It all comes down to background checks before you are allowed to have children. Why not start at the beginning? Yes, I am being facetious. You are not going to resolve this problem with background checks and mental screening. It won't work and both are expensive, if they are effective.
The only/ONLY answer besides giving your child the best raising you can, is to allow more folks to carry and less gun free zones. If you get rid of gun free zones, there is less likely going to be a mass killing in those areas that were safe for the wacko. More folks carrying will mean that if someone is crazy enough to start firing in a crowd, someone will take him down before he kills more than one or two in the crowd. Much better than ten or twenty. That takes care of the wackos.
To hinder drive by shootings and robberies, enforce strict penalties. Anyone perpetrating a crime using a gun will automatically get life in prison or death if anyone was killed. Why so strict? Because if a person is using a gun in a crime, he is prepared to use it and if he is shot, it's his own fault. No one else's fault. This would work as a deterrent.
That takes care of the wackos and the career criminal.
You can't do ANYTHING about the suicides because you will never know if that person is depressed in time. And about 51% or more of the gun related deaths are suicides. They aren't bothering anyone so leave them alone. Good news women, men are four or five times more likely to commit suicide. Good news young people, most suicides are of ages 45 to 65 years old. There's hope for Social Security longevity after all.
Solution: More guns and less gun free zones.
So, other than polishing up and enforcing our existing gun related laws, there's nothing legislatively that can be done to lower the statistics.
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