Fuck the NRA .... 50 dead.

[Straw Man]

197. Legality.

Lawn darts are now illegal because they were created as a child's toy and they proved to be too dangerous for that population. A gun is not a child's toy.

Guns are deadly and some guns are far more deadly than others, and should not be available to a normal citizen to purchase. They should be reserved for war, or destroyed and not manufactured any more.

Despite what you may have been led to believe, AR15s are not "weapons of war." They have never been issued to any army because modern military long arms must be capable of full-auto or burst fire. It is the sine qua non.

There are less destructive guns that you gun enthusiasts and hunters can play with. There are less destructive guns that people who live on a farm or ranch can have for protection of livestock, or as you mentioned, to put down a suffering animal.

I can think of no gun more suited to protecting livestock from packs of coyotes than a semi-automatic centerfire rifle with a scope. Something like an AR15.

When angry people take a gun to a mass killing, they don't use the pistol, they use the semi-automatic and the gun that can take a large magazine of unending ammo.

Cho used pistols at Virginia Tech. Wong used pistols at Binghamton. Hasan used pistols at Fort Hood. The Navy Yard shooter used a pump action shotgun that didn't have a removable magazine. He killed twelve, and would have killed far more if he had attacked a crowded public area rather than an office building.

I have no problem with people having a gun if they have a legitimate reason for having one. But it does not need to be a semi-auto, or magazine capable.

Self-defense is always a legitimate reason, and the best weapon for self-defense is a magazine-capable semi-auto.

The fix for this is not technological. That's a red herring.