Probably not in most school shootings, no. Especially not when the first people you killed were the teachers and the victims are little kids. In the Tucson shooting Loughner was right in a huge crowd of people. In shootings like Aurora and most school shootings everyone is already running away or trying to cower behind something, so in reality reloads would be an ideal time to disarm the shooter but in most shootings I’ve read about no one is positioned to actually do that.
I’ve always said, no one with a single firearm could come out alive if 10 people within close range of him just rushed him. Most of these shootings could have been ended by a bum rush, basically. Utoya for example, there were hundreds of people there. If they had rushed Breivik as one he’d have killed several and then been overwhelmed.
So anyway…this ban almost certainly won’t pass unless there has been a massive shift in Republican party politics.
That being said, what I find disappointing is this is 100% gun centric. There is no talk of owner-licensing. I don’t understand why Democrats want to ban specific guns but don’t want to require people to go through a licensing process to be able to buy guns in the first place. That, to me, is one of the key differences between European gun control, which over time appears to have worked, and American gun control attempts, which mostly don’t.
There is no requirement that Congress only consider changes that would have stopped the Newtown shooting. This isn’t only a gun issue, and most people who are interested in stronger gun laws are not trying to retroactively prevent any one mass killing. That being said, the old AWB was mostly pointless and it’s discouraging if the debate is moving in that direction again.
Anything that slows a shooter down gives people a chance to either grab him or run away. So yes, in that sense making people switch clips would make a difference.
Why is this bad?
I’m not seeing the problem here either.
Because on an individual level it’s kind of suicidal.
Really? You don’t see why gun owners are skeptical of registration?
You must never have read a gun control debate thread before.
Registration is bad because it’s a necessary first step on the road to confiscation. Confiscation, when it has been done in other countries, is always begun by registration. The final step of forcing people to turn them in is only possible if the initial step of registering them takes place first.
You don’t see the problem that I would have of heading down to the police station and providing them with a photo, my fingerprints and my ID all for exercising my constitutionally protected rights and not violating any laws? Really?
Would you have a problem with doing that for any of the rights you cherish? Like, say, voting?
I think in the hands off a homicidal maniac, it would be safer. The fact that you or anyone else never offer any reasonable explanation of what you want all those bullets for makes me think you secretly want to kill a bunch of people quickly.
I’m fine with registration, and I think requiring people to get a license for each new weapon they buy (so you have both weapons licenses and owner licenses) is the way to go. Yes, in some cases registration has been used for confiscation. But many countries require registration and haven’t confiscated all guns (ex Germany, the Nordic countries.)
Ah, I see: it’s bad because it could lead to something that’ll never happen. That’s not a persuasive reason at all. The 1994 AWB involved no gun confiscation, neither does the 2012 proposal. There won’t be one in the future either (even though that would arguably be a more effective way of dealing with the issue). It’d never get through Congress and I doubt it would survive the courts either.
I don’t think you’ve identified an actual problem, no.
When I registered to vote I had to give the state of New York my name, address, birth date, and Social Security number or drivers’ license number, and if I’d had neither of those, they would have accepted a picture ID or other documentation. They said they were going to verify that against other information. I’m guessing you had to go through the same thing. And no, I had no problem with that because without voter registration the system plainly would not work at all, so any other expectation would have been ridiculous.
This is the obvious comparison here. The fact that there is a Constitutional right to bear arms doesn’t mean registration is somehow a bigger burden or a bigger problem. Guns are weapons and I think it’s reasonable to ask people to handle some kind of minimal registration and certification.
Did anyone claim this would prevent shootings? Is there a requirement we can only look at legislation that would have stopped freak events? It seems like elementary common sense to me that if you have to pass a test to get a driver’s license and maintain registration of your car, you should have to do the same thing with a gun.
In reply to Debaser’s comment about gun registration:
I think the question when passing a new law should be “Why is this good?” So I ask, how will registration help solve any of the problems that are currently being discussed? What value does the government gain from knowing about my gun inventory? If I use them illegally, then registration didn’t prevent anything. If I use them legally, why does the government need to know about them?
Well, it’s handy when you’re target shooting, or hunting small critters (varmints), as you don’t have to reload as often. But it’s REALLY useful in a self-defense situation if you’re facing multiple attackers. Contrary to what Hollywood shows, people don’t necessarily go down with a single shot, and some shots are going to miss. (I’ll admit that situation doesn’t come up that often for the average gun owner, though.)
Are you being deliberately dense? If you use them illegally, the registration makes it easier to catch you - meaning you are less likely to use them illegally. It also makes them easier to recover if they are stolen. Have you never wondered what the license plates and VIN on your car are for?
You’ll forgive me if I don’t take your word on that.
How about the simply practical matter that we’re talking about millions of people, many of which won’t conform to the law. What do we do with the hundreds of thousands to millions of people who we would be criminalizing with this proposal. This isn’t a problem?
Regardless of what you think about the merit of the idea, it’s unworkable simply as a practical matter.
I asked about voting, not registering to vote, to draw a comparison to the voter ID laws so rabidly opposed by those on the left because of the unfair burden it places on law abiding voters. You need to shift the goalposts to avoid this comparison, but the hypocrisy if there.
I’ll widen the scope: What would it prevent? You are the ones proposing it. Is there no benefit at all? If so, why make the proposal?
No.
Not good enough. “It’s common sense” is a big red flag on this board that you’ve got nothing. Make an argument, using logic and words, to back up your position. Just stating that “It’s common sense” means you’ve got nuthin’.
No one’s out there lobbying for the elimination of all cars, or claiming that car owners (or subsets of car owners, such as sports car owners) are all psychologically warped. I’ve seen a LOT of those attitudes expressed right here on the Dope. Frankly, I don’t trust that such registration lists won’t be used to harass gun owners, or to facilitate confiscation of legally-purchased firearms that are retroactively banned.
No, but we’re not going to make your arguments for you.
How? How does registration make it easier to catch gun criminals? Do you have proof of this claim?
Finally, an actual argument in favor of your proposal has been made and makes sense. See, that wasn’t hard.
Unfortunately, tracking stolen guns isn’t a good enough reason to force registration on tens of millions of lawful gun owners. Most illegal guns are sold on the black market and aren’t stolen from legal owners. ID numbers on guns can be filed off. This simply wouldn’t work, and isn’t worth it if it did work.
If you use them illegally, the registration makes it easier to catch you - meaning you are less likely to use them illegally.
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Cite please for both of these claims. If I were to use my legally registered gun in a crime, assuming that I don’t leave it at the scene (which I’m certainly not going to do since it was registered), how is it easier for the police to catch me?
[QUOTE=Really Not All That Bright]
It also makes them easier to recover if they are stolen.
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Do you honestly believe that that is a reason behind registration?
[QUOTE=Really Not All That Bright]
Have you never wondered what the license plates and VIN on your car are for?
Feinstein is either corrupt or an idiot. She does not get that the problem with the first AWB isn’t that it was easy to comply with the rules, it’s that it was easy to comply with the rules because the rules were stupid. Arbitrary restrictions naturally result in arbitrary work-arounds, and playing catch-up with more stupid, arbitrary restrictions is just going to result in more arbitrary work-arounds.
That was my thought. The whole point is to get certain things out of the hands of the public. You can argue about whether or not it should be done, but the banning of currently existing weapons seems like the intent, not a mistake or the result of “faulty logic”.
What proof do you want? Right now, to tie a suspect to a murder weapon, we have to use fingerprints. Do I really have to spell out how registration will make that easier?
Guess what happens if you’re caught with a gun with the ID number filed off? You go to prison. See? That was easy.
What’s being “forced” on them? The inconvenience of filling out a form? Oh, the horrors!