Sandy Hook Killings Should Mean Gun Control

By Chuck Strouse Fri., Dec. 14 2012 at 7:24 PM

For the record, the killing of 20 innocent school children in Connecticut was about the most horrible thing I have heard in years. The kids, of course, didn't deserve it -- and Florida needs to act. We are preparing to issue our 1 millionth concealed weapons permit next week. And we have blocked cities from sensibly limiting firearms.

One of the many outrages of these killings is that neither presidential candidate -- and I particularly fault President Obama -- had the balls to call for substantial gun control during the election. And U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who has changed the conversation on gun control by leading a series of Supreme Court decisions redefining the relationship between guns and the Constitution, is also to blame.

This is a national tragedy that will, over the next few weeks, enter every home in the nation. Online petitions are already circulating. And the Florida legislative session is around the corner. It starts in mid-March.

Stand Your Ground ought to be repealed or at least substantially overhauled. A law passed last year that prohibits good gun laws should also be amended.

The history isn't all bad here. In 1997, the state's Supreme Court hit Kmart up for $11.5 million after a drunk guy bought a gun there, then killed his estranged girlfriend.

So call your rep. Talk to your neighbors, Make things happen. This is an important time in our nation's history. Florida needs to limit guns.

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JoeMamma

I have no idea how gun control could have stopped something like this. legally purchased guns stolen.

Unless you have something like a digital token that cops use so someone can't fire the gun unless they have the token....

and this really has nothing to do with stand your ground.

-do you even know what the law is?

ChazStevensGenius topcommenter

Chuck;

Children ages 5 to 14 in America are 13 times as likely to be murdered with guns as children in other industrialized countries.

We regulate toy guns, by requiring orange tips — but lawmakers don’t have the gumption to stand up to National Rifle Association extremists and regulate real guns as carefully as we do toys.

It's harder to adopt a pet, than to buy a semi-automatic assault rifle.

The argument that if more people carried guns, they would deter shooters or interrupt them doesn't hold water. Mass shooters typically kill themselves or are promptly caught, so it’s hard to see what deterrence would be added by having more people pack heat. There have been few if any cases in the United States in which an ordinary citizen with a gun stopped a mass shooting.

We should look for inspiration at our own history on auto safety. As with guns, some auto deaths are caused by people who break laws or behave irresponsibly. But we don’t shrug and say, “Cars don’t kill people, drunks do.”

Instead, we have required seat belts, air bags, child seats and crash safety standards. We have introduced limited licenses for young drivers and tried to curb the use of mobile phones while driving. All this has reduced America’s traffic fatality rate per mile driven by nearly 90 percent since the 1950s.

Nancy Reid

How about momentum for mental health services?

chucks3

This writer is not a Commie, and the war on drugs has largely worked. Any mass murders are bad, particularly those of kids aged 5 to 10.

blkdoggy421

Yes!! Let's outlaw guns. We've done that with drugs and you see how well that one is going.

Colleen Custred

The victims in Connecticut were not about gun control and stripping us of our rights. Put your energy someplace else and do better homework, chuck.

stevengenesdad

1 Like

The communist writter who wrote this article is not intellegent enough to write for fortune cookies.

Cal Adams

For the record, this is a straight up tragedy but it doesn't have a damn thing to do with Stand your Ground.

scuba

There are about 20 mass murders in the US each year and have been for the past decade. Of course this pales in comparison to the 15,000 single murders each year.