BTW- No guns and (little or) no crime in Sweden, Japan, Holland, Denmark, Communist USSR, Communist China, Germany...etc.

Also, more people die in the USA from guns than anywhere else in the world that is not at war (besides places like South Africa).

Anaconda's example is an extremely rare case that is used by pro-gun advocates to scare people into using their emotions (instead of reason) to make decisions.

We need some kind of safety lock (optional on whether it is used or not) on every gun to prevent the 10 year old accidental shooting cases. If you need your gun to be ready to fire at all times, you can have the lock off. If you worry about the kids, you can turn it on.

Eliminate the drug war, which will eliminate a huge number of shooting deaths.

Get rid of other restrictions, they hurt honest citizens.

Keep violent movies and video games away from children. I'm NOT talking censorship.

And finally we need better parents. Anyone disagree with me? I don't claim to know it all on this issue, but it makes sense to me.

Lock the shit up and take the time to educate your children.

There is no reason why anyone needs a handgun. Argue till your face turns blue about "the right to bear arms" but this is the year 2000 and not 1776. We are not afraid of the red-coats anymore.

I agree that 99.9% of children are not affected. But the bottom line is if the kid wants to rent Resident Evil, and the parents say no, they shouldn't be able to. If its ok with the parents, go right ahead and let the kid do it. I'm not trying to tell anyone what is or isn't appropriate, but the parent should have the authority to make that call.

"If they are wrong about steroids, then there should be doubt about all of their information."

Don't worry. I am very aware of this. I take everything the media says with a large grain of salt.

"There is no reason why anyone needs a handgun."

Who are you to make that call? The criminals are going to get their guns regardless of the gun laws. Some things do need to be changed, I admit. The kids that shot up Columbine had no business whatsoever getting their hands on a gun. There parents didn't buy the gun, the kids did (over the phone I think). That should never happen, no exceptions. But to totally outlaw guns? Again, what good will it do when the criminals have their guns and the honest citizens don't?

It has now been 12 months since gun owners in Australia were forced by new law to surrender 640,381 personal firearms to be destroyed by the government, a program costing Australia taxpayers more than $500 million dollars.

The first year results are now in:

Australia-wide, homicides are up 3.2 percent,.
Australia-wide, assaults are up 8.6 percent;.
Australia-wide, armed robberies are up 44 percent
In the state of Victoria alone, homicides with firearms are now up 300 percent. (Note that while the law-abiding citizens turned them in, the criminals did not and criminals still possess their guns!

While figures over the previous 25 years showed a steady decrease in armed robbery with firearms, this has changed drastically upward in the past 12 months, since the criminals now are guaranteed that their prey is unarmed. There has also been a dramatic increase in break-ins and assaults of the elderly.

Australian politicians are at a loss to explain how public safety has decreased, after such monumental effort and expense was expended in "successfully ridding Australian society of guns." You won't see this data on the American evening news or hear your governor or members of the state Assembly disseminating this information. The Australian experience proves it.

The statistics I seem to remember claim people who own guns kill themselves (and other innocent people) more than they ever use it to protect themselves.

Rifles (not assault rifles) are one thing since they can be used to hunt and for sport shooting but handguns...well, your mind seems made up but please do a little digging (just for kicks) and see what you find out about the other POV.

Neither your examples nor Australia is directly related to the potential success or failure of disarming the citizenry here.

We have more people and more guns than Sweden or Germany. China is irrelevant. It is a borderline totalitarian state, where most of the people are so poor that a gun is an abstraction to them.

Communist USSR was similar. Its demise makes comparison to our country useless.

Our country is significantly larger than the "relevant" examples you mentioned (Sweden, Japan, Holland Denmark etc.) We have more money, more guns, and more drugs than any of them.

No other country has the situation we do. It is not effective to use other countries successes or failures on this issue to gauge the US's options.

Without a reference point we are lost.

We must use varying examples and establish links to our society. Then we can make educated judgements and hypotheses about the potential impact on our country.

2thick,

Guess what my wife,who is vehemently anti-gun, screamed when the window was broken and heard them say "lets get em".

Thats right- "GET YOUR GUN NOW!!!!!!!!"

I did, they left,nobody hurt,end of story.