Las Vegas shooting: one more reason to learn that guns are NOT the problem!

[mundaire]

From : https://www.gunsweek.com/en/current/new ... ot-problem

Las Vegas shooting: one more reason to learn that guns are NOT the problem!
October 2, 2017 - 4:06pm
Posted in: Current

50 killed and possibly 200 wounded in Las Vegas, after a gunman has opened fire on the people attending the Route 91 Harvest country music festival. The criminal, Stephen Paddock, used an automatic weapon to spray fire on the crowd from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino.



News are still running and the reasons behind such a criminal action are not yet clear – although some press sources claim, possibly unreliably and following a claim by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (link is external), that the perpetrator could have been a muslim convert (link is external). Nothing is official, and yet all mainstream media are already jumping to conclusions – the usual ones.

And so are politicians (link is external).

What do we know so far?

Mass murders like the one that took place today in Las Vegas, are always cause for hype, but if there’s something recent events such as this have taught us is never to jump to conclusions on the heat of the moment. Unfortunately gun control supporters seem to have skipped class that day.
Things that seemed mathematically certain at first, often turn out to be a whole different story: remember the false lead about the "one glove" of the Brussels airport bombing terrorists (link is external)?

Media have jumped on the Las Vegas massacre bandwagon, often with bold claims whose main purpose is to help pushing a political agenda rather than to inform. Which is why we waited at least a few hours before giving any news.

Few facts are known with a degree of certainty right now:

• There are at least 50 dead and 200 wounded, although the number of casualties is bound to rise; the shooter opened fire upon the Route 91 Harvest Festival from a room at the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel.
• The shooter, Stephen Paddock, was found dead – likely by a self-inflicted gunshot – when the Police entered the hotel room where he had been shooting from. A woman, Marilou Danley, was taken in by the LVPD for questioning and later released.
• Several genuine full-automatic weapons, along with some others illegally converted to full-auto or using "trigger cranks" (link is external), were recovered in the room. Two different footages of the shooting, from two different positions – one at the concert site, one on the side of the hotel – record two different weapons, one with a very fast rate of fire, the other slower, but still full auto. This difference may be a camera "artifact" or an objective difference.

Full-automatic firearms in the United States of America

This IS NOT the result of "excessive numbers of firearms owned by individuals". This is the consequence of an individual's own irresponsible actions: a complex problem that won't be solved in a snap of finger by a total ban on civilian gun ownership. Same applies to terrorism.

"But... in America you can buy machineguns at WalMart! That's what CNN says!"

Not really.

Full-automatic firearms are not available "over-the-counter" in the United States. Under the provisions of the 1934 National Firearms Act (link is external), the private ownership of full-automatic firearms must be pre-emptively authorized at a federal level.

More specifically, any individual wishing to purchase a select-fire or full-automatic firearm (a.k.a. a "machinegun") must submit a fully compiled ATF Form 4 (link is external) and pay a $200.00 tax stamp; processing times can vary from a minimum of six months up to a maximum of two years, and a separate form (or authorization request, depending from how you want to call it) must be submitted for each single machinegun an individual intends to purchase. The procedure must also be repeated anew if the machinegun, or machineguns, is/are transfered to another individual.

In case you're wondering, the same procedure applies to all Title II firearms (link is external), which is a series of items that includes sound suppressors, "Destructive Devices" (link is external) (any firearm with a bore larger than .50-cal or that can launch an explosive or incendiary projectile, and their ammunition!), "Short-Barreled Rifles" (link is external) (any rifle or carbine with a barrel shorter than 16 inches), "Short-Barreled Shotguns" (link is external) (any shotgun with a barrel shorter than 18 inches and shorter than 26 inches overall) and "Any Other Weapons" (link is external) (firearms disguised as other objects). Only the cost of the tax stamp varies.

It's not a matter of opinions: you can NOT freely, legally purchase a machinegun over the counter anywhere in the United States. PERIOD!
Also, the Hughes Amendment to HR4332 (link is external) banned select-fire or full-automatic guns (machineguns) manufactured after May, 1986 from ownership by private individuals, with the relevant licenses now being available only for corporate uses.

This means that only shooting ranges, private security or private military companies and those business entities that rent firearms to the movie industry have access to those, as well as the "Special Occupation Taxpayers" (link is external) – such as manufacturers or dealers – whose business is normally to sell those firearms to local law enforcement.

As any firearms enthusiast in the United States will know, during the course of the years, this made the price of the so-called "transferable" machineguns (manufactured or imported and registered on the U.S. civilian market before May 1986) to skyrocket.

The cheaper ones, such as Madsen 1950 or Ingram MAC-10 sub-machineguns, can cost a handful of thousands of dollars – the rough equivalent of a small city car – depending from the conditions; other more desirable firearms such as World War II Sturmgewehrs or modern assault rifles will normally go for several tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars: on this link you can see the typical prices paid on a legal auction of Class III full-automatic firearms in the United States (link is external).

This makes the eventuality of Paddock's select-fire weaponry being legal extremely unlikely, if not outright impossible.

"When will you ever learn?"

"How many more have to die before you gun nuts realize that firearms must be banned?"

The shooters' community and the shooting industry are sick and tired to hear the gun grabbers pose this question every damn time that a criminal or a terrorist gets his or her way. Of course, we could answer that, in Summer 2016, in Nice, some guy killed 86 and wounded 302 in five mere minutes with a 20-ton truck (link is external), so how many more have to die before you car nuts realize that powerful vehicles must be banned for the sake of everybody?

The awful truth, pure and simple, is that we are not going to "learn" that. It's just not going to happen.

Collective responsibility and collective punishment are something fitting for totalitarian dictatorships. In a democracy, responsibility is individual, and so is punishment – including the loss of rights and privileges. Plus, the fact that something can be abused to commit evil acts or be dangerous otherwise does not automatically exclude a legal use.

Very simply put, the shooters community – both in Europe and in the United States – will never and ever be willing to "discuss", "dialogue", "reach an agreement", or accept any limitation, let alone impose self-limitations, on our rights for the crimes of a handful of criminals, terrorists and madmen that are still a negligible minority if compared to the sheer number of gun owners worldwide.

With the State of Nevada enjoying liberal gun and carry laws, which would have made a Bataclan-style head-on attack to the concert absolutely impossible (link is external), Stephen Paddock chose the way of the coward and sprayed fire upon the crowd from a window.

If anything, that's an evidence of how legal gun ownership and carry can save lives. Only when they fall in the hands of evil or deranged persons do they become dangerous.

In the end, everything reduces to a single consideration: laws, particularly restrictive laws, can not protect us.
Both in Europe and in the United States, the conversion of firearms to full-auto and murder are illegal. Did that save one single life, ever?

If right now, somewhere in the world, a man or a woman is willing to slaughter dozens of innocents and is getting ready to act out, the sheer idea that restrictive gun laws could stop the massacre is nothing short of insane (link is external).

Nothing else matters.

[rhleng1]

True Sir, am humbled to read it.

[pkaran]

Hi All,

I am a law-abiding citizen and know that it is illegal to retrofit a weapon. Therefore, by posting the below news-item that appeared on Wed, the 4th Oct in the Times of India, I do not mean to encourage gun-owners to tamper with their devices. Doing so shall be at your own risk and liability. This post excerpts of which I copy below from the quoted source is intended solely for the purpose of sharing news with a view to enhancing our general awareness:

“Numerous attempts to design retrofits failed until recent years when bump stocks came into the market. The device basically replaces the gun’s shoulder rest, with a support step that covers the trigger opening. By holding the pistol grip with one hand and pushing forward on the barrel with the other, the shooter’s finger comes in contact with the trigger. The recoil causes the gun to buck back and forth, bumping the trigger. This means the finger is pulling the trigger for each round fired, keeping the weapon a legal semi-automatic.

This replacement shoulder stock turns a semi-automatic rifle into a weapon that can fire at a rate of 400 to 800 rounds per minute, said Dianne Feinstein, California Senator.

[mundaire]

@ pkaran, You don't need any accessory like a "bump fire stock" to bump fire a semi. You can do so with most semis without the need for any modification/ accessory. It is quite difficult to control though.