In the US gun sales hit new record on 2013.

Background checks show peak is reached after a record year

From the article:

Gun records checks, fueled by a post-Newtown boom of gun sales, hit a new high in 2013, and industry analysts expect ammunition to be the big seller this year as consumers catch up to all of those firearms purchases.

More than 21 million applications were run through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System last year, marking nearly an 8 percent increase and the 11th straight year that the number has risen.

Background checks serve as a proxy for the number of gun sales, which soared in the months immediately after the December 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings. But NICS checks plummeted in November and December compared with a year earlier, suggesting that the boom may be over.

Gun sales spiked as Congress and a number of states debated whether to impose more restrictions on firearms purchases after Sandy Hook. Congress stalemated, but some states moved forward.

Monthly gun checks set an all-time peak in December 2012, the same month as the school shooting. The next four highest monthly totals for the national background check system all were in 2013. Thomas R. Baker, a criminology professor at Virginia Commonwealth University’s Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs, said if buyers are purchasing more guns per visit, sales could be even higher.

John Hudak, a fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution who studies the gun issue, said the fading of a post-Newtown boom in sales also was coupled with a subsiding of fear among some that the federal government would enact sweeping laws to curb gun ownership.

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And that is that.

Obama still gunna take er guns. He just trying to lull us in two a false since of cumfert. Hee yuk.

Soon you guys will have more number of guns sales than the number of people we have here in Australia.

Considering 1 person gets murdered each day in the whole of Australia, it shows that gun control works.

Take that, Libruls! >_>

Good

So in other words the NRA's "Obama's gonna take yer guns!!!" rhetoric is working

More guns more fun

I am not surprised, all of the brainless rednecks are trying to stock up on guns since they believe that Obama is going to take away their second amendment rights.

So the U.S. should see a drop in gun violence, right?

so in other words, politicians shouldn't push for gun control because when they do people rush to buy more guns?

I would much rather have the freedom to pursue my interests.

Well it doesn't really matter if politicians are actually pushing for gun control, it depends more on whether or not groups like the NRA can convince people that politicians are pushing for gun control.

As if the gun control imposed in Australia would actually work here

It's actually probably directed more at liberals than Obama. But when you have a heavily blue state requiring its residents to register semi-automatic rifles and then banning the future sale of them, gun owners all over the nation get anxious.

Eh, who cares if you have to register your guns. It's not like the government is going to come confiscate them...oh wait

Bought two myself last year.

You don't need two guns

Oh shoot, you should have told me that before I bought my fourth military rifle.

An assault rifle! what do you need so many bullets for. If children die, it's your fault

I am so ashamed! I'll go destroy my guns at once.

Guns really aren't a right/left thing in the US in all actuality. Plenty of liberals such as myself absolutely love guns. How anyone can hate guns is beyond me.

^^^^wasdie, just make sure you don't ever use one of those rifles for home defense or anything. The bullets most rifles use are way too high of a caliber, and could easily pierce through cement blocks and into a neighbor's house. I know my friend's AK 47 has no problems going through cement blocks. Or they could ricochet and hit someone else. Best to use a 9mm hollow point or buckshot.

So what? We should all realize by now that gun control is pretty useless. Let the gun enthusiasts have their guns. I live in a concealed carry state and I've never been shot, so I guess that means that guns are okay.

It would take more than gun control to change things in the US. Australia has a different culture and more importantly it doesn't have a third world country with a drug waron its southern border that illegal guns could be smuggled over in the event of a ban on legal firearms.

BS. Australia gun violence rate went down by 31.9% since they started gun control. Over the same time period, the US gun violence rate dropped by 31.7%...Surprise.

The overall violent crime rate dropped by 31.8% in the US. In Australia, the violent crime rate rose by 42.2%.

That is a prime example of Gun control not working.

EDIT: those numbers are a few years old, but it still proves the point. Source

although a hollow point wouldn't penetrate

The M4, M16 and most AR-15s use .223 or NATO 5.56mm.

Will still go right through most walls that aren't solid concrete.

Major advantage an AR-15 has over a handgun for self defense is stopping power and magazine size. However you do run the risk of putting holes through walls.

I would never use any of my rifles in self defense. The smallest caliber rifle I own is 7.62x39mm, the AK round. The rest of my rifles are full sized rifle rounds, all .30 cal. They would go through about 10 walls before stopping. Too dangerous.

So...erm, you would want more people murdered?

That's a kind of weird way to go about things, Mr. Officer.

Yet mass shootings are up in this country and we still average nearly a thousand gun death a month. I was told that more guns would equal less of this sort of thing.

The NRA wouldn't lie to me right?

@Serraph105: With Mass Shootings pretty much all (if not all) happen at "Gun-Free" zones. So a normal civilian isn't allowed to have a weapon on those grounds.

For the amount of gun deaths a month. When you look at the numbers a good part of them come from suicides. You can ban all the 'guns' you want but it is not looking at the real issue. The (lack of) mental health care in the US, like with all the mass shooting the shooters had issues. But all we are hearing is that we should ban guns that look scary.

Which ones if I may ask?

I'll never understand american's obsession with guns

so what you are telling me is that we still don't have enough guns in enough areas. as long as the NRA hasn't totally gone off the deep end.

Older military surplus rifles. A Mosin Nagant 91/30, Short Magazine Lee Enfield Mk.III*, Sino-Chinese SKS, and an HRA M1 Garand. They are all old military rifles designed for war and that apparently has no place on our streets according to people here.

There are like 88 million legal gun owners in the United States......and about 10k homicides committed with a firearm per year.

So assuming it is legal gun owners, which the majority is not, 0.01% are committing murders with firearms. I think this entire topic is so overblown it is ridiculous.

It is not so much an obsession with guns as it is an obsession with defending yourself from people with guns. I own a gun for the same reason I own a fire extinguisher, in the unlikely event I should need it.

That's not the real concern. You're debating gun crime, but not overall violent crime.

It's like saying "England has strict gun laws, and there's less gun crimes", but than totally ignore the large amount of crimes involving knives. Legislation does nothing but prevent normal folks from obtaining legal weapons, and switching the weapons to less serious criminals.

Mexico doesn't really manufacture (Only Mendoza comes to mind, which makes full autos) guns; so illegal guns into America isn't a big concern as the only guns within Mexico are usually NFA weapons (full autos), which 99.9% of America can't even afford. Take the already expensive NFA weapons, and add black market markup, and all it would do is start prohibition again.

It's actually about a 1:1 ratio. There's about 1 gun per citizen, and that obviously proves gun aren't the issue. There's no real way to count the amount of guns as some states don't require registration, and in some states it's even illegal to register your gun (Florida), for example.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_guns_per_capita_by_country

Compare our numbers to the rest of the civilized world though, it's one of the few categories we are actually winning. Now if only it was a category we actually wanted to excel in we would be good.

It's also one of the few problems I know of in this country that we have allowed those who are completely apathetic to the issue due to their own selfishness call the shots on the matter. What if we did that for other crimes? What if we starting doing that when other countries attack ours? Would that still be okay so long as it only meant only a couple thousand deaths a month?

So your solution is to implement policy that is detrimental towards the people who haven't done anything wrong?

I have a news flash for you, buddy. Freedom isn't free. No, I'm not using it as a catch-phrase. It simply ISN'T free. Something must be given in return for it. If having access to firearms means I have to run the risk that some people may be killed with them, even myself, then so be it. There is a cost for EVERYTHING.

I didn't offer a solution anywhere in my comment. Since you seem to be upset by my comment however lets get more specific with those numbers, how about if a couple thousand police officers were the ones getting killed every month? At what point does it no longer become okay for the people who don't give a damn be the ones allowed to call the shots on a matter?

If officers were being murdered by the thousands by criminals how would legislation stop that?

Let's talk about actual numbers.

Right now, a very small percentage of people die as a result of firearm usage. Most of those killings are done by criminals. People also die by crossing the street. I could keep going on but that would be pretty silly. So lets compare actual freedoms. People die by overdose. People kill themselves. People die in sporting accidents. People drown while swimming. People get hit and killed while jogging. People get killed while driving drunk. People get killed in clubs. People choke to death while eating at a restaurant.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE?

People die in any multitude of ways in this country EVERY SINGLE DAY. I don't see you fucking advocating for more law enforcement to cut down on those crimes. I don't see you advocating that everybody wear reflective belts when running at night. I don't see you advocating for somebody to stand at every person's side at a restaurant to make sure their food is in more manageable bites.

You keep saying no one gives a damn but that's not actually true. I don't like the fact that people die. I don't like the fact that people get killed crossing the street. I don't like that people die by overdose. I don't like people killing themselves. I don't like people dying because of a sport. I don't like people drowning. I don't like people getting hit. I don't like people dying because they were hit by a drunk driver or because they were behind the wheel and were drunk. I DON'T LIKE PEOPLE GETTING KILLED. I care VERY MUCH about people living.

I am simply UNWILLING to lose my freedom WHEN I HAVEN'T DONE ANYTHING WRONG. Seriously man. What do you not understand about that? What isn't clicking in your mind? The people who are being affected by things like the SAFE act are people who HAVEN'T DONE ANYTHING WRONG. Not actual criminals.

@airshocker:

I would advocate for good solutions to lessen all of those things.

And again I have yet to suggest any solution in this thread that would take away from you or any other law abiding citizen, I'm simply questioning why it is that we allow those who are least likely to put forward solutions to an issue to have the final say on the matter. Especially when the final say is "Do nothing."

How is that a wise way of going about solving any issue much less this one?