>>Today's news brought even more good news. Congress passed a bill protecting gun manufacturers from lawsuits. Terrific! We have a gun fatality rate several times that of ANY OTHER CIVILIZED NATION and this is how we address it? Disgusting.
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>I don't own a gun and never will, mostly because I don't know for a fact that if push came to shove I would ever be able to pull the trigger. If you aren't willing to do that.....what's the point. I am profoundly grateful that during my three years of military service I was never in a position of being put to that test. I'd like to think that I wouldn't have gotten anybody killed by freezing but until you're actually there, you just never know.
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>But our society has determined that guns have some useful purpose outside the military. I tend towards doubting that, but not adamantly so. But I see no reason whatsoever why a gun manufacturer should be held liable for the illegal use of his legal product. Do you sue Ford when some nut puts a bomb in a car and blows it up? Do you sue Compaq/Dell/IBM when one of their computers is used to plant a virus which causes millions of dollars of damage. Do you really think that hold gun manufacturers liable will do anything significant to reduce the level of gun fatalities????????

In a word, yes. But that wasn't really my point. My point is why should this one particular industry be inoculated against lawsuits? To me this shows our political system at its worst -- ruled by money and connections. The NRA might be the most powerful lobby in Washington.