Okay, now instead of ridiculing every possible manner of restricting certain weapons, how about putting forth, some thoughtful and decent restrictions on guns. Never would we allow a company producing cars, baby cribs, stoves, insulation, refrigerators, farm equipment to get away with turning out a product that had the possibility of wounding and killing so many citizens, BUT......every single suggestion is argued and beaten down. What is the matter with you people, you can/t really be that so suicidal and fearful of giving up what I see as a souse or comfort blanket.
Such blind terror of being helpless without a gun is ludicrous.
I do NOT advocate taking away your hunting rifles, or target pistols. However, those rifles and weapons that are capable of killing a small army with one or two firings, should NEVER be lost track of and the company or agency that is responsible for such a breach, must be held responsible for the damage that occurs.
Posted this in another thread. Guess you missed it.
I live in the state of Maryland, one of the most restrictive states in the U.S. As it happens, I just bought a hangun. In order to do so. . .
1. I had to give (and pay for) my fingerprints and identity information to the state police, who ran a background check, and thirty days later issued me a "Handgun Qualification License" (HQL) without which I cannot legally buy a handgun in Maryland (or anywhere else. In the U.S. you can only legally buy a handgun in the state in which you reside).
2. I went on Gunbroker.com and ordered the gun from a gun shop in Oklahoma.
3. I had to give the Oklahoma gun shop the contact information for my local gun shop, because handguns (and most other guns) can only be transferred from a Federal Firearms Licensee to another FFL.
4. Yesterday evening I went to my gun shop and filled out five (5) different forms, mostly containing the same information I submitted to get my HQL, for the Federal and Maryland governments.
5. Now I wait.
6. After eight days, I can go pick up my gun.
7. I cannot get a concealed weapons permit in Maryland (they're very tightly restricted). I have non-resident permits from Utah and Florida (more fingerprints and background checks), which allow me to carry concealed in 35 states. Maryland is not one of them.
Most states are not as restrictive as Maryland, but a few are (Massachusetts, New Jersey, for example).
In the alternative I could have gone to DC or Baltimore with two or three hundred bucks in my hand and acquired a gun in a half hour. BUT. . .
If I was caught possessing that gun, I'd only be talking to you good folks during computer time at Jessup (our local prison). That's possessing AT ALL, not carrying. Carrying has additional penalties.
Sooooo. . . Maryland's laws ensure that only "honest" citizens can acquire guns legally. While this, of course, has no effect at all on career violent criminals, it does do some good in cutting down on the number of people who hurt or kill others in a fit of rage or drunkenness or craziness, who were OK (or at least not on the criminal justice radar) before said fit.
All in all, I'm pretty happy with Maryland's laws. My two major objections are some of the guns they ban for what appear to be arbitrary reasons, and the fact that having proven my lawabidingness, I still can't carry a concealed gun for my own protection.
Will "gun control" stop all gun violence? No, of course not. Countries that have extremely strict gun control (e.g., Japan and Germany, in both of which I have lived) still have gun violence. It's just a tiny fraction of the U.S.'s gun violence For me, the real questions are:
1. Will a proposed "gun control" measure actually do anything useful to control the number of guns or the people who have them?
2. How does the proposed "gun control" measure weigh against our freedoms and rights to self defense, hunting, target shooting, &c.?
