(02-27-2019 11:59 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(02-27-2019 11:49 PM)Rice93 Wrote:  

(02-27-2019 11:32 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(02-27-2019 11:12 PM)Rice93 Wrote:  

(02-27-2019 10:54 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I wouldn't focus on the guns in any event. I'd focus on the people who use them. But if I were going to focus on guns, I'd at least focus on the guns that kill more people.

I think there is focus on the guns because they are tangible. "Focus on the people" sounds sort of of like politicians who say "We need to focus on mental health" when the gun debate is reignited. They have no actual approaches to mental health, but I guess it sounds good to say it.
How would you focus on the people who use them?

Scatter shooting, but here are a few ideas.
A gun license with a training program, written and demonstration tests, and linked to the criminal database. You can't buy or possess guns or ammo without it.
Stiffer sentences for gun criminals. Something like a 10 year tack-on for using a gun to commit a crime.
Revision of the HIPAA privacy rules to facilitate exchange of mental health information about truly dangerous people..
I frankly think that the thing that would probably have the biggest impact o gun deaths would be legalization of marijuana. You pull a revenue source away from gangs, and free up officers to go after those gangs. Plus you free up prison cells so gun criminals can be kept off the streets longer.
So I've responded to your question, how about responding to mine? Why do gun control activists focus all their efforts on a gun that kills a minuscule number of people?

I love your proposals. The NRA would call you a threat to the American way of life with that first one, though.
I think activists focus so much on these "AR-15 equivalent" weapons (dont @ me, Tanq) because those are the ones we see used during the horrific school shootings. I also think that gun control activists have a hard time understanding why citizens need to ability to fire off multiple rounds in a short time. They see these types of weapons as low-hanging fruit that more people are likely to see as worth regulating. It also probably has to do with a general lack of understanding of the nuts-and-bolts of the various weapons as Tanq pointed out (and I clearly fall into this category).

I don't think the NRA would be as opposed as you think. For one, they'd be making the money running the training programs. For another, a lot of them already ave CCL's so they are already enrolled in something very similar.

As for your second point, the thing that I find painfully apparent is that most gun control advocates know absolutely nothing about guns.

As for school shootings, Columbine occurred during the prior "assault weapons ban," and the worst ever (Virginia Tech) was with pistols (which I think actually make more sense for mass shootings, as if anything about mass shootings could ever make any sense).

The NRA opposes the use of federal money to even study gun violence. In what world do you think that they would be OK with a massive uptick in the stringency of gun licensing?