Aurora Colorado Violence

No, it's determined by whether or not it is a pistol grip. Something else of the same size which was not a pistol grip would not be a pistol grip. I myself own numerous objects of about the same size as a pistol grip which are not in fact pistol grips. No, it's determined by whether or not it's a folding or telescopic stock. Something else of the same shape which neither folded nor telescoped would not be folding or telescopic. "You weren't wrong when you said 'four', but only because we were talking about what two plus two was." Not so. It also needs other properties. Here, let me help you.

No, it does specify. It specifies the arms that are necessary to the security of a free state, and to the formation of a well-regulated militia.And note that the entire perspective of the Amendment is not in the form of what it grants to the people, but what it takes away from the government. Like all the rest of our rights in the constitution, it is construed not as what we are granted but as what the government is prohibited from infringing.So by definition an interpretation of the Second Amendment from the perspective of "what is the minimum level of armament the American people are allowed to possess" is illegitimate. The Second Amendment has to be interpreted from the perspective of "what is the minimum level of regulation the government is allowed to enact on arms." Joe Blow does have the right to own a minigun, provided that it was manufactured before 1986 and registered with the ATF. I assume that since his ownership is legal he can mount it on anything, including a car, assuming that doing so doesn't violate the laws about cars. I'm sure you view this as an unacceptably dangerous state of affairs, but can you point to even a single mass shooting in the US that was perpetrated with a legally-owned minigun?

No, it says "arms" which is an even more inclusive category than "handguns and assault rifles." In US vs. Miller, the Supreme Court was very clear that the arms made permissible by the Second Amendment were precisely those that were of a "military order", when they ruled that a sawed-off shotgun by virtue of its inaccuracy and unreliability would not be a weapon used by an orderly military or that could contribute to the general defense.

A pistol grip is the grip of a pistol. If we're talking about a rifle, then the grip of a rifle is a rifle grip, by definition. How can a rifle have a pistol grip if a rifle is not a pistol?

Well I'm not going to put any effort into this if your just gonna play dumb and nit-pick. Let me know if you have a point to make.If you do, take it to the Gun Control thread. Edited by Catholic Scientist, : No reason given.

This thread was meant to discuss,specifically, the massacre and subsequent news from Colorado. Gun control has its own topic.

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1) Changing gun laws won't stop these types of incidents, though the criteria as to what types of guns are allowed to be purchased might be considered.

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2) Just because it is a disturbed white guy, it is as much an act of terrorism as it would be had the shooter been black and/or Muslim.

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3) People will be ever more willing to trade in personal freedoms for greater public security...and our society will continue to change.

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4) There are no easy answers in faith to tell people. I believe, for the record, that God had nothing to do with this, nor any sort of devil, though some fundamentalist friends whom I know would argue the latter to be the case.

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1) I agree with you, though wasn’t the theater a gun free zone? As in aren’t people prohibited from bringing firearms into that theater? Really just two examples of how more laws won’t do anything.
2) I have to disagree here. Terrorism is inducing terror in people as a means of coercing them into doing something. This was more a random act of violence, it was two unorganized for it to be terrorism, and the perp was not doing it out of some goal or reason to use fear to convince people to do anything. This event definitely does not fit in what I see from my POV as terrorism.
3) In some localities and states sure, but I doubt it will happen across the board. In Virginia there was a mass shooting at Virginia Tech, and afterwards people did not trade in for security, in fact some gun free areas ceased to exist after that spree.
4) I have no comment on this point, belief in God is a personal thing, and is about as well proven as the effectiveness of gun control is.

A pistol grip is something which allows you to hold something more or less at right-angles to the way it's pointing, like a pistol.So, for example, this is a drill with a pistol grip. It's still called a pistol grip even though it's on a drill and not a pistol.Similarly, this gun, although it is not a pistol, has a pistol grip:

I second Dr. Adequate. You can have a pistol grip on any type of firearm it has no bearing on whether it is actually a pistol or not.

This is my rifle, this is my gun; one is for fighting, one is for fun.This rifle, although it is not a pistol, has a pistol grip.

Ok, but this rifle has a grip where you hold it more or less at right-angles to the way it's pointing:Is this a "pistol grip"? Why or why not? And what makes a "pistol grip" on a rifle unacceptably dangerous on a rifle but not on a pistol?Isn't this part of the law a regulation on nothing more than the appearance of the weapon?

It appears that specifics are very imporatant here, especially from this Dr. adequate fellow.This also has a pistol grip but is not a pistol, even though most uniformed people will say otherwise While we are on the topic of specifics. Dr. Adequate linked a firearm that had a pistol grip but was not a pistol, what makes that weapon a pistolfor instance is this a pistol

An aside but of interest maybe.Edited by jar, : fix sub-title

Why are you guys going into minutiae about pistol grips?

I think that that would be a "semi-pistol grip". Since all pistols have a pistol grip, there's no need to specify this as one of the features which makes a pistol unacceptably assault-weapon-ish any more than they needed to put "fires bullets out of one end" on the list. Well, the military, who want their weapons to be assault weapons, use pistol grips, whereas skeet shooters (for example) who don't, use traditional rifle grips. Assuming that both groups know what they're doing, I suppose that there must be something about the ergonomics of the pistol grip that makes for a better assault weapon.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.