Fish in a Barrel

I have noticed myself that the partisan pundits are in the habit of giving advice to the other side.  I don't know if they have always done that or if they have just started doing it lately, but I never noticed it until the last few years. 

I seem to remember saying before that I don't mind background checks.  We've had them since about 1970, but only for purchases from licensed gun dealers.  Extending them to all gun sales might not be a bad idea, although enforcement might be difficult.  That's why I asked about licensing the gun owners like they used to do, and maybe they still do, in Illinois.  In Michigan, when a motor vehicle is sold from one private party to another, both of them have to go down to the Secretary of State and register the transaction.  Doing something similar with guns might be more efficient than trying to get private sellers to check the backgrounds of private buyers. 

Banning ARs is more complicated.  Fully automatics are already banned, but it's not difficult to convert a semi auto to a fully auto if you know what you're doing.  If you ban all semis, you are including a lot of popular guns that are not normally used by mass murderers.  In Michigan, semi autos used for hunting are already limited to five round magazines, so a total ban on high capacity magazines might be easier to pass than a total ban on ARs.  By the way, I read somewhere that Trump has already banned bump stocks by executive order.  I suppose that he could do that without Congress because fully autos are already banned, and the bump stock makes a semi auto shoot like a fully auto, so it was just a tweak in the existing regulations. 

I agree with Old Dog that a fully automatic rifle is not so effective in taking out individual targets but, as Uncle Ken once said, "When you're shooting fish in a barrel, all you have to hit is the barrel."  Shotguns can be deadly at close range, say up to 50 yards, depending on what kind of ammo is in the gun.  A disciplined machine gunner can have a similar effect over longer ranges by firing short three to five round bursts.  Any more than that, accuracy goes out the window, and the gun will eventually overheat and jam up.

They have been reporting near record high lake levels here as well, but I seem to remember seeing them much higher in the past.  Shoreline erosion is not as much of a problem here because we don't get the big waves breaking on shore like you do at the long end of Lake Michigan.  Low water was a bigger problem a few years ago because it was impacting navigation.