I need a little help with an anti

[Erratic]

This guy is far from an idiot. He's a professional businessperson. Very successful. I don't remember how the discussion on guns came up but I feel good educating him, and at the same time I feel he appreciates it. I don't know if he will feel better or worse knowing that the laws he thought would decrease crime have been in effect for years! I know he will pony up on the bet once I show him that link to the atf website. After reading it though, I gotta go hide my Potato cannon or "spud gun" as the ATF calls it. Who woulda thought the ATF even knew what a potato cannon was.

 

[Rich Miranda]

I don't have anything to say that y'all don't already know, but I'll say it anyway. The problem is that people think they 'know' things based on what they see and hear in the media. There is a constant political call for MORE laws to restrict firearms, so they figure there must not be enough laws.

I spoke to a 'neutral' today about gun control. He was not anti, but he did possess the false knowledge I speak of.

It's important to tell people what you think they should know for the same reason you tell your kids drugs are bad: if you don't tell them, someone may tell them the opposite and they'll believe it.

 

[carguychris]

There's one tiny loophole in all this left. You buy a percussion revolver...

There's also one other little-bitty loophole. Firearms manufactured before January 1, 1899 are considered "antiques" under the 1968 Gun Control Act and aren't regulated.

Most of the guns covered under this loophole are black-powder arms such as flintlock muskets, early breechloading single-shot rifles, and percussion revolvers, but savvy gun historians will recognize that it encompasses a few high-powered metallic cartridge revolvers, such the Colt Single Action Army and S&W Model Number Three, and it also includes the first generation of easily-reloadable military bolt-action rifles, such the Mauser Model 96 and Mosin-Nagant Model 1891.

However, most of these guns are just what their title implies- antiques. The January 1st, 1899 cutoff date is static, it's never updated, so these guns get more rare, collectible, and expensive every day. Most crooks want to do things the cheap and easy way, which is why they became crooks in the first place. The cost and difficulty involved in buying a functional pre-1899 weapon- not to mention the problem of finding suitable ammo- would deter almost all of them. It's far, far easier to steal a modern gun or buy it on the black market.

While I'm confident that a few crimes are committed each year using "antique" firearms, I seriously doubt that the number even represents one tenth of one percent of gun crime. I'm also confident that it's far smaller than the number of violent crimes committed using readily available improvised weapons such as hammers, axe handles, or chains.

{EDIT} I'd also wager that, in the vast majority of gun crimes committed using "antique" firearms, the antique was used out of pure convenience- it was used simply because it was readily available, not because the crook sought it out to avoid the background check.

 

[johnwilliamson062]

The thing I have not been able to convice him of is this. He believes that if someone cannot for whatever reason buy a gun in his home state (he used NY as an example) that they could just order it from another state and have it shipped right to his door. He just wont believe me that this is not possible.

Every once in a while someone ships a gun into the US dissassembled and labeled something like "plumbing parts." It isn't legal, but it does happen.
Drugs, especially pills get shipped in under different prescriptions some. Say Oxycotin in a bottle which reads allegre. Isn't legal.

Why is it ok with everyone that machine guns are illegal?
They are not anymore dangerous than other guns, and in untrained hands I have to imagine even less dangerous in many cases.
It isn't that they are dangerous, it is that they are POWERFUL. THe government does not want its citizens to have any power. I can't afford to feed one, but that is my thoughts on the subject.

God have mercy the first time someone decides to go on one of these mass killings with a Honda civic and they just drive around a city running people over. A lot more dangerous and a lot harder to stop than a gunmen.