Whether or not humans in general, or Americans in particular, are murdering fiends with a genetic propensity to mayhem is irrelevant because that is out of our control. What we can actually do about it is to deny them the tools of the trade. People will kill, and if you ban guns, they may find other means of doing so, or they will use contraband firearms. But the number of deaths could be greatly reduced with a few simple steps.

The obvious solution then is to regulate them. Yes, that dirty word, again. We have a right to protect ourselves and our homes which we have earned through common sense, long tradition and honored custom, not any phony constitutional excuses. I exercise that right myself, you know my own personal feelings about firearms, I own them and I'm not squeamish about using them if it should become necessary.

But there is no reason why the carrying of weapons in public, concealed or otherwise, should not be an immediate felony. We should be able to protect our homes from intruders, but when we go out on the street we are all intruders. Firearms should be illegal when not in your house, the range, or designated areas like hunting lands.

Long guns, rifles and shotguns, are not concealable, have a long history of use in sport and recreation, and they can be used in a pinch for home defense, there is no reason they should be restricted at all. On the other hand, fully automatic weapons or those with high capacity magazines are specialized military tools with no sporting or recreational use. They should be banned for public use and ownership. Period. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. They will be lying.

If you are familiar with firearms, and know people who are, you know all gun designs are highly specialized and optimized for their intended application. Even hunting rifles are meticulously designed for the game they are meant to bring down, the sportsman likely to carry one, and the environment it is likely to be used in. No one needs an assault rifle except a soldier facing an opponent equipped with one. If you want to play with one that badly you can join a "well-regulated militia", like the National Guard. I'm sick and tired of this pathetic schoolboy fantasy that we might need them to protect ourselves from foreign invaders or tyrannical governments. If personal hunting rifles were good enough for the Minutemen, they should be good enough for us.

All firearms must be registered, that's why they have serial numbers. And some form of owner vetting should also be mandatory. (I own three, and none are registered and I was never vetted. Two I purchased legally 30 years ago, (I doubt if records still, or ever, existed of those transactions), the third I inherited from my stepfather. If I were a criminal I would already possess a small but untraceable, and perfectly legal, arsenal. What's wrong with this picture?

Firearms and munitions marketing methods have evolved to get around all our restrictions. Manufacturing, selling, servicing and promoting guns is a business, one not only carried out by large corporations, but by many small individual entrepreneurs and retailers. They have trade associations, a propaganda arm, political action organizations, lobbies and are highly publicized, organized and funded. They didn't accumulate their political power because of our constitution and heritage. They bought it.

This is the primary reason, along with our adolescent fascination with things that go bang and killing things from a safe distance, why so many Americans die from gunfire. If too many of us are dying that way, then it is obvious that the availability of firearms must be curtailed. I know it cannot be stopped altogether, but this nation is awash with guns, and if they are easily available, they are more likely to be used. The reason so many people die from gunfire is because it is so easy to kill with a gun and so easy to get one. It does not take much courage or skill, or planning to shoot somebody, or even yourself. People die in mass shootings, gun accidents and domestic arguments in Norway, too, but not as many. There is a reason for this.

A look at our gun laws shows that none of these ideas are new, and many have already found their way into law. But our gun laws are full of loopholes, haphazardly applied, uncoordinated and vary in an incomprehensible patchwork from state to state, and even city to city. This is not an accident. We need a simple, straightforward, uniform firearms code in this country, systematically applied and enforced nationwide. It need not be anything Draconian, every one of the measures I've outlined here already exists somewhere and has ample legal precedent.