What Is Wrong With America?

[magpie]

firstly, how can the ownership of weapons that cause so much destruction be owned by an individual? owning a gun means that there is a weapon at a crime scene which can easily be taken from you and used against you.
secondly, the provision of health care to the needy, in a civilised society isn't it a wonderful thing to take care of the most in need?
thirdly how can they elect a politically amateur egoist to protect their foreign interests?
fourthly i completely support the kneelers at various sports venues!
unrelated but the reports from catalonia are horrific, why would we want to belong to a union that a member nation treats it's citizens so tragically?

[ToraToraTora]

mikey it's no surprise that the guns are legal you can buy almost any weaponry quite legally in Nevada and Arizona. I saw a program about the gun laws a while back, were a journalist went to little more than a car boot sale and was able to purchase no end of guns for cash no id nothing. On the subject of their health system, I echo eddie, on this. The US claims to be No 1 in many things perhaps they are but their gun laws and health system put them close to rock bottom in my opinion.

[EDDIE51]

TWR once you check into a hotel you get your room key. Then you can come and go as you please with no checks or restriction, he would have packed the guns in suitcases and taken them up to his room. If anyone saw him they would assume he was just taking his luggage up to the room.

[ToraToraTora]

TWR: "Don't know if this has been said, why did the Hotel not Question the person when he booked in to the Hotel, surely the Gun Case should have stood out. " - they are legal anyway, they'd no more question a cello case. Anyway he could pack suitcase or 3 full of them.

[mikey4444]

TWR...this has been asked before. As there were "in excess of 10" rifles in his room, and a considerable amount of ammunition, it would take many trips up in the elevator, to the 32nd floor. It seems that the Hotel needs to explain itself here.

[mikey4444]

TTT...its seems that we agree on this issue, but there again.....who would not ?

[albaqwerty]

TWR, the hotel staff and some of the other guests wouldn't have batted an eyelid about the number of guns due the US law and the laws about guns in Nevada.

As has been mentioned, can you imagine the weight !!

(don't think it's going to enhance the image of Las Vegas much, my heart goes out to all those affected)

[TWR]

As your post Alba xx

[EDDIE51]

Guns are cheap in the USA
https://www.cheaperthandirt.com/product/am-tac-300-blackout-semi-automatic-rifle-16-barrel-30-rounds-collapsible-stock-black-finish-am-tac300-gun-315.do?sortby=ourPicks&refType=&from=fn
This is an automatic assault rifle , a handgun can bought new for under $100. There are also many thousands of pawnshops and secondhand dealers who are licenced to sell guns, in one of these you can get a gun for less than 25% of the new price.

[ToraToraTora]

the thing about LV and the hotels is that they are the conference capital of the world. They hold conferences for every industry from arms to bath plugs and they probably have several weapons conferences a year. No doubt it's common place for people to bring their wares in. The whole problem needs looking at from the root and as I and others have said the US will never end it's love affair with arms.

[ToraToraTora]

yes eddie and as I said above you can buy them privately no questions ask or from the boy scouts jumble sale.

[ivor4781]

eddie51 regarding your text 8.56 tues,
this is from the guardian.....
""You can get a clean [unused] 9mm automatic for £1,500, a Glock for a couple of grand and you can even make an order for a couple of MAC-10s," he said. "Or you can get a little sawn-off for £150. They're easy enough to get hold of. You'll find one in any poverty area, every estate in London, and it's even easier in Manchester, where there are areas where the police don't go."

[zebo]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4942536/Gun-shop-owners-sold-Las-Vegas-shooter-firearms-speak.html

It's very easy to get guns in the US legally. If there were a central register, opposed by the NRA naturally, questions could be asked about why one person needs a small arsenal, even within the nonsense of the holy constitution. If they insist then a firearm for personal protection and a sports gun but after that why do you need them?

[jim360]

There's a fairly good discussion here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/73z7np/us_gun_fans_looking_at_vegas_please_explain_a/dnua3g6/

[youngmafbog]

I've still seen nothing yet that would convince me that this sort of person would have been stopped by gun laws. He was hell bent on a massacre and had money so could easily have done it in any UK town or City.

Even if he didnt have the money to buy guns the next option seems to be steal a van/truck/lorry and mow people down.

For this particular case what needs to be understood is why he did it. Only then can we start looking at ways of preventing another occurrence.

[mikey4444]

YMB...unfortunately, we may never knew the answer to that question.

[jim360]

You may be right, ymb, but it's hard to imagine that more stringent gun laws would make this sort of thing more likely. It flies in the face of almost all empirical evidence, let alone common sense, to suggest that making it harder to obtain such large quantities of guns wouldn't have an impact. I am sure that it wouldn't remove gun crime entirely, but not being able to solve a problem completely is no excuse for not trying to solve it partially.

The problem the US faces is that, firstly, the guns are often already out there for many people anyway, so you would have to not only stop selling guns so freely but also try and encourage or force hand-ins of the guns people already have. I think that was done in Australia, and shows that the principle works, but it would be a much larger exercise in the US.

But the second problem is that there's not enough will to take that step, either among the politicians or among many US citizens. I think, again, the reddit post I linked to above summarises the point rather nicely.

[jim360]

Historical reasons, social attitudes, and an incredibly powerful gun lobby.

[andy-hughes]

America's love of guns started back in 'frontier' days, which is when the Second Amendment was written to protect a very different society from the current society that still enjoys the freedoms it enshrines.

The major problem is that a vast number of Americans still adhere to that 'frontier' mentality, the notion of a man protecting his family and property with guns.

Until that culture shifts, the political will to change society will remain powerless - as it has been up to now, and will continue to be so for the foreseeable future.