GUN CONTROL THAT MAKES SENSE

Mandatory psychological exams for all gun purchasers and concealed carry applicants

Every time we have a mass shooting I hear the same talk on the need for stricter gun control. President Obama is right when he says that his talks following mass shootings have become routine. He and most Democrats believe stricter gun controls will prevent the frequency of mass shootings.

Pro-gunners and most Republicans oppose any more gun control measures. Donald Trump says there is nothing we can do about the problem of nutjobs getting their hands on guns because there are always going to be people who “slip though the cracks.” Jeb Bush said “stuff happens.”

Then there is the mother of 16-year-old Cheyeanne Fitzgerald, a nursing student who got shot in the back and is recovering in a hospital. Cheyeanne’s mom said she wished her daughter had been armed.

Instead of passing more restrictive gun legislation, I have a gun control proposal which I think makes more sense. I propose that in addition to the current background checks, all gun purchasers must pass a psychological examination before being allowed to buy a gun. The same for concealed carry applicants – they should pass a psychological examination before obtaining a license to carry a gun.

For gun buyers who pass the psych exams, those results should remain in effect for three years. After three years, the gun buyer will have to pass another exam.

Every three years, the concealed carry license holders should have to take another psych exam in order to maintain their licenses and each time they renew those licenses they should take another exam as well.

I realize that a psychologist's examination might cost more than a hundred bucks, but someone who is willing to plunk down $600 to well above $1,000 for a gun should be able to afford this added cost. Those who cannot afford expensive firearms will just have to save up the psych screening costs before purchasing a gun.

Will my proposal stop mass shootings like the Oregon and Sandy Hook massacres? Of course not. There are already millions of guns in circulation and some of those guns are now in the hands of nutjobs like Chris Harper-Mercer, the Oregon shooter. But my proposal would weed out nutjobs and prevent them from purchasing guns. And that will prevent some future mass shootings.

As for the concealed carry applicants, if we require police applicants to take a psychological examination in order to see whether or not they are mentally fit to be cops, we can certainly require a concealed carry applicant to take a psych exam in order to see whether or not he is mentally fit to carry a concealed firearm. I’ll bet that George Zimmerman would not have passed the psych exam.

The regulations requiring a psych exam should stipulate that gun buyers and concealed carry applicants must use the same psychologists local law enforcement agencies use to weed out their mentally unfit applicants.

Even though psychologists can be fooled, it seems to me that my proposal is far better than the alternative of more restrictive gun control legislation.

I admit that those psych exams will restrict the purchase of guns, but that restriction will only apply to persons who, as the result of a psych exam, are found to be mentally unfit to possess a gun.