Anti-gun stupidity continues...

Grenadier

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Figures, that the anti-gunners would be dancing around in a bloodbath so soon... This article also shows their flat-out ignorance.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/10/opinion/10collins.html?_r=2&hp

If Loughner had gone to the Safeway carrying a regular pistol, the kind most Americans think of when they think of the right to bear arms, Giffords would probably still have been shot and we would still be having that conversation about whether it was a sane idea to put her Congressional district in the cross hairs of a rifle on the Internet.


But we might not have lost a federal judge, a 76-year-old church volunteer, two elderly women, Giffords’s 30-year-old constituent services director and a 9-year-old girl who had recently been elected to the student council at her school and went to the event because she wanted to see how democracy worked.


Loughner’s gun, a 9-millimeter Glock, is extremely easy to fire over and over, and it can carry a 30-bullet clip. It is “not suited for hunting or personal protection,” said Paul Helmke, the president of the Brady Campaign. “What it’s good for is killing and injuring a lot of people quickly.”


So... A Glock pistol, that works just like any other handgun, suddenly becomes a supremely powerful item? Doesn't Helmke know that any semiautomatic handgun can accomodate an extended length magazine?

The stupidity of the gun-grabbers never ceases to amaze me...
 

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Guns are tools it the operator who makes it dangerous to others. If someone wants to hurt you or is crazy and wants to hurt a lot of people then there are ways to do that.

This was a tragic event but no one, that I have seen, has pointed out that if someone else was armed this could have ended quicker with the shooter being put down like the mad dog is apparently is.

My .02 only.
 

Bill Mattocks

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Guns are tools it the operator who makes it dangerous to others. If someone wants to hurt you or is crazy and wants to hurt a lot of people then there are ways to do that.

This was a tragic event but no one, that I have seen, has pointed out that if someone else was armed this could have ended quicker with the shooter being put down like the mad dog is apparently is.

My .02 only.

And for a change, I agree with you.

People who have a deep dislike or fear of guns and a desire to see stronger gun control laws often know little or nothing about them.

In the past several days, I have heard the major news networks incorrectly identifying high-capacity magazines as 'clips'. I have heard them identify semi-automatic pistols as 'automatic weapons' and even 'assault weapons'. I have read pundits and politicians stating unequivocally that such pistols have "NO PURPOSE" except to commit crimes. I have heard the emotionally-laden buzzwords such as 'spray' and 'hose' with reference to rapid pistol fire, which certainly gives an indiscriminate concept to the shooting.

I have also heard about how this guy 'slipped through' the gun laws and that therefore they do not work; there appears to be a complete (intentional?) lack of understanding of how the FBI Instant Background Check system works and why it is the way it is. The man lacked a criminal conviction record as well as the type of mental instability resulting in detention that would have resulted in his being a 'hit' on the IBC. The man also violated the law when he filled out the mandatory form 4473, which under penalty of perjury attests that he is an unlawful user of (among other things) marijuana. That is the intent of the question; not to stop people who use marijuana from purchasing guns, but to ensure that if they do, they are committing a felony by so doing. This law was apparently violated as well. So the system worked as intended; it was not designed to be able to stop people from doing something terrible with the gun once they purchased it.

And finally, as you mentioned, it has not been mentioned that an armed citizen might well have been able to put a stop to this. However, I doubt we'll see it bandied around much; some would argue that if someone had been armed and opened fire, it might have become a bloodbath. Not that I think this would have happened, but I would expect to see this as an argument.

I often do Google News searches for instances of armed citizens defending themselves with guns from predators. One in particular was just a few days ago; a woman killed an armed intruder into her home who fired shots at her; she returned fire and killed the man.

I have yet to hear a cogent response from an anti-gun person as to what they would prefer to have happened. In their world, she would have been unarmed. The criminal, of course, would still have a gun; criminals tend not to obey laws (surprise!). Since the FBI says that most criminals get their guns illegally, there's no way to argue that the criminal also would have had a gun; so she just dies. And that's better for us how? No answer.
 

CoryKS

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Loughner’s gun, a 9-millimeter Glock, is extremely easy to fire over and over, and it can carry a 30-bullet clip. It is “not suited for hunting or personal protection,” said Paul Helmke, the president of the Brady Campaign. “What it’s good for is killing and injuring a lot of people quickly.”

Or the same guy, multiple times. Which, in the hands of anyone else at the gathering, would qualify as "personal protection" IMO.
 

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Guns are tools it the operator who makes it dangerous to others. If someone wants to hurt you or is crazy and wants to hurt a lot of people then there are ways to do that.

This was a tragic event but no one, that I have seen, has pointed out that if someone else was armed this could have ended quicker with the shooter being put down like the mad dog is apparently is.

My .02 only.
I don't know a lot about guns and I'm not in favor of banning them. That said, this is a genuine question. Didn't the heroes on that day take advantage of the pause to reload as an opportunity to jump the guy and pin him to the ground? A 30 round magazine seems a little over the top. Would any of you carry a semiautomatic pistol with an extended magazine for personal protection?
 

Steve

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And finally, as you mentioned, it has not been mentioned that an armed citizen might well have been able to put a stop to this. However, I doubt we'll see it bandied around much; some would argue that if someone had been armed and opened fire, it might have become a bloodbath. Not that I think this would have happened, but I would expect to see this as an argument.
If we're playing around with hypotheticals, an armed citizen might also have overreacted and shot additional innocents in the confusion. Or an armed citizen might have had the weapon taken from him or her and given the bad guy an additional loaded weapon with which to shoot more people. Or an armed citizen might have been shot by the police having been mistaken for the shooter. Any or all of these could also have happened. Really hard to say what might have happened, but it's easy to be an armchair QB.

It's times like this that the people who oppose guns use the bad guy to their advantage, and the people who are pro-gun tend to forget that guns aren't illegal, so someone could have carried a weapon. We don't know. It's very possible that someone did have a gun, but froze or just plain forgot about it. Ultimately, an armed person with an unknown amount of training and an unknown amount of experience is an x factor who could save the day or make things dramatically worse.
 
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Grenadier

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I don't know a lot about guns and I'm not in favor of banning them. That said, this is a genuine question. Didn't the heroes on that day take advantage of the pause to reload as an opportunity to jump the guy and pin him to the ground? A 30 round magazine seems a little over the top. Would any of you carry a semiautomatic pistol with an extended magazine for personal protection?

I routinely use extended magazines. A Glock 26 subcompact pistol can have its magazine capacity increased by two rounds, simply by using one of the factory +2 extenders, giving it a 12+1 capacity, instead of a 10+1 capacity.

For that matter, I know of a fair number of folks who buy special sleeve adapters that allow them to get a full handed grip on a Glock 26 when the adapter is fitted with a 15 round Glock 19 magazine, giving them a 15+1 capacity.

There are also many who use full size pistol magazines in their compact Glocks, giving their compact Glock 19 a 17+1 capacity when using a Glock 17 magazine, or their Glock 23 a 15+1 capacity when using a Glock 22 magazine. For that matter, the factory and distributors were selling refurbished compacts that came with two full size pistol magazines, back in the Assault Weapons Ban days.

I also have a few 33 round magazines that I keep around, in case of an incident the likes of the 1992 Los Angeles riots occurring again. While the chances are small that such a thing can occur, you never know when some repeat criminal loser high on PCP ends up causing another large scale event.

Despite my having possession of such magazines (in addition to numerous 30 round AR-15 magazines), none of my firearms were ever used in crimes, much less any of the magazines.

The magazine capacity isn't the issue. If the gunman magically decided not to use a 31 / 33 round magazine in his weapon, he would simply have carried a second weapon instead.

It's an operator issue, not an equipment one. Even if someone waved a magic wand and said "presto, no more guns allowed in law-abiding people's hands," the criminal would still have found a way to obtain one illegally. Failing that, he could have easily turned to deadlier methods (see the Bath School Massacre, where the deadliest school massacre of all time took place without guns being used).
 

Bill Mattocks

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I don't know a lot about guns and I'm not in favor of banning them. That said, this is a genuine question. Didn't the heroes on that day take advantage of the pause to reload as an opportunity to jump the guy and pin him to the ground? A 30 round magazine seems a little over the top. Would any of you carry a semiautomatic pistol with an extended magazine for personal protection?

These are reasonable questions, thanks. Let me see if I can answer them. It may sound like side-stepping, but I promise that's not my intent. I'll try to explain why I'm giving the answers I am giving as I go...

1) Wasn't the guy tackled whilst reloading?


Yes, he was. And it is more than reasonable to infer that had his magazine capacity been lower, he might have been tackled earlier. That's logical.

However, the question that is being asked here isn't *just* about magazine capacity. It's about restrictions on legal ownership, period. If one decides, for example, that a 30-round magazine is 'too much' for civilian ownership, then what is 'enough'? Who decides? Why? And what's to stop the NEXT shooting that occurs with a 10-round (or 5-round or 1-round) magazine to bring about the next call for smaller magazines?

So if I defend the right of citizens to own 30-round magazines, it is not that I think they have any particular use, nor any use that I would find compelling for myself, but that I see where such 'reasonable' restrictions end up and fear that.

2) Isn't a 30-round magazine a little over the top?

It depends very much on what value you put on legality. If something is legal to own, it is legal to own. How much or how large or any other value question is legitimate to ask, but not legitimate to demand that others adhere to. I could as easily approach a guy eating a Big Mac in McDonalds and say "Whoa there, big guy. Don't you think you could eat a smaller burger instead? Do you need all those french fries? I think that apple pie is a little over the top, don't you? How about that super-size Coke, I mean really?"

Then we get into the issue that the big guy in McDonalds isn't killing people. No, he's only costing us all money. Lots and lots and lots of money - in aggregate, more die from heart disease - and by a lot - than die from being shot by loonies. And the cost to society is huge, in money and in productivity and in lawsuits and so on and so forth. But we don't get involved in personal choices like that. Somehow, when it involves a gun, we feel as if we do have the right to get involved in deciding how much or how large of a legal item a person can have.

It's also true that this kind of argument immediately puts gun owners on the defensive to answer that exact question - why a 30-round magazine? What's wrong with restricting high-capacity magazines? What possible use would a law-abiding citizen have for a 30-round magazine? The truth is that these kinds of questions are designed (not by you) to engage gun-owners in ever-smaller circles of justification for this or for that particular item or device. I prefer a much more generic approach to such questions. My answer is "what business is it of yours (not you personally) to tell me how much or how large of ANY legal item I may own?" I do not hear anyone asking me why I need so many cameras, or lenses, or cars, or stuffed cats, and inferring that I have 'too many' and have 'no reason to have them'. Only with guns do we hear that question. The question itself is invalid for that reason.

I also note that the 30-round magazines were legal prior to the 'assault weapons ban' which expired in 2004. Prior to that time, there was no particular issue with high-capacity magazines (there was a notable shootout with police in LA, but I think many would agree that the criminals in that case would have used whatever they could get; they had illegal fully-automatic weapons as well as high-capacity magazines). And after 2004, we haven't had any episodes that I recall hearing about that involved high-capacity magazines; so here it is in 2011, nearly seven years later and we have one incident. And yes, it's a huge incident, and yes, it's a tragedy. But I think we'd have to agree that on balance, the overwhelming number of those 30-round magazines that have been presumably sold have NOT been used to commit atrocities.

3) Would any of you carry a pistol with an extended-round magazine?

No, I personally have no use for such things. But as I mentioned earlier, I feel I must defend the right to own WHATEVER size magazine on the basic premise that an attack on gun rights is an attack on gun rights, period.

Many of us gun-owners remember the bans on 'Saturday Night Specials' of years ago; some of those laws still exist. The idea was that cheap revolvers with short barrels were often used by criminals to commit crimes. So the question was asked, "What do decent law-abiding citizens want with a Saturday Night Special?" Many gun owners went along with this logic - after all, they did not personally have any use for a cheap short-nosed revolvers. But they soon found out to their chagrin that a) this law also meant poor people could no longer afford inexpensive home defense weapons, and b) the 'gun grabbers' were not satisfied with banning Saturday Night Specials and quickly reneged on all public promises that they would not ask for more restrictions if they got this one.

So although I have no use for a 30-round magazine in a pistol, I defend the right of law-abiding citizens to own them; and I don't think anyone has to explain their reason for wanting to own them, any more than you or I have to explain why we want a Big Mac instead of a cheeseburger. It's simply not a valid question to ask.
 

Bill Mattocks

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If we're playing around with hypotheticals, an armed citizen might also have overreacted and shot additional innocents in the confusion. Or an armed citizen might have had the weapon taken from him or her and given the bad guy an additional loaded weapon with which to shoot more people. Or an armed citizen might have been shot by the police having been mistaken for the shooter. Any or all of these could also have happened. Really hard to say what might have happened, but it's easy to be an armchair QB.

Yes, that's true and that is why I do not make that automatic statement that having an armed citizen in the crowd would have resulted in a positive outcome.

The same logic, of course, also means that it is reasonable to say that we cannot predict that the 30-round magazine was a major factor in the number of people shot; if the man had not had a 30-round magazine, he might have successfully reloaded a second smaller magazine; he might have carried more than one gun; or his high-cap magazine might have jammed (it didn't, but high-cap mags are known for jamming - we gun owners know this).

It's times like this that the people who oppose guns use the bad guy to their advantage, and the people who are pro-gun tend to forget that guns aren't illegal, so someone could have carried a weapon. We don't know. It's very possible that someone did have a gun, but froze or just plain forgot about it. Ultimately, an armed person with an unknown amount of training and an unknown amount of experience is an x factor who could save the day or make things dramatically worse.

It is also possible that were more than one legally-armed citizen in the crowd who evaluated the situation, realized they would not be able to return fire without endangering other innocent citizens and deciding not to draw or fire. There tends to be an assumption on the part of many non-gun owners that gun-owners are just itching to shoot someone. I think this is an invalid assumption. The fact that licensed concealed-carry gun owners commit a far, far, lower percentage of crimes with guns than the rest of the population I think lends credence to the notion that by and large, people who carry legally are smarter about guns than most of the rest of the population; they tend to know when a gun is and is NOT the solution to a given problem.

I own hammers. I don't automatically think the best solution to every problem is to hit it with a hammer.
 

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Interesting posts, Bill and Grenadier.

I own guns, I'm not really in favor of gun control as it's understood beyond some obvious common sense controls, and I'm not in favor of banning extended magazines for all the reasons you both state.

This issue did get me thinking about dividing lines. One commentator explored this issue, and got into the banning of "plastic" guns and AP rounds ("cop killer bullets") in the 80's. Interestingly, the votes to ban both were overwhelming - Dick Cheney was only one of 4 "no" votes in the House on the plastic guns one. Even the NRA eventually endorsed the ban.

Personally, I would tend to favor the ban on non-metallic guns for basic security reasons, and disfavor the AP round ban, although I'm not really committed on either. Where would you both fall on these old bans? What arguments would you use? Where do you think the reasonable compromise line should be between "Nuclear Weapons for all!" and "Not even harsh words for all!"?
 

Bill Mattocks

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Interesting posts, Bill and Grenadier.

I own guns, I'm not really in favor of gun control as it's understood beyond some obvious common sense controls, and I'm not in favor of banning extended magazines for all the reasons you both state.

This issue did get me thinking about dividing lines. One commentator explored this issue, and got into the banning of "plastic" guns and AP rounds ("cop killer bullets") in the 80's. Interestingly, the votes to ban both were overwhelming - Dick Cheney was only one of 4 "no" votes in the House on the plastic guns one. Even the NRA eventually endorsed the ban.

Personally, I would tend to favor the ban on non-metallic guns for basic security reasons, and disfavor the AP round ban, although I'm not really committed on either. Where would you both fall on these old bans? What arguments would you use? Where do you think the reasonable compromise line should be between "Nuclear Weapons for all!" and "Not even harsh words for all!"?

Excellent questions. My thanks to all for keeping this thread more-or-less civil!

I realize that there are all sorts of responses to the question you ask 'what is reasonable gun control' if I may paraphrase.

Personally, I accept that no right is absolute; but the usual and generally-accepted rationale for infringing on what would otherwise be a civil right is a direct, clear, and immediate deadly danger to others, or a direct infringement on the civil rights of others.

I suspect, but cannot prove, that the reason some types of gun regulations get bipartisan approval and others do not has more to do with the zeitgeist and political expediency than with the regulation in question.

With regard to plastic-framed guns; I am against banning them. I do not believe that an immediate, clear, and direct threat has been shown. The same for bullets which can penetrate body armor - the so-called 'cop killers' (By the way, what politician would be in favor of 'cop killer' anything?). Words have power. Label a thing and you've gone a long way towards shaping public opinion your way.

I can't say I have a strong opinion one way or another on things like fully-automatic weapons and silencers and short-barreled weapons. Most of these things were banned due to public perception that they were commonly used by gangsters of the time (1930's) and that the criminals so armed were 'outgunning' the police. Was there a problem amongst everyday citizens using 'machine guns'? I don't know. I don't think so, though.

The same could be said for those who purchased guns of all kinds directly through the mail. Until the assassination of President Kennedy, which was committed by a man armed with a surplus rifle he purchased via mail-order. Such sales were banned, but really, were they an issue prior to the assassination? Did they stop people from trying to assassinate presidents? Did the ban really make any difference? The gun used was not known as a high-quality weapon, nor was it very difficult to find much better rifles for little money locally; it would appear to have been a matter of price or convenience for the assassin. What did banning mail order weapons do? What problem did it solve?

On the other hand, I am uncomfortable with the idea of legal hand grenades and rocket launchers; I admit it. And yes, I realize that is contrary to my overall belief in infringing on civil liberties without a direct, immediate, and clear danger to others. I will live with the fact that I harbor some hypocrisy in my beliefs on this matter.

My opinions on this issue are informed to a great extent by a book I read some years ago; "Unintended Consequences," by John Ross.
 
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Grenadier

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This issue did get me thinking about dividing lines. One commentator explored this issue, and got into the banning of "plastic" guns and AP rounds ("cop killer bullets") in the 80's. Interestingly, the votes to ban both were overwhelming - Dick Cheney was only one of 4 "no" votes in the House on the plastic guns one. Even the NRA eventually endorsed the ban.

The ban on "cop killer bullets" would have banned almost every kind of centerfire rifle ammunition, since virtually any centerfire rifle ammunition will launch a bullet that can easily punch through soft body armor. This includes virtually all centerfire cartridges that any hunter would use. The gun-grabbers basically got caught in a lie, since they had asserted that they wouldn't interfere with hunting, sporting, etc.

Furthermore, the infamous "KTW" bullet that used a bronze (and later, tungsten) core, that also had a teflon coating, was never issued to the general public. If anything, I have yet to see a single incident of a police officer dying from a KTW bullet penetrating his vest... If someone can find an example, I'll gladly stand corrected.

This is why such an all-encompassing ban is silly, since too many people believe the hype, and don't look into the facts of the matter.

As for the "plastic gun ban," that was a non-existent issue as well. The anti-gun crowd got into a frenzy once they "heard" about a gun that was made out of plastic, which was the Glock pistol.

As a result, the anti-gun crowd asserted that anyone could take one of these guns onto a plane, since they wouldn't be detectable by a metal detector.

The reality?

A Glock pistol has a carbon steel slide that gives it most of its weight. There is no way that you can take a pound of carbon steel through a metal detector, period, as long as the detector is working. The anti-gun crowd ignored this fact, and continued to assert the fallacies.

Only the frame / receiver of a Glock pistol (or any polymer framed pistol) is made of a polymer material, and even if you tried to take it through a metal detector, the integrated steel parts in the frame have plenty of mass to trigger a metal detector.

There is no way you can bring a Glock frame or slide, through a metal detector, plain and simple. No way.

Nobody makes a functional handgun that's made without metal. There simply aren't any materials out there that can do the job of steel. The barrel (which holds the chamber) has to be able to take tens of thousands of PSI or copper crush pressure units, and if you were to try to make a barrel out of polymers, it would simply rupture.

Furthermore, the ammunition itself would easily trigger a metal detector. If you tried to take a single 9 mm cartridge through, it would trigger the alarm. Those who assert that you can manufacture bullets out of ceramic or other non-metallic materials should read a few materials science texts.

As stated previously, a non-metal barrel wouldn't be able to contain the explosion that comes from the propellant. Second, even if the barrel could withstand such pressures, a hard ceramic bullet is not going to be able to expand to properly seal the bore, resulting in a very dangerous situation for the shooter. In addition to this, the frictional aspect, and many, many other factors, make this a moot issue.

When it comes down to it, there are simply no substitutes for metal for various critical components.

These days, there are many models of polymer framed pistols on the market, such as the Glock, the HK USP, the Sig 2xxx series, the Smith and Wesson M&P, the Ruger P95 and P97, the Ruger SR9, and so forth. Any of these guns would have been banned under the "plastic gun" law, even though none of them can do what the anti-gun crowd asserted that they could do.

Personally, I would tend to favor the ban on non-metallic guns for basic security reasons
At this point, I consider such bans to be similar to wanting to ban disintegration rays and lightsabers. It simply isn't going to happen.

on these old bans? What arguments would you use? Where do you think the reasonable compromise line should be between "Nuclear Weapons for all!" and "Not even harsh words for all!"?
Again, those are non-issues. Most people aren't going be able to legally afford a nuclear weapon. Even if one could, what defensive use is it? You would simply blow yourself up along with the home invader. If someone had that much money, he could certainly invest it in other security issues, such as hiring a private army, etc.

Criminals will find armaments regardless of what restrictions are in place.

My proposal is this: leave the law-abiding folks alone. Lawful gun owners are much less likely to commit crimes, since they do not have felonies on their records, are not users illegal substances, are not members of subversive organizations, etc.

If you want to nail someone, then punish those who commit the crimes. They don't obey the laws anyways, so why punish the law-abiding folks?
 
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Bill Mattocks

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If you want to nail someone, then punish those who commit the crimes. They don't obey the laws anyways, so why punish the law-abiding folks?

Agreed. One might as well argue that no one needs to own a car that exceeds the speed limit; what use could it possibly have? Therefore ban it. We don't do that, however. What we do instead is punish those who speed, and let people own whatever type of car they wish to own.

I have heard people say "What on earth would you want with a car like that?" I have not yet heard anyone say, "I don't think you should be allowed to own a car that can go faster than the speed limit." But they feel free to state that people should not be allowed to own a gun that does not have a purpose they find acceptable.
 

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Again, those are non-issues. Most people aren't going be able to legally afford a nuclear weapon. Even if one could, what defensive use is it? You would simply blow yourself up along with the home invader. If someone had that much money, he could certainly invest it in other security issues, such as hiring a private army, etc.

Respectfully, I don't think you're really answering my questions or the overall thrust of the post. I'm not really interested in the particulars of making a polymer gun, I'm more interested in your philosophical thoughts on gun control. Saying "well, no one could afford a nuclear weapon, or if they could they could hire an army" dodges the question. If you do not believe there should be any limits on what sort of weapon a person should own, please say so and state your rationale - that is more interesting to me.

Also saying that law-abiding owners aren't a problem also dodges the issue for several reasons. First of all, the restrictions you presumably oppose define who is and who is not a law abiding gun owner. It sort of becomes tautological. Second, the rate may be small, but legally purchased guns are used to commit crimes. With handguns it isn't really a concern, but as we go up the destruction scale we eventually reach a point where even one ill person with access to something really destructive can wreak havoc. Plus, if large weapon systems were freely available, then clearly the "non-law abiding" people out there can purchase them too, with attendant collateral damage.
 

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On the other hand, I am uncomfortable with the idea of legal hand grenades and rocket launchers; I admit it. And yes, I realize that is contrary to my overall belief in infringing on civil liberties without a direct, immediate, and clear danger to others. I will live with the fact that I harbor some hypocrisy in my beliefs on this matter.

I agree with all of your points, particularly the historical reasons for banning certain things but not others, in a not-particularly-rational manner. I remember the same sort of thinking when shuriken and nunchaku were banned in certain places.

I don't think having a line of reasonableness makes you a hypocrite, nor that every principle must be binary. We can combine principled thinking with utilitarian analysis on harm. It seems to me that eventually you will reach a point with certain weapons that even if the person owning them intends no harm, the potential for accidents, thefts or unforeseen problems leading to use of the weapon will have such a negative effect on surrounding people, that regulation becomes reasonable.

Consider: I'm a researcher in a BSL4 microbiology lab. Should it be legal for me to take home highly virulent strains of some disease, like smallpox say? I intend no harm, and I only want to keep it in my freezer. I present no immediate threat to anyone. Yet, if by chance something were to happen, the results would be catastrophic. It seems pretty reasonable to forbid me a weapon like that, even though the chances are small. The downside is too big. You could look at it as infringing on those around me, taking chances with their safety I have no right to take.

Of course, this is all in principle. Defining exactly where this line should lie in practice is difficult, and subject to immense political pressures and irrational thinking. I should state again so it's clear that I'm not in favor of most gun control, and I don't think any small arms currently available would fall past this line. Probably not most of those banned either, such as fully automatic rifles. Just not that big a problem, really.
 

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Yes, that's true and that is why I do not make that automatic statement that having an armed citizen in the crowd would have resulted in a positive outcome.
The only reason I posted a response is because you specifically implied that an armed citizen would have made a positive difference. You also made it very clear that you think the media is intentionally burying this. I was just pointing out that hypotheticals can go either way, that you're being a monday morning quarterback, and that the media is, in my opinion, correct to not post fiction.
The same logic, of course, also means that it is reasonable to say that we cannot predict that the 30-round magazine was a major factor in the number of people shot; if the man had not had a 30-round magazine, he might have successfully reloaded a second smaller magazine; he might have carried more than one gun; or his high-cap magazine might have jammed (it didn't, but high-cap mags are known for jamming - we gun owners know this).
Exactly. We could go back and forth indefinitely if we're creative enough, although I'd probably throw ninjas in pretty shortly. I like ninjas in my make believe stories. :)
It is also possible that were more than one legally-armed citizen in the crowd who evaluated the situation, realized they would not be able to return fire without endangering other innocent citizens and deciding not to draw or fire. There tends to be an assumption on the part of many non-gun owners that gun-owners are just itching to shoot someone. I think this is an invalid assumption. The fact that licensed concealed-carry gun owners commit a far, far, lower percentage of crimes with guns than the rest of the population I think lends credence to the notion that by and large, people who carry legally are smarter about guns than most of the rest of the population; they tend to know when a gun is and is NOT the solution to a given problem.
That was my second point. How do we know how many armed citizens were there? You're presuming that there were none because no one drew a weapon. We really don't know. Guns ARE legal. It's not as though people in AZ aren't allowed to carry them legally.
I own hammers. I don't automatically think the best solution to every problem is to hit it with a hammer.
I agree.
 

Steve

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I routinely use extended magazines. A Glock 26 subcompact pistol can have its magazine capacity increased by two rounds, simply by using one of the factory +2 extenders, giving it a 12+1 capacity, instead of a 10+1 capacity.

For that matter, I know of a fair number of folks who buy special sleeve adapters that allow them to get a full handed grip on a Glock 26 when the adapter is fitted with a 15 round Glock 19 magazine, giving them a 15+1 capacity.

There are also many who use full size pistol magazines in their compact Glocks, giving their compact Glock 19 a 17+1 capacity when using a Glock 17 magazine, or their Glock 23 a 15+1 capacity when using a Glock 22 magazine. For that matter, the factory and distributors were selling refurbished compacts that came with two full size pistol magazines, back in the Assault Weapons Ban days.

I also have a few 33 round magazines that I keep around, in case of an incident the likes of the 1992 Los Angeles riots occurring again. While the chances are small that such a thing can occur, you never know when some repeat criminal loser high on PCP ends up causing another large scale event.

Despite my having possession of such magazines (in addition to numerous 30 round AR-15 magazines), none of my firearms were ever used in crimes, much less any of the magazines.

The magazine capacity isn't the issue. If the gunman magically decided not to use a 31 / 33 round magazine in his weapon, he would simply have carried a second weapon instead.

It's an operator issue, not an equipment one. Even if someone waved a magic wand and said "presto, no more guns allowed in law-abiding people's hands," the criminal would still have found a way to obtain one illegally. Failing that, he could have easily turned to deadlier methods (see the Bath School Massacre, where the deadliest school massacre of all time took place without guns being used).
Good points and I think you answered my question pretty well. Your point that resonates most is that he could simply have carried two guns. I get that and it makes sense. :)
 

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However, the question that is being asked here isn't *just* about magazine capacity. It's about restrictions on legal ownership, period. If one decides, for example, that a 30-round magazine is 'too much' for civilian ownership, then what is 'enough'? Who decides? Why? And what's to stop the NEXT shooting that occurs with a 10-round (or 5-round or 1-round) magazine to bring about the next call for smaller magazines?

So if I defend the right of citizens to own 30-round magazines, it is not that I think they have any particular use, nor any use that I would find compelling for myself, but that I see where such 'reasonable' restrictions end up and fear that.
Unless you're a strict libertarian, the question isn't whether we limit personal liberties or not. It's what we limit and what we don't. The rest is debate.

Frankly, Grenadier's post makes sense. I'm not sure I buy it completely, but I see where you guys are coming from.

Just want to add one more question. When you guys refer to crime, are you including gun related injury and homocide? Not necessarily murder, but all of the guns that are involved in accidental injury and death. I'm not a cop, so I'm probably off base here. But, when you shoot your hunting buddy or a kid shoots his friend with his dad's gun, is there a crime involved there? I checked the CDC website and there are about 30k gun related homocides per year. Didn't dig too deep, and I'm sure that many are accidental, which is why I'm asking.
 
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Carol

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A large percentage of "gun death" stats are suicides.

That's actually something that get many in the anti-gun crowd fired up, with the implication that the suicide wouldn't happen if the gun wasn't around.

Unfortunately the same sort of statistics lump all suicides together as mechanical acts, without regard to who was suffering from a mental illness. I think this pains a disingenuous picture of suicide. The "guns in the house = suicide" rationality IMO tends to underscore this depiction, which I do not like one bit.
 

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