Ok, so what is "the right thing" to do?
Freedom. Let people defend themselves the way they want to. Self defense can be any means with or without a gun, that can be directed at a single attacker at a time.
Did it really take the police 20 minutes to get there?
And the next part is to allow anyone who can carry a concealed weapon the freedom to do so on any public area (that would include schools), and also on any private land where the owner does not prohibit it.
Also the freedom to buy and sell guns without gov't intrusion would help, including across state lines.
Freedom baby! Freedom saves lives in the long run.
But that's a different objection entirely. "It still would have been a massacre even with a couple less kids dead" seems to dismiss the value of saving a few lives rather than dispute the claim that it would save lives.
It's only a different objection because you either don't understand what I'm saying or you are playing stupid.
I just saw a way of putting this that might help clear things up for you: When high capacity mags aren't used in the next massacre, what are you going to ban next? And then, what after that? When do you draw the line?
Let's say your mag capacity law goes into effect and the next massacre kills 18 kids and 5 adults. You *could* make a correlation between the capacity of the mag and the number of deaths. But the point is not to trumpet a vague correlation, the point is to stop murder. Stop wasting time with useless mag laws that only turn good people into criminals (witness the hilarity of this in
this story).
The best way to stop murder is if people can defend themselves.
Just out of curiosity, do you consider any place that doesn't consider gun ownership a basic right to be a prison?
Not the guns laws, per se, but for laws like that to be instituted you open the country to criminals and/or bad government. Criminals kill people directly, but bad government kills people both directly and indirectly. I don't need to tell you how government kills people indirectly? I've always considered you'd be smart enough to figure that out on your own.
What, obeying laws is a bridge too far for you?
This is why I said you haven't thought this through. An answer like this could also be applied to a law that says you are legally obligated to return a chattel slave to its owner.
I'll take "maybe" over nothing at all.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions. If you don't know the right thing, then don't do anything. A tiny wrong thing will lead to other worse problems later on. And in every example we have from the past, your "maybe" turns out to cost more lives than it saves.
Good thing I don't support arbitrary laws then.
Then you don't know what "30" means when you mention a 30 round magazine.
An arbitrary law like you describe has no limit. Just like agreeing that government should pay for a little retirement or a little medical care or a little make-work, it turns into problem so big it can take down a country. However, unlike those economic problems, when you restrict rights of people to defend themselves without limit, they die.
The rise in gun death, and also other violent crime, goes up when guns are banned. Don't go down that road, go down the road that ends with life and civility - a road of freedom.
By what mechanism? Exactly what is the life-saving benefit of high-capacity mags outside military applications?
There might not be one. But then again there might. There was a shooting in Tacoma Washington back in the late 80's. It started when a group of good people in a neighborhood decided to have a neighborhood watch put together so they could take back their area because it was a hotbed of drug dealing. Some military men from Ft. Lewis lived in that area and attended. Supposedly word went out that the drug dealers were going to crash the party. The soldiers brought their personal weapons, even though they thought nothing was really going to happen. Somebody fired a round and everyone ran for cover. There were some known drug dealers looking on and they exchanged a few rounds with the soldiers. Those soldiers would have been thankful, and the good people at the meeting, to have at least 30 rounds in a mag. No one was hit, citizen or drug dealer, if you were wondering.
Beyond that it is convenient not to have to re-load so often in general, and restricting freedom on the millions of people that own hi capacity mags not only opens the door to more restrictions on freedom, but it turns them into criminals when they are innocent. If I have a hi capacity mag and never do anything with it but save time reloading when I'm shooting, what is it to you?
Of course, calling them innocent begs the question. If we pass laws banning high capacity magazines, they won't be innocent if they fail to comply.
And that answer works for any law, even ones you would consider grossly unjust.
