The Terrible Tragedy in CT, and what do we do about it?

[Kendoo]

Pete,

At the time the regular shooters put forward their case but as we are a mjaority Democracy the laws were passed through both houses of parliament, with amendments.

The general public reasoned that we didn't need automatic or even semi automatic weapons hanging around the house and the debate as such was very short. I have several friends who are gun owners and enjoy it as a sport. Me, I can take it or leave it.

In Australia we have never had the notion that we needed guns to shoot someone who was on our property or was threatening us. We had guns on the whole to go hunting, and I have done so myself, but the idea of having a gun in the house is a bit duanting, especially when you hear stories of children or mentally ill people getting hold of them and the obvious consequences. It's just a matter of risk assessment.

Australian gun owners are very responsible on the whole (not saying that you guys aren't) and have no problem complying with our laws. We can't even imagine the thought of a school teacher carrying a firearm, and I wouldn't want my children exposed to that sort of environment, let alone expect a school teacher to take anothers life.

As far as being disarmed we did not consider ourselves as being armed, it's just not in our psyche. We have armed forces who defend our nation and it is their duty to carry arms, and for this we hold them in very high respect. Recently there have been three Victoria Cross medals given to Australian soldiers, a very rare honour which makes big news. As a nation we move forward with the idea of mateship and although we mave have some pretty poor politicians sometimes we hope deep down that they are hard working and are trying to do their best for the nation.

I guess it just comes down to do you feel the need to keep a gun at hand all the time to kill someone who is threatening you and are you ready to accept the fact that innocent people will have these guns used against them sometimes. I just can't imagine living in a nation which is awash with guns and where most people feel that if they don't have one they are going to be the next victim.

I expect that it is too late to make any real change in the US as the sheer number of guns is overwhelming and the gun manufacturers would have too much lobbying power to allow a reduction in their profits.

But enough of this depressing topic, we should get back to discussing the cars we love.

[RRoller123]

Thanks for the responses "mates" (is that the correct term? ) It really is good to get a perspective from outside on things. You correctly juxtapose that we appear to have a terribly violent culture here, but I do want to say that we are not fixated on this "gun culture" as it gets called. It is obviously a point of discussion here, and right now at large in the media and society due to recent events, but most of us live with little to no fear of being attacked or home invaded, etc. The chances of random violent crime if one lives outside of the inner city, and are not involved in the illicit drug business are astronomically low. The FBI crime statistics show this very clearly. And the vast majority of these crimes are done by perps who knew their victims. But when these random events like CT occur, it really shakes us up....

Anyway, we FA enthusiasts just like to go to the range as you do and accurately put little holes in pieces of paper downrange. But.... events like CT do happen.... and we feel that the God-given right to defend ourselves is sacrosanct. The one thing I can point to that separates Americans from most other developed nations is this notion that our rights source from God, not from man nor government. It sounds minor, but it is not. It defines everything that makes us unique in the world, maybe for the better, maybe not. I tend think it is for the better, but hey, I am an American, so no surprise.

And also I must say that In my 59 years I have never heard a gunshot fired that was not at the range or out hunting. But.... It does happen.... and so we remain vigilant, and defend our Constitutional right of self defense as best we can. I hope the coming national discussion we have here in the US includes some soul searching on our culture. Some portions of it do resemble a rancid cesspool. I try to shield myself and my children as best I can from it. So far so good!

[Gunsmith]

I have seen this subject debated on the TV for the last few days in tiny little tid bits because “We are out of time” on the show and as usual they go nowhere. It is such a shame that public opinion is won or lost this way. One of the things that bothers me on the gun control side of the argument which obviously gets the most air play instead of the bigger harder problems is the reoccurring statement of “Nobody needs these things anyways” by people that don’t even know what they are talking about. Asking people to agree to regulate something they no little to nothing about usually does not end well. The instances of inadvertently committing a crime due to ignorance goes through the roof.

During the last so called “Assault weapons ban” the only thing that made the difference between a legal gun and an illegal gun in many cases was a few digits of a serial number. Could you imagine being sent to prison over a few numbers stamped on a piece of metal? I am not exaggerating anything here. Since they will not be proposing the confiscation of the guns in question yet, they will start with grandfathering in the old ones. They will not stop the manufacture of them as a whole they will just have to be modified to meet the new specs as in the original assault weapons ban that expired because it did not help in the way it was thought and was so hard to enforce and costs millions and millions of dollars.

You see gun parts especially in AR 15’s as you will no doubt hear a lot more about can be swapped out or changed easily. So one could have bought a post ban gun or receiver and changed the upper which contains the barrel with a muzzle break and unknowingly made an illegal firearm. Also a previous owner may have built it not knowing which serial number fell in the band series and sold it to someone who thought they were purchasing a legal firearm. People will constantly be breaking these new laws unknowingly just as before. Additionally it was so hard for law enforcement to enforce because what was legal and what wasn’t legal was so hard to tell. All you had to do was put a preban magazine in a post ban gun and you were now a criminal. So if you owned both preban and post ban guns as many did, you had to make sure you did not accidently mix the magazines that looked the same on the outside but had a different block on the inside, sound confusing yet? Of course since all semi automatics operate basically the same we are really talking about cosmetics.

Sunday morning on Meet the Press talk show left wing so called journalist David Gregory held up a 30 round AR 15 style magazine to illustrate his point as to why no one needed them and how deadly they made a firearm. The problem with that is 30 round magazines are already illegal in Washington DC where the show is filmed and have been for years so he was already violating the law he was asking to be made nationwide. So by creating new laws to “start somewhere” will have a lot more unintended consequences than people who do not understand what they are talking about realize. Now he will get a free pass on this because of who he supports but you can bet he would not have if he was a right winged journalist. So one would have to ask who will decide who gets a free pass and who doesn’t when the millions of people suddenly become law breakers and did not even know it? I guess we will need a massive national ad campaign to educate everyone so we can have zero tolerance. Of course if we put those billions of advertising dollars towards mental health issues we may not need the new version of the old gun laws and maybe we could stay of anarchy for a little while longer.

If we start banning things because we don’t understand them and therefore don’t think anyone needs them we are headed down the wrong road. The same argument could be made by environmentalists and safety advocates about our Spiders. The vast majority of our Spiders are second cars for fun so we don’t need them to get to work, more cars on the road leads to more deadly accidents, someone could steel your car and commit a crime with it when you left the keys in the car or in sight in the garage, sports cars are often driven over the speed limit and driven in an aggressive manner thus are more probable to break more traffic laws, they don't have the safety features of modern cars, the more cars in existence the worse for the environment and so on. Yet we love our Spiders and the thought of someone taking them from us is something we do not want to imagine.

How many times have you been asked why do you have a Fiat or worse an MG because they think they’re the same? No one usually understands until you take them for a ride like I do when I take someone to the range then they get it and usually ask where they can get one. They don’t even know the difference between a Spider and an MG until you take the time to educate them on the difference. In California the VIN number changes everything in the law but actually does not affect anything else except for the roose of being more environmentally friendly even though most Spiders are driven far less than we would like but the wrong parts put on or off the car with a certain VIN number and you’ve got legal problems.

I’m just saying creating even bigger problems trying to fix others is not the answer. You don’t have to “believe in guns” or be part of the “Gun Culture” whatever that is to start to see how this can be screwed up. Start getting educated on what your politicians are voting on and demand they do the same.

[narfire]

Today: Four firefighters shot,two dead at scene two wounded....

They were set up, ambushed....whatever....what the hell is going on in this world... a suit from the NRA thinks every school should have an armed guard... From here it does not seem more guns are the answer folks... What civil scociety needs armed guards at schools...
The fellow who shot the firefighters somehow obtained weapons as he was not permited them being a convicted fellon. His sister has gone missing..
Arming firefighters is not the answer before that suit from the NRA pops off...
How long before the next tragedy happens?
I'm supposed to be feeling happy and all that , difficult to do thinking about parents whose little ones will never grow old or as a former firefighter myself, the families of the fallen who do nothing more than want to help, make a positve contribution in their community.. Man this crap sucks....

[surfingfreeman]

How many more will die? And the NRA's answer: "arm everyone", I'd say it was a joke, but these people and their lobbyists are dead serious! Time to put pen to paper.

[Gunsmith]

My Marketing and Technology Manager was less than a mile from there this morning and is clearly emotionally affected as well. The killer or psycho was supposedly out of prison recently after serving 15 years for killing his grandmother if the story is true. So if he wasn't let out of prison for killing his grandmother we would not be talking about this right now would we? Of course if he did not obtain the guns illegally as he obviously did I guess he could just have set more people on fire? So because we let killers out of jail it's the fault of the tools they use right? Then why aren't we banning alcohol and automobiles?

[Gunsmith]

This is a much bigger problem than guns.

[FulviaHF]

This is a much bigger problem than guns.

But that doesn't mean guns aren't part of the problem.

[Gunsmith]

I get it, because some people have not had to use a firearm to defend themselves or wish they had one when they needed one it is just the simplest answer to say make gun laws. But as we have seen gun laws where already broken in these cases and did not stop evil people or the criminally insane. Would any of you be surprised that when law enforcement from cities such as Chicago and New York with the strictest gun laws retire to Florida one of the first things they do is start purchasing firearms? When all of this started members of law enforcement started buying guns personally for themselves and their family before they get banned. The media would have you believe law enforcement is behind adding more gun laws but the rank and file and many members of their administrations are not for this.

Yes these are tragedies no one is disputing this and yes firearms are used by criminals but they are also used to protect the innocent and law abiding person from these criminals.

I'll bite, what laws do those of you who are not for the individual rights of the gun ower think will prevent these tragedies?

[BEEK]

This is a much bigger problem than guns.

But that doesn't mean guns aren't part of the problem.

guns are not a part of the problem, they sick and demented will use what ever medium they can to do their dastardly deeds.
Legal guns and legal owners are not a problem. If someone wanted to kill people and didnt have a gun or could not obtain a gun, they could just make a bomb. The items needed are easily obtainable. eventually someone will use a bow and arrow, or a spear, or a sword, or broken bottles. then we will have to ban those too. then someone will drive their car into a crowd of people. so we will have to ban cars. Then someone will use a stick, so we will have to get rid of all the trees, so there will be no sticks. then someone will use a rock, so we will have to grind all rocks to sand. The one thing we could do to avoid all of this is stop the person, not ban and destroy the tools

The problem is society, not the tools.

[131]

guns are not a part of the problem, the sick and demented will use what ever medium they can to do their dastardly deeds.

But guns mean you can do it from a distance and rapidfire weapons makes it easier for a novice to do it quickly. Having less of them around and making them harder to obtain must make opportunistic instances less likely.

[surfingfreeman]

IF the article is accurate, yet again another "Assault Rifle" used by mentally Ill person to commit murder, hear me loud and clear I'm not against personal ownership of firearms OTHER THAN these assault type firearms. There must be certain commonalities that all these type of killings have in terms of how the guns were acquired (etc, etc) and this is where our lawmakers need to step in and make some serious changes.

"Webster Police Chief Gerald Pickering said Spengler set a home on fire on Lake Road and waited for firefighters to arrive, ambushing them with gunfire. His motive is unclear. The shooting killed Lt. Mike Chiapperini, 43, a volunteer firefighter and Webster Police Department’s public information officer, and firefighter Tomasz Kaczowka. Theodore Scardino and Joseph Hofsetter were also shot and are recovering in guarded condition at Strong Memorial Hospital.

In addition a police officer from [nearby] Greece[, New York] who was driving by was hit by shrapnel and injured.

Several weapons were used at the shooting today, including "at least" an assault rifle, Pickering said. "

[Gunsmith]

OK well am I asking what this starting point is. Saying our law makers need to do something is like saying a group of monkeys need to fix my Fiat? What have our lawmakers done correctly in recent memory? So please tell me what your gun control solution would be because I feel there is far more intelligence here on this forum than in Washington.

What would the law be?

What would the penalties be?

How would it be enforced?

How do you think it will help?

What would the down side of the law be?

How do you think the 150 million or so current gun owners will react to this new law?

I am very interested to see the answers to these questions.

[BEEK]

im sorry, im not as patient as others. IMHO "guns dont kill people, people kill people" not my saying but it applies.

The facts remain that there is no way Americans will give up their guns, whom ever tries to take them will start a revolution, which will allow people to kill more people with their guns. The problem remains, people who legally possess firearms, be it assault weapons or bolt action rifles or hand guns, should be allowed to keep them. For those who live in different parts of the world where firearms are not allowed or regulated, good for you. But im sure there are killings there that involve guns too. as well most have resulted to bombings ad other mediums to spread their terror.

I am all for proper gun control, i do believe criminals should not be able to have guns. But the issue here is not assault weapons, handguns or rocket launchers. it is the people who choose to use them improperly.

[Fi8spider]

OK well am I asking what this starting point is. Saying our law makers need to do something is like saying a group of monkeys need to fix my Fiat? What have our lawmakers done correctly in recent memory? So please tell me what your gun control solution would be because I feel there is far more intelligence here on this forum than in Washington.

What would the law be?
Too broad a question though looking at other countries that have tighter firearm controls would be a start

What would the penalties be?
Once again, too broad a question and at this point in time it should really be the least of the concern

How would it be enforced?
By employing a new national policing standard

How do you think it will help?
It will reduce the risk.

What would the down side of the law be?
Given that you Gunsmith are like me that we both enjoy time with our firearms I would say the downside of the law would be none.

How do you think the 150 million or so current gun owners will react to this new law?
If you guys have 150 million gun owners that all have to become members of an approved gun club as part of the new law and those gun clubs band together I don't think you'll have much to worry about. We have one main National club over here, the SSAA, look it up. Heck 150 million is a loud voice

I am very interested to see the answers to these questions.

Out of interest, what is the current law in the U.S regarding storage at home and transporting firearms ?

Could one just have it leaning up behind the front door of ones house or laying loose in the trunk of their car?