Have we become used to or immune to mass shootings?

[henry quirk]

Griff,

You highlighted sumthin' of mine...

'I shouidn't have to 'prove' that I'm good to gun own; gov has to 'prove' in an obvious, demonstrable way why I'm not (and it has to do so without diggin' around in my drawers)'

...presumably as an evidence of this...

"So you're saying yes to background checks unless they are effective."

You just make my point for me.

I am presumed innocent till proven otherwise.

Proving me otherwise takes place within the confines of 'due process', meaning I can't be violated in person, in privacy, in property while being investigated for crime. And I can't be violated in person, in privacy, in property because one or more think me 'odd'. This includes a background check. My skivvies drawer may contain all manner of nastiness, some perhaps sufficient to disallow my purchasing a gun, BUT you can't look there without damned good reason (which has got to be more than 'he's odd'). The bar is set HIGH and the legit background check should, can, only dig through what's a matter of public record (which itself should be largely shallow).

So: it's not that I want ineffective background checks; it's that I accept, in a free nation peopled by free men and women, our employees (should) have extraordinarly limited power over us (far less than we [should] have over them).

Now, if you support relieving folks of privacy, support violating personhood, support removing or denying property based on what someone might do, well, then you march, lockstep with idiots like tw, along that road leading to 'politburo'.

Me, I'll be walkin', in a loose, relaxed way, in the opposite direction.

As I say up-thread: more safety, less liberty; more liberty, less safety.

It would be nice if a balance could be had, but I don't think that's possible.

[henry quirk]

"change the Constitution"

Plenty who want to, on both sides of the aisle.

Dumb motherfuckers ought to leave well enough alone.