Oly Doug: only problem with such a law would be that it would scare law-abiding citizens from protecting themselves against someone who has a gun. Look at some of the crazy examples of where someone breaks into a home and is shot by the owner just to be found guilty of shooting someone who may have been unarmed. But even an unarmed burglar could be very strong and easily overpower the home owner and even grab a kitchen knife...or not...who knows in the dark...so how is a person supposed to defend him/herself from an intruder that could very well kill them if they are afraid that they may get sentenced to death by a government that has such fickle laws? I believe that if everyone knew that every citizen was armed and knew how to use them there would be far less confidence on the part of a would be intruder to break into anyone's home. That alone would be a very big deterrent to break ins...to home robberies. But see..criminals don't want the people armed..they want easy prey. The criminals can always get guns illegally and they know that the system works in their favor...by disarming their victims in advance.

It is also not unheard of that politicians ... DAs... Judges... Governors.. have in the past.. sent innocent people to prison and even a death penalty all based on political expediency. Innocent people have been set up and murdered by the state... because of crooked politicians and law enforcement people. While many law enforcement people have gunned down people in the streets and gotten away with it.

If you are going to impose such laws on the people then impose them on the police...impose them on the military who mass murders civilians. Those people, by the way, set the example don't they....those people get away with killing with impunity and are called heroes. And our movies and media hype them up to be the examples that our young people follow.

No wonder this country is going downhill. It won't be long until this country is just another 2-bit dictatorship banana Republic with right-wing death squads disappearing people. If those citizens in those South American countries, all had weapons to match the right-wing death squads, and knew how to use them, there would not have been right-wing death squads or a two-bit dictator. A civil war maybe...but at least the hundreds of thousands of civilians wouldn't have died like helpless slaughtered sheep.

Thank you 2950-10k for the news on the Robin Hood Tax..taxing Wall Street...about time...but:

Quote Reuters article:Critics of the tax say the law it would decrease the volume of financial transactions on Wall Street, prompting companies to move overseas, taking jobs and money with them.

With the passage of a financial transaction tax "thousands of high-paying jobs would leave the U.S., sharply reducing employment at hundreds of non-financial companies that depend on these customers," the conservative Heritage Foundation said in a report released earlier this year.

Same old song!...I think we should call them on it..but before we do...we should set an example and string up any top executives who threatens to send their company overseas. They are traitors anyway! String the bastards up! Ok, maybe "string 'em up" is a little bit too vigilantist...maybe we need to smarten up and stop buying all those goods from US companies who are located overseas. Are you listening all you iphone owners out there? You can buy from foreign companies as long as they aren't owned by US companies...or producing goods for US companies.

Thom Hartmann ~ Your study of ratio between guns and gun violence is flawed. It does not take into account illegal gun ownership. The fact of the matter is that the higher the gun crime rate the more people who seek to own guns to defend themselves. These legally purchased guns are counted, black market guns are--at best--estimated. Worsening economic and social conditions drive up the illegal gun ownership exponentially. That figure is unknown. Therefore it is the increase in the gun crime rate that causes the increase in gun ownership and not the increase in gun ownership that causes the increase in the gun crime rate.

Gun control will do nothing to reduce gun crime. Regulating the manufacture of guns and the disposal of illegal street guns will. We also have to address the underlying economic motives for gun crimes. Without addressing that gun crime will never go away.

Where the hell is this confiscation of guns, "disarmament," proposal? I've never heard of it!

Thank goodness for the real patriots who stood up for us all on Wall Street today. Wish I could have been there. The Occupy Movement is right on target with their Robin Hood tax.....a tax on financial transactions.

Quote Mike-C: Somehow, I don’t think most of these recent perpetrators would have used the gun’s predecessor, a sword or knife – no, that’s too…”face to face”, shall I say. A bomb, perhaps? Hmm…I don’t think so, too complicated to make for most mentally unstable folks.

Well, there sure were some crazy perpetrators in other countries...like China (where guns are banned)..that burst into a school and managed to murder quite a few children and teachers...all with a knife!

And if a crazy wanted to do some real mass murders then he doesn't need semi-automatics or any kind of gun...they can use other forms of mass killing like gasoline..are they going to ban gasoline? Other people might have the talent for making chemical or biological weapons (some are not really that hard to make)...maybe they should ban all of the potential ingredients before it's too late? Of course lots of universities would have a much harder time procuring those things for whatever educational lab work they require.

Better ban fertilizer and keep farmers from stockpiling them because explosives can be made from them...(eg: OKC Federal building and the first WTC basement bombing).

Guns don't kill people, people kill people...and not always with guns. Take away the guns and they'll just move on to more lethal forms of killing. What the heck...eh? If our government can murder millions of people...they sure set an example don't they?

What we really should be doing is taking away the guns and other armaments from our military and quasi-military (ie: our police) before you even think about taking them away from the people.

If all law-abiding citizens carried guns then those who would dare try anything crooked would be justly dealt with. And that would scare the crap out of the would be criminals. It makes a lot of sense that someone will think twice about pulling a gun on you if you have a gun to shoot back. But if you are an easy target...well...lots of criminals just love that don't they?

Most of the prominent big-time crime is done by the 1% anyway. Just look at our economy. And don't try to point to Wall Street numbers...they are all contrived and manipulated. They don't represent what is really happening in the US today to the majority of people who have had their homes stolen from them, or from people who don't have decent health care (and Obama Care is not the answer..it is yet another scheme by gangsters and our government to herd the people (cattle) down the death chute.

Palindromedary/Loren Bliss ~ Very astute observations indeed. We cannot give up our guns. We cannot allow ourselves to be persuaded by this ploy to disarm us. Loren, your suggestion that the assault on mental institutions was intended to provide cause for disarmament is very sound. Actually, the thought has frequently occurred to me as well--starting with the day I learned Reagan opened the asylum doors. It was, after all, the only logical explanation for the action.

You are both right that the prudent course of action would be to insure that we remain ever vigilant. Therefore, the logical approach to addressing this problem would be to attack the underlying cause--lack of comprehensive free public healthcare for all who need it. We must drive that point home over all the anti-gun rhetoric. We must protect the individual and society at the same time. Above all we must protect our Constitutional rights.

GUN CONTROL IS A RED HERRING!!

Bravo! Loren Bliss! Very well said, indeed! How can anyone trust a government that has a long history of "murder, inc" enough to voluntarily give up their weapons? How can anyone trust a government that punishes whistle blowers? How can anyone trust a government that has a massive program to spy on every one of us all the time?

There sure is a very strong push by the 1% to disarm the 99%. And they will stop at nothing to accomplish their goal. They are ruthless, deceitful bastards that are steering the masses into absolute slavery. And an awful lot of the 99% have been fooled again and again by this 1%.

There is reason to doubt the causes behind many of these shootings. Let us not forget MKULTRA, the Manchurian Candidate (even though it was just a movie) was based on reality. You didn't think our government just stopped programs like MKULTRA, and others, did you?

Maybe many people haven't been paying attention...look at our economy and where it is headed...the US is many, many trillions of dollars in debt...the derivatives have made it impossible for anything but a horrendous future...the capitalist pigs have played out their last cards and the only thing left is to make sure that a good size of our population is destroyed. Disarming the population will help them accomplish their goals. Their wars help in that endeavor but it is not enough for them to accomplish their goals.

The path to absolute control of the masses is to disarm them all. Then the starving and sickly masses will have no resolve or means to fight back. It will be too late! This nightmare scenario is now being played out and it is time for us all to wake up and fight any erosion of our rights to bear arms.

We read history and think those awful things can only have happened way back then...when film was still pretty much in black and white. Couldn't happen here? I think that one day will come when those who were against gun ownership will wish they hadn't been so obsequious and gullible.

Geraldine you are so right the mentally ill used to be in institutions, and now they are all pushing shopping carts on our streets. I think the Meds are the problem. When I was little and bad I got a smack or even a belt on my butt. Now they pump them up with Ritalin. I wonder what percentage of these mass shootings, the shooters where on percription meds.

IF this is the FIRST TIME a BLACK man has done a massacre and whites were killed

PERHAPS the FEAR FACTOR will work and make Whites FEARFUL of GUNS. !???

without background check etc etc......

I think this is a turning point and copy cats will follow BEWARE>>>>>>>>>>> I TOLD YOU

By the way, Aaron Alexis was a practicing Buddhist and a friend and coworker that said that Aaron was way out of character on this violent action. He had been "like a brother" to her but that he did tell her that he was being cheated out of something by the system...he had PTSD and wasn't getting the care he needed. And there are a lot of former military people who are suffering from PTSD or many other traumas from the military that aren't being adequately addressed. Time bombs waiting to go off!

America loves their Guns Maybe its the Wild West mentality.. Maybe its fear America has always had a love affair with GUNS. . Maybe if we could get rid of gangs, we would feel safer. IN cities like Chicago and ,LA Thats a huge factor. When I grew up in Chicago It was never like this . Kids are shot every weekend .now. Some neighborhhoods are full of gangs . Areas where I grew up are now crime & drug ridden ghettos. And there were plenty of poor folks back then . but they did not kill.. .When I grew up these areas were middle class. . Public schools provided a very good education. Kids repsected teachers. Something went Horribly wrong since then .

Carol R ~ I'm sorry but Gun Control is a Red Herring. As long as the streets are flooded with cheap illegal firearms, anyone is going to be able to obtain one without a license, insurance, background check or ever an ID. That right, these creep will sell a gun to your 13 year old son if he has the cash. No questions asked.

Attacking the manufacturers is the way to go. We need to regulate gun creation and focus on destroying the ones that we can buy back. Anything else is a waste of time and money.

In these multiple shooting cases the immediate problem is mental health care. Mental health care in this country is woefully inadequate. Just read the above story that I've just posted about Aaron Alexis. He was diagnosed with multiple severe mental dysfunctions by the VA. Yet he was allowed to keep his security clearance. That is the real crime.

Any veteran with a security clearance is going to have access to guns. If we can't suspend the military security clearance of a man who is suffering from a sleep disorder, paranoia, and is being treated for hearing voices, how might I ask can we hope to keep a gun out of the hands of a child who doesn't even qualify for VA benefits when he want to buy one on the school yard because a little birdy told him he should?

Mental health care is the major issue in the problem. We as a nation are failing to take care of our own people. That is what is killing so many people. Not guns.