I really don't see how a knife is any better than a gun, or fewer lives lost versus more.  Even one person dead is terrible.  And I'm not saying there shouldn't be any sort of gun regulations or buying restrictions (we do need to keep nut jobs from buying firearms) but if you try to ban guns, then that only increases demand for them, only through illegal channels such as the black market.  Take this example of mine (even if it is ridiculous )  Last year at summer camp, the snack shack had a bunch of Drumsticks due to expire at the end of the week, and not many people were buying them.  However, when the camp director announced a "ban" on said delicious desserts, people could still buy them by calling them "falafels" (don't ask why...)  Anyways, they sold out by Thursday ("ban" was implemented on Tuesday.)  I know ice cream and handguns are two different things, but the concept remains the same: they may be a little tougher to get if banned, but there is a heck of a lot more demand for them if they are banned.
 
-----------------------
~ Sol Larith
FM/SCRW Sol/Nazgul 6/Phoenix Wing/mSSD Atrus/OFF/VEN/VE (=*A*=)

Even if the laws on getting guns were tighter you can go on the internet and find out how to make a bomb, heck you can take Ammonia and Bleach and make mustard gas, the fact of the matter is if someone wants to harm a group of people there are other ways other then guns.
 
-----------------------
"Rogue, just so you know if we die, I hate you."

SGT Namyr

America will never ban guns. It's against the whole freedom thing they claim to have. Ban books, songs, movies, freedom of speech no worries.. but never guns.

(Yes I am aware there is something claiming to protect your freedom of speech, but it's non existant compared to here. I can joke about bodily harm to our head of state and not fear the FBI crashing through my door to arrest and torture me. Even over the phone, even on an international call. Believe me, I've done it.)

-----------------------
XO/MAJ Merrick/VEA/TADATH/VE [CotE][SoA][CoH]
Verastinian Republic - Minister of Subversion
-----------------------
To thy protection fear and sorrow flee, and those that weary are of light find rest in thee.
If you love something, set it free. If it doesn't come back, hunt it down and kill it.

Limit production? Ha, think of the lost profits, that would never be allowed.
 
-----------------------
+ Advance Recon Commandos {ARC} +
PL:A/CPT/Raziel/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/VEA/VE/{EW1} (WoS1) 2x(VP:1) {IG} {CDS} {BoA} {PoC} {BC} {GRoM} {SoS} {IH}
"Computer games don't affect kids; I mean if Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic music." Kristian Wilson, Nintendo, Inc, 1989.

"God does not play dice with the universe" - Albert Einstein
"Who are you to tell God what to do with his dice?" - Bohr
"God does not play dice with the universe. He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players [i.e. everybody], to being involved in an obscure and complex variant of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won't tell you the rules, and who smiles all the time." - Terry Pratchett
CM/DJK Raziel/lion 1-5/Krath/VEDJ/VE (WoS1) (VP1) (VP2)

Actually, many Irish and Irish-descended people I know are on the terrorist watch list merely for sharing a name with a known IRA member. Thus far, you apparently have been lucky.

As for handguns, can someone seriously explain to me why they are useful? No, seriously, because I really don't think you can.

Home defense, if you need it, requires nothing smaller than a shotgun. If you are blindly firing pistol rounds in the dark, you have better odds of taking out your TV than a home invader. And if you are getting car-jacked, you're already on the losing end of that drama.

So, go for it, because I've never heard a plausible excuse.

But as I ranted elsewhere, and to take Merrick's point further, we don't license or train to do anything in this country. Everyone takes an obligatory driver's ed class, most people pass it with a C, and then are let loose on the road with tons of metal and never see any re-training, unless you count the joke called driving school which you take to get out of a ticket.

We have the joke called sex ed, when you can get a school board out of the way to even teach it, and that class is usually about abstinence. Parenting classes are nigh unexistant. So, we have kids who don't know squat about sex, have it, have kids, and don't know the first thing about raising them. Don't believe me? Go to any mall/department store/regular restaurant before calling me a liar.

Then there's personal finance. Look at the recent mortage situation and tell me that consumer ed classes work. They don't.

Guns are the same thing. You don't have to go to a firearm safety class in most jurisdictions, you are never taught that guns are not to be used, but are a deterrent in nearly all non-hunting, target competition cases, and, once again, no one bothers to re-evaluate you.

I love my bizarre, idiotic country but you are more free to kill yourself here than you are to express yourself.
 
-----------------------
PRF/GG Fury/VEA/TADATH/VE [MoHx2][SCPx2][PoC][SotE:HC][SotE:VEA][SCP][MSM][IOC]
Prefect - Stormtrooper Corps
Administrator - Imperial Center

Of course, how else are you supposed to take down a herd of whatever-it-is you're hunting with a bolt- action .308?
 
-----------------------
~ Sol Larith
FM/SCRW Sol/Nazgul 6/Phoenix Wing/mSSD Atrus/OFF/VEN/VE (=*A*=)

I havn't taken drivers ed, but to be honest, most of the people who know me say that the racing I do in the summers should easily qualify as a double drivers ed course. No way to learn about defensive driving then to throw someone in among 30 other idiots and give them the goal to make ti to the front without denting the car. Ok, well, the make it to the front part isn't one of the 'rules' my dad sets for me. He just yells at me if I dent the car :P.

I was looking at stuff the other night, and the lack of gun laws in alot of the states is appauling, at least for someone who comes from a place where there is a 28 day waiting period and half these states has no waiting period at all.

/me wanders off again because he forgot the rest of what he was going to write.
 
-----------------------
SC/WO2/Trevor Evenson/Nazgul 1(1-1)/Wing 1/mSSD Atrus/DEF/VEN/VE/(=*A*=)(=*SA*=)[VC:B][LSM][BRC][SWC][GWC]

The VEN`s #1 writer as of ESC `06

Clearly Canadian!

Personally, I think a lot of issues are at hand when a tragedy like this occurs.

It is a combination of genetic make-up along with the way a person was raised and what they have been through.

With everyone, it is how we deal with things that make us what we are.

For example, I go to the supermarket and end up with my single bottle of Tylenol in line behind a 96 year old person trying to pay for a prescription with Confederate money from the Civil War that should have been payed for at the pharmacy and they need a price check. Now do I go off or wait patiently to check out and then help this old person with their groceries further making me late for an appointment I was already late for.

It's all how you deal with stuff, if you ask me.
-----------------------
Grammar, mechanics, punctuation, spelling, diction, effectiveness in the science, and larger elements are the facts at hand. The Harbrace College Handbook edited by JOHN C. HODGES

FM/LCR/Etan Evnstar/Kaph/Flight 3/Atrus/off/VEN/VE/Aviation certificate