Then a law banning gun purchasing or guns altogether would be fruitless.

I agree. However, regulation is a different story than ban. I dont and would never support banning driving because some dont follow the laws and cause accidents. But I would also never support not having the laws on account of not being able to ensure noone would ever break them or cause accidents.

We dont allow the blind to drive. We should not be allowing the unstable to have guns.

When it comes down to it our system failed reports were made with proof of what he said posted on a social site... Yet no action was taken...

5 months later he shoots up the school and now some want to blame it on mental issues.. The boy knew what he was doing yes he had a bad life mom died of cancer a couple months after he posted that.... that did not cause it but sure it triggered something..

Did not hear them mention his dad... the boy was living with friends for the last 3 months that said they had not had a problem with him.

Do I believe he is insane no I do believe he might have anger issues and maybe other problems.. But remember his actions of what he said he was going to do....he followed through with them 5 months later...

If only his threat had been taken more serious just maybe this would have been prevented~~~

The unstable are not allowed to buy guns now. So why are you arguing
with yourself?

apparently they are .. kind of the point of this discussion

discussion?.....more like an argument.

not for me.

It is for everyone else.

argument involves anger. Im not angry at anyone here, why would I argue with them?

And why would I argue about whether we're arguing. It's pretty distracting from the topic, I think.

I will let them speak for themselves, and I will take their comments and contributions as signs of discussion.

First and foremost I agree. That being said...

If I post on facebook that I am going to blow up a library. People that know me think I'm really not, just letting off steam. People that don't know me but can see my public post think, yeah, right and dismiss me.
If I don't blow up a library it is just the normal nonsense that people post on facebook. If I do, then it is determined that I have mental problems and people get all uppity about something needing to be done.
BUT...
If I post on facebook that I have a nuclear device and I am selecting possible targets for a detonation, Then the government watchdogs flag it and consider it a threat. They investigate me and all my associations. Look at my patterns and medical/mental history.
As they should.

What gets me is the distinct priority change between the two scenarios.
The technology exists to monitor and evaluate threats of violence on the internet. Super computers monitor communications for keywords and phrases to determine threats.

What it tells me is that the powers that be, do not think school shootings and bombings and domestic threats are worth the time or the money to prevent. People are expendable to a point.
Small mass murder is not important enough to prevent and may even be anticipated. It keeps the population occupied for awhile.

If this problem were really important the people in society would demand something be done to fix the problem. Watchdog monitoring is happening, adding a few select keywords to the program wouldn't break the program. Why isn't it already happening? Because it isn't important to the powers that be.

Watchdogging is not the full solution but it would make a serious dent.

See, your arguing about arguing.

Yes arguments!!!

augmenting discussion by putting forward your argument

No the unstable are notallowed to buy guns " legally " just like you can't buy illegal drugs. But there s this thing known as the black market. Make all the laws you want , you'll never stop a person who's bent on killing from getting a gun.

This has been addressed. This young man was mentally ill and purchased a gun LEGALLY, not through black market. Most of these school shootings are not committed by people with guns from black market, but with LEGALLY PURCHASED weapons. Making laws never stops anyone that is 'hell bent' on harm, but they do make it clearer who can be held to some legal accountability for it.

here i will chime in.
how was mentally ill determined and when?
had he seen a professional and had a documented diagnosis?

I do not know of formal determinations. He had a history of killing animals and posting it online. Destroying property. and threatening other students with weapons.

well unless he was clinically documented before the purchase of a year ago then there would not have been a justification to stop the purchase.

and unfortunately to build that mental capacity data base bigger would require mandating either an across the board evaluation of every one in the us or at the least evaluation in order to make a purchase.

Im all for a latter, if we have to have credit checks to 'qualify' for a roof over our heads

and take driving tests before legally driving a car

and drug testing to be employed

I think its common sense to have mandatory mental health evaluation before legally purchasing a gun.

ok i can almost agree. tho your examples are skill tests not and therefor not quite equivalent now who foots the bill for the evaluation?