Whatever spin you want to put on this, the bottom line is it is very easy for someone to buy a gun in this country. And 99% of the people who do buy them are responsible and would never use them against another person unless they were in a life and death situation. But there is a tiny percentage of gun buyers who are unstable and shouldn't be allowed to buy them. In the case of Mr. Holmes, I don't think there were any red flags, as there was nothing in his past that suggested he was insane. But in the case of someone like Jared Loughner, who committed the murders in Arizona, there were any number of red flags. And yet nothing stopped him from buying his weapons.
Somewhere along the line some of these guys could be stopped in their tracks by a simple background check. Not saying all can, but even if one or two could be caught it would save countless lives. But when this idea is brought up the NRA goes ballistic (pun intended) and nothing ever really changes.
Nobody is hurt by making it just a little more difficult for citizens to purchase guns. If you have a clean record it shouldn't matter in the least, maybe no more than filling out some paperwork. But if just one idiot is stopped because of a background check, some lives can be saved. These are small concessions but the NRA makes no concessions whatsoever. It's their extreme approach to this issue that gets a lot of people riled. There is always a middle ground that can be achieved with a little effort.
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