<p>
That makes sense to me since there are probably a lot more insurance payouts due to trampoline injuries than gun injuries in the home. I’m just guessing this. Trampolines can be dangerous!</p>
<p>A big part of Chicago’s gun problem is the easy access to guns in neighboring Indiana. Multiple gun shows in Lake County even make a waiting period obsolete. </p>
<p>I am a gun owner but I still believe we can have some sort of gun control. I think all guns should require registration, mandatory ballistics tests every five years, and a database that tracks sales of ammunition (no more difficult than tracking sudafed). I did not have to declare for my homeowners insurance about my weapons, but I would agree to it, including higher premiums if I haven’t had a gun safety class, trigger locks and secure storage. </p>
<p>The gun violence that has been part of my life has been from friends murdering each other in a drunken dispute, murder suicide over breakups and custody battles and accidental firearms death of a neighbor that killed a 4yo. They all had guns purchased legally but the accidental death could have been prevented with basic gun safety. </p>
<p>I think the pro-gun people need to realize that we can reduce some violence by inconveniencing some of us, and the anti-gun lobby needs to bend from bans to cooperation. The anti-gun side is trying to do that (at least the Brady people) but I don’t see the NRA doing anything other than the same old party line.</p>
<p>Missbee, I own two guns, and completely agree with you.</p>
<p>"
We were in a Walmart last night where they sold rifles and handguns. It was shocking and repulsive to me.
I’m amazed that anyone would be shocked by this. Well, I’m not surprised that some big city dwellers might find it at least surprising."</p>
<p>Well, I’m a northern, urban girl.</p>
<p>ramius, so maybe it’s not “bullet-spewing,” but is a 99-shot magazine big or not? I still haven’t heard anybody defend the availability of a magazine like that to the public. Are you up to the challenge?</p>
<p>Also, I keep hearing that somebody who is planning mass murder won’t be stopped by weapons restrictions. I just don’t get that logic–does that mean that keeping sarin gas, RPGs and neutron bombs out of Wal-Mart is futile? Perhaps what this guy really wanted to do was shoot up a showing of the new Batman movie–and he would have gone ahead and done it even if he’d only been able to get a couple of Glocks. But maybe he wouldn’t have killed as many people.</p>
<p>
You think you can build a church without getting a building permit, and insurance? You think somebody is going to give you a newspaper for free so you can exert your freedom of the press? I would argue that a “well-regulated militia” should have appropriate insurance, so my suggestion is entirely in keeping with the Second Amendment.</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>NH is northern though only urban in a few places. But the WalMarts near me carry guns. I’ll have to check the next time in in MA if they sell them there too.</p>
<p>
It’s understandable then that you found it surprising and perhaps didn’t realize what the norm is in many parts of the country - most parts. Isn’t hunting pretty big in northern MN?</p>
<p>I don’t shop at Walmart but I’m not surprised they carry some guns and I don’t see that it matters. If someone wants to buy a gun and Walmart didn’t have them then they’d just go to Big-5 or another sporting goods type of store or a gun store. I think the Walmart stores in the smaller town and more rural areas try to have a little bit of everything the locals would want to buy, don’t they?</p>
<p>My experience growing up in the west is similar to what GladDadGrad describes. There were guns everywhere, specifically hunting rifles. No, we did not live in a rural area bit in a metro area of 600,000 residents. Gun racks visible in the rear windshields of pick up trucks was a common and unremarked upon sight. In those days Kmart sold rifles, other sporting goods stores and maybe even Sears, did the same.</p>
<p>Now that you mention it, I think that the local Sports Authority carries guns too.</p>
<p>I don’t think our local WalMart carries “real guns” anymore. They have BB guns, etc but not like .22 rifles or anything like that. But they do sell ammo. I know several sporting goods stores in St. Louis carry some and there is at least one gun store here in town.</p>
<p>“The Amendments to the Constitution are not completely unfettered. If they were, then we would have the right to bear nuclear arms.”</p>
<p>Bear with me: if I understand the framers correctly, their intent was that you WOULD have the right to bear nuclear arms, but the right to small caliber handguns would be unclear. Why? Unlike state constitutions, the Second Amendment didn’t have anything to do with individual self-defense, but people’s ability to resist the encroachment of their own government. While we can debate the comma after the clause about the militia, the reality of the time was that the militia was the force by which individuals, banding together, resisted and ultimately defeated the British, their own government.</p>
<p>Handguns, and most hunting rifles, and most lower powered firearms would be useless against the U.S. government, either as deterrent against encroachment or in actual resistance. A suitcase nuke, a laser-aimed missile, a high-powered tank would be more in keeping with the intent of the framers.</p>
<p>(I don’t want to give Walmart any ideas…;))</p>
<p>Justice Scalia on free speech: “the more speech, the better”. “So long as the people know where the speech is coming from,” Justice Scalia said. [Justice</a> Scalia on free speech (somewhere in the middle)(The New York Times)](<a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/19/us/politics/justice-scalia-says-he-had-no-falling-out-with-chief-justice-roberts.html]Justice”>Justice Scalia Says He Had No ‘Falling Out’ With Chief Justice Roberts - The New York Times)</p>
<p>We can have guns, so long as the people know who have guns within 1000 yards of them. Will he agree with that?</p>
<p>I live in a rural area now and most people I know who are locals own guns. Many especially for hunting. A lot of people go hunting.It is very very popular here. The walmarts all sell rifles, they sell pretty much everything. lol. i grew up in a HUGE city and the only people I knew who had guns were cops. Rarely, I would see a gang member/thug etc, with a gun holstered on to his clothing, in some extra sketchy neighborhoods. Violent crime where a gun was used, illegally purchesed most often, was a daily occurance. I can see how walmarts selling guns and the huge ownership of them in rural areas would be suprising to big city dwellers, although it is kind of ironic depending on what city you are comming from…</p>
<p>I hope this link works as it will give a bit of an idea of the laws and restriction in Canada for firearms. They are not perfect by any means but I think do give a bit more control.</p>
<p>[Guns</a> used in Colorado theatre shooting legal in Canada - *News - MSN CA](<a href=“http://news.ca.msn.com/top-stories/guns-used-in-colorado-theatre-shooting-legal-in-canada#scptid]Guns”>http://news.ca.msn.com/top-stories/guns-used-in-colorado-theatre-shooting-legal-in-canada#scptid)</p>
<p>I grew up in a small town in one of the far northern midwestern states. Hunting was a large part of the area culture. The yearly state teacher’s convention was held during the week of deer season, partly because a large majority of the boys would have missed school that week anyway for the season. Deer and bird carcasses were hung in yards. We owned guns and compound bows. I’ve done my fair share of hunting in my life. People there own land and second “homes”, not at the beach, but in the middle of nowhere, on small lakes where the ducks and geese can be found, and in deer rich woods.</p>
<p>And yet, gun safety is paramount there. Kids take classes on gun safety. Parents, grandparents, uncles, family friends: everyone teaches safety above all. Almost every home had a gun or two or five in it, but I don’t know of a single gun related injury. It just didn’t happen. </p>
<p>Where I live now, every single day there is a report of a shooting in either of the two cities to the north or south of me. It is almost always from easily concealed handguns. It is purposeful human on human carnage.</p>
<p>We tend to talk past one another in our conversations about the second amendment and gun control. Hunters and sport shooters in small towns and rural areas do not necessarily have the same life view and gun view as urban dwellers who read about innocent babies caught in the crossfire.</p>
<p>I have only been scanning this thread since it turned into a gun control debate but I just want to weigh in on part of the issue, as I see it. Gun control doesn’t mean a gun ban.</p>
<p>Why can’t we separate the wants and needs of the average sportsman from the wants an needs of the individual with ill intent? Personally, I hate the idea of hunting but I realize, as a reasonable individual, that others enjoy it and as long as it it is done responsibly, well, fine.
I also agree that we should enjoy the right to bear arms for self protection.</p>
<p>Why can’t those opportunities remain while, at the same time, gun control exist? Why is it that any gang member, psychopath or angry husband go into a gun show in the US and buy a gun or several guns without a background check or a waiting period?</p>
<p>There was a letter in the Washington Post today stealing my idea of liability insurance for gun purchases.</p>
<p>mini–there are at least a few states (Oregon I think is one) that have either a justification or defense that allows a citizen to use appropriate levels of force in response to excessive/lethal force by even authorities. </p>
<p>hunt–would you at least consider that LCMs would have been appropriate in shooting at the Philly Police helicopter being used to bomb the building with the MOVE people inside? Any willingness to assess in light of a Ruby Ridge situation?</p>
<p>You can’t have governmental control legislated by the government if the entire purpose of the 2nd Amendment was to enable people to protect themselves from the encroachments of that government.</p>
<p>(Has nothing to do with hunting, self-defense, etc. etc. I do understand that state governments have different rationales for gun ownership, but they don’t have anything to do with the 2nd Amendment. And, yes, personal nuclear weapons would be strictly protected.)</p>
<p>“Why can’t we separate the wants and needs of the average sportsman from the wants an needs of the individual with ill intent?”</p>
<p>Because the sportsman is not protected by the 2nd Amendment, but the wants and needs of the individual with ill intent against the government is.</p>
<p>mini-- my point is that in addition to the 2nd amendment right of citizens to possess, some states have circumstances where the use of the arms does not constitute a crime.</p>
<p>Nothing in the 2nd Amendment protects the user of the arms against the government–or do you see something I don’t?</p>