<p>A few... a few is what you would find on one block. There are 65 million handguns in America.... the best you could hope for is that you'd make guns more expensive by making them illegal - cocaine, heroine, etc. have all been illegal for decades and yet you can buy them on any street corner in certain parts of Phila - why would guns be any different? Most of the people who own guns in Phila. have felony records and aren't eligible to purchase guns legally even now but they do anyway. As for saving lives, it may have the opposite effect. Some people argue you should allow more guns to be carried legally by law abiding citizens, not less - if one of the Virginia Tech faculty members had been carrying a gun Cho might have been stopped sooner but the Va. Tech campus was a "gun free zone" - for some reason this law didn't stop Cho.</p>
<p>If you made the penalty for having an illegal handgun a minimum 5 year sentence, banned semiautomatics, and make gun owners responsible for crimes committed with their "lost" guns (through ballistic fingerprinting), and imposed a 90 day waiting period and one gun per month rule for new purchases, the guns would disappear and the murders would drop. If Virginia had had any ONE those rules, people at VT would probably not be dead. PA desperately needs rules like this as well - it should copy the New England states, where gun laws are much stricter.</p>
<p>Pennsylvania, for those who don't know, is by and large a rural hick state with the KKK, the NRA and the Dubya.</p>
<p>Gun restrictions will not be implemented because it is under state jurisdiction, and not country or township jurisdiction. Philadelphia representatives have tried to change this law, but have so far failed. Until then, Philadelphia will be a haven for guns, as people buy several guns legally and sell them on the black market.</p>
<p>The state also refuses to subsidize SEPTA. Boo.</p>
<p>Philadelphia, the surrounding counties and the Jersey shore should become it's own state.</p>
<p>
[quote]
**the guns would disappear
[/quote]
**</p>
<p>So.......a gun stolen from a residence or shop is then prosecution of the owner. I don't see it.</p>
<p>I agree chocoman! But I think if everyone in Philadelphia - including the leadership and students and Penn, but also the companies and everyone else - did something, that would change! Unfortunately people there just don't appear to care that hundreds are being gunned down all around them, because they don't think it affects them. It clearly affects all of us, so I don't know what they are thinking. Too busy with their ipods, probably.</p>
<p>
[quote]
**Too busy with their ipods, probably.
[/quote]
** Maybe you don't understand legislative process and tax structure. To enforce the laws you propose local government will need to fund all of the law enforcement, jail space, additional judges and prosecutorial staff. That is why there are limits on much of the current laws. Enforcement and prosecution require funding.</p>
<p>The loss of one person diminishes us all, blah, blah blah but is the average Penn student REALLY affected by the murder rate as long as it is is people in the hood popping each other? In what way are we '"clearly" affected? Some Penn students getting caught in the crossfire/spillover would get peoples attention in a hurry, but not before.</p>
<p>I've heard it said that if you take away Philadelphia and Pittsburgh areas then the rest of Pennsylvania = W. Virginia. Deer hunting is still a big thing in rural areas.</p>
<p>If you are willing to kill someone (life w/o parole) then why would a 5 yr. sentence for gun possession stop you? Aren't the jails overcrowded already - these kind of mandatory sentencing laws for drugs have filled the prisons with people who don't really belong there because the judge has no flexibility to consider the circumstances as to who is really a hard case and who is just a kid that ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time or is set up by an undercover cop, etc. </p>
<p>I thought VA did have a 1 gun/month rule so Cho waited a month to get 2 guns. In a year you could have 12 so I don't see how that really does anything. "Semiautomatic" means that the gun fires one bullet each time you pull the trigger - big deal. If Cho had revolvers (not semiautomatic) he still could have shot the same # of people because he had lots of time to reload - he was in a "gun free" zone except for him. Low crime rates in places like VT or NH have more to do with the demographics of the population, lack of big cities, etc. than their gun laws. In some place (say Utah) where you can buy a gun as easy as a pickup truck they have very low crime rate. For that matter, rural PA is the same - everyone has tons of guns in their house, over the fireplace, in their pickup truck, etc. but people aren't shooting each other. "Tough" gun laws satisfy the impulse to do something symbolic but do they really work? If you are the kind of person willing to kill your neighbor because he "disses" you, you'll do it with a kitchen knife too. Maybe if America was starting fresh we could outlaw production of guns but like I said before there are 65 million handguns in existence plus like another 100 million long guns - enough to give one to every single adult. Many of these are unregistered and untraceable because they were made before they had laws so no one has any idea who they belong to - you'll never get rid of them. </p>
<p>But you can teach your kids not to use them - people in small towns all across America do and murders in rural/suburban areas are extremely rare. It's mostly in the big cities where people are killing each other and what needs to change is not the gun laws but people's willingness to kill each other. But nobody knows how to outlaw a murderous brain.</p>
<p>nope, penn students getting caught in the crossfire / spillover won't produce significant change unless one of those students dies.</p>
<p>last year a then-sophomore was shot in the leg during an attempted carjacking across the street from her on sansom; she recovered, and security was increased, but there was no large change in attitude among students.</p>
<p>probably the biggest culprit is the concept that one can get away with murder easily because nobody wants to snitch, either from fear of the police or fear of retribution from the criminal - this is why community cooperation with the police is so abysmally low and why so many murders and other violent crimes go unsolved. given the attitude of the general west philly community towards penn (anti-expansion / gentrification, etc.), i don't believe that penn students campaigning alone against the prevalent culture will be received well, either in this neighborhood or in the city at large, without larger support. </p>
<p>until the larger political machine within the city government, in cooperation with the commonwealth, will decide to start churning, general inaction will continue.</p>
<p>posterx's intentions were so transparent. Not only do you want to put penn down reputationwise, but you imply that the students are snobby and out of touch. Just go do something productive with your life. </p>
<p>Actually why don't you go protest on the lawn naked, and you might as well patronize the "poor" people in philly by buying some drugs and nostalgicly relive the hippy ways.</p>
<p>I do wish to note that Penn has polling places on campus and large numbers of Penn students do vote in this community. That speaks volumes to me. Penn students do care and support the local legislative process. Voting is caring in my view.</p>
<p>
[quote]
until the larger political machine within the city government, in cooperation with the commonwealth, will decide to start churning, general inaction will continue.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Counting down the days til John Street gets thrown back on the street...</p>
<p>There Was A Firefight!</p>
<p>Boondocks Saints = Amazing movie</p>