Speaker 1: Where to even start today. The last 24 hours have been almost surreal
here in the United States. Let's start with what exactly would I do about guns? You know,
one of the things that has come up in the last 24 to 48 hours after we've had not only the Buffalo
shooting, but also now the Uvalde, Texas school shooting has been when people say we've got to do
something about the guns. There will be those on the right who say, what exactly do you want to do?
Steve Kerr, the coach of the NBA's Golden State Warriors, went on this impassioned rant, and many,
like Ben SHAPIRO and others, said, I don't hear any specific suggestions there, so let me give
you my specific things that I would try with a couple of caveats as we get into this. Whatever
anyone proposes, whatever I propose, whatever is ever proposed, you will always have people saying
that won't solve the whole problem. This one idea won't solve the whole problem of mass shootings
or even the sub problem of mass shootings, specifically in schools. And they're correct.
This is such a widespread issue that no one thing will solve or prevent every mass
shooting. But that's a reason to do many things rather than to do none. So that's number one.
You know, no one, treatment cures all cancer. Blood pressure. Medication alone doesn't prevent
all strokes and heart attacks. But you say, well, let's do blood pressure, medication,
exercise, diet, meditation, whatever. Seatbelts don't stop every car death. But we say seatbelts
are one tool. Safer cars are another. Crash testing is another road design is another driver
education. Okay. I also saw a post bemoaning that the left has all the same ideas as to what to do
as we had ten years ago. We've tried none of them. Of course, we're going to have many of the same
ideas. We've not tried any of these things and many of us believe that they would work. So let's
get into. The list of things that I would do and go through them one by one. First, we've got to
end the gun show loophole. The gun show loophole refers to the fact that federal law doesn't
require unlicensed private sellers like me. If I just have some guns and I want to go to a gun
show and sell them, there is no federal law that requires a background check for gun purchases.
That's the gun show loophole. Okay, you've got it. You've got to close that. Number two,
universal background checks. When we talk about a universal background check, it would require
essentially every firearms transaction in the United States
to be recorded and to go through the National Instant Criminal Background Check system.
And that is sometimes called the private sale exemption. You've got to deal with that.
Universal background checks aren't required by U.S. federal law. You've got 22 states and
D.C. that require them for at least some private sales. But that's got to go federal. Number three,
we need a mandatory waiting period from the time that you go and you say, I want the gun to the
time when you get the gun absolutely imperative. You've got to have a mandatory waiting period
for what about no high capacity weapons for those under age 25? You can get your your your, you
know, single action firearms or your handgun, I guess, at age 18. But you've got to wait until age
25 for certain high capacity weapons. Number five, mandatory gun insurance, maybe even gun insurance.
That's more expensive without a parent cosigning. If you're under 25, I'll get back to that.
What about a required community support letter for anyone under 25 who wants a gun? Meaning
you've got to have I don't know. It's sort of like you would have two or three references for a job.
You need two or three references from people over age 25 if you are under age 25. I'll get back to
why that may be a really important thing. Number seven, we probably want to ban some weapons. Yes,
we already do it right. You can't get nukes. You can't get shoulder mounted RPGs.
We might just expand that list a little bit. There are simply some weapons that are of no
real value except as mass killing machines. I'm not pretending that I have the exact point
at which you draw the line, but we probably want to look at that. Number eight, a periodic mental
health evaluation, including when you first obtain the firearms, all these right wingers
saying the problem is mental health. Well, okay, let's do something about it. Require an initial
and a periodic mental health evaluation. Number nine, an extensive licensing process. Okay, you
need a written and practical test for a driver's license. It should be the same for guns. Also,
the training and licensing period shouldn't be one weekend. It should be longer. Like with cars. And
we do. We should have a gun buyback program that will make the off ramp for lots of people much
more reasonable. There should be a gun buyback program. They've worked in many other countries.
Now, many of you will see that list and you will say, but David, sir, if you're that polite,
not not those things wouldn't have stopped this specific shooter in Uvalde, Texas. Well,
some of the things I listed would have had no impact, like the gun show loophole would
have had no impact in this particular case. But others would. Okay, 18 year old shooter
if you got got the guns legally. Right. Because these were guns that he was allowed to get.
If you limit high capacity weapons to age 25, then this shooter might have had a handgun.
And almost certainly fewer people die. If this particular shooter had only a handgun,
having to have a certificate of gun insurance might have dissuaded
the guy from going and getting those guns because it would have been an additional cost.
Community support letters. Everybody has been posting to social media that we knew about. We
knew about this guy. There were adults in the area who knew this guy was unstable. Well, if that's
true, it might have been more difficult for this shooter to obtain two or three community support
letters from adults saying, I think it's fine for this individual to have a firearm. It would have
been an obstacle. A mental health evaluation could have been an obstacle. Okay. So some of these
things wouldn't have affected this particular shooting. Some of these would. The intangible,
of course, is culture. How do you deal with American gun culture? For many Americans that are
insular and don't know what the rest of the world is like, they may not realize how bizarre it is
that we have this fetishizing of guns, celebration of gun culture, condemnation of intelligence.
And I was it Asimov? I think it might have been Isaac Asimov who said something along the lines of
and this was in the eighties, I hope I'm quoting this roughly correctly,
something along the lines of my ignorance is seen as a legitimate counterpoint to your intelligence.
It's something like that. We have a real cultural problem in the United States as well, and I admit
none of my ideas would impact that. Okay, so there are some ideas. And hey, guys,
nothing else is working, so we might as well try these things. Let me know your thoughts.