In fact, John W, there certainly have been calls in the past to outlaw enormous SUVs that tend to maim and kill people at a higher rate in accidents, as well as bans on or changes to cars like the Corvair or Pinto that had proven safety problems. There are also limits on trucks and what cars can be considered street legal.

Personally, I almost never hear of anybody seriously calling for an outright ban on guns. Can you provide some examples of serious, truly theatening attempts to ban all guns?

“A voter registration card is a more abstract thing, which never empowers anyone to hurt themsleves or others, whether deliberately or by accident.”

Oh, I beg to differ.
.

“Don’t you think death by car is a problem anymore?”

I’m glad for the safety advancements in cars like sealbelts, air bags, and side impact door beams. Likewise, I’m glad for redundant safeties like firing pin blocks, grip safeties, and better designed holsters for guns. Both have been effective at reducing accidents.

I take measures of prevention everytime I get into my truck to help prevent getting killed by my or another driver’s vehicle and I take measures to prevent being killed by my gun or the gun of another.

My issue with deaths by car is how I’ve never heard of any outcry in my life to ban them, even the sportscars that supposedly no one needs, no matter how many fatalities we see. Why is that? Think how many lives we could save by banning cars. And it would be healthier for the planet. Why aren’t more people on board with that?

JW, gunners have been railing on car deaths for years right here on this blog. Well, now that gun deaths are eclipsing car deaths in a number of states, and now that gun deaths are on a track to eclipse car deaths nationwide in a few years, you declare it “a solution looking for a problem?”

Don’t you think death by car is a problem anymore?

“A solution looking for a problem.”

+1

VTHokie, the point you’re making is not an invalid one. You have read the law, I’m sure. So you know that it requires a demonstration of handgun “competency.” The GA in its wisdom (snark) saw fit it define “competency” as taking a hunter safety course (classroom) which doesn’t require gun handling. Then, in 2009, they further watered down the requirement for demonstrating “competency” by requiring that judges accept the online course as “proof of competency.”

We both know that neither the classroom course or the online course fit that bill. Still, the classroom course is better because attendees can at least ask questions. They can’t do that online.

ANSWER, FROM VT HOKIE: “No, it’s not. It is the same logic being used. The logic is rejected for one situation but accepted for another. In both cases, a “problem” is identified by the actions of a few people that are but a drop in the pond compared to people who do not commit those actions.”

I understand where you’re going with this answer. Where I think the analogy fails is what the permit accomplishes. The CHP process in Virginia grants a state license for people to carry a weapon that can kill and maim (or yes, defend), or injure the carrier, by shooting himself in a Lynchburg restaurant as he sidled up to the bar for some more beer (to use an infamous example).

A voter registration card is a more abstract thing, which never empowers anyone to hurt themsleves or others, whether deliberately or by accident.