real problem is not hunters or marksmen, it is the proliferation of
weapons and accessories that allow untrained civilians to become pretend-soldiers. It is here that limiting availability, requiring insurance, training, and full background checks would help. It does for cars.
2
In the 60s and 70s people did support handgun bans ~ I passed petitions for it, and in the 80s, my suburb banned them, only to have the ban undone by the NRA a few years ago.
Why ban handguns? Because their only purpose is to kill another human being, and that seemed immoral.
How the pendulum has swung.
2
Any approach that is somewhat thoughtful such as yours is needed. We need informed voices, gun owners, speaking up for common sense solutions.
Let's be clear: semi-automatic means self-loading: a WWI Luger Pistol is a semi-automatic. To make progress here, we have to look at better definitions for a weapons destructive potential including magazine size (how many bullets in a clip) and caliber (how big are the bullets), or rather some combination of the two. A productive debate might focus upon what is necessary to safe-guard the second amendment, and then we would allow no more so that this one right does not degrade all our other freedoms.
17
None of the recent mass shootings involved large caliber rifle ammunition. The AR-15 has fairly small (0.223), low mass bullets (62 grains). Part of what makes it so much more lethal than, for example a 0.22 caliber long-rifle round is the very high velocity that achieved by the design. Small, high velocity rounds are favored by the military due to lower recoil and an ability for an individual to carry more ammunition. Smaller magazine sizes might be a step in the right direction. Many states already limit hunting rifles to five rounds or less. Requirements for firearm registration and insurance, along with more rigorous licensing, registration, and fee requirements for semi-automatic rifles and handguns will go a long ways towards reducing the number of the most lethal types of weapons in general circulation.
7
Don't forget the 2nd amendment does NOT give the right to own ANY weapon and does NOT prohibit the prohibition or regulation any weapon.
2
Thanks for the clarification. Further reading led me to Connecticut and its existing restrictions and definitions of semiautomatic weapons - a useful example of the practical.
1
Instead of writing a column listing the defects in the thinking of your opponents, it would be a little more constructive to write a summary of gun control laws that you think would be effective in reducing mass shootings. At the very end of your column you do advocate "banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians." The trouble with that proposal is that it is utterly politically unrealistic. Probably half the guns in this country--rifles as well as pistols--are semiautomatic. The laws of California and Connecticut on assault riles and high capacity magazines are politically realistic.
15
I understand the frustration, but spend a little time listening to the NRA (and not its core members), our current POTUS, and pretty much any legislator and you also will come to think of their arguments as defective.
Just about every proposed change to gun-laws have been met with deflections, derision, and a cult-like appeal to the second amendment. Reducing access to weapons with mass-killing capabilities is an inconvenience that is as necessary as a fence around a pool.
1
Those are blue states. The people there would vote to confiscate, it were on the ballot.
"The laws of California and Connecticut on assault riles and high capacity magazines are politically realistic."
And they're also really easy to get around to. Just look at the San Bernadino killers. A criminal can easily take a legal rifle and convert it to a so called assault weapon (which don't exist in the civilian population, only the military). High capacity mags? There's over 500 million of those and guess what, you can easily make one now on your own.
One of those remarkably articulate student activists from Parkland, Florida spoke at a rally in Tallahassee last week. He noted that mental health is a global issue, but mass shootings in schools is only an American issue.
We have too many guns.
289
" .. He noted that mental health is a global issue .."
Really? Geraldo Rivera in 1970, then at ABC News, made his bomber-jacket bones, "exposing" NYS-run mental institutions. So, thus frightened, NYS Legislature "de-institutionalized" those patients, to the streets to publicly urinate. Where's he, now?
It is an American issue. In Europe, there are government workers to tell you, what to do.
"The real problem is that there are far too many firearms in America — more than 300 million, "
And that is PRECISELY, as a former Scotland Yard commander observed, that gun control legislation in the US will accomplish nothing.
Law abating citizens will obey it. But there are far too many guns floating around that criminals, and those committed to wreck havoc, can not get their hand on it, no matter what laws are passed.
The US is NOT England, Australia, or Canada, where far fewer guns per capita float around.
7
And 30 years ago it was heretical to think about banning indoor smoking. It takes time but the gun supply could be dramatically reduced. It's easy to say "impossible" but that's not true.
4
Those 300 million guns are owned by only 30% of the households in the USA, so I don’t buy your argument. I rarely read about criminals being deterred from breaking in a home by a gun owner, but much more often about a young child fatally shooting a family member with a gun found in the home. Australia exemplifies it can be done.
2
The "too many guns" is an answer known as "do nothing".
1
The most important thing that could be done to address the danger of gun violence in this country would be to register and to have those records accessible to courts and law enforcement, as well as to begin licensing gun users to assure that they know the laws and how to use guns responsibly, and then to use those records to identify who are untrustworthy and should lose access to guns.
The talk about assault weapons bans is not smart, those most lethal weapons in fact are not assault weapons, they are handguns. The dream of eliminating all guns held deeply in the hearts of anti-gun advocates is very evident to all but themselves and it conveys the notion that any efforts to control guns is just a first step towards their elimination. The anti-gun advocates mistrust gun owners because they just cannot understand why anyone would have them nor use them. The gun owners know that they are responsible for deadly weapons, they take those responsibilities seriously, and than is why so few of them are involved with gun violence.
The real danger are the number of guns which are in circulation but about which nothing is known and of who has them. That is what enables those who would harm people to have them and to threaten any of us.
4
I don’t think it’s true that gun safety advocates in general want to ban all guns. That is a caricature. Of course there are some, but in general, it is a convenient way for the gun lobby to distract from meaningful change.
1
The gun owners know that they are responsible for deadly weapons, they take those responsibilities seriously, and than is why so few of them are involved with gun violence."
Just to get this straight - are you are suggesting that all gun violence is perpetrated by non-gun owners?
Nearly all but not all gun owners are being responsible. Identifying those who pose risks to themselves and others is the challenge. It would be illogical to think that deadly weapons can be safe unless those who have them assure that they are used and kept safely.
1
It is surprising that gun owners who have concerns about the infringement of their right to bear arms, which, like it or not, is guaranteed by the Second Amendment, are not appalled at these suggestions by Trump and the Republican Party. Do they really want a system where people can, by slandering others, restrict this right? If you believe that there are legitimate uses for guns, locking up people or taking away their right to have a gun would be a limitation of constitutional rights that would do little to curb the problems related to the widespread availability and lack of regulation of guns. Furthermore, the murderers are not usually those with a certifiable mental illness. Virtually all true psychotics, those who can be certified as committable, are too disordered in their thinking to plan and carry out crimes. Those who have committed these crimes, for the most part, are competent to stand trial. They may be disturbed, and have grievances, real or imagined, but they do not meet the definition of certifiable. Unless we develop highly accurate predictive tools that could identify potential killers, a task that has defied science and medicine, it is folly to think that we could devise a constitutionally valid test to ban gun ownership. What we need to do, as Rosenthal points out, it is reduce the indiscrimate availability of guns. And what makes these people think that teachers don't flip out? Shootouts in the faculty lounge will be the next new American aberration.
11
I can agree Trump and his band of paid republicans are insincere, out of touch, and possibly corrupt, but it seems our captivation of cable news and sound bytes has caused a loss in sensible discourse. Agree gun laws are lax. Disagree that restricting guns helps with mass shootings. Is that a sensible position? I think it is, but it has become an impossible position to discuss in our current political environment. We need to stop this us-against-them mentality. Please! It starts at the local level. Get to know your neighbor.
1
I agree that banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians is what needs to happen. But short of that, I suggest increasing the age not to 21 but to 34 - that would cover most of the shooters.
9
And we all know banning something makes it impossible to obtain. Cue drug war . . .
John, actually a ban does work, and we have evidence from the previous ban that was lifted by GWB. When a product is banned, manufacturers stop producing them.
So should we make 34 the voting age as well?
If not, why should some constitutional rights not apply until you are 34?
The trouble is no one on the left or in the media is proposing what exactly needs to be done. By making only vague demands to ban assault weapons or do background checks, we give the the pro gun crown cover to criticize freely.
Name the laws that need to be reversed, for example laws prohibiting studying gun violence or laws that shield manufacturers from lawsuits.
Outline what can be done, instead of 'ban bump stocks', say make possession of a bump stock a federal offense, add time to crimes committed with them.
Demand funding for computerizing records that need to be cross referenced for background checks. Some current parts of the system are on paper, paper!
There is a lot of heat on the issue now but none of it seems as serious as it needs to be and both the left and the media could do a much better job of explaining things in far more detail. People need to ask their representatives for specific things, which also means, the democrats have to propose some specific things. And yes, I know some like Senator Feinstein have but the substance of that legislation has to be understood inside and out by anyone contacting their Senator in order to effectively lobby them.
Let's not squander this moment!
11
Exactly! Where are the Democratic pieces of legislation about these things? How can we make any progress until we have specific things to act on? This is just the latest example of the shell games that keep stalling progress on anything.
2
The new force joining the anti-gun campaign, the students from around the country, must continue to lead and to confront the gun-loving politicians at the state and national level and the NRA. Their goals should be the repeal of the Dickey Amendment, repeal of the National Firearms Act, the expansion of the background check to include gun shows and Internet sales*, banning the sale of the AR-15 and large capacity magazines*, repeal of lax concealed carry laws, repeal of stand-your-ground laws, defeat of gun reciprocity bill, prohibition of sale of silencers and bump stocks. They should consult Everytown, Brady Campaign, Giffords Law Center, Violence Policy Center. They should campaign to defeat pro-gun members in the state and federal government. They should boycott companies that offer special deals to the NRA.
Yes, changes are needed at the national level, but the focus should be at the state level in the gun-loving states, like Florida, Texas, Nevada, and Georgia.
* retroactive to Feb 14, 2018, the date of the Majory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting.
13
What sort of organization will collect the information and investigate tips on every American who, under the right circumstances, might be a danger? Will this be a new government agency like the PreCrime department in Minority Report?
4
Indeed, the gun lobby led by the NRA is as “much or more about expanding the markets for firearms makers than about constitutional principles.” Imagine a million teachers purchasing guns; imagine school guards upgrading their arsenal with AR’s to combat the would-be shooter. Much money for the firearm market. Probably when (if?) guns lapse back to a nonissue there will be another attempt to allow the sale of silencers - which are rather expensive. How good for the gun manufacturers economic well being. It is more about sales and money than about rights. No one needs an AR, a semiautomatic, a weapon of mass destruction. Such weapons belong with our military. No one needs a silencer. The GOP has spent decades grooming the one-issue voter. They instilled fear that the Democrats would deny the gun/2nd Amendment voter their right to their guns. Now we suffer because the GOP fear their single issue voter could “turn on them” and vote for another, further right politician. The GOP sustains this evil carnage upon America unwilling to cut their ties to the one issue gun voter and the NRA. Politics and money far outweigh the health of our nation.
12
Silencers are and have been legal with a tax stamp since 1934. Based upon tight laws, they are rarely if ever used in crimes.
1
It may help clarify policy deliberations, if facts were more clearly present, inconvenient though they may be. A good place to start, is with the NYT article titled The Assault Weapon Myth: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/sunday-review/the-assault-weapon-myth.... As for those deemed eligible for institutionalization, the State may be more weighted with immediate candidates.
4
Don’t muddle up a good self-righteous dander with facts.
1
Weapons of Mass Destruction preying all over us.
It is a chilling reminder of Weapons of Mass Destruction WMD preying all over us. Guns can not be a solution to an issue that is all about mental fitness and being in a better frame of mind. A heavy dose of information that primarily draws its strength from deceit and lies add to the discomfort of an individual who is already deranged. Need to give a measured response and get the arms registered and see to it that it does not fall into wrong hands. The chorus of criticism that President observation has invoked shows he is not in control of the situation. A better construct would be all public places having installed metal detectors at entry/exit point followed by frisking of each and every individual who ever wishes enter a school or a market could be the starting point.
1
Assault weapon bans are widely violated. People don’t get rid of them. They stash them. It offers an appearance of disarmament because the stashed weapons are out of sight and not spoken of. But if the owner of such a weapon decides to seek that end-of-the-road blaze of glory, then he isn’t going to care about the legal consequences.
When the law has been called in a guy dozens of times and not even an arrest made, I don’t think more laws are going to help. When armed law enforcement cowers in safety while children are massacred, I don’t intend to give up means of protecting my family myself.
6
All laws are broken. Banning semiautomatic rifles and high capacity magazines will save lives. These are not good for self defense. You’re better off with a shotgun. FYI: The gun deaths in Louisiana are the highest in our nation because of the high percentage of gun owners.
1
Realize that your ability to protect your family at places like movie theaters or outdoor concerts, or schools has already been compromised. Allowing the continued massing of arms by law-abiding citizens or those who are not law-abiding does not offer you and your family any protection whatsoever--in fact, the problem becomes worse.
1
So you are going to home school your kids, or volunteer to be an armed school guard at your kids’ school, and stand guard in your home at night to protect your family? Don’t be kidding me...
Mr. Rosenthal advocates banning semiautomatic guns, although these are probably the majority of guns in the US. and have been in civilian hands since the turn of the 20th Century (the semiautomatic M1911 semiautomatic 45 caliber pistol was introduced in 1911). Autoloading hunting rifles and shotguns are common. Actual so-called assault style weapons, i.e., knockoffs of the more recent M-16 and AK-47 and high capacity semiauto pistols are a subset of these semiauto guns.
Mr. Rosenthal also advocates restricting purchase of guns to those over 21 although he admits the under 20 cohort is only responsible for 5 percent of mass shootings. Meanwhile, the hunting age is in the teens in virtually all states, so teens will have guns and if raised properly and put through a hunter safety class, should be compared as far as statistical probability to engage in gun crime with those who buy guns without a clear history of being part of a traditional firearms culture. Meanwhile, much gang violence is carried out with stolen or diverted guns.
Gun violence is a problem but actually, has decreased in the last three decades. But lethality does need to be balanced with public safety. Its unfortunate that the Grey Lady once again misses the boat on nuance.
6
The National Firearms Act of 1934 reined in the gun violence led by technological advances of the prohibition era. And this was seen as a constructive step away from lawlessness, not an abrogation of civil rights. The assault weapons ban of 1994 was hardly rejected by the courts as a violation of the second amendment. Banning bump stocks, tightening background checks, and increasing mental health services will do far less good than taking combat weapons out of circulation. Why is this so hard ?
2
I hope that responses of state legislators, governors, Congressmen, and the President are retained in long term memory when elections roll around. I heard on TV tonight the question or accusation that the NRA seems to be running the agenda. There is something more powerful than the NRA. It is the collective vote of the American people! Boycott can be equally effective. The idea that proliferation of more guns is a solution, direct or indirect, is a NRA line. The more guns out there, the chances increase that they may be misused increase also. In my opinion, one may really question priorities when legislators fail time and again to place restrictions on military grade guns. Yes, as the author wrote, there is misdirection, diversion, instead. Remember, people, remember.
7
"Banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians would be a better approach."
Amen. It worked for Australia, it can work for America. Ban all semi-automatic firearms.
It is difficult to appreciate someone "needing" a semi-automatic firearm; lever-action, pump-action, and revolvers are more than adequate for hunting, sport, and self-defense. If someone claims to "need" a semi-automatic, I have to wonder what he plans on doing with his first six shots.
11
If revolvers were adequate for self defense, then why have do police use high capacity semi-automatics? They have no legal privilege to use them other than for defense just as any civilian and are only trying to interpose themselves between us and evil people who do us harm.
Sorry, but no, it didn't 'work' in Australia. A fraction of the weaponry in private hands was turned in voluntarily. This is another myth of the delusional calls for 'commen sense' regulation.
There is a very simple reason that we cannot get to a point where we can determine when someone is too likely to use guns to harm others or themselves and to keep them from any access to guns, and it's not the existence of guns in private hands. It's the conflict based upon the differences between those people who use guns and those people who do not because they simply cannot agree about guns and mistrust each other for very good reasons.
A national registry system which accounted for all guns and indicated who had them would enable courts and law enforcement to take guns from those who it is determined should not have them. Whether it's due to criminal conduct or just a clearly obvious state of mind observed by a court or a law enforcement person that creates a reasonable suspicion that gun violence could result if the guns are not taken. Such a registry could be used to systematically locate and seize any and all guns. So it has become one of those things that cannot be done because of political pressure.
The civilian versions of military style weapons are high profile to those who do not count incidents of gun violence but to those who do, they are less dangerous that the ones used for everyday household protection, hunting, and target shooting. There are 5 million of those feared assault weapons in private hands but getting rid of them will reduce gun violence insignificantly. It would be far wiser to create an effective registry and gun user licensing system.
3
All well and good but why, oh why, do civilians need military grade weapons? They aren't good for hunting animals (except maybe the two-legged human variety) and I can see no other reason to have a gun period. I don't buy the self-defense thing or the misinterpretation of the Second Amendment which applies to a well-regulated militia (military force). There are too many accidental shootings with guns even among "responsible" gun owners. For every person who actually managed to take down a crook, I'm sure there are 3 or 4 more who lost their lives trying.
We keep saying there are too many guns now to ban them all, so let's take "reasonable" measures. I say where there's a will, there's a way. Unfortunately, there is no leadership left in this country who aren't the pawns of the gun lobbyists.
What if the “clearly obvious state of mind” is disagreement with some future administrations plan to impose an unconstitutional fascist police state? One reads in this paper all the time that Trump is trending that direction. What if the “clearly obvious state of mind” is being the member of a political or social group deemed by a rogue administration to need forced “re-education”?
This is a wonderful piece, with a major shortcoming. Those under 18--those singled out in recent conversations about "mental illness"--have few, if any, rights, when it comes to "mental health" interventions. A minor can be institutionalized, indefinitely, based on nothing more than the claims of his/her guardians. Commitment was almost a rite of passage for middle- and upper-middle class teens in the 1980s, a period when the number of private, for-profit institutions increased four-fold in the span of eight years.
I spent 16 months of my life--when I should have been going to dances, attending prom, learning to drive, taking the PSAT--on a locked ward because I was an inconvenience and embarrassment to my parents. I do not want to see this happen to another generation. It terrifies me to think it could happen again, to another inconvenient child.
7
The states have closed state mental hospitals because they are not a humane way to treat people except for the most severe cases. They had been used to warehouse people with mental illness who could remain in their hometowns with community-based treatment. I'm sad that you are not up to speed on this issue, Andrew.
The Supreme Court ruled two decades ago that the Americans with Disabilities Act requires states to treat people in the least restrictive environment that is practical. The real tragedy is when the states were forced to stop institutionalizing people they did not provide funding for community mental health; they just cut people loose. No, we do not need to go back to the bad old days of big institutions for people living with mental illness, most of whom are not violent and only of harm to themselves.
1
Long term living in one of the well run old state mental hospitals was a far more humane life than incarceration with abusive sociopaths or life on the streets. After generations of experience, we know how to run those facilities right, and how to let them turn into snake pits. A proper long term care facility has a full range of residential settings on grounds and nearby where people can be safe with only the level of restriction and support that they need. We did more to care for the mentally ill in 1860 than we do now.
Most people can tell when someone is seething with anger and might just explode, and those who constantly interact with others can detect other people's moods and attitudes rather quickly. Being in a state of anger and resentment for most of the time is not a mental illness but it indicates an inclination to get into arguments and fights, and such people should not he having easy access to guns. How to remove that access is the challenge.
Eliminating guns really is a failure to want to deal with the problem. It satisfies the mind's need for a solution but it's not something can could be done without suspending civil liberties and wrecking people's homes to find and seize them all if the owners are unwilling to give them up.
Accounting for the guns and knowing who has them is the next best solution but to do that means presuming that gun owners can be trusted to do the right thing and to cooperate with a gun registration system. To provide that cooperation means trusting them so that they do not have concerns that their guns will be confiscated because those who do not keep guns trust them.
4
It also means trusting the government.
Your first paragraph describes our current president to a T. God forbid his gun-toting sons inherited his tendencies.
It is as if the US is in some sort of "alternate" reality. An amendment to the constitution is formulated at a specific time for a specific purpose and for specific intentions.
This does not mean that common sense is to be thrown out. The US is alone in their lack of any serious gun control, at least among what pass for the civilized world.
Guns are dangerous and deadly. They should be in the hands of military, police and those whose occupations warrant it. As for the rest, strict rules, regulations and control. This might even be done in consort with the NRA. It requires though willingness and good faith.
The fixation of many segments of US society on guns will unfortunately just result in more shootings and deaths.
5
First, let's be smart and use the words "gun control" because that's what's needed by gun owners and for the public's safety. I've noticed our elected officials shy from using those two words; not doing so is playing the same old game and right into the NRA's hands. We do not need so many guns in America!
As for Trump I think his recent speeches, interviews, and tweets reveal a man exhibiting his own craziness in hopes that he can cop an Insanity Plea when Mueller finally catches up with him.
4
Banning semiautomatic weapons would be highly unconstitutional because of the reason the second amendment was made in the first place, which is not only for recreational purposes and self defense, but also so that when government becomes so highly corrupt or so oppressive that civilians have the collective power to forcefully defend the rights they have as human beings. If semiautomatic weapons were banned, conceal-carry was outlawed, and stand-your-ground laws were gone, how could the people do this? The government has semiautomatic weapons, so the people have the right to have them as well. As for the regulations determining ground rules about who gets them, that is where the gray area lies. However, the 'average Joe' has the right to semiautomatic weapons in America under the second amendment, and that cannot change.
5
Please read the Heller vs. District of Columbia decision made by the Supreme Court in 2008. While the opinion (written by conservative Justice Scalia) protects the right of an individual to possess a firearm, it clearly states that the right to bear arms is not unlimited and that guns and gun ownership can continue to be regulated.
The Supreme Court upheld the first federal gun control law because sawed off shotguns and submachine guns were not the standard equipment of an ordinary soldier or guardsmen. The US army had already moved to semiautomatic sidearms and was transitioning to the semiautomatic clip fed Garand rifle.
There is an additional and truly heinous aspect of Trump and the gun lobby using "mental illness" as a distraction. There is hardly a more stigmatizing "medical term" which can be used against a large group of people who are at greater risk of being the victim of violence than being the perpetrator.
While a stigma cannot be removed in an instant, we could start using the term "brain disease" or "brain disorder." The brain is a physical organ which operates in accordance with all of the laws of physics and biology which govern all processes of the human being.
Please stop mis-using the term semi-automatic weapon, when what you actually mean is high-capacity magazines or military-grade weapons. There are many, many hunting shotguns that are semi-automatic but hold only 3-6 shells of bird or turkey shot. These are not the problem. By using the catch-all term 'semi-automatic weapon' it is not only incorrect, it further alienates those on the conservative side of the gun control discussion.
6
Mostly agree, but you'll never sell the idea of banning all semi-automatic weapons. In fact that idea expressed in a column like this may lose a lot of readers. Many or most hunting rifles are semi.
How about banning "semi-automatic assault rifles" and all rifles that have magazines greater than 10 rounds, or preferably 5. "Assault rifle" may be difficult or impossible to define legally. But anyone who can't hit a deer within 5 rounds needs hunting training, not a bigger magazine.
1
As I write this, there are already 63 comments explaining why there needs to be gun control of all sorts. They are quite eloquent and well thought out. The only reason nothing will happen before the mid term elections is that the gun lobby owns the present congress. Voting matters, a lot.
7
The reason is that millions of Americans have well thought out reasons to disagree and let their congressmen know about it. The “gun lobby” are American citizens who care about what they believe to be their rights.
To KBronson. Take a look at this. on politico.
"... a new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll which shows support for stricter gun laws among registered voters at 68 percent, compared to just 25 percent who oppose stricter gun laws."
Even a majority of Republicans favour stricter gun laws. The gun lobby doesn't want any mesure that would cause gun sales to drop. Period. They have taken over the NRA who's membership gives them credibility they don't deserve. Contrary to what the present day NRA advocates, it's possible to support stricter gun laws and gun ownership rights.
2
Re: comments along the lines of "people need to defend themselves, ergo, guns"
Point 1: Unless you sleep with a gun under your pillow, it is very, very unlikely you will win a gun battle with an nighttime or other surpruse intruder. Night strikes and quick assaults work for a reason.
Point 2: If there is an intruder without a gun, an axe, a knife, or a machete will suffice. Pull a hatchet out and say "Leave" in that situation, and an unarmed intruder will leave.
Point 3: Therefore, guns as a self defense mechanism in home exist either only in an apocalyptic scenario where standard watch is kept by the occupants, or as a broad societal-wide deterrent that prevents crime based on fear of the presence of a gun.
I don't have an argument on post-apoclyptic fears, other than joining the National Guard instead is probably a better plan. Then you have a ready-built unit of compatriots and access to M-60s and grenades, too.
As for the broad deterrent theory, however, the answer from other civilized countries is clear: crime rates drop with reduced gun ownership. Period. It doesn't work the other way around, and it hasn't for years. So let's abandon this nonsense that homes NEED a gun for defense already shall we? Our community NEEDS fewer guns and higher safety, and there is a path to get there.
Someday, hopefully, logic on this topic will prevail.
5
Burglar alarms would help prevent surprised at night by intruders. Dogs are even better: They will attack the intruder, too. Dogs are indeed man's best friend.
Not trying to be contentious, but many people do sleep with their guns very close by: a handgun on the nightstand, a shotgun propped against the wall. In high crime areas, I can understand paranoia, especially from a pretty young woman weighing 95 pounds: Predators know they have a great advantage here. And it's not paranoia if you're an ideal target.
what if "gun addiction" or "firearms addiction" was a diagnosable mental health illness as defined by the DSMVI. Then those who stockpile and are addicted to their guns can be rounded up into psychiatric institutions. Maybe the problem with the Trump's whole idea is that we need to define the illness properly- firearm addiction!
5
Sounds like a version of Soviet psychiatry in which the Soviet Union considered dissention from communism a form of schizophrenia and built special “hospitals” for their “treatment”—run by the KGB. I am sure Putin could refer you to some of his old colleagues to set it up.
Of course the President is insincere and stalling but Democrats in swing states and states like Connecticut also oppose banning all semi-automatic weapons. Confiscating all semi-automatic weapons in every household would be better. There will be minor inconsequential changes in gun law which will be hailed as an incremental step in the right direction until the next massacre which is sure to come. Despite the outcry, despite the grief, despite the polls and marches the NRA still intimidates legislators of both parties. JFK would not be able to write a book of Profiles in Courage of this generation of our legislators.
2
Confiscating, a fifth amendment taking, or compensation at full value for owners of legal property? One is tyranny the other is legal and proper.
1
"The real problem is that there are far too many firearms in America — more than 300 million, according to Congress."
And yet homicides by gun have declined by nearly 50% since the 1990's and overall homicide rates are near 100 year lows. Those statistics don't support the more guns are the problem argument. Of course, in an emotion-driven discussion facts are ignored and, in this column, replaced by straw men.
7
The real facts, per Wisqars database on the CDC site....
1993 gun homicides were 18,523. 2016 were 14,415. At one point in the late 90's the number was under 11,000. Since then gun sales have skyrocketed and gun deaths have increased.
1993 gun deaths were 39,595. 2016 were 38,658.
2016 had the second highest number of gun deaths since 1989.
On the other hand...
Homicide by stabbings went from 4,101 in 1990 to 1,781 in 2016.
Overall deaths by knives went from 4,651 in 1990 to 2,826 in 2016.
The same trend holds true for other methods of homicide.
Oh, and further, the number of homicides in major cities, where gun controls were put in place, plummeted and are responsible for most of drop in gun homicides.
Nonsense statistic. Gang related violence has declined from a peak in the 90s. That does not imply that the overall reduction in homicides is related to the increasing number of guns in this country. On the contrary, it shows how measily a proliferation of guns in a community caused a dramatic spike in homicides when the right fuel, the drug trade, was added to the fire.
@Sxm
Your 2016 numbers are about 30% too high. The actual FBI data show a peak of 18,253 homicides by gun in 1993 and then the following homicides by gun:
2011: 8,653
2012: 8,897
2013: 8,454
2014: 8,312
2015: 9,612
2016: 11,004
https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/...
1
I wish the author hadn't been so dismissive of the link between mental illness and violence. My small, idyllic town is reeling from a tragic, random killing of a young woman reading in our town library on Saturday by an obviously mentally ill young man in town, who was well known to police and other authorities and who had menaced neighbors and others for years. It has been on the front page of the Boston Globe since Saturday: http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2018/02/26/man-who-fatally-stabbed-woma...
"Sluggish schizophrenia" and seeming "off" is one thing, but what about real and untreated schizophrenia? We do need better, more effective mechanisms to involuntarily confine people who pose a true danger to others. We can't be so afraid of "stigmatizing" mental illness that we allow truly ill and dangerous people to live among us.
This young woman was brutally killed by someone people told police was a ticking time bomb. I'm certainly grateful the assailant didn't have an assault weapon, but he committed unspeakable--yet likely foreseeable--violence.
4
The following should happen:
1. Ban future sales of ALL assault weapons to citizens.
2. Prohibit sales of ANY guns to mentally challenged people.
3. Move the minimum age for purchasing guns to age 21, unless the buyer has served in our military, in which case the minimum age would move to 18.
4. Start a Federal buy-back program to rid our country of existing assault weapons.
5. Place a minimum of one armed security guard in every public school.
6. Allow trained school staff to carry defensive weapons and declare our schools to be Safe Zones.
7. Ask Bill Gates, Warren Buffet and Jeff Bezos to combine forces to assemble a database, within a year, that would combine information on all of us to determine who should be monitored. Unlike The Wall, these guys will pay for it.
4
I like your ideas, especially the armed guards at schools: We need an immediate response because today is another school day.
Firearm ownership is a privilege not a right. The sooner that is made clear, the better.
4
If that is so, then so is freedom of speech, freedom of association, freedom of religion, etc.
Our gun violence problem is a matter of mathematical statistics. The more guns floating around , the bigger the chance that one of those guns will be picked up by some violent, angry and / or mentally disturbed individual intent on using their high capacity weapon for mass murder . It’s not rocket science — it’s math .
7
Only 11% of mass shooters were suspected of being mentally ill. So what were the rest? Criminals? Nope. Most of them were responsible gun owners, at least from a background check standpoint, up to the day they committed their crime.
We need red flag rules for every state. We need domestic abusers to be put into NICS in every state in a timely fashion. We need any person with a history of being reported to the police for violent acts to be banned. We need anyone who has attempted suicide to lose their guns.
The bar of a felony conviction or involuntary commitment was set purposely high in order for the NRA to point to the system as a failure.
We can do better. We have to do better.
5
Maybe the best article thus far on this complex problem.
Bump stocks have been used once in a massacre that would have occurred even without a bump stock, and which would not have been deterred by a prohibition on buying bump stocks (since they can be fabricated at home).
Students don’t care if they are being massacred with an assault rifle by an 18 year old, or a 19 year old (as at Parkland), a 25 year old, or a man in his 50’s as in Las Vegas; the age of a mass shooter is irrelevant to the people being blown up by these ballistic machines and explosive projectiles.
Professionals in the mental health field readily admit they do not have the capacity to predict who among the mentally ill population are prone to violence, to themselves, or others. So, enhanced “mental health screening” is similarly a wasted effort.
All these “Republican ideas” coming after Parkland are not new, nor are they of any value; they are simply distractions from the primary problem, which is the easy availability and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction which have no legitimate use other than to hunt humans. The Republicans are counting on the rest of us being thankful for them passing some of this tripe as “common sense” gun control, which will have no beneficial effect, and hope that we once again move on, placated. The NRA will continue to screech in public, and laugh in private.
4
And there you have it. Don't bother trying to do a better job screening folks with mental health issues, even though almost every American looks at the case of Nikolas Cruz and can't fathom how no one got him help or how law enforcement didn't do a single thing to try to keep him from amassing guns and shooting up a school (the exact thing they'd been warned repeatedly he would do). Don't bother increasing school security and the ability of brave school officials to use something other than just their bodies to shield and defend their students. Nope... Ban ALL semi-auto weapons from citizens (btw semi auto would include most of the main selling hand guns used for self defense which SCOTUS has specifically ruled the 2nd Amendmemt covers, as well as many hunting rifles and shotguns). And gun control proponents wonder why they keep losing these arguments. It's not the NRA. It's because what you really want to do, the vast majority of Americans don't agree with.
1
I think there are several approaches that will turn this tide:
1-Boycott companies that support the NRA and publicly shame politicians who accept their money.
2-Have responsible gun owners speak in favor of a ban on semi-automatic and automatic rapid fire weapons; make these only available for sport shooting at a licensed facility.
3-Report police deaths and invite police associations to come out against open carry and stand-your-ground laws and push for stricter laws -- i.e. remove guns from people in domestic violence, stalking, etc.
4-Push Congress to fund an improved and universal gun registration database and reinstate NIH funding to track deaths and injuries.
5-Join the students in a mass protest on 3/24.
6-Sanction states with lax laws--i.e. don't visit, remove your business and put states on a list promoted to tourists as unsafe places to visit.
7-Criminalize private sales of guns and require that gun transfers (even between family members) be licensed.
8-Require gun sells to log guns they sell and bullets. Fingerprint anyone who buys a gun and put in place an automatic flag if someone attempts to buy more than one gun.
13
Yep. You got it. Great essay — the NRA and its Trumpublican puppets are playing "look at the shiny object" so they can diffuse the energy of the anti-insanity movement. Don't fall for it. Insist, and keep on insisting on one primary objective — ban assault rifles and all military style weapons from our streets.
The best way to go after the NRA, in my opinion, is to attack its leadership. Call them what they are, vile and mendacious. But say it like this: "The LEADERS of the NRA are vile and mendacious." Among the rank and file are many sincere people who have been mislead by the leadership and are frightened that their homes will be invaded and they will be defenseless.
Most of the readers here know better — know that guns kill far more family members than home intruders — but the vile and mendacious NRA leadership, working for the gun manufactures, has convinced them otherwise.
By attacking the NRA's leadership, and saying they are lying to their members as well as everyone else, we can start to drive a wedge into the organization, as well as exposing the leaders.
There is much more, of course, but sticking with a simple program — ban assault weapons — and an easily identifiable "bad guy," the NRA leaders, will make fighting this war of words and slogans much more effective.
18
And boycott all the companies that support the NRA. Time to call them out.
(Thanks to those who have already dropped their misdirected discounts.)
15
Please note that the Boy Scouts of America took money from the NRA. It would be worthwhile to ask more about values the organization claims to have.
1
Wont work, were not giving up out guns for any reason..period..
Rebecca Peters, Australia’s National Coalition for Gun Control: “Gun owners recognized that they had bought [semi-automatic and assault weapons] because they were available, and were promoted and marketed by the gun industry. But they recognized that these guns were not suitable for civilian ownership in a country not at war, that they’re not sporting weapons. The Professional Shooters’ Association, which is like the original Crocodile Dundee, these more-macho-than-macho guys who shoot feral animals in the wildest parts of Australia for the National Park Service said ‘If you need a semi-automatic to kill an animal then you’re a city boy who shouldn’t be out here in the first place.’”
New Town to Newtown: How ’96 Massacre Spurred Gun Laws in Australia https://tinyurl.com/y9azfbz6
Australia had about one mass shooting a year prior to 1996. Since then there have been no mass killings and gun deaths are down 50%.
Australia had different state laws like the US. A conservative government put forth a comprehensive set of nationally uniform gun laws:
–a ban on semi-automatic and assault weapons
–higher standards of background checks on all gun sales
–higher standards for gun licenses and waiting periods
–registration of all guns
–strong standards on safe storage of guns
–a mandatory buy-back program for assault weapons
If Australia—a country of hunters, gun lovers, and a strong gun lobby—can adopt sensible gun control measures then the US should find the will to do what’s right.
111
Has it occurred to Second Amendment fanatics that it would be clearly unconstitutional to deprive those who are mentally or emotionally disturbed the right to bear arms? It's interesting that those who would refuse to ban assault rifles (okay, "semiautomatics") on the grounds that they're covered by the Second Amendment are perfectly okay with telling a large group of their fellow citizens- arguably including the paranoid Wayne LaPierre- that they aren't entitled to those same constitutional guarantees.
10
No we are discussing the one by one adjudication of individuals found OBJECTIVELY to be a danger to themselves or society, not a large group of fellow citizens. Only the group of citizens that on a case by case bases need not have access to weapons.
1
@Arny Plumb: That would still constitute a VERY large group of people- whose right to bear arms would, in any case, still be covered by the Second Amendment. We'd all be far better off if we stopped referring to that document as a sacred guarantor of gun rights to ANYONE. (The word "gun" never even appears in the Amendment!)
3
Just FYI: Some commenter here said today that the more correct term for AR-15s, etc., are "military-grade weapons." That encompasses all such dangerous guns and better defines what we're talking about.
1
The electorate must demand real and significant gun law reform and must insist that any person running for political office on any level must stand upon that platform. The media has a role to play in keeping the public focused on that goal and in moving public opinion toward that direction. The electorate must not be distracted by the machinations of the powerful influences who feel otherwise.
9
If the "goal" is disarmament (which it is) then the supporters and their nominees are in violation of the very constitution they take an oath to uphold.
2
In my small Florida county, the tax collector's office is now handling concealed weapons permit applications for the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. A significant percentage of the state's residents (and presumably snowbirds, too; state residency is not a requirement for a permit) currently have permits. Possibly the main barrier to more concealed carry is our summer weather, which makes the"Miami Vice" style of wearing of sports jackets rather uncomfortable. I assume fellow church members are taking their guns to Sunday services.
There is nervousness about the state's famous "stand your ground" law. A recent local apparent road rage incident that left an unarmed (white) driver dead, with the (white) shooter quickly calling 911 and reporting self defense, leaves people wondering who might get killed next time.
The legislature seems to be looking for a few token measures to give the appearance of making schools safer. I'm somewhat surprised that the congressman one county south of us, Brian Mast, has endorsed a ban on semiautomatic rifles. He's a first term Republican in a swing disrict.
16
Banning the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians would be a better approach.
Those who proudly claim to be strict constructionists when it comes to the constitution really ought to be okay with allowing only the kind of weapon commonly available at the time of the passage of the 2nd amendment; flintlock rifle, accompanying ramrod, pouch of gunpowder and pocket full of musket balls - that's the ticket.
49
By that standard, please limit your First Amendment media comments to printing press pamphlets, as was the style at the time. Cornerside soapboxing is also appropriate.
I'm certain the founding fathers believed that technology would stop at 18th century levels, and wrote as such.
4
No, the point was to allow an armed citizenry to resist a tyrannical govt.
The govt at the time had flintlocks. As could the people.
Unlike flintlocks, semi-auto rifles with high capacity magazines are adequate tools for resisting a modern military (See Afghanistan, Iraq). Yes, they have other weapons as well, I know.
Only the kind of weapons issued to the average enlisted soldier is the correct standard, not muskets. Times have changed and our enemies (drug cartels, and the gang banger) are way beyond single shot black powder. The US Citizens should be no less well armed, because we don't all have the police in our hip pocket, like the celebrity and elected class do.
Join in the boycotts against the NRA.
Let Amazon, Google, and Apple know that they must sever ties with the NRA.
It's the guns, stupid.
100
There is only one individual that comes to mind when considering the term 'sluggish schizophrenia', that being the current resident of the White House, Donald Trump.
Whether he could be diagnosed as such, whether he is mentally ill, unbalanced, a malevolent narcissist, or more than odd eccentric, there is no way this man should be the leader of this nation. Each day another outrageous utterance or tweet of his emerges as a half hatched idea, which every one of us is supposed to think about and debate, as so few of his ideas merit serious thoughtful consideration.
When will this nightmare end?
15
Banning bump stocks was all the rage in this paper less than five months ago in the wake of the Las Vegas massacre, and before the latest tragedy in Florida gun control activists would have been euphoric to find someone in power who could move the needle on age limits for buying semiautomatic weapons.
Prohibiting the sale of firearms to those who show the signs of violent emotional issues that 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz displayed to family, school and community for YEARS hardly constitutes condemning him to a padded cell. He may or may not have satisfied court requirements for imposing involuntary commitment, assuming local police and FBI had done their jobs; however, taking away his guns and prohibiting him from future possession of such weapons wouldn’t necessarily have required involuntary commitment.
It’s curious that gun control activists argue that dramatically limiting the gun rights of millions of sane and responsible Americans is justified if even one child’s life can be saved from the predations of a disturbed individual, yet Mr. Rosenthal asserts that “only” 11% of such attacks involved a perpetrator whose mental health had been questioned. Maybe authorities need to be sensitized to the problem and their means of following-through facilitated, but Nikolas Cruz WAS among that 11%, and, if the way HAD been facilitated, he may not have had guns and been forced to plow into a gathering of students with a monster-truck. Presumably, that would killed fewer.
4
The efforts underway by a Republican governor, Florida’s Rick Scott, and the state’s Republican legislature, are good ones. And in a country as diverse as ours, it makes no sense to dictate universal curbs that treat Wyoming (or even Florida) like New York City or Chicago – not because rational universal curbs might not make sense but because they’ll NEVER be passed by Congress. The best hope gun control activists have of reducing massacres, or even gun violence generally, is a state-by-state approach that builds on incremental success.
Mr. Rosenthal’s Holy Grail, which is to “get the guns … ALL the guns” (not his words) is wasted effort that does nothing productive but divide us more vitriolically with no chance of ever succeeding. I see that for the purposes of this editorial he has (barely) moderated his prescriptions to banning semiautomatic weapons (which would necessarily include most hand guns purchased) for civilians, eliminating the right of civilians to carry weapons and eliminating the claim by a civilian of self-defense in a gun-death. However, no mystery exists about his REAL aims – and even his “moderated” ones are quite D.O.A.
He does violence to the ability to establish enough mutual trust between the opposed views now to find worthwhile compromises that could save innocent lives, and which could become more powerful with time.
4
" not because rational universal curbs might not make sense but because they’ll NEVER be passed by Congress."
Right. And the American colonies could NEVER free themselves from the greatest military power on earth; the slaves could NEVER be freed; women would NEVER have the right to vote.
Don't let chickens batten down your hatches.
10
Richard Luettgen wrote: "It’s curious that gun control activists argue that dramatically limiting the gun rights of millions of sane and responsible Americans is justified..."
Where did anyone, or you, identify a gun right that activists are advocating limiting? Which right would that be? The right to a semi-automatic? The right to large-capacity magazines? Those are not rights. The only right under discussion -- depending on how one interprets the Second Amendment, and which way the weather is blowing -- is to keep and bear arms.
You are not complaining about a limitation of rights, you are complaining about a limitation of firearm choices. You are just as armed with a bolt-action rifle as you are with an AR-15. Activists seek to outlaw dangerous firearm choices presently available on the market.
5
,"The real problem with gun violence is not about mental hospitals, armed teachers, bump stocks or age requirements".
That is so obvious for any rational person but not for gun lovers nor for our president and many Republicans, they would blame anything else except the guns. Even if our president and the Republicans come up with some crazy ideas to protect our schools, there are other places like movie theaters, shopping malls, nightclubs and other places to protect where these tragedies can happen easily. In the early morning hours of Sunday, June 12, a single shooter entered a nightclub in Orlando, Fla., and began what would become the single deadliest act of gun violence in modern American history. When the situation came to an end, 49 people were killed, with much more injured. Gun violence has become a noted problem in America, several countries are warning their travelers who are heading to the United States to be on their guard when far away from home.
84
I note that you started out with a "single shooter", i.e., a person. The gun did not get to the nightclub by itself. A disturbed individual brought it there. Why are so many people unwilling to hold people accountable for their actions like this?
The real problem with gun violence is violent people.
1
Donald Trump has no intention of helping to get any gun safety law passed. He's the master of having his cake and eating it too: get credit for floating an idea, and then, let it die a slow death.
His strategy is simple: become associated with a policy (outlawing bump stocks, arming teachers, throwing folks into mental institutions), even if (or more likely, especially when) the policy is so outrageous even Trump knows it won't fly.
Then, upon the next shooting, Trump gets to yell, "see? I told you we should have armed teachers," or whatever other crazy notion he was on record supporting.
This little game Trump plays keeps the conversation circular. It's the essence of craven non-governance.
Donald Trump will never ever go against the NRA because they give him too much money.
Which is the only thing he worships more than attention.
85
Stop treating this sick man as if he has substance! We cannot know his head--but his words show us his heart: dark, void, dangerous, a hollow space of fake outrage and piety, reported to us by grieving widows and wounded teens, by immigrant families attacked for calling out his disrespect, by body language seething with anger and evil as Washington's governor expressed his direct disagreement with Trump's new formula of love and death.
This man has created love as a reason to kill, yet he ignores measures well within his grasp (but absent from his heart!) that would prevent the risks of death. He acts as if guns are the only deterrent to guns. His solutions assume guns as a given!
A further review of context shows the engulfing power of violent fantasies on his thought! From full page Times ads, calling for the death penalty for innocent teenagers (whose innocence he has never acknowledged), to calls at his rallies to hit, punch, and knock “hell” out of protesters, to his removal of blacks and Muslims from his crowds (in GA, black students were removed from a rally held on their campus; in FL, his campaign's minority director was asked to leave), he went on to attack the Dean of Civil Rights, Congress member John Lewis on twitter—after a legacy of attacking women in media. (Katy Tur's articles and books makes plain her real fear at angry crowds whipped into frenzies as she was called out by name.)
(Part 2 below.)
15
(Part 2)
He attacked London's mayor as he expressed admiration for every dictator who kills their own citizens outside of the law. He told cops making arrests to “rough 'em up.” Then he says, it's a joke, he's the victim. The Constitution is in his way, he says.
The man who would “run in”? His first big military bombing was a fake--not a plane, or munitions storage area, or runway was struck by the 62 missiles fired at a Syrian airbase. A military-released photo shows the great accuracy of US missiles, each which missed a vital target, but struck the base. A man who instructed the military to miss vital areas of non-human targets, now wants “adept” teachers to aim center mass, when the accuracy of trained officers is only 25 to 35 % from 7 yards away in live simulations.
Death is not only a mission he urges as a domestic/global solution, it is a weapon he deploys in his politics. He exploited the death of Dwayne Wade's niece. He gleefully disparaged Puerto Rico and has abandoned its cause of recovery. He offers teachers a bounty. He violates civil rights ans divides families. His empathy for violent abusers leads us to consider his passion: death is the centerpiece of his policies (increased by his plans for healthcare and safety nets, his military budget; his lower air and water standards). It is his solution to threats, real/imagined, in words or deeds. Those leaders with blood on their hands, we are told, he admires and praises as friends.
Build one room. Put him in it!
32
How about going back to the idea that guns are meant to be kept at home and away from unsupervised children, or taken out only during deer hunting season, and putting it in the law? The construct served us pretty well until the late 1990s, so why shouldn't it serve us again?
36
Recently, in Winchester, MA, a man walked into a library and with a 10 inch hunting knife, stabbed a 22 year old medical student to death. And injured a man coming to her aid. He did not know her. He was well known in the community and by law enforcement. He is severely mentally ill, but was allowed to frighten neighbors who hid indoors when we was outside. There was nothing anyone could do? I don't know. We are not doing enough to protect the innocent. What if he had purchased an AR-15 at a gun show with no background check required? He would have killed many. Mental health issues and the lack of good mental health care and better red flag laws go hand in hand with a safer community.
13
I live not far from the Boston suburb where the stabbing occurred. Because Massachusetts has gun laws designed to make to possible to screen a prospective gun buyer, that assailant would not have qualified to obtain the needed permit. Also, assault rifles are not legal at all. Now if the rest of the nation had similar laws we would not have the serious black market problem in guns that now exists.
5
Looking for solutions? My major beef with law enforcement at all levels is: 95% of our mass murderers spend months and even years on the law enforcement radar screen, and law enforcement fails again and again to recognize the clear and present danger, and act.
Parkland students and townspeople reported Nikolas Cruz to the cops and other authorities dozens of times. The citizens of Parkland recognized that Nikolas Cruz was a clear and present danger. The cops confronted Cruz a dozen times, and they did nothing. And herein lies the virus, the aspect of our culture that, in 2018, has become a grave mistake. The solution: We must end our relationship with "the benefit of the doubt."
Local cops know who the bad boys are, and the cops do nothing. Red flags pop like firecrackers, and the cops do nothing. My question to every Parkland cop: What was your reasoning behind giving Nikolas Cruz the benefit of the doubt? The radar screen said... teenage white male; animal torturer; school troublemaker; kicked out of school; owns guns and knives; creepy behavior around females; threatening content in his social media posts... Are you going to tell me that your hands are tied until he kills somebody? You gave Cruz the benefit of the doubt and he killed 17 people. Now what, more training?
12
Well, the hands of law enforcement are pretty much tied until a person breaks a law. The benefit of the doubt is a bedrock principle in criminal law, designed to prevent our judicial system from making the horrible mistake of finding an innocent person guilty — a mistake that happens too often anyway, but would surely happen more often if that principle were eliminated. If you or someone you love were wrongly accused of a crime, I assure you that you would want the judge and jury to give you the benefit of the doubt.
Law enforcement has limited options for dealing with a person who might be a prospective criminal but has so far not committed a crime. That’s why regulating the manufacture, sales, and use of guns and ammo would be a much more effective approach to reducing gun violence than trying to nab prospective shooters before they shoot.
3
The cops have to be backed up by prosecutors. What if a young man who gets violent is charged and a conviction obtained. They then have more leverage to force him into treatment, he may do better just from knowing that there are limits, and most importantly he now CAN NOT PASS A BACKGROUND CHECK!
1
You want law enforcement to "act." How, exactly? As things now stand in Florida, without "red flag" laws (which say that guns can be temporary confiscated from people who've been reported for disturbing behavior) someone who's not a criminal or officially declared incompetent has the right to have guns. This was not a failure of law enforcement; they must adhere to the law, even when it pertains to individuals that are clearly troubled. In order to have earlier intervention the laws need to be changed.
3
Another clueless article by the left.
With the exception of a few shotguns, every firearm built since WWII is semi-auto.
Try doing some research first.
8
Funny. I was born in 1945 and clearly remember going to the sporting goods store in Durango, Colorado, and watching my dad buy bolt and lever action rifles.
I hope you're aren't trolling.
3
Research says Norway is banning sem-automatics in 2021. Trump likes Norwegian people. He wants them to come to the U.S. Maybe we should be more like them to make ourselves attractive.
2
Although I don't agree with the article's author, this is not quite correct, in that you are missing bolt-action rifles, single-action revolvers, single-shot target pistols and rifles, and "historic" firearms such as muzzle loaders. The significant majority of firearms sold is likely semi-auto as you infer, but please avoid clouding the underlying issues by playing loose with the facts (on either side of the debate)
1
This is not an either/or scenario. It's not an issue of mental health versus gun control. I don't understand the desire to minimize the need for comprehensive, quality mental health care. Obviously, gun laws need to be much stricter. OBVIOUSLY. But ignoring the issue of mental health is insane. Referencing sadistic policies in the USSR is a cheap argument. So much that is good can be twisted and used for evil; that doesn't mean you abandon it. Increase the number of comprehensive and quality mental facilities in this country and I guarantee a reduction in homelessness, the prison population, and, yes, gun violence.
46
I agree. And it goes both ways. I heard an interview on the radio with an anti-gun control advocate who noted that there have been thousands of guns in our communities for decades but only relatively recently have there been mass shootings and thus we need to look for other root causes for gun violence in our communities and society. That seemed to stump the interviewer who did not pursue the issue. Why does it follow that if the causes of mass shootings are social, gun control wouldn't have a mitigating effect on these crimes? Are we supposed to wait around getting shot until we do what--eliminate video game violence?
It's like saying gee, when I was a kid we never locked our doors but now I'm getting robbed....but I guess I'll keep leaving my door unlocked until we find out why robberies have surged because my leaving my door unlocked isn't the cause of the robberies and hey, someone could break a window anyway. Would any sane person do that? I think not. So let's lock up access to these military grade weapons through gun control AND increase access to mental health care AND improve coordination and response from law enforcement agencies. Let's do it all.
237
If you had ever been inside one of these "quality mental health" institutions, you would know better than to expect any lasting benefit. They exist to drug and confine people during the most acute phases of metabolic brain injury that result in unique perceptions and behaviors that have been cataloged as mental or behavioral health phenomena that have been described as disease. The doctors and nurses are rarely able to identify the source of these "illnesses," so they don't try to cure or prevent them from recurring. They just dope people into cooperation. If the inmate-patients can behave without causing too much trouble for a couple of days, they get put back on the streets. If not, they become long term inmates for the crime of not receiving the mult-systemic diagnosis and care that their complex genetic/exposure/experiential/developmental history requires for them to heal and live within norms of their societies.
10
Your argument makes good sense, Lars. But do you think Republicans, on either the federal or state level, would support appropriating money to expand mental health care? They control both houses of congress and the presidency, so what is stopping them from introducing legislation to convert your idea into policy? I feel sure Democrats would endorse such spending, so long as the "mental facilities" were not places of incarceration masquerading as hospitals.
42
i will agree with the GOP position on gun control--which is, essentially, no controls--when any citizen is allowed to walk into the House, Senate and White House with virtually any gun, just like the GOP and NRA want for everywhere else in the country.
I'm waiting, GOP chicken hawks. It's easy to do nothing and offer "thoughts and prayers" when someone else's life--and someone else's children's lives--are the ones being snuffed out.
Between Trump the draft dodger claiming he would have run into that Parkland high school even without a weapon, and the impotent GOP lawmakers in congress and red state legislatures around the country cowering before the almighty NRA, I am truly embarrassed to be an American. Those Parkland high school students have shown more guts and grit than any of these GOP cowards. What a tragic, pathetic bunch of worms.
421
It is NOT permitted to take guns into "anyplace" and never was.
Anyone's property or business can be defined as "gun free" if they so desire, and this overrides any "concealed carry" laws.
We have concealed carry in my state, but all schools, libraries, stores and public buildings have posted signs saying that ANY firearms of any type are banned -- concealed or open carry.
Not sure what your state is, but the NRA has rammed through laws in a number of states, many in the south, that permit guns in a wide variety of places, even against the wishes of the property owners. And even in the states where the NRA has pushed through very liberal laws on gun ownership and carry, the bills they originally pitched were usually even less restrictive. In Georgia, for example, you can have any gun in your locked car in the company's parking lot even if the company doesn't want guns on its property. And by Georgia law the company is not allowed to ask the person if he has a gun in his car. So you need to go state by state and check your facts.
1
Guns are part and parcel of what it is to be an American. Americans have a lot to be proud of and rightly so. 150 years ago the same arguments about guns was made about slavery, it is American to own slaves. Over the past 150 years the same "Its our right as Americans..." has been chortled to oppose women's right to own property, to vote. Follow our constitutional amendments: it was until the 20th century an American right to not pay taxes to the federal government, to discriminate in hiring, schools, even travel if one was black or Jewish. We as Americans have a lot to be proud of and the current gun violence increase is just part of what it is to be an, and live in, America, the good old USA. To put it in an understandable light reflect on this: I live in a community that spends more money every year on our dog park than on child care. It's all about being an American until its not about being an American, then things change. Winston Churchill knew Americans better than anyone living or dead when he wrote that Americans always do the right thing, after they have tried everything else.
13
Eventually, after we have “nabbed” all the “crazy” people and thrown them into padded rooms because “something was off” with them, the rest of us will finally be able to own more guns than we will ever want, or need, in order to “defend” ourselves. At that point, the only thing missing will be a country worth defending.
40
All the outrage and door slamming in the world is not worth a couple years of hard focused effort to amend the 2cd. And that's exactly what needs to be done. You don't get to a solution in a rule-of-law Republic with a Bill of Rights by insulting the opposition. You must do it by cajoling, persuading, making the case, providing the arguments, showing up at debates, motivating the apathetic, and getting out the vote. None of that is helped by insult and condemnation, in fact insult and condemnation HARM the anti-gun movement.
And so it is with far too many of my fellow liberals. They lust for outrage, they bleed insult. Name calling is their stock and trade and vilification is the campfire around which they sing their kumbaya. It's laziness and self gratification over the grinding trade-craft of real political change. The very idea that my liberal fellows think themselves "better" people than Trump voters is both their big error and doom. It would be just a fascinating study in group psychology, if there was not so much at stake.
9
You have a point, but I think it overstated Civility in public discourse is lacking (and Pres. Trump is the biggest offender). However, if you listen to the media favored by GOP/Trump supporters, and if you talk to some of these people it is difficult not to see large numbers of them as paranoid, uninformed and oblivious to the danger Trump poses to this nation.
Well, it does seem to me that the name-calling, insults and anger-wallowing comes more from the Right. To say nothing of violence-inciting and all of the above from its leader.
Small steps Andrew get rid of the most horrific incidents, which are increasing in number and frequency. For my money the most effective would be limiting magazine capacity to 6 and requiring background checks on the sale of ammunition.
7
Are you sure that they are increasing? The numbers of guns have exploded, gun deaths have declined, and by some measures school shootings were more common 20 years ago. The US is below France, Belgium, Finland, Norway, and the Czech Republic as well as other countries in per capita deaths due to mass shootings.
The courts in some states have ruled it is constitutionally permissible to limit semi-auto mags to ten rounds, but have rejected limits below ten rounds.
You write that the real problem is too many guns. Yet, gun deaths have declined markedly over the last 30 years; except perhaps in Chicago?
And, most gun deaths are by criminals with guns obtained illegally. Yes, we need much stricter laws and background checks, and banning assault rifles is common sense.
Yet, we also need intellectual honesty in the debate and not selective use of data to win some imaginary debate. Let's come together and discuss from the heart, not spin and divide us.
4
Yet, gun deaths have declined markedly over the last 30 years;
WHAT? Where on earth did you come up with that nonsense.
I do hope you're not a troll.
3
Actually, most gun deaths -- about 2/3 -- are suicides.
Crime in general has gone down. You have to take that into account. And you mentioned Chicago, gun related deaths in Milwaukee are almost double that of Chicago (per capita). And they’re going up every year since WI passed that crazy law that made it easier for criminals to buy guns.
I'm shocked that anyone could so completely misunderstand (or mischaracterize) Mr. Trump & the Republicans. They are not addressing the problem of gun violence, or untreated mental illness, or mass shootings. They are addressing very real threats to gun industry profits, and the ever-present danger of legitimizing government action on behalf of the public interest. They are trying to protect this great country from a return to the dark days of rational political discussion. On this, as on so many other issues, Mr. Trump is selflessly offering himself as a beacon of stupidity and ignorance to the good Americans who are justifiably frightened by the prospect of a government actually acting on their behalf. The purpose of this country is private profit at any cost, and its only security is in a government that protects industry from the tyranny of democratic rule. Politicians who speak like fools are our first line of defense.
93
If these guns as omnipresent, should it not be time to educate everyone on how these things work so everyone is reponsible? Cars and everywhere and there is mandatory classes in high school. Why not offer gun classes in high school from professionals? I am pretty sure I remember ROTC walking around my high school.
3
I don't think the problem is that people don't know how to use guns. These mass shooters seem pretty effective. Not to mention that schools lack the necessary funds to teach students basic curriculum.
1
And then, perhaps, offer discount memberships to the NRA and discounts on guns - no thanks. ROTC was for people planning to go into the military and they are not given loaded weapons, by the way.
Pilot-
Do you actually believe that teaching children in school how to use guns will lead to less school shootings?!? That is ludicrous.
The Talmud teaches that to save a single life is like saving an entire world (and the converse is true about the effect of destroying a single life).
In that spirit, I would not be so quick to denigrate any positive and rational step, no matter how modest, to reduce our shooting epidemic.
Progress on this issue is going to take a maddeningly long time, but we have to start where we can.
5
What epidemic? Look at the numbers.
Cars don't kill people, people kill people" and yet we require training, photographic license, registration, insurance, emission tests etc. And unlike guns, cars were not deliberately designed to kill.
256
Here is an idea. Let the gun owners have their weapons of mass destruction. Since their fetish is costing us untold millions and many innocent deaths, let them pay for it.
How about we levy a $500 excise tax on each AR15 type weapon sold. Then take that money to train and install professional paramilitary guards at each school. Of course, since they wont wan to be out gunned, they should be outfitted with fully automatic M4 rifles and flake jackets like the soldiers have.
Don't stop there. Levy a 50 cent tax on each round of ammunition used in the weapon. Levy a 30% excise tax on each and every accessory. If we did that, they can still have their guns and we can at least have the money to protect the kids. We would be turning school campuses into fortifications typically found in war zones, but that is exactly what the NRA wants. When you have guns everywhere, with no restrictions and virtually no limitation on firepower, society is turned into a war zone.
Oh happy days! Now I see the logic of the NRA's position. The more bullets flying around, the more freedom and liberty we have. If your kid get in the way, that's their fault. They should know better than to walk around in a war zone. Ask any six year old in Syria.
112
This Republican government would never even consider such an effective and sane remedy.
I would go a little further. Say a tax on bullets. Buy one box of ammo pay a tax of .50 per bullet; buy 100 boxes pay a tax of $100 per bullet. We would need to track these sales but if we put that into the hands of the IRS it might be easy.
When the patient is having cancer, our president and the Republicans are applying band-aid as the solution. Guns are the problem, get rid of them just like any other civilized country. Mental illness is being used as a scapegoat for gun violence as several studies have shown but the Republicans would not buy it and the CDC is not even allowed do any research on this epidemic of gun violence.
11
And yet the liberal pundits on tv say over and over “No one is trying to take away all guns!” Ha!
3
No need to be paranoid.
I grew up with guns, and I strongly support the right of people to keep their bolt and lever action rifles and pump shotguns for hunting, shooting a family member who comes home late one night, or whatever else they want to use them for — so long as they don't go around shooting up the town.
AND, I strongly support getting all assault rifles and other military-style weapons out of the hands of civilians.
7
Sensible gun control has been on the table for 30 years, and the republicans have continually scoffed at it (while taking billions in compensation from the NRA). So, yeah, the tables are turning. If the pendulum swings too far to the right, eventually it will swing all the way to the left. The republicans have no one to blame but themselves.
2
There is no test test to screen for future mental instability. Add to that, how many times have we heard people close to the shooter say," I had no idea he would be like that. He seemed so normal". We cannot pick these people out of the crowd.
The problem is the AR15. Yes, millions are in use and only a very few are used in mass shootings, but man can they produce huge mass shootings. This rifle is a danger to the public.
Many gun owners claim that a gun is just a tool, an appliance. OK. Let's explore that argument.
Takata had to recall millions of airbags because a few malfunctioned and killed a few dozen people. Even though the ones that worked correctly saved many lives. Society would not stand for the deaths.
GM had to recall millions of cars because of ignition switches that would switch off if a heavy keychain was attached. It caused some deaths even though the operator used a heavy key chain. Society wouldn't stand for the deaths.
A few blinds and shades out of many millions strangled a few toddlers. They were recalled because society would not stand for the deaths.
I could go on. When an appliance causes needless deaths, even if the owner is partially at fault by crashing a car or using a heavy keychain or not watching their babies, we recall the appliance. We often sue the manufacturer.
The AR15 is such an appliance. It is just too dangerous. But we can't recall it. We can't even sue the manufacturer. So kids die. And for what?
542
Remember Lawn Darts? They were banned too. The weapons manufacturers are bribing our politicians pure & simple. Let's address that.
19
After months of debate, Congress will come up with a solution. All AR-15s will have to come with a warning sticker: "WARNING: This rifle is capable of killing many people in a short period of time. Do not point this weapon into a crowd." There! Problem solved.
1
We need to push to repeal the Dickey Act and the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, and fund gun use research as well as allow the courts to manage product liability for guns in the same way that citizens can pursue redress with Big Tobacco and now, with pharma for the oxycontin disaster.
Simple first steps to deal with public health disaster created by gun makers, the NRA and their coward minions in the White House, Congress and state houses.
1
I don't believe the gun lobby is counting on "a few partial measures" to "take our eyes off the bigger picture and drain the energy out of demands for change." No, they are against all measures of gun control, because they fear "the slippery slope." And I believe that the adoption of some measures, however partial, will in fact build momentum for further measures, and I hope it does.
Nor do I think it is accurate to say the President Trump has not called for banning the sale of semiautomatic weapons by those under 21. I believe he did, but then has been silent on the subject. In a clarification, I believe his White House spokesperson has recently said that he has not changed his original opinion on that.
Strangely not addressed in this column is the question of whether banning the sale of semiautomatic weapons to those under 21 would help protect against school shootings in particular. But isn't such prevention precisely the current gun control goal?
Also not addressed is the practical question of how a ban on the possession of semiautomatic weapons by civilians might work in practice, with so many such weapons already in civilian possession. Perhaps a ban on future sales of such weapons would be a more attainable goal?
2
Do what Australia did. It worked.
14
Semiautomatic weapons have one purpose, killing people with as much damage as possible. Big clips only have purpose if you are trying to kill lots of people like the killer in Las Vegas. It doesn't matter that some people think that AK 47s or AR 15s are fun to shoot. The reality is that maintaining ones ability to buy as many fun to shoot guns as possible invariably leads to massacres like those that are seen in the United States and no other first world country. It would be a start to ban semiautomatic weapons, and bump stocks, and large clips, but it would be better to eliminate large numbers of weapons. That is not going to happen until we get past the cowboy mentality of the OK corral, where the good win in a shootout with the bad. It is not going to happen when anyone gets to shoot first and not be held accountable for a death because they "felt" threatened. Really? It is not every person's duty to do everything in their power to avoid killing someone else? I hope there is a movement in the US to bring forth a reasonable gun control policy, rather than this shadowy, free for all, we have now.
19
The hypocrisy and illogical thinking by the NRA and it's buddies in the legislative branch never ceases to amaze and confound me. They have been insisting for years that the best way to decrease gun violence is to have more guns. Yet as the number of guns in circulation have increased, so has gun violence, particularly mass shootings.
Will we some day hear these lunatics say that the only way to stop a bad sixth grader with a gun is a good sixth grader with a gun?
Thank you for driving home such a common sense point, Mr. Rosenthal.
35
“… could ‘nab’ people and throw them in a padded room because ‘something was off.’”
In the wake of the latest mass shooting, we read more frequently of people who think that anyone who “acts strangely” should be reported to mental health professionals, the police, and perhaps the FBI. Certainly in some cases such a response is warranted, but we travel in a perilous downward spiral if we degrade our society by behaving in this way as compensation for the raw greed, corruption, and sheer stupidity of the principal actors: the NRA and its political enablers.
We clearly need to radically reduce the number of guns in the United States, using a country like Australia as the model. Destroying the lives of law-abiding citizens as part of a twisted and paranoid society will never be the answer.
And if you should ever find yourself in a mental hospital, be very careful what you say. If you express any anger or hostility toward others, the hospital can destroy your life. Do not ever mention guns. This is not to say that health care providers are bad people: in fact, they are simply bound by “duty to warn” and corporate “risk assessment.” But better “safe than sorry” is the motto – and you will be the target. You have no intention of harming others? Then keep your mouth shut. Or you will sincerely regret it.
Alternatively, we could reduce the number of guns in America so people would not be so fearful of their fellow citizens. But doing that would be “crazy,” wouldn’t it?
163
If reducing the prevalence of guns in the United States, you really need to approach it on two levels.
The first is public education. You need to convince the public that guns are not necessary. With each instance of a "mass shooting" more people are willing to go out and buy guns. That is not helping matters.
Campaigns such as the one to reduce the perceived societal desirability as was done with smoking work. And while a start has been made, it's progress has been measured by the number of times that it has stopped. Start working on correcting THAT problem.
The second is far more fundamental and FAR more difficult. Start working on a constitutional amendment, for, without that, removing guns from the hands of people is not going to happen.
2
One only needs to read "Being Sane in Insane Places" to begin to grasp that the context of a persons behavior creates a situation where the "mental health professionals" interpret behavior in the most negative way - regardless of how innocent it was. Placing, normal sane individuals in institutions as a kind of undercover experiment was a profound and damning indictment of that industry.
2
There were studies decades ago that found that perfectly sane researchers committed to mental health facilities who behaved as they normally would were never identified by staff as inappropriately detained...
3
It's already too late - again. The media has fallen for the politicians' and NRA's spin of the Florida massacre, by which the issue has become "school safety" - as if the Las Vegas massacre, the Orlando massacre, the San Bernardino massacre, and the various church massacres were about concert safety, nightclub safety, office safety and worship safety. The issue, as Rosenthal points out, is the proliferation of firearms and the bizarre movement to normalize their use instead of limiting their availability.
272
You want to talk insanity? Yes, we have an insane number of guns. Yes, it’s insane that they’re so easy to purchase. Yes, it’s insane that people can buy AR 15’s. But all of that pales in comparison to the insanity of 45 states allowing people to carry loaded firearms in public?!?! Almost anywhere else in the civilized world, the idea of people who aren’t in law enforcement or the military keeping a loaded gun anywhere - let alone in public - is inconceivable.
The gentleman who wrote the op-ed piece a few days ago and who was former military, talked about how he felt he could no longer justify having an AR 15. But then he went on to say that he carries a firearm every day and will continue to do so because it makes him feel safer. And almost half of Americans actually feel that we would be safer if more people carried.
So, at some point could we get around to talking about this? Because when you peel away this horrible onion, and you get to the rotten core of it, this is the truth that you find. It’s the truth that says: all this talk about gun control, pump stocks, assault weapons, background checks, etc. is crap until you start talking about me.
120
Actually, all 50 states permit members of the public (meaning, other than law enforcement) to carry weapons in public, to varying degrees.
2
"...Almost half of Americans actually feel that we would be safer if more people carried." Where does this claim come from? I haven't seen it any survey or stats and I've been following this issue for a couple of decades.
4
Agreed;
My right, your right to LIFE supersedes my right or yours to a gun. Let's talk about us first guns second.
2
No matter who we throw in jail, no matter who we call insane, there will be no end to the massacres until we REPEAL THE SECOND AMENDMENT and confiscate and destroy all the guns.
51
At least you are honest about what the left really wants.
4
Its not the left friend, its all sane thinking people. We are a long way from 1776.
And there it is. Mr. Rosenthal has finally lain out the far left's bright red line in the sand, and the choir is responding in turn. It's a pity, a shame really, because a very large number of gun folks support some manner of reasonable regs and controls, never commit crimes and practice good citizenship. By alienating them with talk of repeal and confiscation, eliminating all semi-autos, etc., they're taking their citizenship to the voting booth feeling somewhat desperate and backed into a corner. The far left has no clue how many of them there are, and how deep this issue runs within them. I too despise the NRA leadership though I stand with the membership on it's core mission and founding principles, all Americans should. That said, the Times should exercise caution when using quotes from Bloomberg et. al. to bolster their arguments when even the WaPo fact checkers rate him and his organizations as bogus. You can no more repeal the 2A than you could the 1A and the 5A. Try it, I dare you.
As a nation we live in tension over many issues, our democracy is often adversarial and contentious. It wasn't meant to be easy, it's ours only if we can keep it. I, and many like me, actually admire and support many of the basic issues the left "owns", but while I can allow for the 80 million or so who are against guns, they apparently can't allow for the majority of us that are for them. This approach is once again going to needlessly snatch defeat from the hands of victory.
1
Here in rural Maine, the AR types are convinced that they are needed to defend the home from attacks that could come during “dark times”.
One moment of listening to Wayne LaPierre could make anyone think they’re on the way. We need him and his stooges gone.
247
You think there are no home invasions? You think no one ever breaks into anyone else's home to rob and probably murder them? You think this never happens?
1
Tell me about one home invasion in the US where 20 attackers showed up at once and needed to be mowed down in unison?
I would think a simple service revolver would be fine against any intruder(s).
Why do Americans no longer have pride in marksmanship? Why do we want the crutch of overkill? Are we cowards because we believe all the scary BS shown in fictional TV and film?
21
@me: Are you having someone stay awake at all times at your home armed with a loaded gun to defend it against intruders? Because that’s what you’re suggesting. I’d suggest you take a guard dog...
4
Mr. Trump may not be a disciple of Snezhnevsky, but is certainly the poster child for untreated mental illness in he US. Mental illness is not a high crime or misdemeanor, so a court will be free to rule on his sanity, danger to the public and then involuntarily institutionalize him if found to be so.
7
Unless we ban ownership of and eliminate the existing numbers of assault weapons, the major problem will not be solved.
Do legislators value assault weapons over human lives? Of their own children's lives? ASK THEM.
Raising age from 18 to 21 is useless as long as assault weapons are available to buy, borrow, steal. People can fake identification or get someone to buy guns for them. What about the many unsupervised gun shows, personal sales?
Either there are limits to gun ownership or there are no limits.
If there are no limits, people can own and use tanks, howitzers, grenade launchers, anti-aircraft guns -- you name it.
End the hypocrisy.
Ban assault weapons as the first order of business.
Doug Giebel, Big Sandy, Montana
28
There are a lot of problems with banning semi-automatic weapons.
Skipping over the obvious issue of the 2nd Amendment, there's also the problem of the 4th Amendment forbidding unreasonable searches and seizures and the 5th Amendment that you can't be deprived of property, without due process, and without just compensation. Now the average semi-automatic pistol runs about $400-$700, the average semi-auto rifle runs from $700- $1500, do the math: Assuming a "buy-back" of 300 million weapons at $500/ (which is barely "just compensation") means $150 BILLION dollars! Where's that money going to come from?
Semi-automatic firearms have been available to the public for more than 100 years.
Since by far the vast majority of wrongful shootings in this country are by handguns and only in vanishingly small few (like Virginia Tech) is there any difference whether the gun is semi-auto or a revolver. IOW, it won't make any difference to the vast majority of shootings.
What we need, instead, are better definitions, better and more consistent background checking laws (If the NICS isn't done in 3 days DON'T allow the gun purchase, instead of the opposite--error on the side of safety).
"Responsible Ownership" needs to be better defined, with stricter rules of compliance.
IOW, keep guns from those who shouldn't have them, and make sure those who can have them strictly obey safety rules, and don't stupidly let them be carried into public places! Lanza's mom didn't secure HER guns & died.
8
"Skipping over the obvious issue of the 2nd Amendment, "......well various restrictions on private ownership of various firearms has been the LAW since the The National Firearms Act of 1934 (NFA). The NFA defines a number of categories of regulated firearms. These weapons are collectively known as NFA firearms and include the following:machine guns, short barrelled rifles, short barrelled shotguns, and silencers..
For civilian possession, all machine guns must have been manufactured and registered with ATF prior to May 19, 1986 to be transferable between citizens. Owning the parts needed to assemble other NFA firearms is generally restricted. One individual cannot own or manufacture certain machine gun sear (fire-control) components unless he owns a registered machine gun.
So these restrictions on civilian ownership of certain firearms, have not been adjudicated to violate the 2nd amendment.
7
No, it really is all about semi-automatic weapons. Loading and firing a revolver or a bolt-action rifle takes time and effort. You're limited to six shots before reloading your pistol. Revolvers and non-semi-auto rifles can't be accessorized to become automatic. It takes much more time and effort to become proficient with guns that aren't semi-auto. Lots fewer people will die in mass shootings if semi-auto weapons are banned. It won't stop all gun violence, but it will make a significant dent in mass shootings. The only people that should have access to semi-auto weapons in our society should be law enforcement. Any citizen can protect his or her home with a revolver or shotgun. No hunter needs an AR-15.
5
Yeah, and we can apply the same argument in spades to drugs. Do you know what a pound of coke goes for? Do you know marijuana was legal in this country up until 1937?
Give me a break.
6
"A well regulated Missile brigade, being necessary to the security of the Juche State, the right of the North Korean People to keep and bear nuclear ICBMs, shall not be infringed!"
American "logic?" applied round the world!
Obviously "people kill people" and weapons proliferation has absolutely nothing to do with the existential horrors unleashed upon humanity in the past century.
7
The re-opening of mental institutions is so Trump. Unable to admit his own mental instability and psychopathy, he thinks that would be a panacea for the likes of the alleged shooter, Cruz. Perhaps if he could admit that he would benefit from a long stay in such a facility with doctors who would confront his "stable genius" which, more accurately, is unstable idiocy, I would buy it. But guns must go away and the NRA must be reduced to a feeble branch of the Boy Scouts with a merit badge offered for someone who can clean a 12-gauge.
5
The legal standards for insanity are different from the clinical definition of insanity. Racism, rage, jihadism don't rise to the level of being crazy in the eyes of the law. Otherwise, it would be impossible to ever prosecute hate crime, spousal abuse or terrorism. So exactly what would make someone mentally unfit to own a gun? The entire line of thought is bogus. Disarm everyone and the problem goes away.
154
Disarm "everyone" and innocent law abiding citizens would be unable to protect themselves from thugs and criminals who would still have guns. Did prohibition get rid of alcohol?
8
Truth! Prohibition did not get rid of alcohol, it only promoted crime involving alcohol. The war on drugs, as a second example, has done much too little to reduce drug use and so a war on guns won't succeed well either. The core problem is that all three are addicting, the urge to have and to use insatiable. Without "treatment" curtailing the demand there is little chance that controlling the supply will be of much good. Just one look at the NRA makes this clear. Gun ownership is impassioned beyond any reason and until that is addressed there is no win to be had here.
4
The purpose of alcohol is not to cause violent death.
3
The ultimate goal of this crowd is the unilateral disarmament of law-abiding citizens.
10
Yup - but only as a means to an end. If there were any other measure which would reliably prevent madmen from slaughtering unarmed citizens, I'd favor it. But there is NOT.
13
And what exactly is wrong with that?
13
We actually don't all have a problem with hunting or sport target practice. We have a problem with civilians shooting each other with rapid fire guns. Humans are emotional and often do really stupid awful things to each other when upset. Making sure that angry young men cannot easily kill 17 people or more in under 6 minutes is just common sense. Wanting to ban automatic guns is only equivalent to banning all guns in the minds of the truly paranoid. Possibly anyone that paranoid should not be allowed to have any sort of gun without a psychiatric evaluation.
14
The irony is too rich. Trump, an individual whom no end of mental health professionals have concluded is, indeed, unwell (his own description of himself as "a stable genius" notwithstanding), now wants to make policy limiting the capacities of mentally ill people.
In any case, the refusal of Trump and other Republicans to finally take action on serious gun control is itself pathological. Trump, in his bizarre non solution of arming teachers, wants to increase the ubiquity of lethal weapons. Paul Ryan peculiarly referenced "culture" as behind the problem of violence. To begin with, whatever thoughts a person may hold translate into violence when they have instruments of death. The more deadly the weapon, the greater the carnage. Also, it is circular reasoning because the prevalence of gun killings itself can influence a culture as much as any culture could inspire a shooter.
The sane answer is that guns have to be regulated, as they are in other first world countries. How sick that those in power avert their eyes from the truth and turn to fantastical thinking.
89
The biggest obstacle of all is the Second Amendment. In America we cherish our right and the Second Amendment protects the right to "keep and bear arms." As long as this is interpreted to grant an individual right to firearms unconnected to service is a militia, progress in gun control will be slow and sporadic. Face it the gun advocates have the high ground here.
The only hope is that some blue states push stricter gun laws along the lines of Australia's system of requiring applications and references for gun ownership. When successful, these limits may spread across the nation.
21
You must be assuming that states can ignore the second amendment. Not so fast! The Supremes have ruled otherwise.
2
All of our rights are balanced with society's need for public safety. It is my hope that if the states experiment with more gun restrictions, it will force the Supreme Court to interpret the Second Amendment to accommodate those restrictions. All we know right now is that a hand gun ban would not be constitutional under the decision of D.C. vs. Harris. Given the lack of functioning in Congress, it is unlikely we will see significant federal legislation limiting firearms.
1
Why do you assume that 2nd Amdmt rights are not limited to service in a militia, when that is precisely what the Amendment says? Gun advocates certainly do NOT have the high ground, either constitutionally or morally.
Stand your ground laws protect homeowners, so there is no way they should be repealed.
7
The "castle doctrine" laws allow you to protect yourself inside your home. Stand your ground laws encourage you to use deadly force rather than avoiding it.
33
"Stand your ground laws protect homeowners, so there is no way they should be repealed."
Stand your ground all you like, as long as you can do it without enabling those who murder and massacre our children and fellow citizens.
9
In France if you go up to a farmhouse as a stranger they will try to sell you some cheese or pate. In the US if you go up to a farmhouse as a stranger you will probably be shot.
5
Backwards - it is forbidden to say "NO" to NRA. What national sentiment is this Country promoting? Australians said "YES" to banning assault weapons and in essence everyone wins. How can a civilized country continue with "YES" to rampant weapons and "NO" to children's safety and devise a country for inherent losers of life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. The national theme touted endlessly becomes a joke...............
17
Actually, i quite like the idea of throwing people who seem "off" into a mental ward. Guess who would be the first person to make that list. Yes, it would be the Donald. His rabid troop would follow.
137
Too many guns.
Obscenely lethal guns - weapons of mass destruction really - such as assault rifles - that no sportsman or hunter needs.
The US has become a treacherous, dangerous, insane place.
342
Shooting deaths are way down in the US. It is safer than it has been in 50 years. We suffer uniquely from mass shootings you say? We are not even in the top ten for per capita mass shooting deaths and countries that are above us include the civilized nations of France, Belgium, Norway, Finland, Czech Republic and Slovakia. The left is being as childishly simple minded in this matter as a climate denier who cites the latest blizzard as more determinative in his analysis that the data.
Please say were you get these statistics, because they contradict all of the evidence I have seen on gun violence, internationally.
2
Sporting and hunting is not why we have the second amendment. As an American citizen I recommend you further research your constitutional rights.