Posted on 01/16/2013 3:44:34 PM PST by lbryce
A new federal assault weapons ban and background checks of all gun buyers, which President Obama is expected to propose on Wednesday, might have done little to prevent the massacre in Newtown, Conn., last month. The semiautomatic rifle that Adam Lanza used to shoot 20 schoolchildren and 6 adults complied with Connecticut’s assault weapons ban, the police said, and he did not buy the gun himself.
But another proposal that Mr. Obama is expected to make could well have slowed Mr. Lanza’s rampage: banning high-capacity magazines, like the 30-round magazines that the police said Mr. Lanza used, which have been factors in several other recent mass shootings.
Those shootings, whose victims have included a member of Congress in Arizona, moviegoers in Colorado and first graders in Connecticut, have horrified the country and inspired Washington to embark on the most extensive re-examination of the nation’s gun laws in a generation. But some of the proposals that Mr. Obama is expected to make at the White House on Wednesday, which are likely to include a call for expanded background checks, a ban on assault weapons and limits on high-capacity clips, will be intended not only to prevent high-profile mass shootings, but also to curb the more commonplace gun violence that claims many thousands more lives every year.
“The president has made clear that he intends to take a comprehensive approach,” Jay Carney, the White House press secretary, said Tuesday. Mr. Carney said the proposals were aimed, broadly, at what he called “the scourge of gun violence in this country.”
While semiautomatic rifles were used in several recent mass shootings, including those in Newtown and in Aurora, Colo., where 12 people were killed at a movie theater in July, a vast majority of gun murders in the United States are committed with handguns.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
A total ban would have no effect. There will still be millions in circulation and they are easy to make, even without 3D printing.
Hold on a second. FReepers, set me straight, please. The shooter was carrying two semi-auto pistols and had some kind of shotgun in the trunk - is that correct?
Nevermind, a friend tells me that the latest official story is that he had an AR and that was the only weapon fired.sorry for the dumb question.
I could see limiting round capacity could slow him down. But these guys have the run of gun-free zones, unopposed. How long did it take the cops to show up? Long enough, presumably, for him to reload or switch to another gun.
How many lives will this save? A few, maybe, of the masses they kill. How many will it doom, who aren’t dead eyes and can’t drop assailants with single shots?
One of the stories is that Lanza was switching magazines before running them empty - with as many as ten or twelve rounds still in the discarded magazine. So the final level of carnage could’ve been as easily achieved with 10-round magazines.
Limiting magazine capacity is merely an inconvenience. Say he was only able, by law, to carry a 10 round mag. He can carry three for about the same weight as 1 30 round mag and they can be switched out in a matter of 1-2 seconds with practice.
The Police arrived in 11 MINUTES! Get the picture? Magazine capacity is MEANINGLESS. Only an armed, properly trained person on the scene could have made a difference, Period.
If Adam Lanza had been a Muslim we would have been spared the gun grabbing dog n pony show today.
Right. Like that's gonna work. /sarc
It took the cops 10 minutes to get there. How long does it take to change a "magazine clip"? [Obama's words]
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