What if a person had to be 28 to buy a gun?

So many mass shootings are by young people.

so...I dunno!

argument that they are having over the drinking age limit - if you are old enough to vote and go to war for your country..blah blah blah.

The Luby's killing, Michael McDermott, James Huberty, and those are just the ones I can think of off the top of my head.

Asinine feel-good legislation that wouldn't do anything to address the underlying causes of such violence. Remember, the Columbine kids had no trouble finding a straw purchaser.

...there is a chance he'll come to his senses in the meantime, or that the person he approaches will go to the cops, etc.

Obviously, it didn't prevent the Columbine massacre. I'm not claiming it's a solution, just an improvement.

probably more workplace disruption, rather than school shooting.

I think we need to look at the general high-anxiety level in our society. I think of these damaged souls as kind of canaries on the coalmine. We all feel it; they're just the ones to be affected by it and act out on it. :-(

Just asking?

NT

a gun owner like he has to get a license to drive a car. I'm not against gun ownership personally. I am against unregulated gun ownership. Yet, the NRA has backed unregulated gun ownership with it's very powerful lobby ever since people started talking about gun control.

Now there are some nuts even here at DU who want to arm everyone with guns. Jeeze! That's worked out so well in the historical past. :sarcasm: Our western history is full of examples of this. Let me throw out a few place names and you can fill in the rest because it's part of our wild west mythology. There's Dodge City, Tombstone, Deadwood, gold rush days San Francisco.

Sure they make great stories, movies and TV series, but in real life it must have been dreadful to live in those places until law and order was established, which is how we got whatever gun regulation that we have today.

It would slow things down, which might give some people time to come to their senses.

But would you also try to setup criteria to stop mentally disturbed people from getting the license?

empirical informaiton and all those things legislators are supposed to do before they pass a law? Only then would it become a law when everyone is in agreement and compromises have been worked out. The way things are now, the gun lobby has acted like plug on any discourse other than their own narrow view.

Had yearly homicide rates of 0-1, zero more often than not. Tombstone was seen as one of the West's most violent towns, and I think its highest number of yearly homicides was six. The OK Corral shootout was the exception, not the rule. If that stuff was going on all the time, the shootout wouldn't have been so iconic.

percentages are high.

Plus, I don't think murderers have much concern for the law.

Just a hunch. :eyes:

...who want to carry something for self-defense?

If people walked around with tasers and mace all the time, you can be damned sure rates of violence would go up. Certainly having tasers on hand has encouraged cops to use them when they weren't really necessary.

tell you, most criminals are thieves and don't want to run into you, anymore than you want to run into them. I owned a business where I could keep a gun legally. I didn't. For one thing most of the time I was burglarized, not robbed. What I needed to do was increase my security like get a safe and make it harder for them to break in. The only real danger was hold up guys and quite honestly you don't want to have a gun battle with them you just let them take what they want.

Murders are usually crimes of passion, like the VT shootings, by someone who is either out for revenge or who is mentally unbalanced. It seems there were plenty of signs with this kid where stricter laws about getting mental health care would have been effective. Also, I would like to see administrators have the option to suspend kids like him until a psychiatrist has treated them and certified that they are able to return to the classroom.

There are many things you can do to protect yourself without needing a gun. This is why we have law enforcement. So it would be better for you to support your local law enforcement making sure they have the budgets they need to operate effectively. Now the only real reason I can see for protection is if you are out in the woods and a bear tries to break into your house. Then a shotgun could be useful.

...but didn't choose to.

I personally know several people in the Phoenix area who have been mugged, beaten or shot at, and the police were nowhere to be found.

Some of these people were on the phone with a dispatcher, giving them exact locations and descriptions and begging them to send someone, anyone to help them before they get killed.

Thankfully all of these people are still alive. But the cops can't be on the scene all the time, and especially here, they're more likely to be writing a ticket or busting a kid for pot than responding to a real crime.

I don't care if you don't want a gun, as long as you obey the law.

I just hope more people extend me the same courtesy and don't care if I do want a gun, as long as I obey the law.

(By the way, I don't own a gun or even want one)

without decent budgets and leadership. Most people don't care about what goes on in their police departments or the jails. Community involvement goes a long way, but please they are the ones that should be professionally trained with gun use and confronting criminals.

Instead there is emphasis on officers picking off motorists for income from the traffic tickets that the city managers and mayors need. This takes cops off the street from actually apprehending real criminals. If you actually take the trouble to go to a few city hall meetings to monitor how your community is being run.

and you can apply at 21. Make it cost about $7,000 and require the assistance of a lawyer.

If someone can get through 7 years of hoops, 7 years of $1,000 payments (no sense making it all due at once), and 7 years of lawyer fees, then they can have it.

That way everyone can excerise their "right", but it'll cut way way back on needless death.