Toddler accidentally shoots woman dead in Idaho Walmart

by nicolaou 101 Replies latest social current

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  Simon

  You need a license and a test to get the 'right' to drive a car and you need to have insurance as well. Don't ban guns - have a system to license people who own them and make them pay insurance for doing so. Have basic checks that people are suitable to own then and haven't been barred from doing so for previous violations.

  No one's rights are violated.

  Nothing else that I know can take a elderly Lady and make her an exact equal to the most hardened gang banger

  An empty soundbite argument. How many criminals are stopped by little old ladies with weapons? In fact, how many gun shooting sprees are ever stopped by an armed bystander?

  
  
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  little_Socrates

  "An empty soundbite argument. How many criminals are stopped by little old ladies with weapons? In fact, how many gun shooting sprees are ever stopped by an armed bystander?"

  
  

  Not nearly enough if you ask me.   If a gun owner prevents something bad from happening  you never hear about, because nothing happened!   Stopping an armed gunman is a MUCH smaller news story than a gunman going on a shooting spree.  How many crimes are prevented that we never hear about?
  

  
  

  The problem is not with law abiding peaceful gun owners.   It is with lawless violent individuals.   The flaw with passing a law to solve this problem is that you overwhelmingly limit the law abiding persons rights while doing nothing to stop the law breaking.   They are already law breakers and passing more laws won't stop them.

  
  

  Would licensing laws have done anything to prevent this sad situation in Walmart?
  

  
  

  
  
• 

  FadeToBlack

  @little_Socrates: you never hear about it because it never happens! If it did, Fox News would be talking about it for weeks on end.But, I do agree with you that laws are not the answer. Something is fundamentally wrong with the culture.
  
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  Slidin Fast

  Lets all get behind the barricades and shoot each other.  Little old ladies on one side, gang bangers on the other. Just get rid of the gun culture.
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  adjusted knowledge

  Those who argue that all guns should be banned will never in their life time see it happen in the USA.  I know the adage of avoiding the word "never".  However, there are 100's and 100's of millions of guns in the hands of over a hundred million Americans.  Guns are very easy to purchase legally in this country.  You can walk into a Walmart that sales gun and walk out with a rifle that holds a 30 round clip (depending on location) capable of firing a .223 round as fast as you can pull a trigger.  You just have to fill out 4473 form and a background check.  Most locations only have to keep the 4473 for twenty years and after that records go bye bye.  Most are paper base and not kept in digital format.

  So how exactly do you plan on disarming millions of people? Keep in mind there is no national gun registry.
  

  A more realistic route is some of the suggestions Simon gave. 

  
  
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  cantleave

  I am so glad I don't live in the USA. The gun culture there terrifies me.
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  Slidin Fast

  I know the issue seems unsurmountable but a sea change is possible.  In the UK drink driving used to be seen as a sport for raffish lads who flouted the law with a wink.  Now it is seen as antisocial, it still happens of course but the norm is to view it with disgust.

   Speeding was similarly a sort of game between drivers and the police.  Now it is largely under control, public sentiment is just against blatant disregard of the law.  People just realise the damage it can do. 

  Smoking in public places was made illegal, the idea of pubs without the smoky atmosphere seemed unthinkable, now if someone lights up it would seem an outrage.

  Things can change if enough people will it, gun control, a tightening up of regulations can effect a public change of mood.  That is a very powerful thing.  It needs political courage to start the ball rolling.
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  adjusted knowledge

  Things can change if enough people will it, gun control, a tightening up of regulations can effect a public change of mood.  That is a very powerful thing.  It needs political courage to start the ball rolling.

  Those are all valid but guns are part of America's culture.  It will be very hard to change an entire countries culture.  Gun ownership transcends all types of groups.  Democrats, Republicans, all races, males, and females. ect. own guns in this country.  A mass shooting and killing of little children is not enough to even get real gun control laws to be pass on a national level, and people still think guns will be banned.
  

  Again, the only question I have is, "How are you going to disarm over 100 million Americans and remove around 310 million guns from this country?" 
  
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  Simon

  It is impossible to achieve 10% success for anything. We can't stop all speeding / dangerous / drunk driving but it doesn't mean we can't have sensible controls and try to enforce them.

  Why not focus on not making the situation worse rather than declaring it unachievable and thus not worth trying (the message the gun lobby likes to promote).

  It is sad though that even after classrooms full of kids are massacred there is still no political will to enact even basic changes to have background checks.
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  little_Socrates

  Simon can you point to ANY evidence suggesting gun control limits crime?    Show me some evidence of it working and you might win me over.

  
  

  (Also gun control has NOTHING to do with this case, there are no laws that anyone are suggesting that would have stopped it)