While a college student years ago, I worked at a manufacturing plant that built school buses in a rural Southern state. Come deer hunting season, the plant just shut down for two weeks .... might as well because nobody was going to come to work.

Two points.

What seems so obvious to some (banning of guns) is not at all obvious to those in a different environment and culture. Gun ownership is very much a part of our way of life. As my Dad used to say, "There are two things a man never loans out... his shotgun and his wife." That's how important guns are to us.

And second, there is a State's Rights issue here. The feds should not impose a law on us to solve a problem in Washington DC... a problem the rest of us don't have. Indeed, many would argue the feds do not have the authority to do so under our constitution. This is particularly offensive when the policy/law they would like to impose has been a total failure in addressing the problem where it has been imposed.

In DC, they are violating the right of citizens to be free of unreasonable search and seizure to enforce another unconstitutional initiative. And, neither initiative has had any measurable success in dealing with their problem.... in fact, it seems to just be getting worse.

May I kindly remind you of your own history and your own bill of rights. England's had the right to bear arms since about the 12th century, and it was because all people made up the King's army. After the Glorious Revolution in the 1680's England's bill of rights clearly stated and made it an official right for citizens to bear arms. This is because the King took away the protestants weapons (gun control) then oppressed and persecuted them and they had no way to defend them self. Hitler did the same exact thing right before he persecuted the Jews.

I've also read that since the gun ban in England robbery by sword has shot up over 100%. I also hear only criminals have guns so law enforcement is less likely to be effective against hardened criminals. So, I highly doubt that gun ban has had any real effect against your crime rates.

Robbery by sword? From two to four instances per year...?

Surely it must be difficult -- not to mention risky -- to try to carry a sword inconspicuously in your Levis! ;)

(Or are you placing no lower size limit on the category "sword"?)

No, by samurai swords...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/e...re/6241363.stm

I only read what happens in the media and I don't live in England, but from what I am reading their gun ban had nil effect on their crime rates and violent crimes. You would have to ask someone from there though to get the best answer because my sources are all from the media, and we all know how any media outlet and exaggerate for a better story.

If Toronto and Vancouver in Canada are relevant to Washington DC's problem (with which I'm not familiar), then a large proportion all of the guns involved in robberies and drive-by street shootings are smuggled, unlicensed handguns obtained by and used in drug dealer's turf wars and by inner city gang members -- in other words, gun laws have almost nothing to do with their purchase or intended use. Toronto's mayor screams for gun control laws, but such laws have been tried and shown to be woefully inadequate in preventing gun crimes or shooting rampages in Canada. Obtaining an illegal hand gun is apparently no more difficult than obtaining the cache of drugs the gun owner wants to defend.

Gun crimes are predominantly an urban core problem and with the exception of target shooters and public security personnel there are really no reasons to own one. What bothers me is the perspective -- peanut butter allergies are relatively rare and yet whole school systems have no problem banning peanut butter from everyone's school lunch. Legitimate uses of guns in a city are also few and far between and yet banning them is an outrage.

If they sent a few kids to jail for smuggling a peanut butter and jelly sandwich into school, would that change your perspective?

I really don't disagree with you on the need for a gun past the fact that it is one more constitutional guarantee (I thought) that may be slipping away. I currently own eight firearms, but I haven't purchased one in 35 years. All but one of the eight were passed down or given to me as a gift.

Current US law, nationwide, requires an FBI background check (for felonies) before purchasing a firearm. However, this requirement is pretty much ignored when the exchange is between two individuals and the weapon is second hand.... as you pointed out. Just more bureaucracy that hasn't changed a thing.

And of course, a mandatory search to catch good citizens who chose to exercise their constitutional right really is scary. What do we give up next? How far can we let this go before we become a police state?

I am with fazstp on this one...

I know the Americans have guns deeply engrained in their culture... but the SOLE and ONLY purpose of a hand gun is to shoot and/or kill another human being. I just don't get it....

And in todays society there is no reason for ANYONE but the army or a small selection of farmers or hunters to have guns.... period.

I think its just another one of those industries like drugs, junk food, alcohol and gambling where a small amount of people make a lot of money from the misery of others..

tlarkin... gun crime is very very very low in the uk.... your average Brit wouldn't know which end of a gun the bullet came out of.. :) it tends to be the immigrant Nigerian drug gangs that Tony Blair let in that are having a field day in the UK.

Self defense, maybe?

http://www.claytoncramer.com/gundefe...g/blogger.html

OK, but your armed forces and your government sure knows how they work. I personally own 2 guns, shoot at the range, and do it for fun. I am not about arming a whole society, especially ours, however, I am all about our rights as a citizen. I can make many historical references thorough out time, through out many countries and cultures, and reference how once the government took away anyone's right to defend them self they got oppressed and persecuted on a major level.

I agree with you whole heartily when you say a hand gun is designed to kill. The sword is also designed to kill another man, you can not hunt with a sword. This was the philosophy of many ancient warriors and military cultures through out history. Just read any thing about the samurai and almost all sword masters admit the sword is an instrument only designed to kill another man. I do not use my hand gun to kill, I use it to shoot paper targets. I would also like to point out that I am also responsible, pay my taxes, don't break any laws, and have respect for almost all my common man, even though I do not share their political or religious views one bit. I still stand by the belief that they have every right I do. As well a right to their personal belief and opinions. I also stand by the belief that once they start to chip away at our personal rights it is wrong. You give them one inch they take a mile.

This is about our rights as citizens and the government has no way to take away any of our rights regardless of the right itself.

Maybe weapons are how humans feel secure with themselves, that they have the power to end another humans life, if they have to, and that makes them better then those who dont have weapons.....(im sure thats a quote from somewhere, its far too intelligent to come out of my head)

out of interest, you say you go to the range for fun, but what about if you played a game like call of duty, would that give you the same amount of pleasure?

And as far as rights go, dont you think the increased gun crime is a good enough reason to take guns away, whats more important at the end of the day? An innocent person's life, or the small amount of pleasure you get from using a gun at the range.

which brings us neatly back round to the beginning of the argument...



and Tom, I know how much having a gun means to most Americans, and us Europeans differ from you in that respect greatly.......
My only thought would be that ... it is one thing having the 'right' to defend your self... but its a different matter having the means to kill others made freely available to every American citizen....
Whilst 99% of Americans can, I hope, be trusted not to go on a killing spree... there have been to many 'Virginia Tech' type incidents to warrant such free and open access to weapon's who's sole design is to kill.

But hey, thats a European perceptive..

Acknowledging up front that I'm an old guy (retired 5 years ago), I still hark back to Canada's pre bill of rights motto: "Peace, Order, and Good Government". The focus of the times was on community rights at the expense, if necessary, of individual rights. As a graduate student at MIT 45 years ago, I often argued (over a few ales as students have forever) for the benefits of that community-based perspective in contrast with the American "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness" which in my view and that of several other of the foreign students in our Friday gatherings focussed too closely on the rights of individuals over those of their communities. Gun control is just such an issue: individual rights trump those of endangered communities.

Having said that, however, many of those young foreigners (including me) nonetheless remained in the USA long after we graduated because the "American Way" fuels initiative and opportunity like no other country can or does. It's the flip side of personal versus community rights. I stayed for nearly 20 years and two of my adult children still live in the USA, both prospering as they quite possibly never would have in Canada (although a third is doing quite well here). Teaching a Mechanical Engineering graduate class some years ago on product development and entrepreneurmanship (I was a founding member of two successful startups, and so is my son now), a student asked "If you were to start another company right now, what would be your first move"? My response: "To Boston". One of my students then took that advice and has just arrived back to open a branch of his company here and live here.

So why am I back here now? Why did that student come back? Because while Canada is a hard place (compared to the USA) to get started, most Canadians think that it is a better place to live and raise children. With the exception of the cores of large cities, it feels safer, it's economy is steadier and more predictable (if less prosperous), it has universal health care and more accessible higher education (and higher taxes, of course). Even though there is now a bill of rights, there is still a lingering sense of community and community welfare. A ban on hand guns in Toronto will probably go through because the community wants it. A strip mine near Digby, Nova Scotia, will not succeed because the local community objects.

My point, of course, is that the American Bill of Rights cuts two ways; it empowers individuals to do great things, and it penalizes community welfare by so doing. You can't have it both ways, alas.

You're kidding, right? Mostly gun ownership is just a phallic symbol.

This cuts to the core of the argument. There has always been a degree of friction surrounding the issue of majority rule vs. minority (and individual) rights. Apparently, the majority of DC residents (but we don't know that for sure... they didn't vote on it you know) want gun control. It is the exact opposite in the more rural US heartland. So, in my view states rights should prevail... except DC is undermining constitutional individual rights and that affects all of us and not just the right to bear arms. BTW, the DC law is touted by their legislators as a gun safety measure, not a gun related violent crime prevention law.

Seems to me that if I lived in or near a crime infested inter-city with a police department that cannot protect its citizens, I would want very much to have the opportunity to defend my home and family. I would also like to be free from unreasonable police searches ... with the purpose of the search being to make absolutely sure I cannot defend my home from violent, armed intruders. But then, that's just me.

Photek, you just described a whole lot of people in my state. Take out our two urban centers, and I suspect "farmers and hunters" would constitute a rather large majority of our citizens.

I have no problem with people owning guns. I think the real problem is responsibility, or the lack of it, in the US. The more rights you choose to exercise, the more you should be held accountable for the consequences, but that's just not how we do things here.

I think that if you sell or lose a gun then you should be held responsible for its misuse. If the gun is stolen, then it's your job to know about the theft and promptly report it. The government did it's job by requiring a background check on you when you bought it from the dealer, and when you sell it to some one else, you need to be held responsible for that decision.

They go a step further and ever seller of a gun, even private sellers are required to keep records of driver's license information and the gun purchased, and are suppose to submit it to law enforcement upon request. To help track down guns in crimes.

Now, here is the problem about gun control. It does not take guns out of the hands of criminals at all. Look at anything we have outlawed or banned, and we always EPIC Fail! So you then strip the defense from every law abiding citizen and possibly create more government from regulating it, make things like the ATF bigger.

I am sorry but a right is a right, and even though if I don't exercise it, it should not be taken away or stripped by the government.

The government came today and took away all our cats, but I said nothing because I did not have a cat.

The government came today and took away our ability to congregate in public, but I did not speak out because I do not do that.

The government came today and took away our books, but I do not read, so I said nothing.

The government came today and took away my internet and I thought it was an outrage, but there was no one to stand up for me, so I was forced to give it up.

We need to keep our rights, it is important.

“Sometimes a cigar is only a cigar.”

-- Sigmund Freud


How about a compromise:
DC can take the guns away from federal bureaucrats, as well as non-resident senators and congressmen*.

:cool:

NB. Those who voted against the Patriot Act exempted.
(Just kidding – no one exempt.)

Boston is working on instituting a similar voluntary search program, with mixed reaction. Some neighborhoods are strongly supportive. A high profile case of a child accidentally killed by another child with an illegal handgun adds to the emotional debate.

By coincidence, I came upon this post while thinking about how it sometimes seems that people who hold local control sacrosanct happily seek federal control when it suits them (abortion, school prayer, evolution, gun control, etc. are issues where this is continually argued).

I am not opposed to gun ownership, but I do support fairly strict regulation of it. I am uneasy about the vehemence with which sensible measures are opposed. Try to ban assault weapons or so-called "cop-killer" bullets and the NRA cries tyranny. Unfortunately, they also oppose measures (such as closing the "gun show loophole") that would help stem the flow of illegal guns.

I agree that prespective is lacking.

Also, by coincidence (and drifting off topic a tad), I have a child with a peanut allergy entering kindergarten this fall. It's more usual to have a peanut-free table in the cafeteria (a generally adequate solution, in my opinion), but you make an interesting point. Although I have, in exasperation, explained to people who can't grasp the severity of the situation that peanut butter is as deadly as a bullet to my daughter, on the whole, I have found the level of awareness of and support for protecting people (especially children) from allergens in general to be very high.

However, partially as a result of another divisive issue, illegal drugs and the resulting overwrought zero-tolerance drug policies in schools (just say no to aspirin :rolleyes:), I face an uphill battle with the school system in my efforts to ensure that my daughter's epi-pen is kept close enough to save her in the event of accidental exposure.

I thought what was at issue was a voluntary search to catch bad citizens who chose to violate the law. I don't know that the programs in Boston and D.C. - as they stand now - will withstand judicial review; I certainly see some problems with them - but I don't think they are a sign that we have become a police state.

Good one!

My sense is we're all coming from very different perspectives here, with gun owners pegged as some kind of ultra right wing militant cult or something. For those of you so adamantly opposed to guns, please take just 3 or 4 minutes to poke around this site -- http://www.agfc.com/ -- it's our state's Game and Fish Commission, a state agency. Hunting is big here and very much a way of life as well as a major tourist attraction.

Most attempts at increased gun control have nothing to do with hunting - unless you consider restrictions on assault weapons and armor piercing bullets to be an obstacle to hunting. Virtually all gun control advocates separate hunting (as much as possible) from the larger issue.

We (not that I took your point to be specifically directed toward me) may be coming from different perspectives, but that doesn't mean we are at opposite extremes. I think that could only be the case if I supported an absolute ban on firearms and you opposed any restrictions whatsoever on them.

I don't own a gun. I feel no need to own a gun. I believe that outside of law enforcement and the military, there is virtually no need for guns - although I do believe hunting (even though I was once shot at repeatedly by an idiot hunting out of season on private property) to be a legitimate if not entirely necessary, activity. Yet I support only certain restrictions, but not an outright ban, on gun ownership.

That doesn't mean that I believe gun ownership to be a sign of ultra right wing militancy; it doesn't mean it is logical to conclude that I believe gun ownership to be a sign of ultra right wing militancy; it certainly doesn't mean I should be considered an ultra-left wing socialist naively willing to give up my rights.