I think the big difference was that back in 1992, the news networks were not as wired in or as emphasized on the shock and awe factor as they are now, which made the B’ton incident nothing more than a regional news story, rather than a forever-repeating-every-15-minutes horror story on CNN, complete with its own screen graphic, and Larry King interviewing a victim’s cousin’s neighbor’s psychiatrist about it.

But I appreciate your thoughtful response and that you reminded me how thoughtful you were.

Right now if I want a phone with a land line the government requires a more rigorous registration process than if I want a pump action shotgun with a pistol grip (AKA, a street sweeper). Also, the government demands more of the phone manufacturer in terms of product safety and quality control than it does of the gun manufacturer. These disparities are clear instances of civic insanity. Why? Two reasons. First, because a street sweeper is used to kill people, and a phone isn’t. Second, because despite all the requirements placed on the phone companies by “intrusive, authoritarian” government, no one has a problem getting and lawfully using a phone.

How about we better pay and hire better police to enforce the gun laws we already have, work to make them consistant across the country, provide tougher sentences for crimes that involve guns, AND work to fund our mental health systems so we can treat people with problems as opposed to locking them up an/or [worse] just setting people we know have problems lose on the world because there is no mental health program to recognize & treat them?

Oh, may I add let’s have tougher anti-stalking laws. You know, ones that stop folks with these problems before they murder/assault?

Oh, and when I get out of bed, I’ll write the “Guns are good” 500 times on a blackboard in my kitchen. Maybe then I will have learned my lesson.

Guns, Garvey, guns are different. They’re not organic. They didn’t evolve. They rely on something different; that’s technology. In particular, making guns on a large scale requires large, obvious industrial and machining processes. (Compare that to what’s involved in, say, making joints on a large scale.)

So a nuke isn’t a gun? (Which is OK, because there really isn’t a prohibition against nukes anyway, right?) OK. Can you tell me where I can buy a claymore mine? I think of them as giant indescrete shotguns, which is exactly what they are. Thanks.

Oh and I hardly described a vision of government in my last post. But give me your email, and I’ll send you my manifesto.