How do we keep...

[Bullseye]

If you're talking about tough criminal laws and an end to revolving-door parole policies, I'm up for that. My major take on the thing is that semi-auto rifles are serious weapons - owning them is serious business. There's a responsibility there. When I was in the Army and I went and signed out my rifle, that was a serious thing. If I didn't come back with that same rifle, then I was up the creek without a paddle. I was responsible for it.

I'm not saying civilian life is or should be like serving in the Army....but what I am saying is that there should be more gravity to going out and getting yourself an AR-15 then there is to buying a hotdog. It ought to be a solemn responsibility that ought to be assumed by serious people. People who are willing to put up with the headaches and the paperwork and the regulations that come with it.

I could buy enough hot dogs to feed everyone at the World Series game Tuesday in the time it takes you to buy an AR-15; at least in my state, California, and many others. They don't have them in the freezer at 7-11. Here in CA we also require a ten day waiting period, require FFA background checks at gun shows - with minor exceptions, and safety certificate. Most states require some or all of those requirements.

The problem is failure of the background check system. Garbage in, Garbage out. The Parkland shooter should have been in their dozens of times. Same with Aurora, West VA tech, etc.

 

[Cordelier]

We have had a nationwide ban on many recreational 'street drugs' for decades and all that does is make crime more profitable because 'mere possession' is no longer considered a problem. I don't have official stats but my gut feeling is that most of our crime is related to buying (securing funds without working for them) and selling drugs - the most popular solution now seems to be to decriminalize 'drug crime' until (unless?) it becomes super violent (or super profitable). I can't see any logic in making illegal gun possession (the non-violent offense of not having a gun 'properly registered') into some crime that is more serious than illegal drug (street poison) possession.

The way I figure it, Congress may have the power to pass the laws to organize and discipline the militia, but the Constitution reserves to the States the power to appoint it's officers and conduct training. I'd let the States handle the actual registration of firearms. They're really the only ones who'd need to know who was in the militia or not. The day-to-day stuff would all be done locally. I don't see there being any "National Registry"... but I do see there being Statewide registries. All you do is register your firearm with your local State-appointed officer. When you change your residence, your militia membership changes with you. How active your local militia is would depend of how active your local State-appointed officer is - he/she could conduct optional safety/training sessions, target practice, you name it. If the military wanted to get rid of some surplus ammo, they could consign it to the State militia for target practice some weekend. I'd want to get gun owners more involved on a local basis - make it an inclusive, community-based thing.

I'm not trying to focus on the criminal side of it... sure, there will be people outside of the system, just like there are people who have firearms with the serial number filed off. Those people aren't what this is about... it's about making communities safer. Local law enforcement is safer when they know what weapons they are potentially dealing with on that next domestic they respond to. Civilians are safer when they can learn the proper techniques for using and storing their guns. Communities are safer when the local militia members know one another and live and work and socialize together. And the public at large is safer with a greater awareness of the importance of responsible firearms ownership.

 

[Lursa]

That's exactly my point, Lursa... in an active shooter incident, it's pretty much only ever going to be the shooter that has a semi-auto rifle. Everyone else is going to be surprised and outgunned. I imagine most people's initial reaction will be to freeze wherever they are. Even the act of running for cover takes some situational awareness.

So what's your point? A person with a handgun...much more common...can defend themselves. And if there are many people around...they have a chance to do so...which it sounds like you would like to take away.

A gun isnt magic, not a handgun, not an AR. The element of surprise is always an advantage, that's why predators plan :roll: And guns dont save cops or soldiers from ambushes either. But if you are not the first person or 2 targeted, then you have a fighting chance of saving yourself. Again...IMO people like you should not be working on removing that chance for others.

 

[TurtleDude]

So what's your point? A person with a handgun...much more common...can defend themselves. And if there are many people around...they have a chance to do so...which it sounds like you would like to take away.

A gun isnt magic, not a handgun, not an AR. The element of surprise is always an advantage, that's why predators plan :roll: And guns dont save cops or soldiers from ambushes either. But if you are not the first person or 2 targeted, then you have a fighting chance of saving yourself. Again...IMO people like you should not be working on removing that chance for others.

its all convoluted nonsense trying to hide the fact he wants to ban honest Americans from being able to own AR 15s.

 

[Cordelier]

Once you accept that the type (features?) of gun owned can be regulated then it's a simple matter to expand on that to make any gun fall under those 'reasonable restrictions'. Why are semi-auto handguns not (yet) included in your scheme of 'militia only' guns? - since they are, after all, used in far more crime than semi-auto rifles are.

This is true...according to the data from the FBI Active Shooter study a few years back, only about 20% of incidents involved a shooter with a semi-auto rifle. The problem with that, though, is that in those 20% of incidents, average casualty rates were 46% higher than the average for the other 80% of cases. If you eliminate the cases where the shooter wasn't a "hardened killer" (ie, 0 fatalities, <5 wounded - or about 4% of the 20%), the average casualty rates (for those 16% of all cases) were 78% higher. The combination of higher rate of fire, greater magazine capacity, higher muzzle velocity and accuracy of these weapons put them in a separate league where it comes to mass shootings.

 

[Cordelier]

So what's your point? A person with a handgun...much more common...can defend themselves. And if there are many people around...they have a chance to do so...which it sounds like you would like to take away.

A gun isnt magic, not a handgun, not an AR. The element of surprise is always an advantage, that's why predators plan :roll: And guns dont save cops or soldiers from ambushes either. But if you are not the first person or 2 targeted, then you have a fighting chance of saving yourself. Again...IMO people like you should not be working on removing that chance for others.

Lursa... I haven't said a word against handguns. I don't know where you're getting the impression I "want to take them away". My only problem is with unregulated ownership of semi-auto rifles.

 

[Lursa]

Lursa... I haven't said a word against handguns. I don't know where you're getting the impression I "want to take them away". My only problem is with unregulated ownership of semi-auto rifles.

Yeah and others here have pointed out that by the numbers, that's a) useless and b) not a major source of gun deaths.

 

[TurtleDude]

Yeah and others here have pointed out that by the numbers, that's a) useless and b) not a major source of gun deaths.

he already lost on Heller. the goal is to ban things that are rarely used in crime and then argue precedent and note if we can ban guns rarely used for crime, we can certainly ban the firearms most used to commit murder or robbery.

 

[Rucker61]

Lursa... I haven't said a word against handguns. I don't know where you're getting the impression I "want to take them away". My only problem is with unregulated ownership of semi-auto rifles.

Any ability of the government to restrict semi-auto rifles would allow the same restrictions for handguns. And pump action shotguns. There is nothing unique about a semiauto rifle.

 

[Rucker61]

This is true...according to the data from the FBI Active Shooter study a few years back, only about 20% of incidents involved a shooter with a semi-auto rifle. The problem with that, though, is that in those 20% of incidents, average casualty rates were 46% higher than the average for the other 80% of cases. If you eliminate the cases where the shooter wasn't a "hardened killer" (ie, 0 fatalities, <5 wounded - or about 4% of the 20%), the average casualty rates (for those 16% of all cases) were 78% higher. The combination of higher rate of fire, greater magazine capacity, higher muzzle velocity and accuracy of these weapons put them in a separate league where it comes to mass shootings.

Stop talking misleading percentages and use real numbers. According to Mother Jones, the majority of mass shootings using semi-auto rifles have six or fewer deaths. There have only been two mass shootings in the US with deaths greater than a shooter with a pair of handguns, one a .22, cause a Virginia Tech.

On average per year since 1994, there have been about 13 homicides per year resulting from a mass shooter using a semi-auto rifle. That's fewer homicides than with water as the weapon, and fewer deaths than the US has experienced from lightning strikes over the same period.

If you actually quantify the danger, it's off the charts low. If all semi-auto rifles magically disappeared overnight there would be no impact to the homicide rate and virtually no impact to the death toll of mass shootings.

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

We ban lots of cars. We also ban knives being brought into certain areas

Oh come on, which cars do we ban and please show me that we banned them for being used as a weapon.
The only cars that get banned are cars which (A) don't meet US manufacturing safety standards, (B) fail to meet pollution standards, (C) fail to meet adequate vehicle inspection standards or (E) fail registration requirements.

Cars do not get banned because someone might use them as a weapon.

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

When I was a kid the old NRA did it's best to make sure there were no "wrong" hands, they, and the men that had just returned from War 2 did their part to make responsible gun owners out of their children.

I remember the old NRA and that's why I used to be a member!
I also remember when the NRA underwent an enormous change, and that's when I cancelled my membership.
I am however looking into joining The Liberal Gun Club.

 

[Irwin Corey]

I remember the old NRA and that's why I used to be a member!
I also remember when the NRA underwent an enormous change, and that's when I cancelled my membership.
I am however looking into joining The Liberal Gun Club.

I didn't know there was a Liberal Gun Club; thanks!

 

[Cordelier]

Stop talking misleading percentages and use real numbers. According to Mother Jones, the majority of mass shootings using semi-auto rifles have six or fewer deaths. There have only been two mass shootings in the US with deaths greater than a shooter with a pair of handguns, one a .22, cause a Virginia Tech.

On average per year since 1994, there have been about 13 homicides per year resulting from a mass shooter using a semi-auto rifle. That's fewer homicides than with water as the weapon, and fewer deaths than the US has experienced from lightning strikes over the same period.

If you actually quantify the danger, it's off the charts low. If all semi-auto rifles magically disappeared overnight there would be no impact to the homicide rate and virtually no impact to the death toll of mass shootings.

There's nothing misleading about percentages, Rucker... the numbers speak for themselves - semi-auto rifles have a significantly higher casualty-inflicting capability than all other types of firearms. Now you may not like that fact, but it's a fact nonetheless. Virginia Tech was an outlier event... and even as an outlier, it was included in the 80% of cases where a semi-auto rifle was not used. It doesn't change the results.

Now you may write off casualty premium we pay as a result of semi-auto rifle active shooter incidents as trivial or insignificant, but I don't. To me, these are people who are being killed and wounded so that a bunch of fat old men can have the privilege of locking and loading and blasting away at paper targets and tin cans. It's ludicrous. That being said, I realize it's never going to be feasible to take all semi-auto rifles out of circulation... so my answer is this - instead of trying to ban them outright on the one hand or callously turning a blind eye to the Sandy Hooks and Stoneman Douglases that are bound to keep happening on the other... why don't we as a society try and come together and try to instill a little discipline and organization into the keeping and bearing of such arms? Why don't we recognize that with rights come responsibilities?

Right now, semi-autos are only used in about 20% of active shooter incidents. If we keep letting them proliferate unchecked, and if more and more of the public obtains them, what's to stop that number from rising to 50% or 70%? How many more people are going to die then? If Virginia Tech was a fluke outlier where it comes to handgun incidents, then what is the casualty count going to be for a similar semi-auto rifle outlier incident?

I'm not trying to be alarmist here... I'm just pointing out a fact. If we continue to turn a blind eye to a problem that just keeps getting worse and worse, eventually we're going to reach a tipping point where the demand by society to do something drastic to stem the tide is going to become irresistible. The way I see things now, we're all living in a neighborhood with a dangerous street corner... we all know that sooner or later some kid is going to get mowed down crossing the street there. It's inevitable. I'm just trying to put up the Stop sign before that happens...and from my perspective, you're that guy who objects because it'll impede the traffic flow in the neighborhood.

 

[TurtleDude]

There's nothing misleading about percentages, Rucker... the numbers speak for themselves - semi-auto rifles have a significantly higher casualty-inflicting capability than all other types of firearms. Now you may not like that fact, but it's a fact nonetheless. Virginia Tech was an outlier event... and even as an outlier, it was included in the 80% of cases where a semi-auto rifle was not used. It doesn't change the results.

Now you may write off casualty premium we pay as a result of semi-auto rifle active shooter incidents as trivial or insignificant, but I don't. To me, these are people who are being killed and wounded so that a bunch of fat old men can have the privilege of locking and loading and blasting away at paper targets and tin cans. It's ludicrous. That being said, I realize it's never going to be feasible to take all semi-auto rifles out of circulation... so my answer is this - instead of trying to ban them outright on the one hand or callously turning a blind eye to the Sandy Hooks and Stoneman Douglases that are bound to keep happening on the other... why don't we as a society try and come together and try to instill a little discipline and organization into the keeping and bearing of such arms? Why don't we recognize that with rights come responsibilities?

Right now, semi-autos are only used in about 20% of active shooter incidents. If we keep letting them proliferate unchecked, and if more and more of the public obtains them, what's to stop that number from rising to 50% or 70%? How many more people are going to die then? If Virginia Tech was a fluke outlier where it comes to handgun incidents, then what is the casualty count going to be for a similar semi-auto rifle outlier incident?

I'm not trying to be alarmist here... I'm just pointing out a fact. If we continue to turn a blind eye to a problem that just keeps getting worse and worse, eventually we're going to reach a tipping point where the demand by society to do something drastic to stem the tide is going to become irresistible. The way I see things now, we're all living in a neighborhood with a dangerous street corner... we all know that sooner or later some kid is going to get mowed down crossing the street there. It's inevitable. I'm just trying to put up the Stop sign before that happens...and from my perspective, you're that guy who objects because it'll impede the traffic flow in the neighborhood.

that's just idiotic and is not supported by statistics. and it shows you have a rather slim understanding of environmental factors.

 

[Rucker61]

There's nothing misleading about percentages, Rucker... the numbers speak for themselves - semi-auto rifles have a significantly higher casualty-inflicting capability than all other types of firearms. Now you may not like that fact, but it's a fact nonetheless. Virginia Tech was an outlier event... and even as an outlier, it was included in the 80% of cases where a semi-auto rifle was not used. It doesn't change the results.

Now you may write off casualty premium we pay as a result of semi-auto rifle active shooter incidents as trivial or insignificant, but I don't. To me, these are people who are being killed and wounded so that a bunch of fat old men can have the privilege of locking and loading and blasting away at paper targets and tin cans. It's ludicrous. That being said, I realize it's never going to be feasible to take all semi-auto rifles out of circulation... so my answer is this - instead of trying to ban them outright on the one hand or callously turning a blind eye to the Sandy Hooks and Stoneman Douglases that are bound to keep happening on the other... why don't we as a society try and come together and try to instill a little discipline and organization into the keeping and bearing of such arms? Why don't we recognize that with rights come responsibilities?

Right now, semi-autos are only used in about 20% of active shooter incidents. If we keep letting them proliferate unchecked, and if more and more of the public obtains them, what's to stop that number from rising to 50% or 70%? How many more people are going to die then? If Virginia Tech was a fluke outlier where it comes to handgun incidents, then what is the casualty count going to be for a similar semi-auto rifle outlier incident?

An average of 13 deaths per year. Water is used to kill over 40 people per year. Knives are used to kill 1500 people per year. Handguns are used to kill 8000 people per year.

Are semiauto rifles in common use for lawful purposes?