put actual criminals who use guns to rape, rob and murder in jail for 30 years to life
that should happen to any violent criminal regardless of weapon used
I can't agree ---- the way to stop violent crime actually is to put them on trial quickly and execute them immediately upon conviction. This would stop violent crime not by caging people at great expense for decades, which is pointless, but by eliminating the criminals. This was normal practice in most countries within living memory.
I'm not interested in deterrence. That's not the point. The point is getting rid of the violent criminals. And cleaning up the gene pool. That's what sensible countries always did, forever and ever, before very recently when this prison business started up.
There was some deportation -- banishment -- from the 1500s on --- African slaves were sold by the local chieftains because they were criminals, insane, or defeated enemies. Of course the British famously sent criminals to Georgia and Australia and Tasmania. Before that, criminals were executed for most crimes, notably for stealing anything with a value more than a turkey, I read in a Tudor history (about 1525). They had turkeys from North America so early in England? Who'da thought.
Development of the giant prisons was a late development and not a good one. The rule is very simple: Don't hurt people and don't take their stuff. The world is grossly overpopulated: people who cannot manage these simple rules should be eliminated, toward the great improvement of life for all the rest of us.