In article , tonycooper214
@gmail.com says...

On Wed, 18 Sep 2013 17:04:59 -0400, "J. Clarke"
wrote:

In article , tonycooper214
says...

On Wed, 18 Sep 2013 08:26:11 -0400, "J. Clarke"
wrote:

It is only one, very limited, form of reality. A state law could
require Grandma to sell the gun on consignment through a licensed
retail gun seller. There certainly is no shortage of them in this
state.

Fine, you pass that law. Since Grandma has no interest in guns and gun
laws and wasn't paying attention the day you passed it, she has no idea
that there is such a law and goes ahead and lists the guns on Craigslist
anyway. Now what?

Grandma is probably quite unaware of many extant laws. If Grampa's
estate include meth lab equipment, a stash of marijuana, a computer
loaded with image files of naked children, or anything obtained
illegally, she might innocently offer them for sale. We don't pass or
not pass laws based on people's knowledge of what is, or is not,
legal.

Meaningless noise. Grandma has disobeyed your law. Now what do you do?

Prevent it. Require the refusal of any advertisement for a gun in any
medium unless the advertiser is an authorized seller of guns. We
already have restrictions in place on advertisers that the medium must
observe. We require certain contractors to have a license number to
advertise. We require sellers of automobiles who are dealers to
reveal that they are dealers. There are many other restrictions in
place.

Fine, pass such a law and figure out a way to make it stick. Hint--
internet search engines are not necessarily hosted in your state or even
in the US. If they're not in the US there is absolutely nothing that US
law can do about them.

You seem to be big on passing more and more and more and more laws,
without regard to whether any of them actually accomplish anything other
than killing trees.

That would probably be safer for Grandma. For Grandma to offer
the
gun on Craigslist and meet with a total stranger is putting Grandma in
danger. Worse, if Grandma is so naive to allow the stranger to come
to her home. Nor do we want Grandma toting the gun to a flea market
to sell it.

rolling eyes

Do you hear yourself? Yeah, gotta protect grandma from all those mean
ugly looking mother-stabbing father raping strangers if she wants to
dispose of grandpa's guns. Why don't you pass a law that says that she
has to take his cameras or golf clubs or fishing tackle to a gunshop and
get a background check run on the buyer as well? Wouldn't that be safer
for her as well?

If you want to make a case for something, do it with some connection
to a logical reason for your position. There is no logical connection
for a background check on the sale of fishing equipment.

Your argument is that Grandma selling something on Craigslist is
dangerous for Grandma. Now it is up to you to explain why selling a
firearm on Craigslist is more dangerous to Grandma than selling a camera
or a bicycle or a fishing rod.

Up to me? All it takes is a modicum of common sense to understand why
advertising the fact that you have a gun for sale can attract people
who would not respond to an ad for a camera or a fishing rod.
Craigslist has a search option, and the bad guys aren't searching for
"Nikon" or "Daiwa".

They aren't? So where _do_ all these terrorists who are such a deadly
danger that police prevent them from taking pictures of bridges and the
like get their equipment? Or are terrorist bombers OK around grandma?

While I would not advise Grandma to advertise expensive items of any
sort on Craigslist if the sale involves strangers coming to Grandma's
house when only Grandma is there, there are certain items that are
more likely to attract the attention of those "mean ugly looking"
people. Guns is one such category.

Well, that pretty much sums it up. To you people who own firearms are
all in Group W. When you actually meet a few get back to us.

Then I'm in Group W. I own two firearms. While no survey is totally
accurate, most place the number of Americans who are in favor of
stricter gun laws at 80 to 90 percent of the population. Unless you
think that only 10 to 20 percent of Americans own a firearm, then
there are many of us firearm owners who support stricter gun control
laws.

You're the one who is portraying firearms purchasers as being
automatically suspect and unsafe to be around. If that is the case then
you should be suspicious of yourself and your motives. Why _do_ you
need guns anyway?

Heck, just ban private sales of everything unless they happen at a gun
shop. Gotta protect Grandma you know.

Yeah, that goes along with the NRA bull**** about "only outlaws will
have guns".

You're the one who brought protecting Grandma from mean ugly looking
mother-stabbers and father rapers into this. So are you the NRA?

Congress deals with the reality that the NRA dreams up.

You go on believing that.

Like something like 80 to 90 percent of the population, I believe in
the need for stricter gun controls. The NRA, though, has dreamed up
the "reality" that our representatives should not represent us. The
dream is accompanied by generous donations to campaign funds and
threats that they will support any opposing candidate in the next
election.

You go on believing that.

Can you dispute it? With a straight face?

Have you ever looked beyond "80 to 90 percent" to find out what
"stricter gun controls" they want? And then compared those to the laws
actually in force?

Dragging this back to photography, I've met these gun owners:
http://tonycooper.smugmug.com/Hobbie...ction-Shooting

So that's what mother-stabbers and father-rapers look like. I always
pictured them more like Arlo Guthrie.