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Maybe more of a privilege, in the sense that it can and should be taken away for bad behavior.
For example, people convicted of even non-violent felonies can't legally buy or own a gun. Extreme, perhaps, but it makes sense.
I definitely think that people who have exhibited serious mental health issues - especially those who have been institutionalized and/or heavily medicated - should be kept away from buying guns. There definitely should be better records kept of the mentally ill, for one thing. As far as I know, there's nothing stopping a person who was institutionalized in Maine from buying a gun in Kentucky, for example; I'm fairly certain that person wouldn't appear on any kind of database in Kentucky listing them as mentally ill, even if they were severely so.
That's kind of a big problem. In this shooter's case, it appears that he had a serious history of mental illness, yet he had little trouble getting his hands on a gun, and further, transporting it across several states. I can't even begin to get into what's wrong with all of that.
I'm 100% in favor of people's right to own a gun, but some people absolutely shouldn't be allowed to, and they need to tighten that sh*t up a bit. Too many cases like this lately, where the shooter realistically shouldn't have had such an easy go of things.
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