RichmondLeaders.com: News & Opinions by and for the Leaders of Richmond

This article is eloquent and reasonable and is so reassuring to those of us who find it hard to understand our fellow citizens who so ardently oppose reasonable gun laws. Keep writing.

I was the vigil and Lie-In on Monday and witnessed the events that Chip described. I have never seen anything so disgusting in my life. With handguns on their hips, members of the Virginia Citizens Defense League surrounded those laying on the ground and taunted and laughed at them. Many of these people had lost their loved ones to gun violence, including mothers who had lost their young children. This group not included family members of the Virginia Tech victims, but survivors from across the Commonwealth. It’s something I will never forget, and it is beyond comprehension that Virginia legislators voted for these people and not the overwhelming majority of Virginians who want to prevent dangerous people from getting guns. They should be held accountable, the Republicans and also the two Democrats on that committee (John Edwards and Roscoe Reynolds).

Just to present another viewpoint here, a few responses:

You say, “As the shots and screams rang out in Norris Hall, do you think anyone would have debated the merits of making guns harder to buy?

“Do you think any of them would have agreed with stickers such as “Life is precious. Guns protect it.””

Can’t answer those questions, but I’m real sure that a good many of them, if not most, wished desperately that they had had some way to fight back.

The description of the “die-in” that I heard was a lot different from the one presented here. Not having seen it myself, I can’t say whether each side is presenting partial truths, or one side is lying. I do know that the Capitol Police have in the past removed people who attempted to disrupt the sort of authorized protest that the anti-gunners put on.

You quote Adam Gopnik, “Nations with tight gun laws have, on the whole, less gun violence; countries with restrictive gun laws have some gun violence; countries with essentially no gun laws have a lot of gun violence.”

What say you to the example of the Swiss, where every mature male is required by law to have in his home, ready for use, an automatic weapon and hundreds of rounds of ammunition?

What say you to the British, who after banning firearms are seeing drastically-increased rates of violent crime (see http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article2409817.ece).

What say you to the repeated studies that show, here in the States, that violent crime falls when a state adopts a “shall issue” policy for Concealed Handgun Permits?

Lastly, how DARE you attempt to tell anyone, whether they be college students or others, that they have no right to have an effective means of self-defense? After late-night sessions (past when GRTC runs) at the General Assembly, I may well have to walk home, four miles through the night-time streets of Richmond. Although I pass the police station, I almost never see a police officer throughout the journey. If I’m accosted by muggers, as has happened in the past, should I ask them to wait while I find a pay phone and call 9-1-1?

I was at the Capitol and watched the protest against the so-called “gun show loophole.” There is no loophole - gun transfers at gun shows are under the sdame rules as gun sales in McDonald’s parking lots - OCCASIONAL PRIVATE SALES ARE ALWAYS ALLOWED WITHOUT getting permission from the government.

The protestors are entitle to their opinion, but they are wrong - either you are for the right of self defense, or you are not. Unfortunately, unlike the pro-gun citizens who watched the protest, many of the the anti-gunners appeared mean spirited. That’s too bad.

The “gunshow” loophole allows no backgound check. If you listened to Steven Colbert and Mike Huckabee, you buy 200 guns, ship them to the streets of NYC and sell them to anyone (felons, gang-bangers, terrorists,etc), it doesn’t matter. Or the felons, gang-bangers, terrorists can just buy them out-right - no background check, no worry. That’s the point. The gun show loop hole has nothing to do with CCW. Take one point and stick with it please. If you are legally allowed to purchase a firearm, the closing of the “gun show loop hole” should have no affect on you. So stop your whining.

Well, Joanne — and, BTW, the link to your email address comes up as generic Yahoo, so you might want to fix that if you really want people to know who you are — I’m afraid that you’re wrong here.
First, ‘The “gunshow” loophole allows no backgound check’ doesn’t really make much sense. There’s no provision in Virginia law to allow private citizens to run background checks on prospective buyers, true, but at gun shows there is a special setup connected directly to the State Police database, available to anyone. If an individual had any doubts about a prospective buyer, it’s the simplest thing in the world to ask a licensed vendor to run a check for you, and give him $10 to cover the fee and the trouble.
Second, I do NOT listen to SC and/or MH if I can possibly avoid it — and usually I can!
Third, if you think that anyone can buy “200 guns” at a gun show and avoid a background check — and without violating Virginia’s 1-gun-a-month law, then you’re either entirely ignorant of the law, or you’re smoking something much more powerful than anything I ever ran into! Can I cop some of that?
Fourth, pray tell what is “CCW”?
Fifth, the word you meant is “effect”, not “affect”.
Sixth point is left as an exercise for the reader.

Virginia is not the only state to have the gun show loop hole. 32 other states have it and many do not have the 1 in 30 stipulation. They are all looking at Virginia to see what happens. CCW is the concealed weapons permit. If you know anything about the varios gun laws in the various states, you’d know the abreviations. And, so sorry, I didn’t hit my spell check. The point of getting rid of the loop hole is to make it maditory that all sale require the background check just like all car sales require tag transfers. I f you sell your car to your neighbor, do you not have to transfer the tag?

Affect - to product an effect upon. I used the word correctly. As you originally said, you were not at the Lie-In. You would have heard them say they were not anti-gun. They were Protesting Lax Gun Laws. A totally different thing. The complete background check would have caught this particular idividual’s mental illness and that would have disqualified him from obtaining the guns. By closing the gun show loop hole, disqualified individuals can not go to other indiviuals or gun shows and obtain guns there that they are not legally allowed to buy. That is the point. Again, nothing to do with the conceal, carry permit.

You compare those ‘liers’ to Christ? Well Christ said to get a sword (Lu 22:36).

Christ was there to Save humanity, The Anti-s were there to get their picture in the paper or for extra credit in some liberal course. (We have been told in previous years, by the students, that those who showed up were given extra credit)

What a way to build an organization. Build it with promises of gold and silver (or grades to a kid) instead of what the VCDL builds on… what is good moral and RIGHT! Guns SAVE Lives!

Joanne -
–”CCW is the concealed weapons permit.” Sorry, Virginia does not have those. What we have in Virginia is “Concealed Handgun Permits”, or CHPs. There is no permit to allow carrying a concealed pair of nunchuks or Bowie knife.
– “If you know anything about the varios gun laws in the various states, you’d know the abreviations. And, so sorry, I didn’t hit my spell check.” Dear heart, in the first place anyone who is literate shouldn’t need spell-check except to spot typos, and in the second place you you don’t have to “hit” it. The function is built into the software that we’re all using on this site; when you spell it wrongly, it gets a red underline. To ignore that would seem to me to indicate a lack of respect for proper communication, if not for both the readers and for one’s self. BTW, the words are “various” and “abbreviations”, not to mention “mandatory” and “sales”.
– “Affect - to product an effect upon.” Yes, that’s the definition of the word that you used, except of course that you typed “product” rather than “produce”. However, you said ‘the closing of the “gun show loop hole” should have no affect on you’, which is entirely a different matter. Either “have no effect”, or “would not affect” would have been correct. Consult any grammar-school teacher.
– “The complete background check would have caught this particular idividual’s mental illness ” Sorry, Joanne, wrong again, and not just because you misspelled “individual”. Cho had the standard background check under Virginia law in effect at the time. Remember, he was buying from a dealer, not through some imaginary loophole.
This discussion has descended to a depressingly trivial level, so I’m opting out — though not before pointing out that there’s probably a correlation between sloppy spelling and sloppy thinking.
Have a nice day, and remember to always feel good about yourself regardless of reasons not to do so, and never to consider anything that would make you feel less than safe.

Yeah, VCDL builds on what is “good and moral and right”…like taunting and laughing at mothers who have lost their children to gun violence. Not only that, but some of them also brought their kids to join in and watch.

The only people who would consider taunting the VA Tech families “moral and right” as they lay on the ground remembering their deceased loved ones are people who are demented, pathetic human beings.

What strikes me about this debate is the failure of cooler heads to prevail over the reactionary politics of extremists. It’s unfortunate that despite significant concessions on the part of the supporters of this legislation, no compromise was reached. In fact only more negativity was created, leading to an ugly confrontation (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL7g8hbzQzw) between those whose lives have been affected by gun violence and a group who time and again push a tired rhetoric of “constitutional rights” while simultaneously impeding by proxy the rights of life and the pursuit of happiness that all Americans are entitled to.

Perhaps this video of the protest can remind us all that while the right to “bear arms” deserves further debate, the importance of compromise and mutual understanding are the only means by which we can ensure both public safety and wellbeing AND political freewill.

If the big thing that Roy has to complain about is my typing, than so be it. He has a small mind. He misses the big picture. A person has to pull the trigger of the gun that kills people. That person should be held accountable for his/her actions. Grow up and take responsibility for your actions. If you own the gun, if you shot the gun, it is your fault. What ever happened that is connected to that gun. BTW, Christ didn’t have a gun.

Thanks for sharing that YouTube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL7g8hbzQzw

I have never seen anything more disturbing and heinous in my life. Those people who did the taunting and heckling should be ashamed of themselves. I wish all America could see that - it would put a much different tone on the gun control debate moving forward. How angry does someone have to be to yell venom and physically confront those who lost loved ones at Virginia Tech (or anywhere else)?

Now let us examine the background check. It is in no way a complete check. It is flawed. It is missing information. Until all the data bases within your state are connected with all the data bases to all the other states, and all their data bases are inter-connected (which they are not), a complete background check can not be achieved. So, even though HR 2640 has been signed into law, the background check is still inadequate. When Cho bought his gun, the standard background check had it’s own loop holes. It was and is incomplete. Any law enforcement agency will tell you that. Again, you have not done your research.

The video on youtube of the “lie-in” protest has made me sick. What nerve do the people who supposedly represent the victims of VT have to make a spectacle of themselves and then get upset when they draw a crowd? If you watch the video (what little actual video there is) You will notice that the laughter is coming from a conversation in the background, something that has nothing to do with what the people laying on the ground were doing. It was an A-B conversation, C your way out of it, if you can. But that is hard for an Anti to do. They rely on deciet and lies to spread their point (sticter gun laws create less gun crime? Did Big Bird give you this statistic??) and without the audience that the VCDL brought, PEG wouldn’t have had ANY audience. I do believe that this protest ended up with an Anti complaining to the cops that the VCDL were “ruining” their protest, and didnt have a permit… Uhhh, we weren’t protesting, we were watching you make a spectacle of yourself. Then an angry Anti actually shoves a member of the VCDL! Non-violent protest you say? Not quite! The Anti-gun crowd has legendarily used disrespect and a slurring of words and meaning to make their own views look more lucritive. Look at the recent committee meetings in which the VCDL and 2A groups remained silent while listening to the views of the Antis, only to be heckled and ridiculed when it was Our turn to speak.
Creating more gun laws is not the answer, we already have over 20,000 gun laws on the books, and the criminals who will not abide by those will also not abide by the laws keeping guns off campus. So do the world a favor and honor those who were killed at VT by protecting yourself!! If a dog were to attack you would you not fight it off? If someone were to come at you with a knife would you tell them to wait for the police? (More than likely the police would be looking at your body lined in chalk as everyone knows when seconds count, the police are minutes away!). God gave us a right to live and a right to protect that, so make the criminals jobs a little tougher, give them a little more reason to second guess robbing or raping you, arm yourself.
As for the gunshow loophole, more than 90% of gun sales at a gun show are done through a dealer where a background check is mandatory. The remaining tables (that dont serve food) are usually some guy who has a collection of antique guns (most probably dont even fire) that guys like to buy and hang up above their mantle and whatnot. Less than 1% of all guns used in crimes come from gun shows. What needs to be done is that if you commit a murder with a gun, then your life will be taken also, not after years of living off the taxpayers in prison, but swiftly after judgment. The harsher the penalties, the more people are going to reconsider their actions. So learn the facts, and learn some respect, not just in what you do, but how you spread your slander afterwards.