As I write this, there hasn't been a mass shooting in weeks. I'll use the lull to shoot off my mouth about guns, divorced from the debate that usually follows a massacre in which both sides dance on victims' graves for PR gain.In the photo, Mike Stout and his sons Ryan, 23, and Michael, 11, look over semi-automatic rifles at the Philadelphia National Guard Armory Gun Show in January of 2013. The Stouts live in Philadelphia.
When President Obama tried early this year to get gun restrictions passed (including background checks identical to Pennsylvania's current system) the vast majority of Americans wanted what he wanted. His most important goal was broadened criminal-background checks at the point of sale for guns. Despite overwhelming public approval, Congress chickened out, mainly because of opposition from the National Rifle Association that purports to represent gun owners (like me), gun sellers and gun manufacturers.
I am not a member; the NRA doesn't represent me or most of my pistol-packing pals. Some of my NRA friends say it doesn't represent them, either, on background checks.
A poll by Frank Luntz, who usually works for Republicans, reported that a majority of current and former NRA members favor background checks. "Majority" understates the case: it was 74 percent.
That's an amazing statistic, but I have one (allow me to invent a word) that's amazinger.
The Violence Prevention Research Program at the University of California at Davis, polled licensed dealers who sell more than fifty guns annually. It reported that 55.4 percent of the surveyed gun dealers support background checks.
That's a greater percentage than President Obama got over Mitt Romney, and it comes from the very people who would be most "burdened" (aside from the criminals and the deranged) by background checks. So gun sellers join gun owners and literally everyone else in wanting more background checks.
Under current Federal law, anyone buying a handgun or long gun from a Federal Firearms Licensee in any state must submit to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System. The issue: rifles and shotguns can be bought from private individuals without a background check, at gun shows for instance. State laws controlling such sales are a crazy quilt. That is the huge, dangerous loophole Americans want closed.
After years of writing about gun issues, I developed a plan to reduce the risk of gun violence; neither side will love it all:
* Mandatory instant background check for everyone, for every gun sold.Will my plan end all gun crime? Of course not. Will it stop some? You make that call.
* One gun purchase a month. This is aimed at slowing the multiple straw purchaser.
* Increase prison time to ten years for straw purchasers (those who buy a gun to pass along to someone who can't pass a background check).
* Lost or stolen guns must be reported, to thwart straw purchasers who may claim the guns they sold illegally were lost or stolen.
* No "assault weapon" ban. It was tried for a decade to little effect, and the Washington Navy Yard maniac used a shotgun. In 2011, the FBI reports, shotgun homicides (356) outnumbered rifle homicides (323). Both were dwarfed by handguns (6,220), the biggest problem.
* Make carrying a gun in a crime a Federal offense, with ten years, mandatory, added to the sentence for the original crime.
* No clips with more than fifteen rounds. If you can't hit a target with fifteen chances, you shouldn't be packing. (Limiting magazine size negates a "need" to ban "assault rifles".)
* States must report people with mental illnesses to a Federal database, as they are required to do; most lag behind.
* Hollywood should reduce violence in films, recordings, and video games.
* No more "gun-free" zones. They don't stop gunmen; they provide defenseless targets.
Rico says hey, he could live with that; he wasn't a big fan of 'black' gubs anyway...
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