[punky]

BTW, I do respect your right to an opinion, just as I hope respect my right to a different one (or to argue with yours).

I know you do but I am glad you said it. I respect everyone's opinions, and I don't think any more or less of you because you take a different stance on the gun control issue.

Sorry, can I just ask (you've mentioned it before) why do you keep on mentioning cars, baseball bats and knives for?

Knives have other legitimate uses, but cars and baseball bats are designed as a method of transport and something to hit a ball with.

Because they can also be used to kill, along with 1 million other items. You can't just ban guns, pat yourself on the back and think you have done a good deed for mankind. Banning guns doesn't really seem to affect the murder rate, which is the ultimate goal. I have noticed looking at the stats that gun crime is more reliant of general crime levels, and fluctuate with it.

If your average burgler thought every house he was going to break into had potentially armed owners, chances are he'd carry a gun with him, chances are he'd probably also shoot the occupants as the first sign of a disturbance.

Yes, but criminals do already. Also noone ever said if you had a gun for self defence you had to use it. The way I see it, it is better to have gun and not need it, to be facing a situation where it might come in handy, and to not have one. People who wish to use a gun as self-defence are always at a disadvantage, because a homeowner would worry about being sued or going to jail. A burgular usually has no such worries. Noone ever said if you have a gun in your house you have to blow the hell out of anything that moves, but sometimes it helps.

If I honestly believed that a complete gun ban took the guns out of criminals' hands, then I would stand up for a firm ban. I believe even if it did, that the murder rate wouldn't change much, if at all, so where is the improvement?

Chances are he/ she would also try to carry as big/ fast firing a gun as possible, this sort of weapon spiral is what puts semi and fully automatic weaponry on the streets

Bush said if Congress requested an extension to the automatic weapons bill, he's sign it. But they never did. Automatic weapons are big, so hard to conceal, and the rapid firing makes them expensive and hard to aim with. People do think shooting is as easy as it looks. Fully autos are more of a status symbol than a practical weapon. At any rate a semi-automatic doesn't really fire much slower. and is much easier to aim with. Despite assault weapons being banned criminals seemed to get hold of them easily enough.