Wow. You realize that you just advocated the assassination of public officials, right? (Not to mention myself - a gun control advocate). If I thought you were serious I would report you to the same authorities you appear to hate so vehemently, but as I actually believe you are a harmless internet troll fapping away while people respond to your hate rants with outrage, I will pass.

BTW, have fun with the FBI/Secret Service investigation you are so desperate to instigate. I know they'll have fun with you...

Why exactly? Thats the reason so many people are so upset about the failure to do anything. You have no reasons. I offered a number of reasons why I think more effective background checks are a good idea but you dont address any of them. You simply parrot the NRA line that it just "wont work". No reasons, just that background checks will somehow inconvenience people - which is bullshit for two reasons:

• 1. People already do such things for dozens of other less dangerous licences - car, boat, insurance, even a fucking hunting license takes time and a little money
• 2. A large majority of gun owners ARE IN FAVOR OF THESE REGULATIONS!!!!!

Then of course you pull out the old chestnut: some hypothetical future (democratically elected) official will suddenly become a fascist dictator hell bent on taking everyone's guns away for some reason. (Of course you could be one of the crazies that think Obama is the antichrist or something, in which case you should probably just stop reading and go polish your gun). There are again, two primary problems with this objection:

• 1. An AR-15 will not stop an M1-A1 tank. Not with depleted uranium bullets and a million round magazine. Never, ever, never. So get that out of your head. And if you think the "resistance" will be able to pull a General Washington on them and hide in the woods doing hit-and-runs, I have news for you - "they" are us. We are them. We/us/they are not going anywhere, no matter how many IUDs you place in the K-Mart parking lot. So how would a Vietcong "make it bloody and wait em out" strategy work exactly?
• 2. And even if the anti-christ did make an appearance, what makes you think your silly second amendment will protect you from the forces of darkness. The only reason we're even having this "discussion" is because there is respect for the rule of law - especially the constitution. If Darth Clinton came at you with a UN helmet and a laser, do you really think the black helicopters will give a flying fuck what it says about a well regulated militia?!? Really?

Please understand, I am in no way suggesting that the government should confiscate anyone's shotgun or even their licensed handgun. What I and most of the rest of the country is saying is, "let's be smart about who we let have a gun". Very simple. What exactly - and I mean lay it out for me in more detail than "nah, wont work" - is wrong with that?

Please, for the sake of everyone else who agrees with you and has similarly failed to do so, give us something that doesn't include "because freedom".

[Sorry for the dupe post, but I didnt want to post anonymously]

No. Its to filter out people who should not have guns in the first place. The conspiracy theory on this is that there will be some maniacal evil genius control freak somewhere (at the UN?) ready to command a secret army massing behind the moon to go door to door in Montana taking away everyone's shotguns. Utter gibberish. And of course there's the inevitable Nazi references, which I wont even waste the pixels addressing.

Exactly! And where do these guns come from exactly? They are not coming from some random gun theft in some random neighborhood. They are coming from organized groups of criminals who are operating in the dark corners of the gun show loopholes buying weapons and ammo in volume to resell on the black market. Again, background checks will not stop all gun violence. They will simply thwart the largest illicit operations from doing what they have done for decades: buy lots of guns in places where no one cares who they are or who they are associated with and re-sell them illegally in places where it's hard to get a gun. This is how ALL black markets work.

Why do I need to register my car? On average, most people do not engage in vehicular manslaughter. But when it does occur law enforcement has a way to track the car to a person. Now that person may not have been driving because the car was stolen, but at least they can ask that person what happened to the car. Did their brother-in-law borrow it? When/where was it reported stolen? Etc. Similarly, why do I need a passport to get across a border. On average most people are not trying to escape justice and remain anonymous. But by requiring everyone to have one, we are much more effective in maintaining security at the borders and track criminals as they travel. (You sound like a border-security type, so that should sound familiar).

There's Godwin's law [wikipedia.org] at work. You didn't actually call the US government Nazis, but you do realize where the term "jackboot" comes from...right?

Why? Because you have the only "correct" opinion? Sounds like a fascism to me. I am using well established non-partisan facts to make a case for sane gun regulations designed to allow law abiding people to continue buying guns for both recreational and self-defense purposes while filtering as many illicit purchases as possible.

You, on the other hand, are relying on misinformation disseminated by the lobbying organization for the largest weapons manufacturers in the world to make outrageous speculative claims about some mythological totalitarian state that exists only in the minds of people who go to great lengths to justify wearing a pistol into McDonalds.

Cant believe I have to address this, but I will. Kitchen supplies have a non-lethal, non-criminal, delicious purpose. You can use a rock to kill someone. That is what's known in the debating business as a "strawman". Look it up. I dont have the patience to put two wikipedia links into one post. No one - NO ONE - is suggesting that we regulate anything that can be used as a weapon. The proposal (which I believe just died in the Senate because of bullshit similar to your own) is to address a real, immediate and widespread problem that has been debated and discussed for decades. Who exactly has suggested that we regulate paring knives? Give me a name and I'll go kill them with a rock for you.

You miss the point of background checks. It is not to stop individual crimes. It is to make it harder - ON AVERAGE - for people with a history of violent and/or criminal behavior to acquire firearms. Think abusive spouses who don't like their ex's being with someone new. Or a stalker who wants to take their obsession to the next level. Or a thug with a record who wants to pick up the latest in thug technology. WIthout a federal background check, states that allow people to carry concealed weapons into bars and schools in the name of "freedom" would do nothing to stop such individuals from acquiring firearms.

The 20 children killed in the Newtown massacre (say that out loud if you are unsure of why people want action) are a drop in the bucket when it comes to gun violence. THOUSANDS have been killed by guns since then, and many of those crimes would almost certainly not have occurred if the US had two things: 1) effective and universal gun regulations, 2) a less fanatical obsession with violence as a solution to people's problems (think "War on ___" or how every "action" movie poster includes someone holding a weapon). I am not one to shy away from criticizing the entertainment industry for their pandering, and hope the increasing number of large-scale public tragedies involving guns will begin to turn the tide against this long-standing trend.

But i digress.

The ridiculous meme that says something like: "Chicago has strict gun laws and they have lots of gun violence" completely ignores the fact that many if not all of the guns used in Chicago come from outside the city's jurisdiction. The same goes for NY, Washington DC, Miami, etc. These cities know what the problem is, but they cant do anything about it because neighboring states ignore it in the name of "freedom". Recent studies have shown that a large percentage of the guns used in NY-Metro area crimes originate as legit purchases in states like Virginia where the gun lobby has fear-mongered the local legislature away from even the most basic regulations.

Consider what would happen if you couldn't go to a "gun show" in someone's backyard and pick up a bunch of handguns to sell on the black market in Chicago. Where would the average street thug get their weapons? Russian arms dealers? 3D printing? Granted there are plenty of weapons already out there, but is "it's hard so what's the point" really an excuse?

And background checks do not address the problem of what you can buy once you pass. Why would anyone need a semi-automatic rifle with armor piercing rounds and a 30-round magazine?!? For that entire heard of delicious armor-plated deer you ran out of standard rounds trying to slaughter? To shoot at UN tanks when they invade Idaho?

Please explain...

To begin with, your callus attitude towards what happened in that classroom is astounding. It is indicative of why this "debate" is so futile. You appear to feel nothing for those kids and what they went through - whether they were killed after the "first well aimed shot" or not.

That said, let me try to get past your perhaps unwitting ugliness and address the points you tried to make.

First you dismiss any effective difference between, for example, a bolt-action hunting rifle and a semi-automatic assault weapon. Fine, so why would anyone need a Bushmaster? If you can shoot a deer or an intruder with a bolt action or shotgun and get the job done just as effectively, why do we need semi-automatic weapons at all? Convenience? Not good enough. Cool-factor? Not even close. So I would suggest that you explain to the world why exactly we need such weapons in the hands of civilians in the first place.

Second, you claim that because there are 200 million weapons out there already, "The crazy people will get them and there is nothing you and I or even Congress can do about it. Period." Really? So if no new semi-automatic weapons were manufactured or imported for civilian use, would there still be 200 million weapons out there in 10 years? 20 years? Would you tell a newborn that there's nothing you or anyone else can do about guns because it wouldn't help anyone right now? Sounds like a rather short-sighted view of the world. Perhaps you would reconsider if you added confiscation regulations as well - but no, of course not. That would be "treasonous" and cause for another "revolution". And at the very least, it would not get past the House with its current makeup. Another reason to vote Democratic in 2014.

The rest of your reasoning is somewhat less coherent, but I will address a little of it.

This is a bit of a digression, but I believe you misunderstand why people buy guns on the black market. No one who can "afford to buy drugs" would buy a gun to get more because they already have the money to buy drugs. Based on how you talk about drugs I do believe you when you say that you've never smoked pot in your life. Moreover, the fact that you place the words pot and guns in the same sentence implies that you have a very shallow understanding of what makes someone commit a gun crime. Pot is almost never the source of individual crimes on it's own. Mainly for the reason you yourself suggest - it's too easy to get (Cartel violence is of course another story, but the legalization and regulation of marijuana is a completely different discussion that is also being had across the nation). Heroin, meth, cocaine, etc is where the gun violence is at, and most of those crimes are committed using guns that were purchased legally and then fell into the black market. But back to your case.

And why is that exactly? Because criminals are so good at working the system? No. You can buy an unregistered firearm precisely because so many unregistered weapons are being sold legally. What do you think they're doing at all those school gymnasium "gun shows"? No background checks. No registration. And if you're referring to the weak serial number system currently in place, how about some microprinting on them guns? No of course not, because that would make George Washington cry.

There was a story a few years back about a psychiatrist who gave car companies advice about how to sell all those giant "cars" (e.g., the Suburban) that the government taxed like light trucks - making them VERY profitable. Most people recognized them as gas guzzling behemoths, but this gentleman suggested that if you make them seem like essential utilities (hence Sport Utility Vehicle), people would see them as a way to be "prepared" for anything that they may be up against "out there". After that, you'd see commercial after commercial depicting some suburban family hitting the road with the kids in the back and finding themselves on top of some mountain somewhere for a picnic. Or fighting through two feet of mountain snow. People were being fooled into thinking that they needed these things even though they would never even see a dirt road. (Unsurprisingly, car dealers won't even give you full price for an SUV trade-in if the vehicle shows wear from off-road use). Why would you ever think that, given the way the post-Newtown NRA has gone all the way with "More guns are the answer", guns would ever be marketed or even remotely considered as "unnecessary". No way. Wherever there are people who believe pot smokers go out and buy guns because they can afford drugs, there will be people who think guns are necessary.

Not sure what that means exactly. Are you saying that they're socialists? That the US gun culture will never change because people in the US dont work together? Perhaps what you mean to say is that they have gone through numerous bloody wars where guns were used to commit all sorts of heinous crimes and they had just about enough. That the US has been the world's number one gun dealer for a century and has developed a fetish for something that most people have no direct experience with (and never will - shooting ranges dont count). That gun sales to individuals has skyrocketed over the last few years due to "survivalist" notions fueled by a black president and an increasingly diverse population (remember the utility in SUV?).

I understand that you're trying to make the point that all this talk of regulation is futile because it's too late. But you're wrong. It's never too late to plan for the future. From environmental policy to education to drug policy to gun control, it's always too much to sacrifice. Short-term thinking is what's killing us. Not individualism.

So what you're saying is that Lanza would have done the same amount of damage as fast as he did without the use of a semi-automatic assault rifle? You're suggesting that the sale of thousands of rounds of ammunition to anonymous buyers without any oversight would not have made it more difficult to acquire the arsenals used in many of these shootings? Are you saying that there is no such thing as an effective gun regulation?

The US has almost double the rate of any other industrialized nation when it comes to gun related crime. The reasons for that are fairly simple: a) it's too easy to buy a gun, b) the cultural insanity that calls itself the "gun culture" has put weaponized assault on the forefront of everyone's mind.

Moreover, the "gunshow loophole" has created a huge hole in whatever gun regulations there are already in place, which makes it seem easy to argue that "gun laws are ineffective". The common way to put this is: "gun crime is the most serious where the gun laws are the strictest, so that means gun laws dont work". Bullshit. Gun laws do work, its the fact that guns are purchased in unregulated states and brought to where the money is: NYC, Chicago, LA, etc. (Fact: most guns used in NYC crimes are purchased legally in places like Virginia and resold on the black market - look it up).

Therefore it stands to reason that if gun laws both strict and uniform across all the states (i.e., federal law), it would be much more difficult for criminals to attain weapons. Now of course this will not be effective overnight. There are already millions and millions of guns out in the wild, but going forward we need to start working on a sane gun policy and apply it everywhere - not just where people are actually dying from gun violence.

People outside major cities are perfectly happy to reap the rewards they bring to our society, but when it comes to gun violence, the non-city dwellers say "Screw you, we're keeping our guns. You're on your own".

While it is true that the share price is partly based on the assumption that the price will continue to go up - i.e., getting in now is the best way to make money on Apple's future success. - there is good reason for optimism. The Tulip example is of course a metaphor, but Apple is not a commodity or even a set of products. Apple is a way of designing, making and marketing products. The reason Samsung is able to sell smart phones at the rate they are is because Apple made everyone "realize" that smart phones are cool. And that's just design and marketing. They also make stuff. Really well. BTW, I dont (think) I even own any Apple stock.

Let me start by saying that I believe you are as upset about what happened as anyone else. I also believe that you are trying to be reasonable about this. However...

More guns == more violence. Plain and simple. If you arm more people, more people will be involved in gun violence. This is not a conclusion, but rather a fundamental premise for any argument that involves "if only someone had been armed, they could have stopped this". In other words, the only way for me to be safe from guns is to carry a gun myself. Hence the reductio ad absurdum critique.

If you asked people to decide between no one having a gun and everyone having one, I think most non-gun owners would instantly say: no guns. Gun owners on the other hand would provide a wide array of excuses for their fetish. (His mother was an avowed "gun enthusiast", by the way)

Some will point to boogie men like FEMA or the UN. Others would offer what appears on the face of it to be a reasonable answer, saying that guns were a fact of life for pre-modern societies who lacked sophisticated law enforcement or local fried chicken joints, and therefore it would somehow be unfair if they cant go out and shoot some deer on the weekends because its "part of our history".

All of these reasons are ridiculous. An AR-15 you buy at Walmart is not going to stop a fantasy FEMA tank and no one uses a Glock 9mm to hunt. So ultimately they all fall back on "its in the constitution", as if it was something Jesus said. And oh yeah, there's my new favorite: guys like this will just blow up the school instead. It is now extremely difficult to acquire the necessary chemicals to pull off such a task precisely because reasonable and very effective laws were passed after the OKC bombing. Just ask the idiot who tried it in Times Square earlier this year.

We don't need guns to be safe. They are in fact the reason we dont feel safe in the first place.

Wow you missed the point entirely. Or perhaps that was an attempt at humor. Either way, in a world where grade school teachers are armed in the classroom do you expect gang rapists to avoid guns because they're dangerous or something?

Apparently libertarian tendencies dont go beyond Obamacare and your glock. These people are not "lunatics" the way they are often betrayed in the movies (think Dirty Harry). They are otherwise "normal" seeming people who tend to demonstrate their violent tendencies for only a short time before acting on them.

It is only after a thorough investigation of the person that the tendencies become obvious. So are you prepared to arrest and commit people for posting disturbing facebook entries? On the say of their neighbor? Based on something their high school guidance councilor thinks?

Moreover, you seem to suggest that we allow the same govt you mistrust with basic weapon regulations to regulate the standard of "crazy" in a way that involves monitoring and preemptively arresting people based on "crazy panels" that determine who will shoot a bunch of grade-schoolers and who will just go postal on some deer.

As for the pipe-bomb thing, yes it would be preferable because for most people like this, it is the act of shooting their victims that they seek. Lighting a pipe bomb and running would not allow them to look their victim in the eye. Thats why you never hear about that version of events. Its always the image of a guy in black leather holding multiple weapons in some Call of Duty pose that turns up. They dont want to hear a boom and hope they did the deed. They want to be face to face. And if they blow themselves up right away, they cant roam the halls shooting people they've never even met and dont "care" about.

Right, so the guys doing the raping are gonna come at her with their dicks while she's got a gun? Unlikely. Moreover, most violent crimes occur in such a way that the attacker "gets the drop on" the victim. This suggests that reaching for a gun when someone else is already pointing one at you would do much more harm than good.

Most of these arguments are based on the hollywood-fed groupthink that results in revenge fantasies like yours. "Attractive, gun-wielding woman shoots sleazy toothpick chewing thugs while shouting: You want some too? Come and get it!"

It resulted in strict regulation of fertilizer and the other materials involved, which resulted in 0 incidents like it since. Moreover, that was 20 years ago. How many have died from gun violence since - many many thousands.

So actually, he was not wrong. You are.

Everything you refer to have primary uses that in no way involve violence. Guns have a single purpose. Death. And if you say we still need to kill rats with antlers for fun on the weekends, fine. Get a bow and arrow.

You're an obtuse, insensitive, jackass. Most of those kids would still be alive if he was using a knife or hammer or whatever "tool" you're talking about.

Riiight...so instead of limiting access to weapons that are made solely to kill other human beings (NO ONE GOES HUNTING WITH A HANDGUN) in the name of individual liberty, you propose "identifying" and isolating individuals whom we decide are crazy because of some facebook posts or something they said to their mother.

Another insane rationalization. Oh wait, maybe YOU'RE crazy. I think you need to be isolated...