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Erik S. Lesser / EPA
Ron Moon, co-owner of CJI Guns in Tucker, Ga., holds a pair of 100-bullet-capacity magazines for an AR15 assault style semi-automatic rifle on Wednesday.
Anticipating staunch resistance from gun-rights groups to any effort to ban assault-style rifles, some pro-gun control lawmakers are instead trying to leverage the national outrage over the school shooting in Newtown, Conn., to enact federal legislation outlawing high-capacity ammunition clips.
House Democrats, emboldened by President Barack Obama's call Wednesday for quick, "concrete” proposals to curb gun violence, are pushing House Republicans to quickly consider a ban on high-capacity clips.
The move follows the massacre of 20 schoolchildren and six adults on Dec. 14 at Sandy Hook Elementary school. The gunman, 20-year-old Adam Lanza carried three guns, primarily using a Bushmaster XM-15 — an AR-15/M4-type rifle -- which police said was fed by 30-round magazines. He also was armed with a Glock 10mm handgun and Sig Sauer 9mm handgun. Although authorities didn't reveal the models of those weapons, both of those handguns allow high-capacity clips -- including 15-round magazines for one model of 10mm handgun that's sold by Glock.
The bill’s list of co-sponsors this week grew from 113 to 135, according to a spokesman for Rep. Carolyn McCarthy, D-N.Y., the measure’s author. In 1993, a man armed with a gun and several 15-round magazines shot and killed McCarthy’s husband, Dennis, aboard a Long Island, N.Y., commuter train. Five others also died and 25 were wounded.
“We've been here before,” McCarty said Wednesday on Capitol Hill. “All too often, we see these mass killings and yet all our lives go on. Everybody is asking: Is this time different? It is ... This time is different because there is so much anger.”
“We can get the job done,” added House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., one of the bill’s co-sponsors. In an interview Tuesday with NBC’s Andrea Mitchell, Pelosi predicted: “Right away we could pass ... the ban on the assault magazine.”
Related:
NRA blames media, music and more for culture of violence
Obama demands 'concrete proposals' on gun violence by January
In the other house of Congress, Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., is simultaneously pushing for a rapid vote on his almost identical proposal to outlaw the possession, import or sale of any ammunition clip that hold more than 10 rounds, saying: “These high-capacity magazines, which were used in Newtown, Aurora, Tucson, Virginia Tech and so many other tragedies, were designed for one purpose only — to shoot and kill quickly.”
From 1994 to 2004, high-capacity ammunition magazines were illegal as part of the Federal Assault Weapons Ban, but that provision lapsed when the legislation expired. Congressional Democrats have made several attempts to similar legislation barring possession of rapid-fire assault-style weapons since then, but those efforts have failed.
Legislators also have pushed legislation banning specific types of bullets – with one notable success: In 1986, President Ronald Reagan signed legislation that outlawed armor-piercing "cop-killer" bullets.
But other recent ammunition-cutting proposals have failed to gain traction in Congress. Last summer, a bill filed Lautenberg and McCarthy sought to significantly curb the ability of Americans to buy unlimited amounts of ammunition via the Internet. That bill never made it beyond the Senate Judiciary Committee, a spokeswoman for Lautenberg said this week.
So in a country where the right to bear arms is held sacred, firearm foes are refining their pitch to focus on the delivery mechanism. One of their main talking points is asking why such high-capacity clips are necessary.
“I've been a hunter all my life, and there's no reason to have a magazine that holds 30 shells,” said Rep. Mike Thompson, D-Calif. “Call it what it is: an assault magazine. And we don't have any reason to assault anyone in our communities, in our neighborhoods. ... Why do you need 30 shells in a magazine?"
“Who needs these? The answer is sports shooters,” responds Mark Walters, co-author of "Lessons from Armed America" and host of a syndicated radio show “Armed American Radio." “For example, if you were target shooting or practicing for an upcoming (shooting competition), it’s nice not to have to change magazines on a regular continual basis."
In the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, the National Rifle Association held a news conference in Washington, D.C, on Friday and blamed the media and video games for cultivating a culture of violence.
What’s more, many ranchers use firearms like AR15s — manufactured to carry 30-round magazines — to protect their herds from coyotes and clear their land of prairie dogs, added George Hill, an employee at Basin Sports in Vernal, Utah.
The talk of banning “assault magazines” emanating from Washington appears to be driving sales of the high-capacity clips, according to Walters and Hill.
“I came in at 8 this morning and I have been non-stop on selling AR15s and ammo. Nonstop,” Hill said Wednesday afternoon. “Those (30-round clips) have been going out, and I’ve been selling those two, three, 10 at a time. Everybody’s worried about the politics behind it and that’s generating a lot of these sales. They’re worried about it being banned.
“I would be real happy to only sell Benelli goose-hunting guns and Browning deer rifles. And that’s normally what we sell this time of year. But the politics has super-heated the tactical market. Normally, I sell somebody 50 rounds, maybe 100 pounds. Instead, I’m selling them 500 or 1,000 rounds.”
While Walters and Hill each oppose the proposed ban on high-capacity clips in principle, they argued as well that such a crackdown won’t slow gun violence in this country.
“This is all symbolic legislation that will do nothing. Absolutely nothing. If I could say something different, I would admit that,” Walters said. “But the facts don’t bear that out. It’s just feel-good legislation being backed into a horrible event.”
They note that gun ownership has increased over the past decade, with the number of instant criminal background checks conducted by retailers required by federal law rising each year. In November alone, more than 2 million such point-of-sale investigations were performed nationally on people seeking to purchase firearms — the most in any single month since federal officials launched the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) in 1998, according to the FBI. By comparison, gun retailers and federal authorities completed 842,932 background checks in November 2003.
“There are millions of rounds of ammunition already in the public’s hands — high-capacity or standard-capacity magazines already in the public's hands,” Walters said. “If they pass this ban, in the days prior to the date (it goes into effect), stores will sell 10 years’ worth of these capacity magazines.
“But beyond that, it’s irrelevant. A seasoned, experienced firearms enthusiast, including myself, can change a magazine out, including a tactical reload, in under a second,” Walters said.
Moreover, such ammunition doesn’t degrade over time, he added.
“It’s a plastic magazine with a spring. Magpul (based in Erie, Colo.) makes the most popular 30-round magazines, PMAGs, which are selling for $13.99,” Walters said. “I have five of them being reserved at my store because they’re selling like crazy. I know I could keep them in my safe forever. I can open it in 20 years, take it out of the plastic bag, and if I want to use it, I can use it.”
Any federal ammo ban — or mandated purchase limits on certain clips or bullets — would simply create an “underground market,” Hill said. Today, scores of gun enthusiasts — including many hunters — make their own bullets as a hobby. They’re called “reloaders.”
“People have been making ammunition themselves since the 1880s. That’s something anybody is capable of doing with a little bit of know-how,” Hill said. "Those kinds of bans are like throwing a steak on the grill for like 10 seconds and calling it cooked. It just looks like it’s cooked but it’s not.
“You can reload. Or, you can order online and get stuff from outside the U.S. It’s too late for any of that,” Hill said. “And it never works.”
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did any of you simple minded liberals even watch the news conference? do you know the entertainment industry gives about 4 times as much to lobby congress then the nra? are you going to listen to mark cuban, give me a break? do you think he's going to do anything to risk his fortune?! there are people alive today in colorado because the theaters they went to allowed concealed weapons and the shooter chose the theater he did because it banned citizens from bringing in their guns so he knew no one in the theater would be able to stop him. if the left would actually educate themselves about the issue instead of exploiting this for their own political needs maybe they could actually do some good for society!
Proof that he chose the theatre for that reason??
The safest place in the world for a gun crazed killer is a "gun-free" zone.
The most dangerous place in the world for an innocent citizen is a "gun-free" zone.
This is true about the gun free zones.
It is also true in places like Australia who tried to ban weapons.
Home invasions and gun related crimes went through the roof.
Why?
Because they knew that only THEY (the bad guys) would be armed.
How about some proof that the pschyo killer made the rational decision to choose that theatre instead of another? I thought so. There is no proof. My guess is that it was nearby and it was showing the movie batman.
Parking lot in Arizona was hardly a gun free zone. In fact there was conceal carry guy near, but he did nothing...he was tackled when he had to RELOAD.
First of all, rational and psycho are not compatible words.
Second, he did shoose the theater for the opening of the movie.
Third, no one should have "tackled" the conceal carry guy in the first place.
Now, what is your point?
@11madness- you missed my point. An innocent civilian in a gun-free zone has no means to defend himself because he abides by the law. The mad-man killer doesn't care about gun-free zones.
Get it now?
The rotary magazines that hold 100's of rounds are stupid and a folly.
I will stand by the 30 round magazines for several good reasons.
But, the drums and rotaries are just plain bullsh!t.
First of all, if you load one of those up you had better be build like Hercules to shoulder it..
Second, they jam, and are bad on your weapon receiver.
Third, they give gun owners a bad name.
Now, because of this crap an honest man cannot find a 30 round magazine for his rifle, THANKS.
But, not to worry, I ordered early.
So, if a bad man comes in my neighborhood and you opted NOT to own a weapon, come see me.
Call it what it is-death by a thousand cuts. The gun control crowd knows they cannot hope to fully take away the right of Americans to keep and bear arms, so they'll settle instead countless little infringements, hoping to disarm Americans not by making guns illegal per se, but rather by making them so difficult to purchase that people will basically give up trying. Stack enough inconveniences in the law-abiding citizen's way, and he just won't bother arming himself.
What they forget, however, is that none of those inconveniences matter to those would use those guns for harm. Their existence would solely impact law abiding citizens.
Could not have been said better, Ross.
I am the widow of a victim in a mass shooting. A 10 round clip and the additional 4 seconds would have saved lives. I am not against concealed weapons - a weapon at SRP would have saved lives. The shooter is prepared, planned their attack and in control - the victims are unaware and unprepared. Even law officers are wounded or killed when they are trained and prepared. To say that nothing will help is wrong - you don't know until you try. The number of mass shootings and violence in Mexico has increased dramatically since 2004 when certain weapons and magazines became legal. The large capacity magazines and drums need to be banned and made illegal to have - and a misdemeanor law, not just a fine, passed. The bullets used at Ft Hood were banned but grandfathered. Those and the bullets used at Sandy Hook should be made illegal and again possession of them illegal. While most gun owners are responsible - esp those of my family in Alaska and Montana- many are irresponsible and they need to be held accountable. Everyone has to take a test to get a DL- people who purchase a gun should have to take a class which includes what bullets do to a human being. Only when they can pass the test should they be allowed to have a gun. The background check needs to include all law enforcement, esp local. An 800 number needs to be available to those to report persons who are mentally unstable and have weapons and once a month law enforcement and feds need to allow persons to turn in guns, ammunition, and magazines with no questions asked. To those of you who disagree with everything I have said may you walk in my shoes someday.
Sorry for your loss but my uncle died in an accident with a drunk driver. By your rational that justifies a return to Prohibition.
Lets start the gun ban first with the government, then the police, then finally the military. If it turns out to be a huge success then we can do it to civilians.
Would you anti-gun folks agree to that to prove your point?
Hmmmm...I thought so.
I own many guns and my family and friends own many guns and have all our lives. But I do not need an assault rifle. I have no problem with stopping them. But until America stops violent movies and video games as it Desensitises a lot of people, we will still have a lot of problems. A lot of you who are for gun control will say those movies and games never made you violent and not sensitive. It never made you go out and hurt or kill someone. I say neither did owning a lot of guns make me or my friends and family go out and shoot someone. But both in the hands of a nut are dangerous.
You probably would have never owned a true "assault" rifle in the first place.
AR-15s, AK-47s, SKS, etc. are not allowed to be made and sold as "assault rifles".
And assault rifle is capable of fully auto or burst fire.
You can't buy that at your local gun store.
Just because they look like the real deal does not make them assault rifles.
For example, the AR-15 is the CIVLIAN version of the M-16.
The M-16 if full auto, the AR-15 is not.
Bill [Ignorant] Briggs learn about your subject before you make a fool out of yourself as you did in this so-called article,[ 3rd grade work]. There is no such thing as a 10,20, or 30 rd. "clip" A clip holds your hair not cartridges. They are called "magazines".
The reason the Constitution allows us to own guns was a way of ensuring that the Gov couldnt control the people.
And that fact alone and given how many of us own guns (both liberal and consrervatives) is the 1 reason there will never be Gun Control (taking guns away from us) the people wouldnt allow it .. want a revolution > that will do it ... it would make the civil war look like a snow-ball fight.
A bag of rocks is an assault weapon if your the one being hit by the rocks.
How many of you liberals here worry about guns .. yet you are ok with millions killed by abortions ... BTW .... FAR more people die each year from Drunk Drivers than guns ... lets ban cars and booze .... 5 times more people died during the Nam War years from DUI's in the USA than troops in the war
A gun in a show case does not show violence .. but people who see movies like Pulp Fiction and Scareface learn to kill and joke about it ... and almost all of the violence in movies and video games are a product of Liberal Hollywood
Do you guys realize you can just 'print' as many magazines as you want on a 3-D printer? it's like banning pictures of guns
Let me tell you all about a wonderful little "magazine" that most people who don't know weapons forget about.
It's called the shot shell.
If this guy had a semi-auto OR pump 12 ga shotgun loaded with 00 buckshot, the carnage would have been worse
and a lot quicker.
Shotguns are legal, can be concealed, and have been around for centuries.
I have myself a legal Winchester defender 12 ga pump that has a barrel just shy of being illegal.
It will hold eight rounds.
Imagine what that would have done.
(Oh, and I have had it for years for home protection, and have only fired it for function checks.
Oh, and take a 12 gauge, 3" Magnum, dump the shot out of the shells, and fill them with 21 dimes each, then load 11 of them in a 870 or 1100 Remington, and you have a significant alley sweeper.
@ Andy
If true, thanks for the tip. Never heard of that but I might have to try it. he, he, he.
We need 30 a round magazine in our pistol grip, detachable magazine, semi-automatic rifle so that we can have a chance of defending ourselves from a sociopath with a stolen assault rifle and two 30 round magazines.
My pistol grip, detachable magazine, semi-automatic rifle isn't an "assault rifle" because I will never assault anyone with it.
If a psycho assaults you using a pen as a weapon, his pen is an "assault weapon". If you ban and confiscate his pen, his screwdriver could become his "assault weapon".
nonsense..........you want to use a rifle in your house....shoot it downstairs and kill the kids upstairs, or kill the neighbor in the apartment next door...you are an idiot.
@11
My AR-15 is a competition gun.
I wouldn't use it for home defense and it's secured in my safe when not in use.
I have another gun that's made for home defense.
You are the idiot.
You said you had it to defend yourself.....that is what you said in your post......big talking idiot.
@11
Defense outside of the home.
I don't compete in tactical sharpshooting for nothing.
Use your brain, idiot. And, don't be lurking in my bushes.
I suggest doing a Google search on "Bath school disaster." Took place in 1927 and eclipses Newtown in casualties. You don't need a gun or high capacity magazine in order to inflict mass carnage.
Guns get it done quickly, but they aren't the only way.
Killing all those people simply because he thought his property taxes were burdensome is really sad.
He could have taken it up with the county.
That's a start.
Every single one of the thousands of local, state, and federal gun laws was a "start".
Let's talk about an end to the most egregious gun laws that just don't work and never will.
Yes, Rummy-another place to look.
The comments I am reading on this site really scare me. Do some of you know just how dangerous you are.
j murphy, you are so correct. Until we have walked a mile in someone else's shoes, we have no idea.
@j
"illegal to own with a misdemeanor law on the books"
Oh yeah... that'll stop a sociopath with a stolen gun who wants to murder children.
There are hundreds and hundreds of millions of high capacity magazines in American homes. Good luck controlling them.
Fool.
We have lots of laws on the books, but they aren't enforced equally.
We, who are responsible gun owners are not dangerous.
The dangerous people are the ones that do not see the real danger and try to prepare to defend themselves.
Gun control is not the answer and the weapon is not the question.
The question is, when an armed sociopath plans to enter a school and kill children, what resistance will he meet? An unlocked glass door? A glass door that will shatter when struck? A bolted solid oak door? A bolted steel security door? An unarmed security guard? An armed security guard? A police officer? A teacher with mace? A teacher with a gun? The Navy Seals?
What weapon the sociopath has is not the problem. The adult question that America needs to discuss is "when an armed sociopath plans to enter a school and kill a child, what resistance will he meet?"
When a sociopath with a flintlock musket plans to enter a school and shoot a child, what resistance will he meet?
When a sociopath with an AR-15 plans to enter a school and shoot children, what resistance will he meet?
When a sociopath with a knife plans to enter a school and stab a child, what resistance will he meet?
When a sociopath with a flintlock musket plans to enter Wal-Mart and aim it at you, how will you protect yourself?
When a sociopath with an AR-15 plans to enter Wal-Mart and aim it at you, how will you protect yourself?
When a sociopath with a knife plans to enter Wal-Mart and hold it to you, how will you protect yourself?
GROW UP GUN HATERS, MEDIA AND POLITICANS, AMERICA NEEDS THE ADULT CONVERSATION!!
STOP WASTING TIME WITH THE THE GUN CONTROL CRAP!!
Somewhere in America, right now, a sociopath is making plans to enter a school and hurt our children.
The clock is ticking.
Ah, yes. Sociopathy. The state in which a person has no conscience and therefore views others as nothings.
Has no social skills other than what they have observed others do.
Full of anger and rage.
Able to con most people.
Sociopathic men are not caught by the women they victimize, but by the men.
Sociopathic women are not caught by the men they victimize, but by the women.
I can answer about the Wal Mart part, Elsie Pea and a Kabar does wonders to make that stop. The rest, that is for the smart people to figure out, us simple soldiers can only go so far.
@andy
:)
Love ya man!
Outlaw all the "clips" you want to. I will keep my magazines-thank you. Stupid Hollywood types and liberals have no clue. Personally I have no need for an "assault weapon" but I do fear the police who do have them. Police and govt officials are just as bad as a threat. The Feds killed 80 plus people in Waco-where is all the outrage over that one. Those were women and children also.
Touche.
Kent State, Waco, Ruby Ridge, and most recently in August there were several armed police in NYC at the Empire State Building who managed to shoot nine innocent victims while only EIGHT feet away from the shooter!
We have a government out of control when it comes to firearms.
Dear RummyTub, gun control means keeping a steady hand and hitting your target. As for those highly trained NYPD professionals, well, as my good friend Pogo once said, "We have met the enemy and he is us." Have a good night, but you may want to sleep with one eve open.
The photo above... "Ron Moon, co-owner of CJI Guns in Tucker, Ga., holds a pair of 100-bullet-capacity magazines for an AR15 assault style semi-automatic rifle on Wednesday." ... is wrong. They are 100 capacity magazines for Glock pistols, not AR15's.
I do agree with the store owner any laws or banning that will come out of this will only be symbolic as far as making a different. The AR15's you can buy are no different that any high powered center fired semi auto rifle. 3 10 round magazines have the same potential destruction power as 1 30 round. It takes less than 1 or 2 second to reload these magazines.
I'm not an NRA member but I do own guns, no AR's. Having said that I personally don't see any needs for 30/100 round magazines. Honestly get mad as you may but armed guards or cops in every school is really the only deterrent. Hardened up the enter and exits and lock the class rooms from the inside with alarms buttons like banks.
The Republicans are doing a great job in exploiting a lot of Americans using the NRA and 2nd amendment to politicize the gun issue. Posters all over the country of Obama saying he wants to take their guns away... and a lot of people are ignorant enough to believe it.
At the end of the day it is one of their own (NRA) that was the cause of Sandy Hook. The mother of Lanza was the true cause. A person with legal guns in her house with a son with psychological problems. She takes him to ranges and leaves guns around for him to access. She should have known better. The reasons why she had to go thru background check was to prevent what she was guilty of and the cause of Sandy Hook.
30 round clips? LOL you ban them all you want but leave my 30rd mags alone
Left, right, middle, top, bottom, you all do not need military weapons, keep your handguns and shotguns, and rifles. Now go stand in the corner
YOu do no more KNOW what anyone else needs than we know or care if you do or do not use deodorant.
George, if you are correct about people not needing military weapons then why do the police have them?
The Second Amendment was written with military weapons in mind.
Now don't reply with a tangentially silly remark about nukes or tanks. You know exactly what I mean.
George, I needed some time to calm down and quit laughing after reading your high-larious comment. It was almost as funny as the cracks about the police being all we need for our protection.
Get real.
Interesting;
No one calls these clips who know better; it's a term used by the ignorant and the uninformed. They are correctly called - magazines. Clips are for hair bows and ties. Magazines are for ammunition. "Mag/s," for short term is experientially acceptable.
I hope they keep calling my mags clips. That instantly tells me which comments can be dismissed as coming from the ignorant.
Fear the government that fears your guns.
ex:the government that is big enough to help you is big enough to hurt you.
You are correct, except that "clip" is a valid firearm term when discussing a weapon such as the WWII era M1 Garand rifle.
When the anarchy begins, and government evaporates, I expect my gun hating neighbors will be the first ones pounding on my door begging to be let in for some protection. The sad part is that I am now seriously starting to wonder "when" this will happen, not "if."
Absolutely correct, Sam! The en bloc Garand clip is not a magazine, and the (fill in your favorite number) round AR-15 magazine is not a clip. Now get ready for the "enlightened" ones to jump on us both.
The time has come to put armed police officers in schools. It will lessen the chance of another massacre. The kids will feel safer. The parents will feel better knowing their children have some type of protection.
If we, as a society continue to wait, we all know through history, another one will happen. If we have learned anything, Newtown has shown us that it can happen anywhere. Don't wait! Don't allow any more families to go through this type of preventable, insane tragedy.
@me
"The time has come to put armed police officers in schools."
No, no, no. The left wants gun control, not school security and they are proving it.
Their agenda is glaring.
Champagnesabre..............the immediate safety of the children superseeds ANY discussion regarding the right to own, the banning of assault weapons, multi ammo clips, etc. If it doesn't happen now(police in schools), all we are doing is waiting for another massacre to happen.
I cannot believe how STUPID this society is to argue about gun rights/bans, etc,.
Jesus, in heaven................what will it finally take for people to do the right thing!
You are so correct, do the right thing! If it needs protection, harden it. Just like a lot of stores in crime prone areas do. Bullet resistant glass, steel doors, jersey barriers where needed, inside locks and electric locks that can only be activated with a code, that changes frequently, mini cams that show who is at the door, before opening it. Really easy stuff like that.
@me
Duh.
Tell it to the gun banners.
The time has come to put armed police officers in schools. It will lessen the chance of another massacre. The kids will feel safer. The parents will feel better knowing their children have some type of protection.
If we, as a society continue to wait, we all know through history, another one will happen. If we have learned anything, Newtown has shown us that it can happen anywhere. Don't wait! Don't allow any more families to go through this type of preventable, insane tragedy.
I hear shades of Prohibition, which began in 1920. We all know the terrible unintended consequences of that law. (By the way, remember the assault weapons of choice used then? The "Tommy guns'?)
On unintended consequences, the book "Superfreakonomics" says this:
“People respond to incentives, although not necessarily in ways that are predictable or manifest. Therefore, one of the most powerful laws in the universe is the law of unintended consequences.”
If we somehow eliminated every gun in the country, how many unintended consequences can you add to the first few that popped into my head in no logical order:
-The biggest black market for guns ever, likely initiated by drug dealers and doomsday preppers, would spring up overnight.
-Guns, never cheap, would be far more expensive because of the reduced supply and the cost of smuggling them in and averting the authorities.
-The increased cost of guns would raise the cost of doing business for muggers, bank robbers, etc.
-This rise in the cost of doing business could force many muggers and bank robbers to do a little more mugging and bank-robbing, with more people being killed.
-Mass killers like Adam Lanza might very well load up with firebombs and other explosives (aren't the instructions on the internet?) that could kill even more than handguns.
-Virtually everyone would be traumatized by the fear of marauding criminals.
-Many people might leave the country.
Many of the severely disturbed shooters apparently are quite bright despite their mental illness.
If they have no access to guns, they will simply choose other methods as they've done in the past: homemade bombs, including firebombs which can be more disastrous than assault weapons in, say, a crowded theater with limited exits.
They will also choose different venues, ones that offer them protection long enough to do their gruesome work. In 1966, Charles Whitman chose high up in the Tower bldg of the Univ. of Texas. Several people were shot and killed even before anyone knew who was shooting and from where. He killed 13 and wounded 32 others. His venue gave him protection from about 11:45 a.m. when his killing began until about 1:30 p.m. when he was killed by three cops.
It's exactly at this moment, when our emotions are highly charged, that we must be careful when casting for solutions.
You are correct. And if I remember correctly, the Columbine villains intended bombs to do most of the damage. They had set up propane tanks that didn't go off. And they apparently intended to shoot people as they ran out. Instead, they had to resort to shooting alone. The carnage could have been worse.
Responsible guns owners.....shooter's mother was one of those. Parents of kids who bring guns to school, yeah they are responsible. Gun owners should be held strictly and totally responsible for what happens with their stolen lost gun.....totally responsbible both civilly and criminally.
@11
"Responsible guns owners.....shooter's mother was one of those."
Responsible gun owners don't leave their guns where an unauthorized people could get it.
You're logic is twisted.
We also haven't been told if her gun was secured in a gun cabinet that was broken into.
And if a drunk steals your car then crashes/kills innocent bystanders, I guess YOU will be willing to be tried for the crime?
Get real.
With an ordinary 12 gauge pump-action shotgun loaded with 5 rounds of OO buckshot, 45 .33 caliber pellets can be fired in a few seconds. Each round holds nine pellets. A single pellet can kill and multiple hits make very nice hamburger. Now what--small capacity, big damage.
There is a huge knowledge gap between firearms owners/sports shooters and those not engaged. The ignorant tend to embrace simpleminded solutions to a complex problem.