Guns bad...case closed

[Tero]

And the PEOPLE of the state somehow do not represent the opinion of the state? The senators they choose are firstly there to protect and serve (military contracts!) their state.

[Seth]

And the PEOPLE of the state somehow do not represent the opinion of the state? The senators they choose are firstly there to protect and serve (military contracts!) their state.

The people of the state elect their state legislators, and originally those legislators were vested with the constitutional authority and mandate to appoint two Senators from their state to the Congress.

The people directly elect their House of Representatives politicans.

So, yes, the people of the state do represent the opinion of the state, as filtered (deliberately) through the state legislature, whom they elect to perform that duty.

[Tero]

Idiots/NRA have passed these kinds of laws in many states. It actually supports guns "leaking" down to criminals through straw purchases:
Am I required to register my weapon in the State of Colorado?
The State of Colorado prohibits gun registration. CRS 29-11.7-1
https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/csp/colorado-gun-laws

[Seth]

Idiots/NRA have passed these kinds of laws in many states.

Funny how the democratic representative process of 50 different state legislatures seem to be "idiots" to you, not to mention the "NRA." I can only wish the NRA had the kind of power you ascribe to it, because if it did the war would be over and permit-free Vermont-style universal concealed and open carry would be a nationwide thing right now.

It actually supports guns "leaking" down to criminals through straw purchases:

No it doesn't. Once again you're trying to blame the lawful commerce in and possession of firearms for criminality and once again I point out what a fucking stupid and ignorant attempt this is.

Am I required to register my weapon in the State of Colorado?

Why would you need to? Are you a criminal? If you are, then you don't have to register it even if it is stolen, and you'll be arrested if caught with it even if it's NOT stolen (including if it's the product of a "straw purchase") and so will the person who illegally bought it for you. So what good would registration do?

If you're not a criminal it's nobody's business what guns you own, and if someone steals one, why then you can go to your private records and give the police the information so if it's found it can be recovered and returned and the person in possession of it arrested for possession of a stolen firearm. Otherwise, short of a gun being stolen, there is absolutely no need for registration and registration does nothing whatever to prevent theft because criminals are already breaking the law by possessing ANY firearm so they don't give a shit if the gun is registered because they don't intend to get caught with it in the first place.

The State of Colorado prohibits gun registration. CRS 29-11.7-1

Yup. That's because it's a useless, pointless waste of taxpayer money that's only done in places where the government has designs to create gun ownership lists that they can use to eventually seize, using their armed and jackbooted thugs to do so, as has happened several times quite recently, as I have related previously and which you have studiously ignored.

And because that is the ONLY possible reason for registering guns, we don't allow our state officials to register our guns.

[JimC]

Seth wrote:

Yup. That's because it's a useless, pointless waste of taxpayer money that's only done in places where the government has designs to create gun ownership lists that they can use to eventually seize, using their armed and jackbooted thugs to do so, as has happened several times quite recently, as I have related previously and which you have studiously ignored.

And because that is the ONLY possible reason for registering guns, we don't allow our state officials to register our guns.

Well no, it's not the only possible reason. I know it's the possibility that has your knickers in a twist, but...

I think your reason is unlikely, but I guess not impossible. However, it is also possible that gun registration would assist straight forward law enforcement, such as tracing guns used in crimes, and doing things like ensuring someone just released from a mental institution has the guns known to be in his possession removed...

[Seth]

Seth wrote:

Yup. That's because it's a useless, pointless waste of taxpayer money that's only done in places where the government has designs to create gun ownership lists that they can use to eventually seize, using their armed and jackbooted thugs to do so, as has happened several times quite recently, as I have related previously and which you have studiously ignored.

And because that is the ONLY possible reason for registering guns, we don't allow our state officials to register our guns.

Well no, it's not the only possible reason. I know it's the possibility that has your knickers in a twist, but...

I think your reason is unlikely, but I guess not impossible. However, it is also possible that gun registration would assist straight forward law enforcement, such as tracing guns used in crimes, and doing things like ensuring someone just released from a mental institution has the guns known to be in his possession removed...

The question is whether the cure is worst than the disease, which it is. You're supporting the registration of 300 million guns on the very, very, very small chance that one out of a hundred thousand guns will be used in a crime. The Canadian government spent three BILLION dollars trying to register a tenth as many guns and failed miserably.

"Tracing" guns used in crimes does nothing to solve the crime committed with the gun. The purpose of "tracing" crime guns is not to prosecute the crime in which the gun was involved, it's to attempt to ferret out other possible crimes, including filing criminal charges against a gun owner who fails to report a stolen or lost gun.

But again, the burden on the liberties of gun owners posed by registration schemes, and the danger of such registration records being misused by the government for confiscation is not worth the minimal amount of information gained by identifying the original purchaser. You see, the gun may have passed through many hand, all perfectly legally, before it ends up in the hands of a criminal and such "tracing" efforts do little more than to make a suspect out of someone who has no criminal liability.

As for those released from mental institutions the answer is much more simple: The judge merely orders that the disqualified patient dispose of all his guns and that as a condition of his release he must allow the police to perform a search of his home. He may dispose of those weapons by selling them (they are his property after all), giving them to a friend or family member, or surrendering them to the police. Universal gun registration is a pointless waste of resources if you're trying to deal with the even smaller (than criminals) group of adjudicated mental defectives who cannot possess firearms.

When a gun is involved in a crime, the person in possession of the gun is criminally responsible, not a prior owner. If it was an illegal transfer, that too can be proven by methods other than universal gun registration.

As I said, there is only one reason for the government to register firearms: so that it can confiscate them should it desire to do so. And that is the only reason that anti-gun zealots suggest it. They have no interest in crazy people or criminals, they want to be able to take guns away from everyone, and the only way they can do so is by first registering them, just as Hitler did.

Anything else can be accomplished adequately using other methods short of trying to keep track of 300 million firearms and the tens of billions of dollars it would take to even begin to do so.

[Tero]

Seth:

No it doesn't. Once again you're trying to blame the lawful commerce in and possession of firearms for criminality and once again I point out what a fucking stupid and ignorant attempt this is.

Tero:
Not registering allows straw purchases. As soon as the buyer is in the gun shop parking lot, we've lost track of the gun. He can give it to the criminal right there.

Solution: national registration. You would only be allowed to sell back to gun shop or pawn shop who put that serial number back in system as "to be sold."

[mistermack]

Registering guns is obviously going to make it harder for a criminal to get an unlicensed gun.
If your gun is registered and you want to sell it, you know that it can be traced back to you.
Make it compulsory for you to see documentation proving the buyer's identity, and his right to own the gun. Make it compulsory for the buyer to provide copies of those documents.
We do it with cars, for fuck's sake.

As for the cost, that's down to gun owners. If Canada spent money on a registration scheme, they should have charged that cost to the gun owners, with the option of handing in the guns, if they don't want to pay.

[Tero]

We also need gun permits. Too many Americans are on antidepressants. It's fine if they shoot themselves, but they tend to shoot exes, kids, bosses, cops etc. So it will require doctors to send in names STRICTLY for gun control. Or we could interrogate the gun owners every 2 years.

[Hermit]

Arguments from eleventy quadrillion criminal acts per second averted due to unfettered possession of guns and the evil intentions of government to disarm freedom loving citizens in 4 ... 3 ... 2 ... 1 ...

[Svartalf]

They can prise my gin bottle from my cold dead hands!

Actually, you'll give it to me willingly, that this happens once it's empty is purely coincidental.

[Svartalf]

We also need gun permits. Too many Americans are on antidepressants. It's fine if they shoot themselves, but they tend to shoot exes, kids, bosses, cops etc. So it will require doctors to send in names STRICTLY for gun control. Or we could interrogate the gun owners every 2 years.

I'm on antidepressant, and I'm fully able to assess when I need a weapon, and I"d feel safer and have a nice hobby (target shooting) if the mofos in the gumint let me have one, but they are too afraid of the populace rising against them as we have a history with revolutions here.

[Hermit]

Privately owned guns are a powerful force against governments that try to infringe on its people's freedoms. The Weimar Republic discovered that when the Sturm Abteilung turned up to curb its tyrannical ways.

[Tero]

Svarty, it would be too expensive to review every depressed American case by case. Also the drugs are given for anxiety more often. So you would need tochoose: guns or drugs. We would give you a urine test yearly.

[laklak]

Where you get "we", white man?