It seems insane to me (as a Canadian citizen) that the pro-gun folks continue to peddle that safety comes from increasing the number of "responsible" carriers. Here are the issues that I see with this:
1. The assumption that all gun users are trained and responsible. It seems obvious to compare this to other licensees such as drivers and you'll immediately see that it is not a valid argument. There are terrible drivers on the roads with valid licenses, who have presumably been trained with a lot of experience. The barrier to entry is even higher in that the cost of a vehicle is higher than a weapon.
2. How do you differentiate the good vs. bad in a situation such as Aurora? If you see a number of random strangers running around with guns in hand, few of whom would have any sort of melee training outside of video games, who do you shoot at? Where does the liability lie if one innocent murders another innocent by mistake?
3. The number of guns will increase (as they are now). With more lying around either forgotten or marginally broken, it increases the availability for non-licensed usage as I doubt responsible users dispose of their weapons appropriately (see item 1).
I say all this fully recognizing the gun's position as a tool, strongly advocating mental health reform and even supporting the OP's position of rational rather than emotional response to Newtown.
