The flurry of proposals for responding to the massacre in Newtown, Conn., have come from all quarters: the White House, members of Congress, advocacy organizations, religious leaders, governors and state and county legislators.

Specifics are hard to come by in some cases. But taken together, the suggestions for legislative and executive action foreshadow a broad political debate about assault weapons, ammunition, violent video games, shoot-em-up movies, gun shows, mental health services, and permits for concealed firearms. Much of the national discussion this week has focused on a comprehensive approach, rather than just new gun controls.

Proposals to regulate, limit or evaluate the current state of affairs in all of those areas have quickly been brought forth in the days since the shooting that killed 20 young children and six adults, along with the gunman and his mother. Some proposals have received broad support, while others could prove divisive.

President Obama has now signaled that he supports a renewed effort to ban assault weapons and might back efforts to limit high-capacity ammunition clips for semiautomatic pistols and rifles. Jay Carney, Mr. Obama’s spokesman, said that the president also was “actively supportive” of closing the gun-show loophole that allows the purchase of guns without background checks.

“And there are other elements of gun law, gun legislation that he could support,” Mr. Carney told reporters on Tuesday. “People have talked about high-capacity gun ammunition clips, for example, and that is something certainly that he would be interested in looking at.”

But Mr. Obama, who will announce on Wednesday that Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. will head the administration’s efforts to develop a response to the shootings, is just one of the newly revved-up sources of ideas for trying to prevent future mass killings.

Local, state and federal lawmakers from around the country are vowing to take action in the new year. In some cases, they have already proposed legislation that they say will make it less likely that someone will have the means to kill so many people at once.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, has said she will introduce an assault-weapon ban on “the first day” of the next Congress, and it will include limits on high-capacity ammunition clips as well.

“It will ban the sale, the transfer, the importation, and the possession” of assault weapons, she said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” program on Sunday. “Not retroactively, but prospectively. It will ban the same for big clips, drums or strips of more than 10 bullets.”

Even the National Rifle Association, which had been largely silent since the attacks on Friday, issued a statement late Tuesday saying that it was “prepared to offer meaningful contributions to help make sure this never happens again.”

In the statement, officials with the group did not say what those proposals would be, but said they would be holding a news conference on Friday.

Here are some of the other ideas that have been proposed:

• Improvements to behavioral health services. Gov. Jan Brewer, Republican of Arizona, questioned the need for new gun-control measuresbut said that improving “behavioral health services” and the mental health system could “address those issues before they get out of control.”

• Improved communication of mental health records to law enforcement. Records of people who are committed to mental institutions would be transferred in real time to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation for use in background checks, under a proposal by John W. Hickenlooper, the state’s Democratic governor.

• Strengthen the national background check system. A group of the country’s mayors, including Michael R. Bloomberg of New York and Rahm Emanuel of Chicago, proposed eliminating loopholes in the background check system in an open letter to Mr. Obama. Senator Richard J. Durban, Democrat of Illinois, also backs a proposal to make the background check system more robust.

• Increase penalties for straw purchases of guns. The mayors group includes this suggestion in its list of what it calls “reasonable changes” in gun laws and regulations.

• Require background check and $50 permit for ammunition purchases. State Senator Kevin de León, a Democratic lawmaker in California, said he would introduce legislation that would impose the requirements on people buying ammunition. It would also ban the sale of ammunition by mail.

• Arm teachers. Virginia’s Republican governor, Bob McDonnell, urged people not to overreact in the wake of the shootings, but also said that the country should have a discussion about letting teachers have weapons in the schools. “If someone had been armed, there would have been an opportunity to stop the person from coming into the school,” he said.

• Develop a commission on video games and culture. Many people in the last several days have suggested a serious look at violent video games. Among those raising the issue is David Axelrod, one the president’s top advisers. Mr. Axelrod said in an interview with The New York Times on Tuesday that he does not envision legislation or regulation, but that “there’s no doubt that if you spend hours a day winning a game by killing as many people as you can, that has to have some impact.” Senators Joseph I. Lieberman, independent of Connecticut, and Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, also want a commission to examine violent video games.

• Require a psychological evaluation to carry a concealed weapon.Several state lawmakers in Wisconsin proposed that people who want to carry a concealed weapon in the state would have to undergo training that would include a psychological evaluation.

• Ban hollow-point bullets. The Wisconsin lawmakers, who all come from Milwaukee, also suggested bans on what they called “high-velocity, maximum-damage bullets.

• Prevent people from buying more than one gun per month. Gov.Deval Patrick, Democrat of Massachusetts, urged lawmakers to approve his previously submitted legislation that would prevent people from buying more than one gun every month. Mr. McDonnell, Virginia’s governor, signed legislation repealing his state’s one-gun-a-month law earlier this year.

• Study mental health issues. Mr. Grassley called for a “blue ribbon task force” to investigate the wide range of issues surrounding the provision of mental health services and any connection to violent episodes like the one in Connecticut. “There must also be a serious and thoughtful discussion on mental health issues. And, I think you have to look at the culture of the United States which tends to be less civil now than it has been for a long period of time,” he said on Fox News.

• Require identification when buying ammunition. In Florida, several Miami-Dade County commissioners proposed resolutions calling for gun-control measures to be adopted in the state and nationally, including one that would require people to present a driver’s license or other identification to buy ammunition.

• Increase minimum penalties for committing felonies with assault weapons. The Miami-Dade commissioners also proposed increasing penalties for using banned weapons and said that privately owned guns should be registered.

• Ban high-capacity magazines. In addition to Ms. Feinstein, others have also said they want to ban high-capacity magazines. Among them is SenatorFrank R. Lautenberg, Democrat of New Jersey. Mr. Lautenberg proposed legislation would outlaw magazines that carry dozens, or even 100, rounds of ammunition.

• Increase access to mental health services. Several religious groups have issued statements urging new laws or regulations, and some have been specific. B’nai B’rith International, a major Jewish organization, on Monday called for a new assault weapons ban. The Jewish Council for Public Affairs said in a petition that it wants, among other things, better access to quality mental health care.