Taking shots at new gun laws

Another day, another mass shooting with a legally purchased gun, by yet another person with possible mental health issues who telegraphed his problems on social media [“6 dead, 30 hurt in Illinois parade shooting,” News, July 5].

How many times do we have to see the same movie before we admit that something is clearly wrong?

Background checks must be more thorough and include some form of psychiatric screening. Every firearm purchase should be subject to a check. If we don’t draw the line somewhere, people who are not mentally competent to own a firearm will continue to be able to purchase them legally with consequences that we have sadly become all too familiar with.

 — Arthur M. Shatz, Astoria

Denmark had a recent mass shooting (three dead), with the previous one there in 2015 (two dead). That country gets to say they were shocked by that shooting. Not us.

In the United States, where gun violence occurs daily and headline-making mass shootings on a too regular basis, nobody gets to say they are shocked. If you say it, you have lost all credibility. We are past “shocked.”

My take on the U.S. gun violence in the USA is that mental illness plays a big part (counting hate as an illness). We cannot identify and predict which person is the next shooter. Certainly, only a small percentage of those with mental health issues will become shooters.

What we can predict with a high degree of certainty is the type of weapon that will be used. At the least, we must limit the availability of those types of weapons while we work on resolving our rampant mental health issues. Take the matches away, then help the person.

 — Steve Boyce, Dix Hills

The Democrat-led state Legislature is increasing the number of “gun-free zones” to include mass transit [“Lawmakers OK gun legislation,” News, July 2]. Business owners will ahave to give express permission allowing guns on their premises. So, criminals who rob stores and subway riders and who always obey gun laws will have to ask permission to carry heat. Problem solved. Why do we keep electing liberals who enact policies at odds with the interests of law-abiding people?

 — Bradley Morris, Astoria

I would think that everyone’s main concern with the Supreme Court’s gun decision is how much can we trust our fellow man to do the right thing as a gun carrier [“Reactions to ruling on NY gun law,” Letters, June 27]. With today’s bitter political divide, along with a persistent anger among the population, who is to say we can trust the average gun carrier to be judge, jury and possible executioner in any given situation? Because that is what they might become.

 — Michael Filaseta, Ridge

If Justice Clarence Thomas’ construction of the Constitution is based on original intent, how do he and other Supreme Court justices reconcile their gun rulings with the Constitution, which was written when there existed only single-shot pistols and also rifles that were loaded quite slowly, with a ball and gunpowder? Assault rifles and even today’s pistols could not have been envisioned.
 — Ralph Kreitzman, Great Neck

William F.B. O’Reilly waxes poetic about the “unpretentious” and “ lovely” homes of Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett [“Residences must be off-limits for protesters,” Opinion, June 24]. As if normality should shield them from protest.

Shielding the justices from the public who live with their decisions is wrong and poorly timed. The decision on open carry will increase the vulnerability of Americans to gun murder in their equally unpretentious and lovely homes, schools, churches and supermarkets. The right to peaceful assembly, which O’Reilly enjoyed near Bill and Hillary Clinton’s home, should not be abrogated to comfort justices in a world they now made less safe for everyone.

 — Bruce Madonna, Mount Sinai

One reader said our schools should have 15-foot fences with cameras and only one entrance [“Readers weigh in on gun issue,” Letters, June 12]. I’ve seen these; we call them prisons. Is this how we want our children to spend six hours each day? Sure, let’s lock up the victims.

Whenever we try to regulate something in the name of public safety, conservatives scream about their constitutional rights. Seat belts, smoking and others.

Last year, more than 20,000 Americans were killed by guns. Advocates talk about the Constitution, but we do not have a well-regulated militia, and the gun proponents want zero gun regulations.

The good guys with guns never seem to stop the bad guys. They want to arm teachers. More guns, not fewer. What doesn’t stop a bad guy with a gun are a couple hundred Republicans in Congress who refuse to protect our children.

 — Robert Broder, Stony Brook