What with all the shootings and all, from people paranoid that Barack Obama is going to steal their guns.
Some background: I live in the South. My family is from out West. My mother was a sharpshooter in the army; my sister was in ROTC. My mom kept an unloaded gun in the house, with no bullets since her permit had long since expired. Maybe if she had had bullets she'd still be alive today, since she was murdered in her home. My brother in law hunts, so do all my aunts and uncles and cousins. And they hunt real animals for real food, not just foxes and rabbits for sport.
And yet.
And yet, I've never touched a gun, and I have no desire to. I'd rather not think about them, really. Knives and swords are much more my style. Guns are just so inelegant.
My biggest concern with guns is that all these people that aren't supposed to get them, are somehow getting them. The kid that shot up VA Tech with a history of depression. That immigrant that shot up his former classmates cuz he lost his job. The dude with a history of violent crime and felonies.
It seems to me that additional restrictions of gun laws are unnecessary. We just need to enforce the ones we already have. Any Joe the Plumber that looks remotely sane can walk into a public gun show, pay his $20 admission, see the latest ******* from the manufactures, plunk down cash and walk out armed to the teeth, all with no background check or anything more than a request for something vaguely resembling a gun permit.
Probably the best solution would be to have a national gun permit database, and required vendors at gun shows to verify the validity of permits before selling to anyone. Sort of how like you have to have a valid driver's license before you can buy a car. People with genuine up to date permits should have no problem with such a database. And if vendors are found guilty of not checking gun permits (as one local firearms store around here was) then need to have their firearms selling license revoked until they can re-train their salesman to do it right.