It’s not the guns it’s the phases of the moon.
The nation, including Wisconsinites, are saddened and outraged at the Newtown massacre. Something must and will be done to reduce these killings.
On Dec 21, 2012, a week after Newton, Mr Wayne LaPierre stepped before television cameras and identified the culprits behind mass killings.
It was the Lunatics among us. It is Not a consequence of bushmaster rifles, or the high capacity magazines.
That belief has resonated with the 80% of Americans Pew Polling reveal favor greater efforts to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill.
Gov Walker is now convening experts to consider just how to do that.
Not to say that some gun owners or some mentally ill don’t or can’t commit mass shootings, but legal gun owners and the mentally ill share similar per capita risks of less than 0.0001% of committing a mass shooting (6 mass shooters among over 80 million gun owners or over 60,000,000 mentally ill).
The biggest holes in the NICS instant check database of persons prohibited from gun purchases are for records of felons (23 million missing) and drug addicts/users (14 million). Among the 987K denials the NICS system has generated since Nov 1999, 58% are for felons--58 times the number of denials for mentally ill applicants for gun purchases. Nearly 9% of the denials are for drug addicts/users.
But, forget that, because a majority of Americans firmly believe the huge problem facing the nation is that the NICS is missing 2 million records for lunatics. Clearly, Wisconsin, and every state in our Union, MUST find and list more of its lunatics in the NICS database! The nation's safety, and peace of mind depend upon this action.
However, this critical effort will take serious scientific input, because the answer to the most important question is, literally, not provided in the mental disorders listed in the DSM-V or the ICD-10. How do we identify someone whose homicidal tendencies depend upon phases of the moon?