Disqus - Latest Comments for Beansie_time

Re: A common sense approach to gun control

Beansie_time — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 21:24:32 -0000

I'd like to add that I am a member at a local fish and game club and I would be more than happy to welcome both of you there as my guests to further discuss the ideas of gun control and responsible ownership, and also allow you to safely try some of the shooting sports. If you wish to take me up on this offer feel free to email me. my email is the same as my user name here @ yahoo dot com.

Re: A common sense approach to gun control

Beansie_time — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 19:27:56 -0000

The solution I propose is personal responsibility. Where did the student who brought the gun to school in Londonderry get the gun? Whoever gave it to him committed a crime by giving an unsupervised minor a handgun. Did he steal it? If so he committed felony. Is the Londonderry Firefighter being charged with felony murder? Will he actually serve the rest of his life in prison or be paroled early? Did he have a history of violence with his wife or past girlfriends? If so why wasn't he held responsible for his actions then? In any situation the person who committed the crime should be held responsible. Otherwise we are encouraging bad behavior and reinforcing the fact that people who commit these crimes will get off with a slap on the wrist. If people were actually held responsible for their actions with guns then no regulation beyond what is already in place is necessary. I know this solution is largely simple but in my mind it is the only one that has a chance of actually working.
Thank you Miss Mckinney and Mr. Editor for giving me the opportunity to post my thoughts.

Re: A common sense approach to gun control

Beansie_time — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 19:08:42 -0000

My argument is not that the deaths are the price of freedom. A single death is an unnacceptable price to pay for nearly anything.
I'm arguing that the deaths cited here would have occurred independently of the presence of firearm. These people intended to kill another person. Murder would have occurred in these situations even if guns had never been invented. Blaming the gun does nothing to address the fact that the Londonderry firefighter willfully committed multiple felonies.

Re: A common sense approach to gun control

Beansie_time — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 16:54:51 -0000

Mr. Editor,
I have neither slung mud nor called names, and I will not do either.
In the situation of domestic violence if a gun was not at hand the husband would have used a knife, a bat, a car, or any of a thousand other means by which an abusive man has killed his wife or girlfriend in the past. This person has sunk to the level of commiting physical harm against a woman he is supposed to love, he will commit such harms by whatever means are available to him. Would his crime be any more tolerable if it were committed with a wrench instead of a gun? No. It is still murder regardless of the means. The gun did not turn him into a criminal any more than a car turns a drunk driver into a criminal.
As far as the Londonderry firefighter's story goes I am unfamiliar with the details but I would tend to believe that people are careless enough to put their neighbors and others in danger by having a "driveway shootout" are not the kind of people who would be too concerned about following the law.
I also tend to think that a Firefighter who works 500 feet from the Police station, and 500 feet from the chief of police who would be charged with issuing permits, would be the kind of person who is denied a license to own a firearm. Therefore this law, or magazine capacity laws, would not have helped in keeping him from killing his wife.

Re: A common sense approach to gun control

Beansie_time — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 14:40:04 -0000

I think what Cekim is trying to state is that in NH gun owners are already held liable for commiting a crime with a gun, and for the crimes a juvenile commits with a gun that was stored irresponsibly by a legal gun owner. The mistake here is thinking that adding another law ( licensing ) to the process for a legal gun owner, will prohibit a criminal from using a gun for illegal purposes. The target here should be the violent criminal and keeping them in prison for their entire sentence rather than restricting the right of the law abiding citizen. A gun will not turn a law abiding citizen into a criminal much in the same way that another law will not turn a criminal into a law abiding citizen. People are what they are and objects and laws will never change that. Years of education might, but never objects and laws. I suggest you take a deeper look into the gun owning community of NH and New England and realize that many parts of NH and New England rely on firearms not only for sport and protection but also for jobs. Many of the largest gunmakers in the US are right here in NH (Sigarms in Exeter, Ruger in Newmarket) or the surrounding states (Smith and Wesson, and Kahr Arms in MA, Colt and Ruger in CT, and Bushmaster in ME) supplying many people with jobs in a tough economic time. Surely further restrictions on legal gun owners who hurt those who legally supply them with their firearms and possibly hurt our local economy.
I would never argue against Miss Mckinney's right to express her ideas in the forum your paper provides, but she and you need to understand that there will be an exchange of ideas when someone writes about changing the way another exercises their rights. Common sense to me is to that law abiding gun owners be left alone by their government and that we hold criminals responsible for what they have done regardless if they used a gun or a kitchen knife. A compromise does not exist when only one side sacrifices.