Ready now?

[Sue U]

But I'd like to see it regulated much like car ownership...

Deal! Where do I sign up for that?

Now where did I read someone proposing that very idea? Oh yeah, right here:

we could require training/periodic recertification, licensing, registration and liability insurance

And I literally made the automobile comparison here (emphasis added this time):

None of what I suggested actually limits gun ownership to "the rich, the well-connected, the police, and criminals," at least not any more than do those same requirements applied to automobiles. And guns in the U.S. are substantially cheaper and more plentiful than automobiles.

But apparently when I say it, I'm some sort of gun-grabbing commie serving the interests of the rich, the police and the political elites. I wonder what could be the difference between me and XKA that elicits such a reaction?

On the point of gun liability insurance, Jarlaxle's analogies to auto and homeowners coverage are simply inapposite. "Intentional acts" of the insured aren't excluded in health or life insurance, for example. And if there were to be an actual firearms insurance market, certain "intentional acts" exclusions might still apply: there is a cogent public policy argument for excluding liability coverage for murder (although some portion of collected premiums and/or firearms taxes could be legislatively directed to a victims compensation fund), and there would be no need to make liability payments where a shooting is intentional but justified (e.g., defending against an imminent threat to life).

As to whether gun violence is actually a problem, literally "ripped from today's headlines":

Shootings never stopped during the pandemic: 2020 was the deadliest year for gun violence in decades

by Reis Thebault and Danielle Rindler, The Washington Post, Posted: March 24, 2021 - 2:35 PM

Until two lethal rampages this month, mass shootings had largely been absent from headlines during the coronavirus pandemic. But people were still dying — at a record rate.

In 2020, gun violence killed nearly 20,000 Americans, according to data from the Gun Violence Archive, more than any other year in at least two decades. An additional 24,000 people died by suicide with a gun.

The vast majority of these tragedies happen far from the glare of the national spotlight, unfolding instead in homes or on city streets and — like the COVID-19 crisis — disproportionately affecting communities of color.

Last week's shootings at spas in the Atlanta area and Monday's shooting at a grocery store in Boulder, Colo., killed a combined 18 people and rejuvenated a national effort to overhaul gun laws. But high-profile mass shootings such as those tend to overshadow the instances of everyday violence that account for most gun deaths, potentially clouding some people's understanding of the problem and complicating the country's response, experts say.

"There are many communities across this country that are dealing with ever-present gun violence that is just part of their daily experience," said Mark Barden, a cofounder of the gun violence prevention group Sandy Hook Promise. "It doesn't get the support, the spotlight, the national attention. People don't understand that it's continuous and it's on the rise."

Shooting deaths in 2020 outpaced the next-highest recent year, 2017, by more than 3,600. The rise resembles other alarming trends: Last year, the United States saw the highest one-year increase in homicides since it began keeping records, with the country's largest cities suffering a 30% spike. Gunshot injuries also rose dramatically, to nearly 40,000, over 8,000 more than in 2017.

In 2020, more than 2,240 people were shot in Philadelphia, a total 40% higher than ever recorded since police began separately tracking data on shooting victims in 2007.

The year was also one of the deadliest in Philadelphia’s history, as nearly 500 people were killed — more than all of 2013 and 2014 combined.

"More than 100 Americans are killed daily by gun violence," Ronnie Dunn, a professor of urban studies at Cleveland State University, said, using a figure that includes suicides. "The majority are in Black and Brown communities. We don't really focus on gun violence until we have these mass shootings, but it's an ongoing, chronic problem that affects a significant portion of our society."

More here.

But hey, why let actual facts get in the way of gun fetishists' fantasies and paranoid delusions?

[Jarlaxle]

You haven't though it through.

If we treated guns like cars, a fourteen-year-old could go into any state and legally buy handguns, machine guns, cannons, whatever, cash and carry, and shoot them all with complete legality on private property. And at age 16 he could get a state license good anywhere in the country to shoot these guns on public property. Sounds great to me.

Credit to John Ross for that.

[Scooter]

How does the 14 year old get that car from place of purchase to said private property? Oh, that's right, he can't, because it would be illegal for him to drive it there.

How does that 16 year old drive that car in public? Oh, that's right, he can't, because he can't get it registered or insured until he is 18.

Try harder.

[Big RR]

Sccoter--as I recall, in my state, New Jersey, one can register and insure a car when one acquires a license, at age 17 (of course you could not drive it, or any other automobile, in NYC until you are 18; similar restrictions likely apply in other areas). But different states vary, so you may well be correct in some.

And come on Jarl--cannons? Machine guns? Just as there are guns that cannot be owned operated legally, there are some vehicles that are not registrable for use on public roadways. indeed, even if an automobile were registrable in one state does not mean it can be driven in all (nor could a 14 year old drive a car (even one (s)he owns) in many states (like NY or NJ where the licensing age is greater). There are others that cannot be registered because they are not insurable. Likewise, gun ownership can be regulated in the same way. But the point is, guns and cars are not the same and would/should be regulated in a common sense way.

[Jarlaxle]

How does the 14 year old get that car from place of purchase to said private property? Oh, that's right, he can't, because it would be illegal for him to drive it there.

Trailer, wrecker, flatbed truck. I have known people who were racing at 14...Dad usually trailered the car to the track.

How does that 16 year old drive that car in public? Oh, that's right, he can't, because he can't get it registered or insured until he is 18.

It's almost like 16 year olds drive on public roads now...

Try harder.

Don't have to.

[Jarlaxle]

Sccoter--as I recall, in my state, New Jersey, one can register and insure a car when one acquires a license, at age 17 (of course you could not drive it, or any other automobile, in NYC until you are 18; similar restrictions likely apply in other areas). But different states vary, so you may well be correct in some.

And come on Jarl--cannons? Machine guns? Just as there are guns that cannot be owned operated legally, there are some vehicles that are not registrable for use on public roadways. indeed, even if an automobile were registrable in one state does not mean it can be driven in all (nor could a 14 year old drive a car (even one (s)he owns) in many states (like NY or NJ where the licensing age is greater). There are others that cannot be registered because they are not insurable. Likewise, gun ownership can be regulated in the same way. But the point is, guns and cars are not the same and would/should be regulated in a common sense way.

Aside from truck weight restrictions, multiple trailers, and the 18-20 intrastate CDL limitation (which is Federal), anything legally tagged in one state can be driven in any state. My wife can drive her Federal-emissions car in California with no issues. I know a couple people who ride motorcycles that can't be tagged in California in California, 100% legally. (One is tagged in Oregon, the other in Arizona.)

Cannons are actually perfectly legal. Note that, legally, this is NOT a gun:


Legally, this is NOT a machine gun:

[Scooter]

How does the 14 year old get that car from place of purchase to said private property? Oh, that's right, he can't, because it would be illegal for him to drive it there.

Trailer, wrecker, flatbed truck. I have known people who were racing at 14...Dad usually trailered the car to the track.

So you're arguing for a system where minors could shoot guns on private property where they were transported by a parent or some other responsible adult. Which can already happen, so who cares?

How does that 16 year old drive that car in public? Oh, that's right, he can't, because he can't get it registered or insured until he is 18.

It's almost like 16 year olds drive on public roads now...[/quote]Drive cars that are registered or insured in their name? Hardly ever. Drive cars registered and insured in their parent's name, far more likely. So sure, if a parent wants to pay the thousands of dollars for insuring their 16 year old to be carrying a gun in public, and assume the liability for whatever stupid acts their minor children might engage in with that gun, just like they do when they allow their minor child to drive their car, I could certainly be on board with that.

[Jarlaxle]

I had a car in my name at 17. So did my wife. Nothing unusual.

I also shot my first (and thus far, only) machine gun at 17.

[Bicycle Bill]

Contending that an assault weapons ban could have prevented the gun massacre that killed 10 people in his city this week, Boulder, Colo., Mayor Sam Weaver pleaded with gun rights advocates to reconsider their opposition to such a move, asking them to address a single overriding question:
“Why wouldn’t you want a future where we have fewer innocent people killed?”

To Jarlaxle — and anyone else who is vehemently opposed to any attempts to restrict any type of firearms — I'd love to know how you would answer this question.

-"BB"-

[Crackpot]

I doubt he cares as it is been made abundantly clear over the years that he is a self-centered misanthrope.

[Big RR]

Aside from truck weight restrictions, multiple trailers, and the 18-20 intrastate CDL limitation (which is Federal), anything legally tagged in one state can be driven in any state. My wife can drive her Federal-emissions car in California with no issues. I know a couple people who ride motorcycles that can't be tagged in California in California, 100% legally. (One is tagged in Oregon, the other in Arizona.)

tell that to the owners of self driving cars.

[Sue U]

All this blather about cars and cannons is stupidity. There is no reason that qualification/licensing/registration/insurance must be done exclusively on the state level and even if it is, there is nothing thing that prohibits the federal government from setting uniform nationwide minimum standards. There need not be any "rule" that says 14- or 16- year-olds must be allowed to carry guns at all, or that jurisdictions with prohibitions against, say, handguns must allow people from outside that jurisdiction to bring their handguns into it. And who gives a fuck about cannons? Does this country have a problem involving rampant cannon deaths?

If education, licensing, registration, insurance and associated taxes are reasonable requirements for operating something as dangerous as an automobile and maintaining safety on public roads, what is the actual objection to the same type of requirements for firearms?

[Guinevere]

But I'd like to see it regulated much like car ownership...

Deal! Where do I sign up for that?

Now where did I read someone proposing that very idea? Oh yeah, right here:

we could require training/periodic recertification, licensing, registration and liability insurance

And I literally made the automobile comparison here (emphasis added this time):

None of what I suggested actually limits gun ownership to "the rich, the well-connected, the police, and criminals," at least not any more than do those same requirements applied to automobiles. And guns in the U.S. are substantially cheaper and more plentiful than automobiles.

But apparently when I say it, I'm some sort of gun-grabbing commie serving the interests of the rich, the police and the political elites. I wonder what could be the difference between me and XKA that elicits such a reaction?

[Econoline]

A Modest Proposal...

...which demands Swift action.

[Jarlaxle]

Contending that an assault weapons ban could have prevented the gun massacre that killed 10 people in his city this week, Boulder, Colo., Mayor Sam Weaver pleaded with gun rights advocates to reconsider their opposition to such a move, asking them to address a single overriding question:
“Why wouldn’t you want a future where we have fewer innocent people killed?”

To Jarlaxle — and anyone else who is vehemently opposed to any attempts to restrict any type of firearms — I'd love to know how you would answer this question.

-"BB"-

Because it's a false premise...there is no evidence whatsoever that an "assault weapon"" ban would make any difference.

[Bicycle Bill]

Contending that an assault weapons ban could have prevented the gun massacre that killed 10 people in his city this week, Boulder, Colo., Mayor Sam Weaver pleaded with gun rights advocates to reconsider their opposition to such a move, asking them to address a single overriding question:
“Why wouldn’t you want a future where we have fewer innocent people killed?”

To Jarlaxle — and anyone else who is vehemently opposed to any attempts to restrict any type of firearms — I'd love to know how you would answer this question.

-"BB"-

Because it's a false premise...there is no evidence whatsoever that an "assault weapon"" ban would make any difference.

Of course we can't prove a claim like that.  But you have to admit that it does make logical sense, even from a simple mathematical standpoint.  Less weapons of quick and easy killing out there = less bullets likely to be flying around = less people dead and/or wounded.

And since it is impossible to prove a negative, neither can YOU conclusively state that if we DID ban 'assault weapons' like the weapon the Colorado shooter purchased less than ten days before his shooting spree — the Ruger AR-556, a semi-automatic "pistol" capable of accepting a 30-round magazine and fires the same cartridge (5.56 NATO) as a full-sized AR-15 ... in effect, an easily-concealable, cut-down, short-barreled assault rifle that successfully circumvents already existing rules covering purchases and background checks required for long guns — we WOULDN'T have fewer deaths.

And the gun nuts are too scared that someone is trying to take away their noisemakers that they are totally unwilling to say, "You know, maybe you ARE right.  Let's try it for a while and find out."

So it's a stalemate, until the next shooting happens.....   which will probably be within a week to ten days.  Hell, it was only two days later (and barely a week after the other shootings at the Atlanta spas/massage parlors that left eight people dead) that another twenty-something-year-old whack-job walked into a supermarket in Atlanta with five or six weapons and fuckin' BODY ARMOR even, went into the bathroom, and suited himself up in full battle-rattle.  Fortunately, he was seen and reported and police were able to intervene and apprehend him before he could try to set a new high score.

Goddammit, Jarl, even a cement-head like you should be able to see that we need to do SOMETHING!!

-"BB"-

[Sue U]

Contending that an assault weapons ban could have prevented the gun massacre that killed 10 people in his city this week, Boulder, Colo., Mayor Sam Weaver pleaded with gun rights advocates to reconsider their opposition to such a move, asking them to address a single overriding question:
“Why wouldn’t you want a future where we have fewer innocent people killed?”

To Jarlaxle — and anyone else who is vehemently opposed to any attempts to restrict any type of firearms — I'd love to know how you would answer this question.

-"BB"-

Because it's a false premise...there is no evidence whatsoever that an "assault weapon"" ban would make any difference.

Except for, you know, the evidence:

Louis Klarevas, a research professor at Teachers College at Columbia University, studied high-fatality mass shootings (six or more people) for his 2016 book “Rampage Nation.” He said that compared with the 10-year period before the ban, the number of gun massacres during the ban period fell by 37 percent and that the number of people dying because of mass shootings fell by 43 percent. But after the ban lapsed in 2004, the numbers in the next 10-year period rose sharply — a 183 percent increase in mass shootings and a 239 percent increase in deaths.

In a more recent study co-written by him and published by the American Journal of Public Health in 2019, Klarevas also measured the impact of banning large-capacity magazines and concluded that such bans end up saving lives. “When LCMs were involved, the average death toll for gun massacres increased by 62 percent,” he said. “Jurisdictions that did not have LCM bans in place experienced a 129 percent increase in the incidence rate and a 206 percent increase in the fatality rate of gun massacres.”

“There is ample evidence to support President Biden’s suggestion that a new federal ban on assault weapons and large-capacity magazines will reduce mass shooting violence and save lives,” Klarevas said.

***

Grant Duwe, director of research and evaluation for the Minnesota Department of Corrections, has assembled a database of mass shootings that he has previously shared with The Fact Checker. Duwe defines a mass public shooting as an incident in which four or more victims are killed publicly with guns within 24 hours — in workplaces, schools, restaurants and other public places — excluding shootings in connection with crimes such as robbery, drugs or gangs. He then adjusts the data for population and also looks at five-year moving averages.

“There’s not strong support for the notion that the per capita incidence was much lower during the late 1990s and early 2000s,” Duwe told us in 2019. “There’s more support, however, for the idea that the per capita severity (the rates at which victims were killed or shot in mass public shootings) was lower during this period of time. But what’s even clearer from the data is that there has been an increase in both the incidence and severity of mass public shootings (on a per capita basis) since the latter part of the 2000s.”

***
Moreover, recent research also supports the contention that mass shootings have increased since the law expired. What once was a hunch, unsupported by rigorous research, has now been largely confirmed.

Source: WaPo.

[liberty]

The problem is one can’t trust the lying murdering communist son of bitches on the left. It is not the controlling ownership they want but disarming the citizen. Every time an unarmed person is assaulted or murdered by a thug, leftist communists like Shit Head and Communist sue are guilty. They are accessories to the murder of untold numbers of people. Jamil Jones didn’t need a gun to murder Sandor Szabo. Jones chased him down and killed Szabo with one punch and didn’t serve a day in jail. Without a penalty, he gets to brag for the rest of his life about how he killed a cracker with one punch; that is a lot of street cred. Comrade Sue and Shit Head want to make it easier for thugs to kill more people.

[Sue U]

The problem is one can’t trust the lying murdering communist son of bitches on the left. It is not the controlling ownership they want but disarming the citizen. Every time an unarmed person is assaulted or murdered by a thug, leftist communists like Shit Head and Communist sue are guilty. They are accessories to the murder of untold numbers of people. Jamil Jones didn’t need a gun to murder Sandor Szabo. Jones chased him down and killed Szabo with one punch and didn’t serve a day in jail. Without a penalty, he gets to brag for the rest of his life about how he killed a cracker with one punch; that is a lot of street cred. Comrade Sue and Shit Head want to make it easier for thugs to kill more people.

Doesn't make any more sense here than it did in Philosophy & Religion.

[Burning Petard]

No evidence? What about history? A hundred years ago the only requirement in the USofA for possession of fully automatic firearms (the tommy gun for instance) was a willing seller and a willing buyer. Same for dynamite. The Marlin company sold a lever action rifle with a 15 inch barrel and it fired the .44-40 cartridge.
Hollywood with at least a couple of tv shows demonstrated the way a lever action could pump out a pretty fast stream of bullets. The Browning Automatic Light Rifle had a twenty round box magazine, fired the .30-06 cartridge (much more powerful than the little 5.56mm used in the Ruger AR556) and was only fully automatic. That is the gun Steve McQueen used in the movie The Sand Pebbles. The Winchester company made a pump action 12ga shotgun with a short bbl that could fire as fast as you could work the pump, if you just held the trigger back. Where were all the mass shootings back then?

Now we have all those scary 'black guns' and most of them shoot the feeble little military .223--feeble compared to a .45-70 or a 12 ga slug gun or even the venerable .30-06 that is available in many semi-auto rifles. What has changed in the last hundred years?

snailgate