Correct me if I'm wrong, but can't a "lesser" gun with less purchase controls be easily modified to fire multiple bullets per trigger pull?
No. That's the entire point of my post. Did you not read it? There is no such thing as a 'lesser' gun. The part that turns a semi-automatic into a fully automatic is, in theory, easy to manufacture if you have access to a machine shop.
Again. Read the link about someone 'making' a machine gun with a shoestring. It's right there.
Know what's even easier to make? A molotov cocktail. A bomb. Napalm. People don't own automatic weapons, and people don't 'just convert' them with 5$. The BATFE does not fuck around. Possessing an unregistered automatic weapon is a good way to have a no-knock raid and 5-10 years of fuck me in the ass federal prison time.
Here's a link from the NRA. At least pretend you read it.
https://www.nraila.org/articles/19990728/federal-penalties-for-firearms-misuse
It's true, I don't know too much about firearms, but I think my points are still valid.
They aren't. You're discussing from a position of willful ignorance as though you are very knowledgeable and are ignoring people pointing out glaring shortcomings in your understanding and knowledge.
Shot guns. (for home defense)
Shotguns are horrible home defense weapons. A standard 12 gauge buckshot shell will massively over penetrate. It's a great way to hit someone. And your neighbor. And your neighbors cat. And possibly their neighbor, if you're in an apartment. Shotguns are also the same size, or smaller, than your aforementioned 'assault weapons'. Shotguns also have a minimum distance to create spread; it's about 1 inch per yard, after 10 yards. That's right, at less than 30 feet you are shooting what amounts to a single, very large, bullet.
Despite 'sounding' scarier on paper, a 5.56 rifle round is only .223 inches. It's a tiny piece of lead and copper shoved into a large case for a lot of gunpowder so it moves fast. The good side of this, in home defense, is that as soon as it hits anything (like drywall) it slows down or stops. The opposite is a big, heavy, bullet. Like 00 buckshot, or a .45. These things move slower but they're so heavy that if they hit drywall they simply keep going. Think of the 5.56 as a Fiat. Fast to accelerate but if it hits something it stops. The .45 bullet is an 18-wheeler. Slow and heavy, but if it hits something it's just going to keep going.
Guns that aren't easily concealable or easy for children to operate.
There is no such thing as a 'difficult' to operate modern firearm. You put in the magazine, pull the bolt or handle or slide, and it goes bang bang. With a shotgun that might mean putting shells into a tube and working a pump or simply pulling back a handle and letting it do everything for you. But again, you seem to have no knowledge of how firearms actually work.
Also, why does concealment factor in? The mass shootings we have had were not concealed. They were legally obtained, unmodified, weapons. You could fabricate an 'easy to conceal' firearm with a hacksaw from nearly anything (cut off stock, cut off barrel). It wouldn't be able to hit fuckall, but it would be concealable and would be fine at 5-10 feet ranges. It would also be illegal as hell. You can also make a 'liberator' pistol in your garage (quite literally here; that's the point, it's a single-shot gun designed for ease of creation from scraps, look it up).
I'd prefer if there were less of both. I don't even like that cops have hand guns. Cops in London don't.
Cops in London most certainly do. They have special response teams with firearms. But London isn't the US. You might as well argue that cops in rural Africa have fully automatic AKs so fuck it, cops in east bumfuck should too.
You know what cops in London do have? Fucking stab vests. Because they might not get shot, but they were so god damned likely to get stabbed that the entire police force was issued preventative armor. That includes police, traffic, paramedics, etc. Their entire first response group. Every single member.
One, I said fly on a plane, not fly a plane.
Oh, sorry, I missed the 'on' part. That explains my confusion. I'm not going to get into the 'no fly' list debate; I feel that the security around modern flight in America is idiotic; it hasn't stopped a legitimate thread and would not have stopped the threats it was enacted to counter.
One of the main purposes of guns is to harm others, justified or not.
The stated purpose of a gun is to move small lead projectiles at high speed. Many people do this to put holes in paper. Some do it to bust clay pigeons. Others use it to compete in sporting games. Some even use them for hunting (animals). The number of people using guns for violence in the US is small. So is the number of stabbings, deliberate car wrecks, and anal rape.