> What I was half-seriously proposing, however, was not a database
> so much as a set of criteria for denying someone the right to own
> a gun (half-seriously because I don't have complete confidence in
> our ability to compile such a "profile").
Most (all?) states already have such criteria.
Here's California's:
http://ag.ca.gov/firearms/forms/pdf/Cfl2006.pdf
Start at Section 2:
PERSONS INELIGIBLE TO POSSESS FIREARMS AND AMMUNITION
Note that having strict laws about possession does very little to change the use of firearms by violent criminals. Much of "gun crime" is really a string of violations of several laws, including possession by a prohibited person. The most common one, from what I read, is possession of a firearm by someone who has prohibition of possession of a firearm as a condition of parole.
Here's a good one:
http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_23651036/life-without-parole-four-oakland-men-who-killed
> We have such criteria for denying someone a driver's license
> ---if your eyes are bad enough or if you've been caught DWI a
> certain number of times, you aren't allowed to drive, period.
Yeah, but we don't take them very seriously. DUI, sure; vision? Not so much.
How about just being a lousy driver? The tests are notoriously simple-minded and result in huge amounts of carnage each day. I would say that as a society we (in the US at least) don't care much about shitty drivers.
> Might there not be legitimate criteria
> that would have kept Zimmerman, for example, from having a gun?
Florida does also have a list; I would have to believe that California's list would be more extensive than Florida's, but I can't think of anything off the top of my head that would prohibit Z from possessing a gun in California.
Was there some specific thing about him (other than abject stupidity) that you're thinking of?
He did get arrested once for a charge of interferening with a cop, but the charge was later dropped; if he had been convicted, he would have lost his gun rights. Alas ...
I think I've gone on record before as saying that education is the answer. I would be all for a much more stringent set of standards for both drivers and gun owners, which involved a significant amount of training with (recurrent) testing to back it up. I think this level of training would help ~97% of those who carry a weapon for a living.
/jordan