Guns, a Major Killer!
So, guns are a "major problem" in this country. I have a hard time hitting Twitter because I get tired of hearing about how people who own guns and who exercise their second amendment protected rights are bad. This country is so messed up that if I try and enter a conversation with large anti-gun Twitter accounts, people see my comment then go to my profile and see I own guns and immediately associate me with say Trump or the NRA. Sometimes I wonder why people are incapable of staying on topic, rather than insulting others. But I guess that is too adult of a thing to do. Back to the point. I have heard lot's of arguments against guns. There are tons of things with guns anti-gun people do not like. They do not like large capacity magazines for example. I disproved the Brady Campaign years ago in a video, see below, where I showed I could shoot 30 rounds with multiple magazines nearly as fast as someone could with a 30 round magazine. Usually these people have no idea about the thing they argue against. They do not like "assault rifles". Like duh it is called the "AR" 15! Well that actually means ArmaLite Rifle, the original manufacture of the rifle. How can you attach an action to a piece of machinery? This just makes my head spin!
Why do I say it makes my head spin? All the FBI statistics over the last many years show around 250 "rifle" murders each year. That includes all rifles, not just AR-15's. So let's just take the number and assume it is all AR-15's, which it is not. That means that, if we break it down, 1,590 AR-15's are in each county in the USA. Of that 1,589.92 are not used in murders each year. Barely 1/10th of one percent, or 0.08%, are used to harm people. People calling this an epidemic are insane. Period. Now that is not to set aside these tragedies magnitude. When anything is used to harm someone else it is horrible and inexcusable. We should not make light of murder and people harmed with guns or frankly anything. This is why I say we should focus on lowering violence, not "gun" violence. If we focus on violence and lowering it, the item used will not matter because it will not get to the level of harming someone. If we change laws, for example, that allow people who have gone to jail for gun related crimes to come out of jail and buy a gun again, that would greatly curb repeat offenders. Which is a problem currently.
We should be able to bridge the gap in keeping guns out of the hands of people who have protection orders against them. A judge has literally reviewed and said yes, this person is a threat to another person. That should be relayed to the background check system. There is so much to do that does not have to do with focusing on the type of guns or the capacity of magazines. The other thing is we live in a free society. Free will is in full swing in the USA. If you want freedom, you embrace risk. That is how it works. It is like taking a backpacking trip. You want to see the beauty of nature. But what is possibly out there? Bears, wolves, mountain lions, mosquitoes, etc. All deadly. But what percentage of trips are affected negatively by wild life? It is pretty low. But we do not focus on Bears as a major reason not to take a backpacking trip.
Then you have people who take the time and effort to get their concealed carry permits. They are background checked. I personally have multiple concealed carry permits. I always find it funny that anti-gunners look at gun owners and concealed carry permit holders as an issue, when in reality they are the most checked people around. With me having multiple concealed carry permits that means that multiple law enforcement agencies, not connected, have checked my background! In reality CCW holders are some of the most law abiding people around. As Texas has showed with their awesome statistics they keep on their concealed carry holders, 99.98% of them do not commit crimes each year. Texas has 1 million concealed carry permit holders. Just wow, mic dropped!
Now are people with guns or concealed carry permits gunslingers so to speak? No, they need training and should continue to train every year and month. I also hear people say that concealed carry permit holders would not be able to use their gun in a situation or mass shooting. They are not trained like police are trained and police miss shots, etc. Give me a break, Navy SEALS miss shots. Everyone misses shots. Anyone can say they will be ready, but when the day comes some concealed carry permit holders will not answer the call. They just do not have the internals for it. It is just as it goes. Not everyone, gun owner or not, is geared to kill someone. Even if it is in self defense! No one should rag on people for that like I see anti-gun people do a lot.
In conclusion, there are many things that can be agreed on in relation to guns. I believe that laws should be stricter for people who commit crimes with guns. It should be treated worse that non-violent drug offenders for example. I also believe people with PFA orders against them should not be allowed to purchase a gun until the PFA has expired. Those should be two things that most everyone can agree on and a good place to start discussing some measures to limit people who could potentially use guns inappropriately.
