Ot: Concealed Guns...What are your thoughts
 

Missouri just passed a law that enables residents to legally carry concealed guns. What are all your thoughts on this. it has been a pretty touchy subject here.

Just think how much the street crime will drop there.

Thug wouldn't know who is carrying.

My opinion, as a gun carrier and also as a cop, is that it can be good or bad. When asked, I always tell people that if they carry one and a situation arrises where they would need one, would they be willing to pull that trigger and take a life. It is not an easy answer. Were you justified in pulling the trigger. Could you have taken a different course of action to avoid pullin the trigger. These are some of the questions one would have to ask themselves. If you could not do so, then you are better off without carrying one. Not to mention if you do shoot, miss and hit somebody else, you are liable for that. I have multiple hours of training in order to use my firearms and I have to get re-certified each year. There is a lot of responsibility to carrying a gun. In my case, I would rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it.

I feel the same, but I feel that if the state makes this law they should require some certification with the firearm you will be carrying otherwise you are going to have to deal with untrained people with a gun.

Unfortunately, my state is no different, there is no private certification requirements that I know of. It can create problems on both sides of the law.

As far as I know all states that have right to carry laws also require a cert course and a criminal background check. The states that have enacted right-to-carry laws have seen lower violent crime rates and virtually no illegal activity from those people that were issued carry permits.

The lady I saved in Phoenix from a carjacker 4 years ago was happy I was carrying!

States with, per capita, the highest percentages of gun ownership, have the lowest crime rates. Although you very seldom hear about it, many many crimes are thwarted simply because the intended victim merely exhibited, or made the fact known, that he/she was in posession of a firearm. I personally have had a concealed weapons permit for almost twenty five years.
I refer to it as my American Express card, I never leave home without it. Have I ever had to use it? No. Would I ever use it? If necessary, without a moments hesitation. I have fired cases upon cases of ammo through my 40 calibre Beretta which is my main "carry".
It is extremely unfortunate we live in the "sickness" our world has become, a world where far too many people have no more regard for a human life, than a mosquitos. How many "massacres" could have been prevented if just one citizen had, and was competent, with a firearm? That restaurant in Texas involving the woman whose parents were killed comes to mind. By Texas law, she was required to leave her gun in her car. I wish it was a nicer, more courteous, safer world, but in reality it is not. Bottom line, don't bring a knife to a gun fight. Oh yeah, I've also won every "shoot from the hip" competition I've entered. That's actually a lot of fun. Like the saying goes, though there are those would would disagree. Guns don't kill people, people kill people. I would not want someone to kill me without at least a chance of defending myself. My two cents anyway.

I had one in Texas-had to get a background check and had to qualify on the range.

Why invite the trouble?