Americans do not have the guts to take the same approaches taken in Australia and New Zeeland! Therefore the politicians here will never want to properly deal with this problem for the only proper solution is to somehow eliminate the killing tools desired by so many believers in that mythical afterlife.
Well, at least it's a better response than "Thoughts and Prayers!"
3
Shameless political opportunism. Both the Governor and lt. Governor needed a diversion from their own issues. This is it. How would the Governor's proposals have prevented this ? They wouldn't.......
10
@Mike I call it leadership, not opportunism
4
@Mike
So....Governor Northam is trying to DO SOMETHING to save lives....and you can only *shout* opportunism??
Dear God.
You really don't have a clue as to how angry people are about this issue, or how the intransigence of the republican cowards who are beholden to the NRA exacerbate this matter.
2
My understanding is that the VA Beach murder suspect purchased his guns legally, which included FBI background checks and clearance to buy. The suspect also had no known criminal history, except traffic violations. So, it seems, neither of these bills would even so much as address the problem.
15
@Dr. Steve That is another NRA talking point. If we had gun licensure that would have to be periodically renewed, there is at least a chance that this shooter's right to hold firearms would have been denied. Furthermore, if a proposal would REDUCE gun violence but fail to totally eliminate ALL gun violence, that is not a reason to reject it.
7
@Rita Prangle , Background checks are a consumer fraud, that dwarfs the crimes by Bernie Madoff, the financial swindler. Only 62 Federal prosecutions followed 76,142 denials (in 2010) of purchase applicants. For the data see, Regional Justice Information Service, "Enforcement of the Brady Act, 2010", 2012, p. 7 https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/bjs/grants/239272.pdf .
A Government Accountability Office (GAO) Report (No. 18-440, Sept., 2018) shows that of 112,090 denials by FBI screeners, only 12,710 were sent for "investigation". Of that number only 12 resulted in prosecutions!!!!
Plainly, far more than 12 denials were fully justified. It is a Federal felony for a "prohibited person" to possess or to try to acquire any firearm. Such a small number of prosecutions shows that Federal authorities care little about stopping those, who seek to abuse firearms.
If the 93 U.S. Attorneys prosecuted even half of those denied, that likely would mean few other Federal crimes would be prosecuted.
Background checks - like "gun control" itself - dazzle many. Behind the dazzling facade: nothing good.
By the way, with some 402,000,000 firearms in the U.S., excluding military items, "gun control" is foredoomed. Things so abundant and concealable cannot be controlled.
For some, "gun control" is a matter of faith, not logic. Soviet Communists' embrace of central economic planning - also a fatally-flawed idea - led them to bankrupt Russia, a hugely wealthy country.
1
@Dr. Steve So is that an excuse to do nothing, once again? We have to start somewhere.
4
We need Federal gun control legislation which requires that all guns be issued Certificates of Title like with cars, that they be Federally registered, and that gun owners be required to maintain liability insurance with high deductibles to indemnify people harmed by their guns. Limit the number of guns that people may own to some reasonable number.
Like with cars, impose strict, vicarious liability upon gun owners for their direct or otherwise negligent conduct in connection with their guns.
As far as bullets go, the eggs I buy are imprinted with a traceable code. Do that with bullets so we know who is buying them and in what quantity.
This will not eliminate all gun violence but it will cut it back and provide at least some compensation for victims. As far as I can see, none of this in any way conflicts with that pesky 2d Amendment which would, of course, stay in full force and effect.
What we have now, a patchwork of gun legislation in 50 states, is ineffectual. You can still get a gun in a state with lax firearms laws and take it anywhere you want. If states, to meet their own needs, want to impose laws that are more stringent than the Feds, like with booze and drugs, fine.
39
@MIKEinNYC
How would that have stopped this shooting? I don't think it would have .
I was appalled by Northam's participation in an insensitive college prank decades ago, but not nearly as appalled as I am at Republican Rep. Kirk Cox characterizing Northam's common sense gun control measures as "hasty and suspect, especially when considered against the backdrop of the last few months."
Sadly, predictably, the backdrop of the last few months (and years, now) to which Cox was referring wasn't the everyday tragedy of innocent Americans being slaughtered en masse in their own schools, office buildings, concert venues and churches, but instead was Northam's prank of 30 years ago. It takes a special mentality to link those situations in defense of out of control gun ownership.
Actually, what's "hasty and suspect" is Cox's knee-jerk response of harsher prison sentences for criminals. That's all he has? That's his solution to mass murder in America?The Virginia Beach killer, Duane Craddock, was a law-abiding citizen, not a criminal, so how would stiffer prison sentences have stopped him?
On this one, I applaud Gov. Northam and can only hope other governors will follow suit.
105
@RJ Steele-Agree. "The speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates, Kirk Cox, a Republican, said that at the special session, Republican lawmakers would address gun violence 'by holding criminals accountable with tougher sentences — including mandatory minimums,' rather than 'infringing on the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens.'" Obviously Mr. Cox knows has an amazing ability to detect criminals before they commit criminal acts and believes that the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens does not include the right to safety and to live to a natural old age. Sigh.
2
Personally, if Gov. Northam manages to impose some gun control on Virginia, and save thousands of lives in the future thereby, I'll forgive him for that blackface incident.
46
Add up all the societal costs of medical care, funerals, people traveling to funerals, lawyers, law enforcement, long term care, lost wages, counseling, and more and increase the cost of bullets to pay for that rather than through taxes and personal funds. Make the gun owners pay for what results from their allegiance to the 2nd amendment.
16
The Feds already outlawed bumpstocks. The VA perpetrator didn't use a bump stock.
Universal background checks wouldn't have prevented the VA killer from obtaining his guns. He passed background checks.
The one-handgun-a-month law wouldn't have prevented the VA mass murdererer from buying the handguns he used in this massacre.
The proposed "assault weapon" ban wouldn't have kept this miscreant from perpetrating this horrible crime. He used handguns. More people are beaten to death than die by rifles, all rifles - single shot, bolt action and semi-auto.
The policemen found the murderer by following the sounds of his shots so outlawing his suppressor wouldn't have given any advantage to them.
So had this bill been law at the time of the murders the outcome would be the same.
I see little mention of the fact that the massacre occurred in a gun free zone.
Humans are the most cunning killers on the planet. Ninteen Saudis killedt 2,900 of us with boxcutters. A terrorist killed scores of people with fertilizer and diesel bomb in Oklahoma City. A terrorist in France killed scores with a rented truck.
It's not the guns. It's the people.
5
@AmarilloMike
It is the guns, rather the amount of them. We do a poor job of ensuring the right people have access to the right kinds of guns.
Our gun laws need to be like Japans. Licensing, permitting, training, storage laws, and annually checkups.
People free to own AR15s and Glocks and High-Cap mags, no worries, but if you are going to own weapons you have an obligation to your community that you are safe. Because people won't voluntarily verify they are safe, it is up to the state to do so.
3
Yes, it the people, and note this article doesn't even mention the killer's name, only calls him "the gunman."
1
@Patrick Costa you are probably the first person to comment a solution that would have done something about this issue of mass shootings. The system should be modeled after the one in Canada rather the one in Japan. Also there would need to be measures in place to prevent abuse by authorities.
There's no better way to move on from the black face affair than to take advantage of a tragedy to promote gun control legislation.
3
Take advantage of a tragedy by....trying to avoid another one?
I’m at a loss as to why you’d associate a dumb, crass, juvenile mistake with a mature attempt to change the laws that make the US such a showcase of mass shootings.
5
I support the governor's call for universal background checks and a ban on assault weapons. However this would not have prevented the latest Va Beach shooting. What is needed is a massive reduction in the +350 million firearms in private ownership and a major cut in the over 8 million new firearms sold each year in the U.S. Evidence is clear--the simple availability of a firearm increases the chance of murder and suicide.
How to reduce firearm sales and shrink the number of firearms around: raise the federal excise tax from its current 11% to $1,500 per new firearm sold. Take the $1,500 and buy back any used firearm and destroy it. Firearms will become expensive and rare. In a few years, maybe there will be 100 million firearms in private hands and maybe 1 million new ones sold a year, but murder and suicide rates will fall dramatically.
This is a public health approach used to cut cigarette use--yes you can smoke or own a gun, but it will cost you
"In a statement, the speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates, Kirk Cox, a Republican, said that at the special session, Republican lawmakers would address gun violence by holding criminals accountable with tougher sentences —..."
Considering that most perpetrators of mass shootings either kill themselves or are killed by police, the Republican response won't have much effect. Rather than worrying about "infringing on the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens" it would be good if these Republican legislators worried about upholding the right of all of us to our constitutional right to not be a victim of random violence.
4
Rational gun control does not pass because gun sales mean big money, because big money has convinced people that someone is going to take their ability to protect themselves against high powered guns away, and because Republican Congresspersons don't care about other people's children and loved ones. If it is not their kids dying in a mass shooting, they could care less.
The Second Amendment does not guarantee unreasonable gun ownership, but the Republicans do. They will keep backing gun sales of high powered weapons for mentally ill people because they simply do not care who dies.
Bravo to this governor for having some morals.
2
Before each election across this country in each state we need a published list of NRA recipients of money running for every office.
Make sure they are well known as taking contributions both known and hidden.
5
"Gun control" is mathematical idiocy. At end-2016, there were about 402,000,000 firearms in the U.S., more than one for each of the 328,000,000 U.S. residents (https://www.census.gov/popclock/ ) , including infants, who usually own little. (See U.S. Dept of Justice, "Firearms Commerce in the United States", 2000 and 2018; military-owned firearms excluded). Things so abundant and concealable cannot be controlled.
That's what foredoomed Prohibition, the nationwide ban on alcoholic drinks (1919-33). Then, as now, the ingredients for home-brew could be bought in any grocery store. In some regions, distilling alcohol ("moonshine", "white lightning") was a tradition older than is this Republic. Prohibition made some "moonshiners" wealthy. Those, who backed Prohibition, were impenetrably stupid. They bequeathed to us well-organized criminal cartels, still a plague on the land.
Further, since 1980, the number of firearms in the U.S. has doubled, but the murder rate has halved. In 1980, the murder rate was 10.2 per 100,000 residents (Dept. of Justice, "Homicide Trends in the United States, 1980-2008", p.2). In 2017, the homicide rate was 5.2 per 100,000 residents (FBI, "Crime in the United States", 2017. Table 1). If firearms drove the incidence of criminality, the murder rate should have doubled. It didn't. The murder rate halved.
Background checks are a vast consumer fraud: a GAO Report (#18-440) shows the Feds prosecute one per thousand of those denied.
2
@Jay E. Simkin
Nice bit of disinformation, Jay.
Gun control *is* rational, and possible. You throw out stats that imply each gun is 'available' to commit crime; yet you show no proof of this.
You *claim* background checks are a 'fraud' and use a GAO report as somehow a defacto arbiter of background checks and the usefulness of them?
Your comment that only one per thousand are PROSECUTED for LYING on the form has nothing to do with the countless individuals who do NOT own guns because they can't pass the background check.
Go back, recheck your NRA talking points. You're out of date on facts.
1
The same sad cycle repeats itself in Freedom's Land
- mass shooting virtually every day
- intense media circus for a few days
- tears and prayers
- vows to 'do something' about the gun scourge "Let's start a national conversation"
- funerals - more tears and prayers
- nothing ever done (of course)
- wait for the next mass shooting
Perhaps taking a page from New Zealand's book might be wise? However, they are not under the spell of the horrific NRA. An impossible situation
5
Thank you Governor Northam! These tragedies have end. I’m so sick of sending my kids off to school wondering & worrying if they’ll be next ...
3
"In Virginia, Gov. Ralph Northam called for a special session to vote on gun control bills after [the Virginia Beach] shootings."
It's like they had no idea such a thing could happen until now.
2
Someone should tell Kirk Cox, Republican speaker of the house that being murdered by guns infringes on the constitutional right of Americans to live.
5
The usual closing the barn door after the horse has bolted. America is crazy.
2
Withhold the names of the shooters.
One thing these mass shooters seem to crave is attention. They seem to relish the titles we bestow on them "the largest mass killing etc." Withholding the names of the shooters is something that could be done immediately; we wouldn't have to spend lots of time on political compromise. We can act now to at least keep them from the notoriety and "titles" (largest shooting etc")
3
Maybe it's time to abolish the Second Amendment and let the states decide how they want to regulate guns.
9
Finally?
A politician who's had ENOUGH of this out-of-control, insane carnage from unlicensed and unregulated guns?
7
I can tell ya what to do.
1. Universal background checks.
2. Licensure, with regular renewals.
3. Bans on assault weapons, extended mags, suppressors, bump stocks, conversion kits, and all the other silly paraphernalia.
4. Required removal of guns from the hands and homes of anybody who commits a violent assault, or delivers repeated threats of violence. And anybody undergroing treatment for mental illness evaluated as dangerous.
5. Tracking of gun purchases; you suddenly start buying, you get a visit from a cop. The cop asks you wazzup.
I have no idea how to get the rational done. And no, I am not opposed to gun ownership. But we got to have us some law.
12
In this time of tragedy, these types of responses for increased gun control are to be expected.
But I wonder if the governor is using this incident to polish up his image after the unfortunate incident of black facing.
Gun control is a horse that folks love to whip - unfortunately always after an incident when emotions are raw. And this horse has been hit more than even one at the Santa Anita.
As a palliative, they pass a law that is almost always legally fatal - waiting to be overturned on Second Amendment reasons.
We have now seen enough of these incidents to know that gun control is really not the issue. There is a lot staring straight in front of us but most of us have our eyes wide shut.
2
More wishful thinking by the Times.
As stated, none of the proposed measures, including the suppressor restriction, would have prevented the tragedy. So this is the gun ban crowd seizing another opportunity.
The gun used has been around since 1911. There were very few mass shootings of any kind before governors all over the country shut their mental hospitals in the 1960's and curtailed treatment for mental health problems.
It is wrong headed to restrict an unrelated Constitutional right because governors acted irresponsibly on mental health to save a buck.
2
So let’s do nothing and by all means let mass murders continue - we will, however, offer thoughts and prayers to show how much we “care”.
3
Strikes me as kind of useless. Anyone who wants a firearm will obtain one by hook or crook, and speaking of crooks, criminals and emotionally disturbed people do not obey laws. Pass as many laws as you want - it won't help. I don't know what the answer is but laws that criminals will ignore won't help.
4
Mike, that's funny you should say that, even though states with stricter guns laws have fewer gun deaths.
7
And the location with the strongest gun law invariably have the greatest gun violence.
@polymath we talking about the same chicago?
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 first and foremost 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. This is the only way for us to effect change and I think if we accomplish this achievable goal many other progressive issues will follow.
8
@George Klingbeil What unfolded in New Zealand shows that those, who have charge of public policy-making, are morally perverted. They know not the difference between the law-abiding and the criminal. So they treat both alike.
New Zealanders seem to accept this perversion. I had thought that New Zealand's bi-ped residents were different from quadruped residents. I was in error.
The idea that governments should have a monopoly on weapons is wrong. Look at Venezuela, Sudan, China, etc., where those in power abuse residents at will.
The usual, idiotic, response is that no one can fight an Army. Not so. Tanks need to be protected by foot soldiers. Foot soldiers can be shot. If enough civilians shoot accurately, the soldiers lose. Google "Blackhawk down".
1
Maybe VA should require that municipal employees have to go thru security when they enter their building just like the rest of have to. Better than infringing on my civil rights.
7
How will that fix all of the shootings which don't take place in municipal buildings?
2
I'm only suggesting a concrete step that would have helped in this one instance. The best way to fix things is with real solutions that could have stopped each instance.
Maybe VA should require that municipal employees have to go thru security when they enter their building just like the rest of have to. Better than infringing on my civil rights.
2
Honestly the best approach to reducing gun violence (criminal violence, mass shootings, suicides, and accidents) would be to have ever state pass a licensing law modeled after Canada’s or Massachusetts’ law. Of course the system should be modeled on the principle of “shall issue” unless good cause can be found to deny a license and measures would need to be added to prevent authorities from denying/delaying licenses for prejudicial or political reasons.
8
Gasoline and cigarettes are exorbitantly taxed. Why can’t guns and bullets be exorbitantly taxed to pay for better security measures. Considering every other option seem to have a high congressional and legal barriers...
19
Congress should take action and weigh in supporting the Governor of Virginia. It is time for universal background checks, a ban on assault weapons and bump stocks , et al.
The time is NOW.
15
Guns don't kill people, bullets do.
Ammunition sales should be tracked. It should be encased in childproof containers with perhaps even more security. Like your phonne has?
The purchaser should sign a form that confirms that storage of all guns and ammo are separate and safely locked away.
Stories of toddlers, small children and teens finding a gun in the home or car that kills family and friends are not rare.
17
One of my H.S. Classmates, a woman I know well for many years, put up on her F.B. page, after Parkland, that we should hold off until all the facts are in. She's very Republican.
So, how many facts do we need?
Doing nothing is an answer, too.
BAN ALL SEMI-AUTO WEAPONS, INCLUDING HANDGUNS.
I'm liberal, and think a minimum 10 years in prison is ok in this case.
18
@follow the money Handguns are protected under the 2nd Amendment. Just look at Heller v. District of Columbia and Chicago v. McDonald. Banning all semi auto likely would not survive court challenge since you they are commonly used by law abiding purposes such as sporting, hunting, target shooting, and self defense. Besides, many other countries allow semi auto such as Canada and France.
1
Actually, Canada highly regulates guns, including universal licensure. France probably has more guns around, but regulates far more strictly yet.
You can’t legally get big-capacity mags or suppressors, either.
Do try and represent things honestly, won’t you?
14
Are you prepared to buy them from lawful owners at full value? Unless you are your solution is a non-starter.
2
The NRA will be all over this like stink on... well, you know.
8
@chambolle
The NRA is supposed to be an association for dues paying owners. Rather like the VFW and others. Not something created from whole cloth to annoy anti-gun persons.
They have there current internal issues, but they represent a lot of harmless firearm owners.
2
Maybe they represent a lot of harmless firearm owners. (If someone with a machine that will kill a human being after pointing and clicking can be called harmless.)
But mainly the NRA represents the interests of the gun industry.
2
@CH The NRA is primarily a lobby association, follow the money.
1
At every election going forward we need to keep front and center that the weapons industry nor the NRA does not want a solution and they do not care about us. We need to vote for our lives.
27
Gun control laws won't cure insanity. Maryland has very strict gun control laws and, still, people are murdered with guns in the hands of the insane and criminals. Guns are not the source of violence - people are.
6
@Angelsea
Yeah, but it's a good start.
7
@Angelsea Won't hurt, though!
1
@Angelsea
That is complete Nonsense. Every country around the world has similar population segments as the US suffering with degrees of mental health issues. And some of those populations will, sadly, act out their illnesses in violence. ONLY IN THIS UNITED STATES are the per capital gun death and injury rates far off the charts. The difference is clearly the ease with which many US people can arm themselves to ridiculous levels, and where US GOP lawmakers do completely nothing to grasp the obvious data and act to lessen it. Whatever your point was intended to be, YOU FAILED.
1
It's nothing short of disgusting.
People clinging to a supposed "Constitutional" right - which in actual fact is a fairly recent discovery by a politically activist court - while day after day the deaths continue. And no political will to put an end to the slaughter of innocents.
Oh, sorry, I thought this was about abortion....
15
@Byron Kelly so gay rights, because they are recent, are not important?
This response is not germane to the event, nor honest in addressing the real causes of this sad disaster. The killer had legally purchased guns and was a veteran of the national guard. He was not the first veteran to have gone wild with guns.
It's a huge task to stop this epidemic of gun insanity, but the first step is to convince the movie, television and video game industries to stop portraying guns as romantic wild west manly things. Next is to stop promoting a militarized social belief that teaches gun possession and concurrent paranoia resulting in their use. Wars are violence romanticized by politicians that teach violence and result in violence.
Isn't Governor Northam a veteran? His promotion of more gun laws will not prevent future crimes such as occurred in Virginia Beach. It only gives him recognition on the Television that is in part responsible for aggravating Americans.
4
@WITNESS OF OUR TIMES\
sorry, I disagree.
The first step is to convince the american voter that guns should be treated just like another lethal implement even if by accident - automobiles. (at is is in NY at least).
Once you buy a car, you must buy insurance (liability), even before registering the car.
You must then renew said registration annually, and it must pass state inspection.
And your license (permit) to operate the device? you must renew on a set date, with tests (vision) thrown in the requirements.
You fail? restrictions come into play.
Why can't gun owners be required to buy liability insurance? To the benefit of those they might accidentally wound or kill?
Why shouldn't they be required to pass some sort of test every so often?
Why shouldn't every gun in every state be registered?
Those would be "first step". Then we can address societal issues. Maybe.
18
@c
Not a bad concept; but I think impractical.
There are millions of gun owners. A very small percentage of people with guns may cause damage or death. A great many of the firearms involved in shootings are used by gangs, drug dealers, and other assorted nefarious entities. Frequently using stolen firearms (which can not really be stopped).
If a gun owner shoots someone, there are already plentiful legal processes to deal with a shooter. A court of law (or dismissing for a legitimate protection use) will deal with criminal deadly use. That is how it needs to work. It is why we have a legal system.
Charging owners for owning their guns is not reasonable or useful to society.
2
"His promotion of more gun laws will not prevent future crimes such as occurred in Virginia Beach."
Funny that you say that, even though states with stricter gun laws have fewer gun deaths.
2
This latest individual used a handgun, not an "assault rifle". He bought the gun legally after passing a background check. What new gun laws are going to prevent a similar crime in the future? We already have numerous laws on the books regarding possession of guns, yet how often are they enforced? Remember, laws are only as effective as our ability to enforce them and we're not doing a very good job with guns, or drugs.
5
maybe he wants to emulate New Zealand's response?
So sad innocent people have to be slaughtered in order to get government leaders to act.
15
@c
Laws will not change anything. People keep blaming guns. It is evil people that will simply not pay attention to firearm laws. Yet the ravening masses (generally without even a minimal understanding of firearms) insist on blaming the guns.
Drive a truck through a mob of people to kill them is awful. Why do we then allow trucks. It is more similar than you may think.
1
How about requiring a license to purchase and own a weapon? We do it for automobiles and a million other things. Why not guns! Let’s get real.
42
@Art Zegarek
Gun registration with yearly inspections and proof of safe storage. Ammunition sales should be tracked.
18
@Anne
Millions of rounds of ammunition are consumed yearly. There are no practical (or useful) was to recognize a particular round.
After a shooting, some information can be derived from details imposed by the gun that fired it. Other wise, tracking ammunition is much like putting serial numbers on individual Oscar Meyer hot dogs.
2
@Art Zegarek
The US has had licensing in most states for concealed carry for a long time. Handguns (and some long rifles) routinely have a background check against the FBI national database at purchase time.
At the sharp edge, no one can be reliably determined to be set upon a deadly shooting. No check will fix it. No licenses. No crazy rules. Kitchen knives could be another example.
1
It’s entirely up to the republicans. Blood on their hands if they do not approve common sense gun laws. If they vote it down, every democrat needs to let the world know that republicans choose violence over safety. It’s past time to act. Enough!
19
What common sense gun laws are you proposing?
2
@Jesse James - Background checks, a waiting period, red flagging, magazine limits, storage safety for starters. Try some common sense yourself, you might get to like it.
16
@Voter
I have yet to see a useful "common sense" gun law.
Keep in mind that this whole thing is funded by some Billionaires who, for whatever reason, do not want us to have guns. Yet they have massive armed guards to protect themselves.
They fund the very high quality TV ads when voting time comes around. They feature things like sheriffs against guns, even though the majority of the officers in the area are for guns in the civilian population. Only the paid Commentators (i.e., Sheriffs) get to be in the commercial. They fund the various organizations (e.g., Mothers Against .........) for whatever their interest is.
I have seen first hand the results of the Billionaire dollars in voting. Hundreds of people paid to stand on street corners and in front of high traffic areas (think supermarkets) with many pages in small unreadable print, and a place to sign the petition. Handled by hired people with no idea what they are talking about, talking to people with no idea what they were talking about. I watched for while while the hired "gun" talked people who were just fed a "no guns is good/ save the children", had no idea of the significance of the vote, that just signed because they were badgered (and confused) by the hired signature collector.
I have no idea what these people are trying to do. But it is wrong.
Good to see some activity on the gun control front but it’s a great shame that the impetus was yet another mass shooting.
How many more people have to die before proper gun control is enacted throughout the country? This is basic, common sense, obvious stuff.
17
I prefer onerous taxes on every party to the sale of guns and ammunition, from manufacturer to owner. If we can't do away with guns or keep them out of the hands of violent individuals by regulation, at least we can recover some of the cost to all taxpayers for police, courts and hospital care. Gun and ammunition taxes could also create a victims' and survivors' fund.
41
Then there should also be onerous taxes on those who want an abortion. They are both allegedly constitutional rights but only one always results in the death of an innocent. Think about it.
2
@Jesse James You must mean the gun victim. When I push a fetus or embryo in a stroller and you stop me to tell me how cute and beautiful my "baby" is, then we can even think about it being a "baby". You would, of course, run in fear and probably call the authorities on that sight.
14
I just posted very much the same comment.
"Mr. Cox said...Republican lawmakers would address gun violence 'by holding criminals accountable with tougher sentences...'"
Pray tell, how does one hold a dead shooter accountable with a tougher sentence?
51
“by holding criminals accountable with tougher sentences — including mandatory minimums,” - so the dead can be comforted by the thought that if their assailant lives he will see some jail time. The problem here is that I don't think mass shooters are concerned about going to jail for what they do so this is, as they say, lipstick on a pig.
13
Let us see if our Political leaders can stand up to the gun lobby? A young politician who happen to be female did just that in New Zealand. It is time we learn from people in politics who put their country's interest ahead of their party's and even theirs. Jacinda Ardern did
19
New Zealand is a largely homogeneous population with a parliamentary system of government. There is no gun lobby there. They do have a National Rifle Association but it focuses primarily on long range target shooting.
In short it is not the United States with a very diverse, economically and racially, population. Our government was designed to move slowly to protect the rights of the minority from a stampeding majority.
3
@Malcolm -- Just an addendum. No one in NZ feels threatened by vague abstractions like they do in the US by which they justify gun ownership. We don't want America's gun laws or gun violence, or its racial hatred. And we are an *extremely* and proudly multi-cultural nation. Immigration is encouraged. Come visit. You'll be a lot safer here than at home.
3
@Stevenz We have seen how, in some countries, a tolerance for minorities has been replaced by hatred. Perhaps New Zealand is "specially blessed". But I'd not bet on it.
If I were a Maori, I'd seek another passport. Should some government - perhaps 50 years hence - decide to murder every Maori, murdered they would be.
Few would relate that genocide to the 2018 enactment of alws, that disarmed law-abiding Kiwis.
Germany enacted "gun control" on 13 April 1928, before the Nazis took power. The goal: to curb fights between Nazi Party and Communist Party thugs.
When the Nazis lawfully took power in 1933, they found in police stations, lists of firearm-owners. Plainly the Nazis did not allow those whom they hated - of whom Jews were only one group - to hold onto firearms.
The disarming of Jews was not decisive: Jews were only one percent of Germans. The prompt disarming of the many other Germans, who hated the Nazis, quickly gave the Nazis an iron grip.
The Nazis were not then wildly popular. They won 43.9% of the vote in an election held on 5 March 1933, even with Nazi party thugs having terrorized other parties' candidates. Even so, the Nazis - short of a majority - had to form a coalition. It had a slim majority in the Reichstag (parliament). By at once disarming their foes, the Nazis stifled any resistance. By 1938, Nazi foreign policy gains - e.g., the seizure of Austria - and a revived economy made the Nazis truly popular.
The Nazis murdered some 13,000,000.
"I will be asking for votes and laws, not thoughts and prayers,” Mr. Northam said.
Well said, sir.
71
@common sense advocate
Too little too late, imho
1
Congratulations to the governor for his proposed legislation. It is well past time for "thoughts and prayers" as he and everyone knows. "Thoughts and prayers" are a very cruel way to say, we are doing nothing about those that have been slain - very cruel!
24
Gov Northam meeting is important At the meeting he should also address the high crime rate in Richmond which has been reduced but that city is still violent according to he FBI
1
If the logic of those who advocate gun-control were applied, then no government employees or former government employees should ever be able to buy anything that can be used as a lethal weapon...no guns, no knives, no cars, no gasoline.
2
@Errol
When the problem is guns, assault weapons, tools made to kill and for nothing else, then it is only logical to get these weapons out of circulation by making them illegal and buying back the assault weapons already out there. That takes time and some weapons will always pop up, but if the massacres are reduced by 90% more or less it is a big step to get control of the problem.
It is illogical to compare military type weapons designed to kill with knives or cars or gasoline made for other purposes.
There has to be a beginning to take the assault weapons and handguns out of circulation. There is no telling if and when even a normal person loses it and flips out and runs amok.
7
@Errol:
to stretch and expand your argument a bit further:
why not pass a law that forces people to stay home?
if they want to do damage it will, at least,
be limited to their own four walls ...
on a global scale, the US has the highest homicide and suicide rates due to gun violence BY FAR. WHY?
can/should nothing be done to remedy the situation?
[as to your listing cars & gasoline as potential killers:
if the oil, car and tyre industries hadn't wiped out
almost all public transportation at the beginning of the
20th century, things would be quite different today.]
Virginia already has a precedent of a law that reduced gun crime and was supported by the NRA, Project Exile in Richmond, VA.
Google it.
Language matters.
Gun Safety Laws.
Many of those who are against gun “Control” and against “Regulation” are often in favor of specific steps to make sure that only those who can be trusted with firearms have access to them.
They also like Safety, Rules, and Laws.
15
If you, who have suffered, and who have bad gun laws in your state, don't do the right thing, then it is not going to be better, it won’t.
3
None of what is proposed here would have stopped the gunman. Indeed, if the shooter acquired his suppressor legally via a rigorous Federal background check and licensing procedure, he presumably would have passed a NICS background check or a state licensing scheme. One gun a month means you have to wait a month to get a second gun. The suppressor acquisition likely took close to a year.
The basic issue for Democrats is the U.S. has a Second Amendment and as Scalia said, that takes some options off the table; Heller actually put the strongest protections on handguns, which was the arm used here. Since he presumably passed a Federal background check to get the suppressor, finding this shooter as he developed motive and the urge to act would have been finding a needle in a haystack and its a pretty big haystack.
I think we need to be a little smarter than just recycling the same tired and ineffective ideas.
7
@Khal
With the thought that this is as much a people problem as a gun problem:
I think background checks need to be much more extensive with local police, educators, family members. doctors and mental health /social workers involved rather than the cursory instant background checks now in place. No doubt people will slip through and people will snap. But a more thorough background check could turn up problematic people and perhaps even those whose behavior has recently changed. This might be particularly helpful regarding prevention of school shootings, domestic partner murders and suicides by guns.
This is probably going to require the cooperation of mental health professionals and changes to privacy laws regarding mental health issues. Closing the gun show loophole is easy. There is video evidence that many of these so called private sellers are dealers in all but name.
No instant background checks
No gun-show loopholes
Comprehensive, detailed background checks
Private sales to blood family members only
Allow doctors to ask about gun ownership
Remove the ban on federal money going to the CDC to study gun violence
Remove NRA’s tax exempt status due to their overt partisan politicking (not their advocacy). Sorry they blew it.
12
@LMT When I got my NYS "may issue" pistol permit back ages ago, I had to provide three character references as well as mug shots and fingerprints. I don't have a problem with a system that has reasonable requirements and limits, but not an open ended fishing expedition to find someone, anyone, with derogatory comments about an applicant. Plus, there must be a fair appeals process for denials with due process protections.
As far as the CDC, they were never banned by law from doing research. The Dickey Amendment prohibited CDC from using Federal funds for political advocacy; they were free to do unbiased research. They lost funding due to GOP politics. You may consider that to be splitting a hair, but since you brought it up...
4
@LMT
Physicians can ask about gun ownership. Look up the "doc's versus glocks" court case. Also, you can't just selectively apply the law and remove a group's tax exempt status just because you don't like the group. You have to have a concrete legal reason to do so such as violating one of the laws that qualifies tax exempt organizations. Anecdotal stories don't count.
1
If Gov. Northam uses the Federalist papers which gave us the 2nd Amendment and the arguments for the 1934 Federal Firearms Act, he might have a chance at getting something done.
Provided that the people of Virginia are reasonable.
3
@BTO absolutely. We just need an amendment to the 2A. The real problem is our moral fiber and lack of value for human life. That all starts early on.
9
The first step in achieving sensible gun control and prioritizing public safety over gun access is to take away all public funding for security at any and all legislative offices.
Force legislators to be exposed to the same risks they have so wantonly opened our schools, our places of business, our churches, our playgrounds, our gathering places to, and see how fast they decide that it is too dangerous to have unlimited gun access for all.
31
@Shar how about we get rid of 'gun free' zones to start with?
1
Why does a child suck it’s thumb ?
The same reason humans have guns .
2
The best solution to preventing shootings, gun trafficking, and gun suicides would be to institute a system of licensing for gun ownership similar to that of MA or Canada. Trying to outlaw firearms directly or indirectly with policies such as mandatory insurance is stupid and those who suggest those policies out of spite truly aren’t contributing constructive to the firearms debate.
1
@Justin
Canada recently rescinded one of their national gun laws.
"On April 5, 2012, Bill C-19, the Ending the Long-gun Registry Act, came into effect. The key changes are as follows: Removal of the requirement to register non-restricted firearms. Destruction of the existing non-restricted firearms registration records."
@Aristotle Gluteus Maximus That's true. However, a licensing system can still be effective without registration of individual firearms since the whole point is to vet potential buyers and reduce suicides by instituting a de facto waiting period.
Passing laws to control gun use is a lot like passing laws to control marijuana use. Such laws have little practical effect; they are widely ignored and they make otherwise law-abiding citizens into potential criminals.
There are thousands of gun laws in the US. Can anyone name a single US gun law that has resulted in an actual, measurable reduction in gun violence? If there were such a law, the anti-gun groups would tout it endlessly, but they can’t.
4
@Johnny Stark, yes Johnny the 1934 Federal Firearms Act, it's why you can't buy a Tommy Gun.
8
@Johnny Stark
Yes. A requirement to get training and permitting. And we do. Just because you didnt hear it doesnt mean it doesnt exist.
LS Miller and Lainhart R. “Prevention of Handgun Accidents Through Owner Training”. International Quarterly of Community Health Education. Jan., 1989.; Shenassa ED, Rogers ML, Spalding KL, et al “Safer Storage of Firearms at Home and Risk of Suicide: A Study of Protective Factors in a Nationally Representative Sample”. Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health 2004;58; Cassandra K. Crifasi et al. “Effects of Changes in Permit-To-Purchase Handgun Laws in Connecticut and Missouri on Suicide Rates”. Preventive Medicine. Oct., 2015;79:43-9. This study found a 15% reduction in suicide rates for having permits and training. There is also evidence that a “suicide substitution effect” where folks use a different method (like a knife) fails to occur, but such a discussion is beyond the scope of this argument.
3
@Johnny Stark
Project Exile, supported by the NRA.
1
Playing politics is when conservatives use unrelated political scandals as an excuse to ignore taking action on pressing issues that have real life consequences for their constituents. Republicans would prefer to delay action on gun violence to appease the gun lobby rather than taking decisive action to address the public health emergency of rampant gun violence in our nation.
13
Tax guns.
Tax ammo.
We already have mechanisms for people
who don't pay their taxes.
13
@ZetelmoGuns and ammo are already taxed. There is a federal excise tax on all guns and ammo. Furthermore states tax guns and ammo through sales tax.
There is a big difference between “gun control” and “gun violence prevention”. Most Americans would agree that efforts need to be put in place to curb violence such as reducing veteran and teen suicide risk through better mental health and background screening before weapon and ammo purchases. Limiting the types and sizes of magazines and after market accessories such as silencers can reduce the number of deaths.
Gun violence prevention does not mean taking away the right to own a firearm. When the NYT continues to use the phrase “gun control” it alienates citizens who use weapons appropriately.
5
Virginia's famous travel-teaser slogan is "Virginia is for Lovers."
After Virginia Tech 4/16 and now Virginia Beach, we can fairly well adopt "Virginia is for Active Shooters" as a travel-turnaway slogan.
People can boycott travel to and business with Virginia, you know. Doing so might get the attention of Virginia's gun-loving, Republican-controlled state house in Richmond until the state begins some real gun control reform. Reform will never come from the gun-loving GOP in Washington DC
15
Every law abiding American would like to see an end to the gun violence in America but a piece meal approach to taking the guns out of the hands of potential murderers is not going to succeed. For at least a period of few years of a trial period everyone needs to give up guns that will be carried in public places. Every time there is a mass murder there is attention paid for a few days on gun violence and after that there is no interest until the next time there is a repetition of the same. In the meantime there a continuous cycle of gun violence and public awareness and focus on gun violence.
6
Virginia has an election every November. This November, all of the state senators and the state house representative are on the ballot.
For many consecutive legislative sessions, the Republicans in the state legislature have blocked a variety of rational gun safety measures proposed by the Democrats. The Republicans currently have the narrowest of majorities in the state senate and state house.
Gun safety measures need to be an issue front and center in every race in every district in the state. Challenge the Republicans, in the face of these repeated incidents, to remain recalcitrant and irrational to the most common sense of measures that support public safety.
19
The legislature meets once per year to prevent impulsive laws from being passed, as happens in states with full-time legislators. Virginia can pick up the issue in January, after people think about the issue for a few months. Also, doesn’t the Gov. know that special sessions are expensive, with per-diem figured in?
That said, with elections in Nov. this year, GOP legislature might want to meet so as to appear to be “doing something”.
1
Quite, quite amusing I must say. Calling for "gun control" in a confederate or midwest state, when the people in those states have already accepted the fact that monthly incidents like the deaths of 5, 10, or 20 people at a time are the cost of their very important "freedom" of uncontrolled gun ownership is running a fool's errand. It would be much more realistic to let this pattern of activity play out until the People actually Demand a change.
Right now, the people in that neck of the woods are at worst "satisfied" with life as is. They will let their respective elected officials know when they want to see a change, perhaps some time after they try arming every citizen down there with weapons to determine if that slows down the death rate by guns.
Until then, let them continue to thin their own herd as they seem to wish.
3
Sorry. Their herds will not be thinned after all. People from "your neck of the woods" are relocating and retiring to "their neck of the woods" in droves.
1
Laudable? Perhaps. But none of these laws would have protected any of the 12 victims.
5
Mandatory liability insurance on all guns. You get to keep your guns, but if they cause damage due to accident, crime or mass shootings, the insurance company would pay the victims. You would be required to show an insurance card when buying ammo for that particular gun. The insurance would also follow the gun if stolen. The insurance company would then lobby for common sense safety measures to keep their exposure down. Let the NRA at Allstate duke it out. Jobs creator too. Win/win.
18
Mandatory insurance is just a ploy to make gun ownership prohibitively expensive rather than prevent mass shootings. Criminals aren’t going to get insurance for their guns. On the other hand minorities, especially those who live in lower middle class neighborhoods would be subject to higher premiums by virtue of where they live. Suggesting policies to make exercising rights prohibitively expensive is also ethically wrong. Just imagine putting a flat $500 “tax” or service fee on any prescription of an abortion pill or requiring an expensive fee for voting. In the end only the rich and the powerful would have any rights.
Language matters. Call these measures what they are: gun safety legislation, not gun control.
13
@MRW We should call these measures gun control then.
For a change, somebody in office is calling for more than thoughts and prayers. In Toano & Norge, James City County, we have two gun shops within less than quarter-mile walk from our elementary schools.
10
I don’t think tougher sentences including the death penalty are of much deterrent to mass shooters who seem to accept they will go down in a hail of bullets, or turn their gun on themselves.
Pro action is necessary, not reaction to this all American pastime of violence.
2
Gun violence! Over and over and over, year after year after year. The Trump GOP can’t get into gun control or the mental health epidemic.
They have no problem trying to control women’s bodies, abortions and access to birth control and medical care at clinics that do women’s health and more than abortions. Stop the gun craziness d get off of woman’s rights to their own body. What kind of mom isn’t against the lack of gun policy. And what about your mom and sister body!!!
Get your priorities corrected. Women will vote against your authoritarian decisions.
13
Yes! Exactly. Less guns and protect women’s rights to their own bodies.
4
@Sonya
Men shoot people and legislators approve. They are owned by the NRA.
Legislators (mostly male) are against abortions though since they believe life is more precious before birth. They are owned by Evangelicals and religious right.
1
The only way to control guns, the respective laws, the violence is to use the power of your vote.
Vote those out who are NRA_sycophants getting money for their silence and propaganda.
Vote.
There is no other alternative but to stop people like Mr Cox, who has the audacity to say those words when so many families sit in funerals and mourning this week.
16
Trust the Republicans to call the demand for action suspicious and hasty! Far from being hasty it has taken decades too long to pass reasonable gun control laws. GOP thoughts and prayers are worthless hypocrisies.
7
End the national prohibition against govt funding into the study of gun violence. Let the ensuing data lead policy.
End the prohibition on adequately creating and computerizing ATF's gun "data systems" and the banning of a national gun registry.
Not to go all 'Minority Report,' but if AI can identify skin cancers better than experienced dermatologists, imagine what might emerge from the black box after crunching massive amounts of data regarding every shooting in America.
National buy back programs.
Incidentally didn't the media initially report that the Va Beach shooter had had violent run ins with his co-workers? I'm sure I read that; it seems more thoroughly scrubbed than accounts of Tiananmen Square protests in China.
12
@Aristotle. FEDERALLY funded, but you knew that.
You are up to about 11 posts on this single thread.
Getting paid per post?
4
Wrong. The CDC is specifically denied federal funding into research under the false assumption that research is facto gun control.
Maybe post better, less often. With some 15 posts here and a obviously fake screen name (that I've never seen until now), you give every appearance of being a paid shill.
6
I totally agree with universal background checks and a requirement that people report lost or stolen firearms.
But more importantly:
The ability to remove guns from people deemed a serious risk; a ban on so-called assault weapons, including sound suppressors and bump stocks; and reinstating a law, repealed in 2012, that would limit handgun purchases to one a month.
If the governors of America want to protect their citizens, they too will call special sessions to forward these common-sense protections.
41
Here is an idea that won't sit well with either political party, but may with the people. Instead of more gun laws (we have plenty) maybe we need more people laws. Instead of just the suspect/s being prosecuted, if they survive, punish the family as well. This way the family will take a more vested interest in what their family member is doing. For example, a person of means could have their family paying restitution for 2 or 3 generations. A person of less means could find themselves and their remaining family members homeless with no future housing for free opportunities ever.
Criminals will always find a means, but we are past the time of asking for family involvement
3
@JohnMichael Punish those who don't do the crime because they happen to be related? No, that is barbaric, unnecessary, and in the end unhelpful. More restrictive gun laws do work, look at other countries.
5
@JohnMichael
No.
That's Old Testament thinking.
4
See the movie We Need to Talk About Kevin. Would you punish the mother in that case?
Sadly, I've become so numb to hearing about mass murder in our country that I didn't even bother to read last week's news stories about the Virginia Beach shooting. "Virignia Beach Shooting Leads Governor to Call Special Session on Gun Violence" was a novel enough news story to attract my attention. Let's hope there is real action resulting from the governor's plan. It is quite frankly criminal that we don't have universal background checks for purchasing guns and ammo -- which would create no obstacle for law-abiding gun owners.
18
After almost 150 mass shootings in the US, I'm SO tired of the hand-wringing and good-intentions of people who want sensible gun regulation and the reflexive push back by the second amendment absolutists. I fear that there isn't a mass shooting shocking enough to finally spur action. I mourn the lives needlessly lost to gun violence.
I can only pray and encourage all of us to help to organize a response that will eventually give us the balance that we need in our gun laws. The lives of so many of our fellow Americans depend on these changes happening sooner rather than later.
8
How many times does a mass shooting need to happen in Virginia before something changes, at the very least on a statewide level? Apparently the massacre of 32 students at Virginia Tech in 2007 was not enough. Does the murder of 12 more people bring the tally high enough? It is way past time for something to be done. Clearly it needs to happen at national level but unfortunately it has been proven time and time again that there is no motivation for change...so it must come from the state governments.
24
The second amendment needs major revising, that’s for sure—and all of these sub laws at the state level are circumnavigating it. That’s not a good thing! Instead of making laws at the state level the individual states should do their job and demand that the second amendment be revised! It’s such a tragedy when these mass shootings take place but at least 50 people are dying due to guns every single day in America! Most of them are due to pistols! The true number one killer.
10
The shooter was a law abiding citizen until he started shooting people. So the argument by Mr Cox holds no water. And not holding a vote to curb gun violence because the governor may or may not have dressed in black face is pure nonsense Seriously Mr Cox how can you say these things and live with yourself?
26
@Leslie Parker By your logic there should be no laws. Why create laws against murder? People will still murder.
5
@Leslie Parker
How Mr. Cox lives with himself? He cries all the way to the bank.
1
I've got an idea.
Perhaps other governors should simply *pretend* that they just had a mass shooting, and then call a special session too.
5
Go for it, Governor Northam! As a proud Virginian, I would be delighted to see our state lead the way in passing some common sense gun laws.
I'm fed up with politicians (virtually always Republicans) who feign concern and mouth insincere "thoughts and prayers" about the latest victims of gun violence.
I'd like to see Speaker Kirk Cox meet with the victims' families and tell them that it's too soon to consider sensible gun control regulations. Now is the time for Cox and his Republican colleagues to listen to the 91 percent of Virginia voters who support universal background checks. But I suspect they are more concerned about keeping those NRA dollars flowing than what the people of Virginia want.
The time for mealy-mouthed excuses and stalling is over. Let's have that special legislative session and see how every politician votes. And then we'll have our chance to vote on them in November!
34
We all want safe communities.
Leaders should read the RAND, FBI, and Secret Service studies.
There are no "assault rifles." We've has semi-automatic rifles/shotguns/pistols since the 1940s.
The test of any intervention is to go back and apply the proposed changes to historical events. None of the proposed changes would have prevented the VA Beach shooting.
Focusing on the popular attack method of the day is risky because the disaffected seek infamy, study target defenses, and look for soft high PR value targets.
We've all read about attacks with fire, knives, shotguns, pistols, vehicles, etc. Meanwhile smoking causes 480,000 deaths per year. Or 30,000 deaths/year could be prevented with first aid training. Apparently we only value human life when it makes headlines or is convenient.
All guns sold in a store require a background check today. All guns have serial numbers. The problem is that in many cases the violent event is the person's first illegal act.
If they pass all these laws, and they have no effect, what do we do next??
While we discuss these political grandstanding measures ad nauseam, we should continue & improve police & EMT training. Offer free first aid training at all fire stations (students pay for supplies). The federal government needs to invest in automated emergency management tools (better than the French one).
Hug your loved ones.
3
@CW "If they pass all these laws, and they have no effect, what do we do next??" You do something else. It's really not hard.
The gun fetishistas have been making this argument for years while simultaneously working to suppress any meaningful data collection or long term study of the problem. Even forbidding such activity by the CDC. (Because knowledge is harmful to their arguments I suspect...)
The irrefutable reality here is that we are the only "first world" country flooded with guns and we are the only such country that regularly experiences massacres. The only such country that sees tens of thousands of dead annually as a worthwhile price for Rambo fantasies of resisting government apc's with ar15's and Death Wish fantasies of justice in daily life. As though bullets magically seek out only bad people...
Those who value their guns more then peoples lives can point their finger everywhere they can think of and raise as thick a dust could as they like. The rest of us can still see what is right in front of us. Hopefully, eventually, we will act.
2
@CW
"There are no "assault rifles." We've has semi-automatic rifles/shotguns/pistols since the 1940s."
So there's no difference in the design of a semi-automatic 20-gauge shotgun designed to kill doves (with a three shell limit), and an AR-15 with NATO spec ammunition designed to kill/maim enemy soldiers? really?
1
Want to stop the gun violence? Then adopt gun control like the kind they have in New Zealand, Australia. and the First World Countries of Europe:
1. Ban automatics, semi-automatics & conversion kits.
2. Ban high capacity (more than 10 shot) magazines.
3. Ban the sale of cop-killer ammunition.
4. Mandatory prison terms for gunsmiths & others converting weapons to auto fire.
5. Insurance for guns owned, as for swimming pools.
6. Ban body armor, except for law enforcement.
7. Close gun show, private sales & other loosely regulated trading venues “loopholes”.
8. Grandfather existing weapons, but require to remain on owner’s premises at all times.
9. Internet notice of persons owning grandfathered banned weapons, as per child predator safety notification.
10. Annual recertification of gun owners with inventory.
11. Sale of ammo only to people with national certification.
12. All weapons to be stored under lock & key in approved gun safes.
After the massacres at Columbine, Tucson, Sandy Hook, San Bernardino, Colorado Springs, Pulse Nightclub shooting, Las Vegas, Parkland, Sutherland Springs and Virginia Beach, our US Congress has done nothing.
Absolutely nothing!
Isn’t it time?
133
@Joe Miksis Thank goodness for the Bill of Rights and the Supreme Court that Americans still have their right to self-defense.
2
@ Joe Miksis\
Appreciate your post, Joe. Thank you.
This term, the House easily passed a bill expanding background checks for all firearm sales (first significant gun legislation in 20 years). Predictably, it's stalled in the Senate.
We need measures on your list. We also need a Dem. Senate and president. Then, we need a law ending gun manufacturers' legal immunity.
8
@JDK -- What a fallacy, but it's all you've got for an argument. More Americans are going to die, not fewer, because of you.
5
This is a Republican Governor who will do nothing . Look at Trump they are getting kick backs from the NRA. They need to step aside and the Dems will stop the bullet sales to the public and make us safer.
@D.j.j.k. The Governor is a Democrat. The VA House of Delegates is controlled by a slim majority of Republicans.
1
@D.j.j.k. Just a little correction. Governor Ralph Northam is a Democrat, not a Republican.
Anyone who claims to be a law-abiding gun owner should be 100% in favor of background checks, significant training, insurance liability, and other sensible measures to control gun ownership and use (just as we control car ownership and use... and cars have actual useful purposes, whereas firearms are designed only to kill). If they are so law-abiding, these measures will not affect them in the least. It is only if they are NOT to be trusted that they would have a reason to be against such measures.
25
Would you also subscribe to the mentality that would allow a police officer to search your home, car or person without a warrant at anytime, and defer to that abuse of authority simply because you have “nothing to hide”?
1
You mean, we already have background checks for guns not sold at a gun show.
But for gun show sales, we don't.
1
@KristenB
We already have background checks. The VA shooter passed his background check. The most recent attempt at "Universal" background checks would not have changed the shooter's ability to get a gun. Most of the recent shooters bought their guns with a successful background check. We already have background checks.
6
The ignorance and stupidity of those who wish to ban guns and/or pass laws which restrict the ability of law abiding citizens to own guns. Criminals have guns and will always find a way to obtain them. Work on preventing criminals, people with anger issues, domestic abuse issues and mental health issues from having guns. Go to a real back ground check and a 14 day waiting period for all gun purchases. Death penalty for anyone committing a crime with a gun. This would be a better approach.
6
@Critical Thinker So if a single father who’s been out of work for a year and can’t find a job no matter how hard he tries gets desperate and points an empty .45 at a grocery clerk, demanding all the cash in the register, so he can manage to buy one more asthma inhaler for his kid, the state gets to murder him.
But background checks are a bridge too far.
Got it.
5
@Critical Thinker Criminals break laws, by definition. They break laws against theft. They break laws against speeding. They break laws against murder. Criminals break laws, and using that fact as an argument against passing more stringent gun-control laws is perhaps the stupidest possible argument a person could make.
5
@Critical Thinker Please let us know any time in the history of The United States of America that anyone has ever proposed a ban on guns. This idea is a myth created by the NRA. It is a well established scientific fact that the death penalty has never been a deterrent to any crime and that it is many more times expensive to prosecute one of these cases than to pay to keep someone in prison for life making such a law fiscally irresponsible.
Your suggestion that "people with anger issues, domestic abuse issues and mental health issues from having guns. Go to a real back ground check and a 14 day waiting period for all gun purchases. "restrict(s) the ability of law abiding citizens to own guns because it is not illegal/or a criminal act to have anger or mental health issues. In order to reduce deaths and serious injuries in this country we should eliminate the right to bear arms for the Constitution and model our gun laws on those of the EU and Australia. In the meantime you should book a hunting trip to France, Germany, Italy, Norway, Sweden, or any of the EU countries that have sensible gun laws because they all allow us to bring our guns there. Of course most hunting guides can provide you with gun appropriate for whatever game you want to hunt and if you like it you can purchase one from one of the many gun shops in any of those countries.
4
VA should control criminals not legal guns owners.
4
I'm a proud Virginia gun owner, and I like to shoot. Still, I strongly support gun education and legislation that limits access to people who are sane, responsible and traceable. Guns themselves should be traceable. They are more dangerous than cars, and reasonable registration of guns and licensing of the people who use them is appropriate. Conceal carry in Virginia requires a course and a test, and many gun ranges require the license to shoot borrowed weapons. These are not unreasonable burdens.
166
@Aristotle Gluteus Maximus
Law enforcement is currently prohibited from establishing a database on gun identification numbers. They do it all by hand.
You absolutely can trace a gun. The same way I can trace an IP address. The point is gun advocates are making the process unreasonably hard.
You should ask yourself how many government employees it took to turn that information around in one day. Unless the gunman volunteered detailed information, we just wasted a lot of tax payer dollars to figure out something that should be automatic.
We shouldn't even need to ask where someone bought a gun. That's the point I think @Heathrock is trying to make.
11
@Heathrock
These are not even de minimus for what gun control looks like. People can't be allowed to freely buy weapons, are you kidding?
@Andy
How would instantly knowing were the shooter legally bought his gun have stopped this shooting?
I am a Virginian and a federal worker. I can’t help but feel more vulnerable after the latest shooting in VA beach where a very normal human being with no red flags in mental health history, criminal background, not even adversary job performances so easily committed mass murder with legally purchased weapons. It is scary to think that no public space can be safe. In times when human lives are slaughtered on a regular basis, I am angry that any elected official should utter that any gun safety measure is “too hasty”. Here I applaud the governor’s timely action. In addition, this November’s state wide election holds vital importance. Concerned citizens let us go out and vote for common-sense gun safety laws. Demand our elected officials to put human lives above politics and their selfish desires at winning re-elections.
151
@Aristotle Gluteus Maximus What news have you been watching or reading? His name, DeWayne Craddock age 40, legally purchased 2 guns with multiple extended ammunition magazines and a suppressor. Coworkers interviewed say no red flags. No problems that he displayed at work. Lots of info out there. Public officials are choosing not to say the shooter's name in public wanting to rob him of notoriety.
Red flags or not, people should not have to fear for their lives when they go to work, school, church, a concert, the post office, a movie, a night club. Missed any scenes of recent mass shootings? Enough is enough.
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@Claire
There are many reports that he had been having fights with co-workers.
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@Aristotle Gluteus Maximus The shooters name is being censored in order to reduce the likelihood of copycat attacks. When an event like this happens, the chance of another event like this happening in the following 30 days goes up. Look it up. It’s called the copycat effect.
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We will continue to have these massacres until the bar to gun ownership is much, much higher, on the level of how Japan regulates guns. But in a nation where guns are a fetish, where the NRA wields such power, and where Congress is ineffectual, that ain't going to happen. So get used to it folks, and hope lightning doesn't strike you or a loved one. We can nibble around the edges a bit, that will save a few lives, but most shootings will continue. I'm sorry, kids, that my generation left you this mess.
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Japan has no second amendment which is why their government can effective limit firearms ownership. We drafted their post war constitution for them.
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It's beyond the pale that even the morning after a bloodbath in their own backyard, Republicans can't muster the courage to support common sense gun laws.
Offering tougher consequences to the mass murderer is a little late to the party, isn't it?
Texas has the toughest consequences, including the toughest death penalty rules. Even death isn't enough to lower their horrific statistics.
Republicans are now certifiably insane and complicit - they've become the case study of insanity - doing the same thing over & over hoping for a different ending.
Nothing short of a Blue Wave throughout local and federal elections in 2020 can change this. Getting these Republicans out of office is the best way to succeed in bringing in common sense gun laws.
The NRA is at a flashpoint, potentially teetering - and certainly weaker than they've been in a long time.
Now is the time to demand this of our politicians. Silence and taking away silencers is not the solution.
#EnoughIsEnough
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@Barbara Franklin Blaming the NRA or Republicans is looking in the wrong mirror. Had we not gone through the last sixty years of progressives/democrats/liberals diluting the justice system many of these issues would be of little concern.
If we could return to a system where criminals are not coddled, a system where the guilty were convicted and executed within a three year period, end the nonsense of thirty years of appeals paid for by working people, stop protecting the guilty at the expense of the victims, then crime and deaths would reverse course.
Today's system of justice is a failure. Too many victims must watch as the guilty walk free while their loved one lies in a grave. Too many victims fear conviction of the guilty as the guilty can harm them without consequence. Too many states now have simple revolving doors on the prisons where incarceration, if it occurs, is short lived and the criminals are back on the street in less than a year.
We must incarcerate, we must execute, we must demand permanent punitive responses for criminal activity. And prisons must not be a pleasant place to stay. No heat, no air conditioning, no mattress, nothing to drink but water, no television, no radio, just four walls and chain gangs.
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@Barbara Franklin
We already have common sense gun laws. New laws won't change the motivations of the killers. But we don't know the motivations of this most recent killer because the Virginia officials are censoring the facts.
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Sadly nothing is likely to come of this, though both measures make sense. Whether it would have prevented this massacre is debatable, but one of the ironies of gun control is that conservatives who support gun rights are also the same people who talk about personal responsibility and accountability, yet they fight the common sense law that gun owners if a gun is lost or stolen has to be reported. The reason for this is simple, conservatives don't want gun sales tracked because a lot of good ole boys make a lot of money buying guns then selling them either to the black market or as a private purchase and face no consequences if they sell to a criminal, such a law would 'restrict their ability to do business'. It won't stop law abiding people from owning guns, but it certainly would dry up sources of supply for the black market, something like 65% of the guns pulled off the streets of NYC and DC were bough legally in a small handful of states that allow you to buy guns but have zero accountability for selling them to criminals.
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I like your analysis. All the other commenters (getting plenty of “likes“), seem to miss this point of the black market underground gun sales/criminal black market.
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"Holding criminals accountable with tougher sentences" doesn't do anything is the criminal in question dies after shooting a bunch of people. What are you gonna do to a mass shooter that hasn't survived the event?
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It's demoralizing to hear the utterly predictable, stuck-record response of the Republican VA Speaker of the House: any request for action after yet another mass murder by firearm can only be "hasty and suspect". How cowardly, and how can these people even look at themselves in the mirror. Compare and contrast with the response to the New Zealand massacre by their PM-with-a-spine, Jacinda Ardern.
The sole optimistic note rests in the last paragraph: "All seats in the Virginia legislature are on the ballot in November. Republicans hold slim majorities in both houses."
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He has failed on other issues, but if he succeeds here, he may become an example to follow.
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I have a prediction regarding any sort of firearm measures: absolutely nothing is going to change. Remember, human carnage is simply the "price we pay for freedom!"
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@mrfreeze6 When 26 children, practically babies, can be gunned down and it's not enough to take national action, the die has been cast. All life is sacred we are told, until it comes to gun violence. The hypocrisy is head spinning.
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A modest proposal: whenever a lawmaker speaks out against gun control measures, s/he should disclose whether they receive money from the gun lobby. This would serve to inform the public about potential conflicts of interest. In the absence of such disclosure by the law maker, the media should disclose that fact when quoting these people.
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@Jay Fox
But we already know the answer to this question.
Uh, wait a minute, neither of these:
"The governor listed a number of measures he intended to propose, including universal background checks and a requirement that people report lost or stolen firearms."
Would have prevented this:
"Citing the shooting in Virginia Beach in which 12 people were killed..."
So...
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So... nothing. But those measures will prevent many future deaths. That's the only thing that matters.
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Here is a measure the governor can add. Outlaw insurance coverage for loss or stolen firearms.
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Thank you so much to the law enforcement and press who have finally decided that mass murderers are not worthy of having their names repeated to glorify the infamy of atrocity and destroying lives and families.
Please reinstate the semiautomatic weapons ban that expired at the federal level in 2006. Somehow, tyranny didn’t arise from keeping military weaponry out of civilian, virtually any civilian, hands.
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“Mr. Cox said that at a special session, Republican lawmakers would address gun violence ‘by holding criminals accountable with tougher sentences — including mandatory minimums,’ rather than “infringing on the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizen”.
If I’m not mistaken, up until the murderous rampage, the shooter too was a ”law-abiding citizen.”
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The idea Bernard, is to put more impediments to gun ownership and have the owners of guns have to go through more of A filter ration process… Although it is well known that yeah, the criminals will always get their guns.
Meanwhile we worry about 800 measles cases. The priorities in public health are not in order. Gun Violence is and has bar far been a public health issue for 5 years now.
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@Calleendeoliveira Definitely a public health issue, but laws prevent researching it and treating it as such. Thanks, NRA.
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