Are my original assumptions / statements accurate? How would you expand, correct, or elaborate on them, if I am wrong or woefully ignorant somewhere?
Close to accurate. Others have addressed them pretty well here, so no need for me to repeat them.
What is your take on the LV thing, considering my comment above?
I am a "gun nut" and therefore staunch supporter of the 2nd amendment. My thoughts yesterday were that perhaps bump-fire stocks and other firing aids, like the "gatcrank" would, and probably should, be banned. Then I came back to my senses later. The reality is that full auto or not, people are going to die if someone is intent on mass murder. I understand the emotional knee jerking; I did that too. It's hard not to, if you have anything other than a lump of coal for a heart.
This mass shooting had no obvious motive for it. It reminds me of the tower shooting in Austin, where the guy turned out to have a brain tumor, and he even suspected it himself and called for his own autopsy to explain his rage. The LV shooting was as if it was completely random, undetectable, and not preventable by any utopian gun law short of a 100% ban. Ban all the firing aids and "automatic" whatever you want, but there will still be a way to spray bullets if someone is so inclined. Mental healthcare? Maybe, but the random psycho is still going to appear from time to time, and cannot be stopped. He might have chosen to fly one of his two airplanes into the crowd instead.
The notion that keeping silencers restricted would help prevent these types of shootings is bullshit. Silencers overheat quickly with automatic fire, and the crowd thought the firing was fireworks at first anyway, and silencers do not stop sonic cracks, which are loud. Sure there is subsonic ammunition, but they lose range quickly.
So I am skeptical federal "gun" laws will be passed, because quite frankly, they probably would not have stopped this shooting from happening, and I believe the majority of legislators will eventually come to that same conclusion again. Scary "assault weapons" have nothing to do with this either.
However, there are some things to notice and laws to be passed because of them. A headline on drudgereport.com says the shooting lasted for 72 minutes. Really?! That is an incredibly long time to be shooting fish in a barrel. One obvious law that could be passed is that public gatherings within a certain range of vantage points could be regulated. Another is that security and law enforcement tactics and equipment can be changed. Las Vegas hotels most certainly will have inspections of anyone going to upper floors in their casinos. No one will be taking rifles onto the 32nd floor of the Mandalay again.