I don't think VT's "gun free" zone has the weight of law. That kind of stuff does have the weight of law in OH. But in VA, you cannot be arrested for carrying openly or concealed (with a permit, if concealed) on property where there's a sign saying "no guns allowed". I ignore these signs regularly, but try to not patronize such businesses if possible. If someone who works at the establishment sees you carrying, they can ask you to leave and refusing to do so will get you in trouble for trespassing. But the gun is totally legal. You can also carry in the VA state capitol bldg. and any state gov't. agency other than a courthouse or school. VA has been pretty good about cracking down on cities and counties that try to pass their own more restrictive gun laws.

Oh, and I buy most of my guns by mail via the Internet nowadays. I don't have an FFL, so I have to have my FFL fax a copy of his license to the seller who then mails it to him. When I go to pick up the gun, my FFL has to call the state police who then run my driver's licese # through the NICS while I fill out paperwork. Takes about 10 min. for everything and costs $27 per transfer. VA's one gun a month law also has an exemption for CCW holders. I always try to buy one gun a month. When that exemption becamse the law, I could buy as many as I want as often as I want. So I've bought three in one month before, but haven't bought any since Feb. Oh, my dad gave me five more two weeks ago. But that doesn't count.

Rick Lee... Well Mr. English teacher, let’s take a look at your post...
1) State abbreviations must be preceded by a period
2) Became is not spelled with an S
3) "But that doesn't count" is not a complete sentence
4) licese is not spelled correctly
5) "When that exemption becamse the law, I could buy as many as I want as often as I want." Is not a complete sentence either

Practice what you preach Jackass!

Victor,

if a kid shots his own foot with a bb gun, it is listed on that list

And that is where debate on just about anything falls apart.....Emotion takes over and logic moves to the back of the bus.

Unfortunately we live in a free society and guns are part of that society. If we could make society a little less free we might be able to control gun violence.

More knee-jerkery following a tragedy.

A gun is an inanimate object designed to fire a projectile--the manner in which the gun is used is up to the individual--be it target practice, hunting, hammering in nails, or attacking others. If an individual acts in an irresponsible manner with his gun, why should all of the responsible owners be punished as a result?
To make it relevant to this board, consider this:
A 911 Turbo driver does 150 in heavy traffic, loses it and crashes into 2 busloads of nuns and orphans--killing them all--suddenly there is an outcry for banning all 911 turbos because of the actions of an irresponsible owner.
You, as a 911 turbo owner, protest, "I never do 150 in heavy traffic with my car", this protest is answered with the argument--"but your car has the POTENTIAL to do 150 in heavy traffic, so it must be banned"


Doesn't make sense does it?

Eric...not taking sides here, but we are back to the same old argument.....Was the 911 designed to kill or maim? What is the primary purpose of a firearm? Can someone, clearly and calmly, please explain why we keep coming back to this somewhat shallow argument?

This subject, and some of the responses should "hammer" home (no pun intended) that the subject of gun control is an emotional one, just like religion and abortion. Logic and rational arguments are difficult to find, and people on bothe side, when they feel threatened, lash out. So far, it is mostly with words. What would it take to tip a true firearm lover over the edge to protect the right to own said weapons? To finally crack and shoot detractors? When emotions are involved, discussion turns to argument and finally to confrontation. Let us pray that the situation does not devolve to that level.

I am not against gun ownership. I am all in favor of responsible gun ownership and the realization that firearms are not some mystical icon that enhances the indivdual's manliness, but simply a tool with a very specific purpose; not to construct, but to destruct.

Fantastic editorial by Ted Nugent (yes, THAT Ted Nugent):

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/19/commentary.nugent/index.html



WACO, Texas (CNN) -- Zero tolerance, huh? Gun-free zones, huh? Try this on for size: Columbine gun-free zone, New York City pizza shop gun-free zone, Luby's Cafeteria gun-free zone, Amish school in Pennsylvania gun-free zone and now Virginia Tech gun-free zone.

Anybody see what the evil Brady Campaign and other anti-gun cults have created? I personally have zero tolerance for evil and denial. And America had best wake up real fast that the brain-dead celebration of unarmed helplessness will get you killed every time, and I've about had enough of it.

Nearly a decade ago, a Springfield, Oregon, high schooler, a hunter familiar with firearms, was able to bring an unfolding rampage to an abrupt end when he identified a gunman attempting to reload his .22-caliber rifle, made the tactical decision to make a move and tackled the shooter.

A few years back, an assistant principal at Pearl High School in Mississippi, which was a gun-free zone, retrieved his legally owned Colt .45 from his car and stopped a Columbine wannabe from continuing his massacre at another school after he had killed two and wounded more at Pearl.

At an eighth-grade school dance in Pennsylvania, a boy fatally shot a teacher and wounded two students before the owner of the dance hall brought the killing to a halt with his own gun.

More recently, just a few miles up the road from Virginia Tech, two law school students ran to fetch their legally owned firearm to stop a madman from slaughtering anybody and everybody he pleased. These brave, average, armed citizens neutralized him pronto.

My hero, Dr. Suzanne Gratia Hupp, was not allowed by Texas law to carry her handgun into Luby's Cafeteria that fateful day in 1991, when due to bureaucrat-forced unarmed helplessness she could do nothing to stop satanic George Hennard from killing 23 people and wounding more than 20 others before he shot himself. Hupp was unarmed for no other reason than denial-ridden "feel good" politics.

She has since led the charge for concealed weapon upgrade in Texas, where we can now stop evil. Yet, there are still the mindless puppets of the Brady Campaign and other anti-gun organizations insisting on continuing the gun-free zone insanity by which innocents are forced into unarmed helplessness. Shame on them. Shame on America. Shame on the anti-gunners all.

No one was foolish enough to debate Ryder truck regulations or ammonia nitrate restrictions or a "cult of agriculture fertilizer" following the unabashed evil of Timothy McVeigh's heinous crime against America on that fateful day in Oklahoma City. No one faulted kitchen utensils or other hardware of choice after Jeffrey Dahmer was caught drugging, mutilating, raping, murdering and cannibalizing his victims. Nobody wanted "steak knife control" as they autopsied the dead nurses in Chicago, Illinois, as Richard Speck went on trial for mass murder.

Evil is as evil does, and laws disarming guaranteed victims make evil people very, very happy. Shame on us.

Already spineless gun control advocates are squawking like chickens with their tiny-brained heads chopped off, making political hay over this most recent, devastating Virginia Tech massacre, when in fact it is their own forced gun-free zone policy that enabled the unchallenged methodical murder of 32 people.

Thirty-two people dead on a U.S. college campus pursuing their American Dream, mowed-down over an extended period of time by a lone, non-American gunman in possession of a firearm on campus in defiance of a zero-tolerance gun ban. Feel better yet? Didn't think so.

Who doesn't get this? Who has the audacity to demand unarmed helplessness? Who likes dead good guys?

I'll tell you who. People who tramp on the Second Amendment, that's who. People who refuse to accept the self-evident truth that free people have the God-given right to keep and bear arms, to defend themselves and their loved ones. People who are so desperate in their drive to control others, so mindless in their denial that they pretend access to gas causes arson, Ryder trucks and fertilizer cause terrorism, water causes drowning, forks and spoons cause obesity, dialing 911 will somehow save your life, and that their greedy clamoring to "feel good" is more important than admitting that armed citizens are much better equipped to stop evil than unarmed, helpless ones.

Pray for the families of victims everywhere, America. Study the methodology of evil. It has a profile, a system, a preferred environment where victims cannot fight back. Embrace the facts, demand upgrade and be certain that your children's school has a better plan than Virginia Tech or Columbine. Eliminate the insanity of gun-free zones, which will never, ever be gun-free zones. They will only be good guy gun-free zones, and that is a recipe for disaster written in blood on the altar of denial. I, for one, refuse to genuflect there.

Moneyguy, you are the only guy I've ever heard, other than tv pundits or politicians, say that guns are made with the purpose of killing. With 250 million guns in private possession in the US, we sure have a low number of gun crimes relative to the number of guns. Ted Kennedy's car has killed more people than all my guns combined.

Banning guns means only the criminals have guns.

Rick: I will reiterate that the purpose of a gun is far different that the purpose of a hammer or a car or anything else not intended from the get-go as a weapon. Your answer speaks of what I have been saying, loaded with anecdotal information and no data. Look at the number of deaths by firearms in other countries vs. the U.S. I think you will find that there is a considerable difference.

I am staunchly against the elimination of the second amendment. I am simply pointing out that in many ways, the emotional aspect of guns and gun control reaches the same level as other "debates" such as those about religion and abortion. Few enter into such a discussion and stay calm and rational for long. Banning firearms is not the answer. Sensible and strict background checks might help, and I have advocated the NRA be involved with policing gun shows and gun dealers in conjunction with the federal, state and local govts. It would be in their best interests to do so.

I see defenders quoting old worn out adages but very few concrete ideas to resolve the problem. If anyone has any ideas, post them. THose of us with open minds will listen, I assure you.

80 million law abiding gun owners in this country did not go to Virgina Tech or somewhere else to unlease carnage.

They have harmed no one and their cival rights should not be erased in response.

A gun is NOT designed to kill or maim--a gun is a tool designed to fire a projectile. The manner in which it is used is up to the individual. This is where anti-gun pundits begin their false logic, by stating the "intent" or "purpose" of a gun is to kill or maim--immeadiately painting the tool(gun) in a negative light.
A 911 Turbo is a tool designed to transfer fossil fuel into forward motion--there is no purpose or intent behind it either.
The purpose of these tools comes from the end user.

Aside from shooting out sheets on pirate ships, tyres on getaway cars, and cheroots from the lip of banditos, can you expain what othe purposes a firearm has other than to kill or maim living tissue?

I'll accept sport/target shooting- if you can expain why sport targets are so ofetn human or game shaped.

If am not anti gun. But really, that argument is pretty stupid.

It's not a stupid argument at all. The last living thing I shot at was probably 25 yrs. ago with my bb gun. Since then it's been paper targets, clay pidgeons, bottles, cans, logs, etc. I rarely use silouette targets too. But why not? Since I carry for self--defense, I like to be proficient. Doesn't mean that I shoot people. It just means I'm better prepared to defend my life if the situation occurs. Other people can just practice dialing 911 and waiting 20 min. for the police to help them.

Fine. None of that contradicts the proposition that a gun is designed to kill or maim.

Then so must a car be designed to kill or maim. I've killed more animals with my Porsches than with my guns. Luckily, my cars and guns serve other "unintended" purposes.

Provided there is real competition, corporations give consumers what they want or they don't survive. Government, on the other hand, gives consumers what the government wants us to swallow.

Elimination of the 2nd Amendment is one quick way to accelerate government telling us what we can have.

Gun-free zones are like hunt clubs for psychopaths. Cho planned his attack. He had a convenient hunting ground where law and rule abiding citizens were disarmed.

Can any of you gun-control advocates say that you are glad that a student or faculty member did not have a gun in that building at VA Tech? Did disarming students and faculty save lives?

Stop judging your policy by intent and look at the results.

I find myself carrying a lot more now since the VT thing. Last night I went to the local ER and there was a big sign saying no guns allowed. Irritates the hell out of me.

My handguns are poorly designed pieces of crap then, as they have failed to deliver upon their design specifications :)! Here's another proposition for ya: A gun is designed to put the "FEAR of god into a lawbreaker" when they HEAR a round being chambered in the middle of the night.... Contradict that :)

OK then.