Ubiquitin, what you wrote is simply not true, and quoting a bunch of liars doesn’t make it true. When you adjust for demographics the US is very far from the lead in homicide rates, even if you artificially limit your inquiry to “high income countries” (and why would you do that?)
Further, you can’t really compare homicide rates across countries which have different definitions and cultures. For instance, in Japan where there is no stigma on suicide they are much more likely to classify deaths as suicide rather than homicide.
And no, the problem has not been solved. In NY private sellers are at the mercy of dealers because they have to get a dealer to run the check for them. That is a big problem.
Are you really claiming that in order to prevent a schizophrenic with criminal history from getting a gun you would be willing to let anyone run a criminal check on you, for any reason they like?! Because if you’re not, then how do you suggest private sellers of guns get access to background checks on their buyers?
And the fact remains that there are NO prosecutions of people whose check comes back negative, which is very strong evidence that the overwhelming majority of such cases are false negatives, and the check system is a massive failure.
Another point: Imposing background checks on private sellers will do nothing to satisfy the gun-grabbers. They are already demanding and introducing legislation to require checks for any transfer of a weapon, including lending it to someone, or just having someone hold it while you tie your shoe.