The domestic terrorist near Chicago that wore women's clothes while shooting down on the July 4 parade......he was a SNIPER using a semi-automatic AR-15-style rifle. Any rifle action can be used by a SNIPER. The best SNIPER of WW2 was a Russian woman using a bolt-action. A SNIPER could use a single-shot rifle IF he had enough DISTANCE between himself and the target and it was a long-range rifle. There are 2,000-yard single-shot rifles.

True, they might then be forced to use a different tool like a bolt-action, which is slower and would or could give Police more TIME to arrive on the scene. And give children and adults more TIME to run and hide. Magazine limits of 6 or fewer rounds would also give more time to run or throw rocks or whatever. That is what New Zealand and ALL other 1st world countries PROVED...........except the US.

Banning one instrument of Domestic Terror .........the semi-auto rifle .........Australia proved that !

Yes, I knew that.

I don't think so. Myself and many others have proven, with links to government sources, gun control activist sources and gun rights sources the simple fact that 77% of mass murders are done with pistols NOT rifles and certainly not AR's.

The Highland Park shooter, Robert Crimo, III was NOT a sniper by the very definition of the word. Snipers shoot from long distances, not 50 feet. He was on top of a 3 story building. Not sniper material. More of an insult to actual snipers, really.

These days 2,000 yard shots are not very difficult. Recently Paul Phillips (from my home town) completed a 6,012 yard impact (3.4 miles) with a custom .416 Barrett round. To give some appreciation to that accomplishment consider, after 21 cold bore shots and some adjustments and a flight time of 17 seconds he impacted a 32"x48" steel plate. He didn't get confirmation of the impact until after he had launched his second shot.

That is amazing. The physical control and calculations that one needs to make to hit such a target is incredible!

My thoughts are (refined) opinion, you thoughts demonstrate bias, the subtle use of language tells much of were we come from , it is also used to manipulate terms of any discussion as to the facts, I think that's why the poster wants to clarify the terms and definitions

I have to wonder why you're against protecting children. The only solution I keep reading is to slow down the killer. Given the average response time for Law Enforcement is 12 minutes how many casualties are acceptable?

It is much more cost effective to harden the schools. That doesn't mean barbed wire and Dobermans. That means taking measures like a few schools have done. There is a fantastic plan implemented by a school in Indiana that stops a killer from accessing children. Florida has implemented the Guardian program in 60% of the schools so far. And of course, as we saw at Greenwood Mall recently, a good Samaritan citizen, armed and trained, stopped the killer in 15 seconds.

What is really the agenda then? Stop killers in their tracks and protect innocent people or disarm law abiding citizens. Those are the two choices.

Jim, why do you think Australia has accomplished what you say? Have you done the research and what do you know of mass murders in Australia.

As we know the turning point was the Port Arthur massacre which was the catalyst for Australia's weapons ban and forced confiscation. That was 25 years ago. Since that time, there have been 37 mass murder events resulting in 160 deaths. The weapons used were axes, knives, shotguns, vehicles and blunt objects. Perhaps the families of the 160 victims can take solace that they didn't die by a rifle.

But, what about the 25 years before Port Arthur? Prior to the weapons ban there were 128 people killed in 21 mass murder events. Of the 21 events, two involved a semi automatic rifle. The rest were shotguns, knives, vehicles, etc.

The facts show that Australia has had more mass murder events and more people killed after their weapons ban than they had before the weapons ban.

What exactly did they accomplish?

A 3.4-mile shot with accuracy IS impressive! And the details stated were interesting also.

I agree whole heartedly on mandatory military service, bring back the draft. At 18 years a person enters military service for 2 years, no exceptions for anything other than a physical condition. During my 21 years in the Army I saw many young kids, who were problem children for their parents, be made to face consequences for their actions and grow up. You either learned to control your anger and emotions or you faced repercussions.

A couple examples.

A neighbor kid was loud, obnoxious, a bully and a hot head. I met up with him one day a couple of years after he got of the Marines, and he was a changed person. Polite, mature and a hard working guy.

A guy in my unit in Germany stole a military truck to go to the local bar one night. He was given 30 days in the stockade located in Mannhiem, Germany. At that time a stockade was not a nice place, it was very rigid and infractions were dealt with harshly. When he was being taken to the stockade he was bragging that he would own the place. 30 days later when he returned to the unit he told me he would rather die than go back. He stayed on the straight and narrow until he got of the Army, and I believe he stayed that way in civilian life.

The best thing about the military was it put all races, ethnicities, city kids, rural kids, rich and poor into the same environment. You learned, firsthand, how to work with people that you didn't interact with where you were raised.

Everyone should perform some kind of civil service for two years. If a person didn't want to go into the military they would be placed in something like the Depression era CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps). You should be expected to give back something to your country, it gives you a sense of ownership in the wellbeing of the country.

I said in 2 previous posts that I liked the IDEA of hardening schools. I also said previously that I did NOT believe that a SIGNIFICANT number of schools will EVER be hardened in any SIGNIFICANT way. That is because most communities and states will NOT do it because it will raise TAXES. And people in the upper tax brackets that have significant property do not ALLOW property taxes or other taxes to go up. Try getting a tax increase here in TV Land !

Just do this thought experiment.........suppose someone is crazy and determined to be a mass murderer. And they just read a newspaper article that stated that EVERY LAST school in the US was hardened like the one in Indiana. Or even that the school in his community was hardened. So, imagine what he might think and come up with in his demented brain.............gee wizz, he thinks I should forget schools and plan for killing in a church or concert or ANY place where there is a bunch of people.......hhhyyyymmm maybe the football games or baseball.......they are NOT hardened.

Think about it - no matter what event the demented shooter chooses the ONE thing that is constant is that he will take the fastest shooting, LONG RANGE, big magazine, firearm that he can procure. It might have a flash suppressor of even a silencer or even a Bump-stop attachment. But, if he is planning it out well (in a demented way)......the firearm he takes will NOT be a pistol, except maybe as a backup!

I hate to say this, but I think that this has been laid out with about the highest logical quality that would make even Dr. Spock (of Star Trek fame) happy .....as a moonbeam from heaven!

Also that Greenwood Mall incident further proves my point. he was unsuccessful because he did NOT use a RIFLE and put lots of DISTANCE between himself and his targets. And he did NOT use elevation and cover. Basically, he was NOT a SNIPER and planned badly. He was out of control and probably wanted to die himself.

What they and all other 1st world countries did (except for the US) was to force the mass murderers to use S-L-O-W-E-R and less efficient means of killing people - like baseball bats, etc. That gives Police or people close by opportunities to intervene in the DOMESTIC TERROR-PRODUCING event - the mass murder.

Whatever the statistics for murders or mass murders are AFTER the Port Arthur - they are LESS than they would be had Australia NOT attacked the PROBLEM and realized that the SOLUTION was to eliminate the fast-shooting semi-auto rifles. They did NOT decide to HARDEN all their schools because that IS the WRONG solution. And that adds further PRROF to what I have been saying. And their MAIN success is that their children do NOT have the TERROR that US children have when they start school soon. Australia and ALL the other 1st world counties, other than the US prove that organizations like the NRA can be BEATEN because people can see that such GREED is unpatriotic and gets their citizens (children and adults) KILLED! Wake up America or the TERRORISM will continue and get worse!