Gun Control Proponents Are About To Face Political Reality
The ultimate impact of the Newtown tragedy on the nation's gun laws is likely to be very limited.
Monday will mark the one month anniversary of the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School that led to the deaths of twenty-six people, the vast majority of them schoolchildren between the ages of 6 and 7. In that time, there’s been a significant amount of political movement and discussion along with vows from politicians in support of some form of increased gun control ranging from beefing up the background check system to restrictions on high capacity magazines to a return of the 1994 “Assault Weapons” Ban, which expired in 2004. At the moment at least, things seem to be moving at a rather quick pace. The task force led by Vice-President Biden and given the mandate from President Obama of coming up with suggested courses of action on gun control and other issues related to gun violence, for example, will present its recommendations to the President on Tuesday, presumably so that they can be integrated in to the President’s State Of The Union Address in February.
Over the past month, there’s little question that there’s been no small degree of political momentum behind the gun control movement. No doubt, this is motivated in large part by the shock to the nation that the deaths of so many small children. It also doesn’t hurt, of course, that many of the public spokespersons advocating the gun rights position have been largely inept. Given all of this, it’s easy to see why gun control advocates seem so optimistic about the prospect of moving forward on the issues important to them. They certainly do seem to have momentum at the moment. However, as The New York Times notes today, the actual prospects for significant gun control legislation making it through Congress are really quite slim:
WASHINGTON — While President Obama pledged to crack down on access to what he called “weapons of war” in the aftermath of last month’s schoolhouse massacre, the White House has calculated that a ban on military-style assault weapons will be exceedingly difficult to pass through Congress and is focusing on other measures it deems more politically achievable.
As a task force led by Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. readies recommendations on reducing gun violence for delivery to the president next week, White House officials say a new ban will be an element of whatever final package is proposed. But given the entrenched opposition from gun rights groups and their advocates on Capitol Hill, the White House is trying to avoid making its passage the sole definition of success and is emphasizing other new gun rules that could conceivably win bipartisan support and reduce gun deaths.
During a day of White House meetings on the issue on Thursday, including one with the National Rifle Association, Mr. Biden focused publicly on universal background checks for gun purchases and the need for more federal research on gun violence. In 15 minutes of public remarks, Mr. Biden made no mention of curbing the production and sale of assault weapons, even though he was a prime author of such a law that passed in 1994 and expired 10 years later. Both he and the president say they strongly support an assault weapons ban.
But Mr. Biden noted that his former colleagues in the Senate have long been “pretty universally opposed to any restrictions on gun ownership or what type of weapons can be purchased.” He said they now seem more open to limits on the purchase of high-capacity magazines.
A spokesman for Mr. Obama said later in the afternoon that the vice president’s remarks merely reflect a desire for a broad approach to gun violence.
“President Obama has been clear that Congress should reinstate the assault weapons ban and that avoiding this issue just because it’s been politically difficult in the past is not an option,” said Matt Lehrich, the spokesman. “He’s also stressed that no single piece of legislation alone can solve this problem, which is why he has asked Vice President Biden to explore a wide array of proposals on topics ranging from gun laws to mental health to school safety.”
The calculation on the assault weapons ban underscores the complicated politics of guns on Capitol Hill despite public outrage after a gunman killed 26 people, including 20 children, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in December. While the shootings prompted some pro-gun lawmakers to endorse limits on assault weapons, Republicans who control the House Judiciary Committee still oppose such limits.
A statement by the N.R.A. after Thursday’s meeting underscored the political challenges. The group accused the White House of having an “agenda to attack the Second Amendment,” and said it would go to the halls of Congress in its efforts to stop gun restrictions.
“We will now take our commitment and meaningful contributions to members of Congress of both parties who are interested in having an honest conversation about what works — and what does not,” the statement said.
In addition to the fact of Republican opposition and the fact that Republicans in both the House and the Senate have made clear their opinion that the legislative priorities for 2013 should be focused on the fiscal issues facing the nation such as the debt ceiling, sequestration, and finishing up a Continuing Resolution that would cover the rest of the current Fiscal Year. After that they’ll have the Fiscal Year 2014 budget, which is due by September 30th, to work on. Notwithstanding the political winds at the back of the gun control movement at the moment, reality is going to hit very quickly once we’ve moved beyond the discussion phase and into the phase of actually discussing specific policy proposals. The Congress that passed the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban is far different from the Congress we have today, for example. Additionally, post hoc analysis of crime statistics makes it entirely unclear if the ban actually had a significant impact on either crime or the availability of high powered weapons to criminals willing to do what was necessary to obtain them illegally. Under the current political climate, it seems rather apparent that the changes most likely to get through Congress would be legislation that expands the FBI database that gun dealers access to do background checks to include things such as people who have been hospitalized for serious mental illnesses, as well as closing other roadblocks in the background check system. The next most likely to pass would seem to be some kind of a ban on high capacity magazines, although even that one seems doubtful given the current makeup of the House and the presence in the Senate of more than a few Red State Democrats who face re-election in 2014. The piece of legislation at the top of the list, though, another Assault Weapons Ban, strikes me as being something that has absolutely no chance of passing Congress anytime in the next two years, or indeed any time during the next four years of the Obama Presidency.
This is one reason why Vice-President Biden’s comments this week about the ambitions of his task force have been rather muted. Rather than broad legislation, he’s been talking about Executive Orders which, despite the panic coming from some quarters of the right, can only accomplish a very limited number of things. Some of them, such as expanding the Federal Government’s database that is accessible to gun dealers, would likely be helpful. However, most of what could be accomplished by Executive Order would have a minimal impact at best. Indeed, even the idea ‘of “Universal Background Checks” seems problematic. If Joe Smith and his neighbor Dan Jones decide over the back fence to exchange a gun for cash, how is any government entity ever going to be able to regulate that? And, why should they? Indeed, if we’re talking about preventing mass shootings like Sandy Hook, Aurora, Tucson, or UVA, regulations such as that would have done nothing. In each of those cases, the guns used in the crime in question were obtained legally. In the Sandy Hook case, it appears that the legal gun owner did not sufficiently protect her weapons from being used by an unauthorized person. Outside of some Gestapo-like inspection force that invades the home of every person who owns guns, how exactly do we prevent things like that from happening?
Notwithstanding these questions, most people on the right have responded to the post-Sandy Hook backlash by going into full panic mode. All discussions of gun control legislation are characterized as “gun grabbing” even though, outside of a few off the radar exceptions, none of the serious policy proposals put forward over the past month have even hinted at the idea of confiscating guns from people who own them legally under current law. Indeed, it seems pretty clear that a lot of the “gun grabbing” rhetoric has come from the NRA and other gun rights organizations who have used it as a fundraising tool.
None of this is to discount the political impact of the tragedy in Newtown, of course. However, in the end, I think we will find that the actual impact on the law of those events will be far more limited than some of the strongest advocates of gun control apparently think it will be.
Doug, there are many middle of the road measures you or James could take a stand on. But yesterday some assh0le said he would have to start
killingmurdering people if Obama issued ANY executive order restricting guns…You and James said….. Crickets.
True. Because some people don’t have the courage to stand up and say, “Enough.”
@OzarkHillbilly:
I’m sorry, but do you really expect either James, Steven, myself, or anyone else who blogs here to waste time on some idiotic comment from some guy that nobody has ever heard of?
If I devoted my blogging to that, I’d literally have no free time left in my day.
I’m shocked. That seems so out of character for the NRA.
/flat-lining
@Gold Star for Robot Boy:
Just like the “they’re going to take away our right to abortion” rhetoric from NARAL.
These groups are very good at using fear mongering to raise money.
@Doug Mataconis: You just can’t help yourself with the reflexive response of “Both sides do it!” It’s SO tiresome.
I like OTB quite a bit. And, Doug, I like it in spite of you.
@Gold Star for Robot Boy:
So, you refuse to admit that activist groups on both sides of the aisle engage in inflammatory rhetoric?
I’m not saying I completely agree with the NRA, but they aren’t doing anything different from any other interest group out there.
I agree with Doug’s many reasonable, common sense arguments in this post. It’s a shame you libtards won’t understand them.
That’s 4 things! And there are barely 400 people in the house! There’s no way they will be able to spend time talking about or fixing our gun problem! And these things are clear priorities… if we don’t attend to them at once, a continuing resolution might wander into a movie theater and start opening fire or something. See, liberals, get your priorities straight.
If Joe Smith decides to sell anything, like, say, his car or his boat to Dan Jones, there are no laws requiring Dan to license his new vehicle, and to suggest doing so is clearly crazy and impossible. So how could we try such a thing with guns?
Why do you leftists want the Gestapo invading our homes? Next thing you know, you nanny staters will require fences around swimming pools, just like Stalin did. Stop trying to police everyone’s lives, you freedom-haters.
As the saying goes, “If something is probably going to be hard, you might as well just not try at all.”
Great post, Doug! One thing I would have added is that I heard a couple of dems say they weren’t sure about new laws either, so something about “both sides being equally at fault” would have fit in great here
Since when does reality even apply to leftists?
In any event, obviously there’s not going to be any actual nationwide gun control. Now, granted, some of the hard core gun control cities and states might gin up their existing ordinances and statutes, respectively, and then as the bodies of gunshot victims continue to pile up in those jurisdictions leftists will for split seconds be confused, but then quickly will go back to denying reality altogether.
Ultimately for Team Obama this is about ginning up campaign donations from wealthy airheads in the likes of Malibu, Tiburon, Pacific Heights and SoHo. For the media it’s an opportunity to self-medicate. Ditto for the academe. For gun shops and gun shows it means brisker business. For the black helicoper types it means a few more hours per day in their bunkers. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
@cd6:
It was my mistake in doubting Doug. While I was typing this, he snuck in a “both sides engage in inflammatory rhetoric” comment.
Great work as always, Doug.
@Doug Mataconis:
Your defense would ring less hollow if there were _any_ serious legislative efforts _anywhere_ to actually ban all guns across-the-board, in comparison to the countless bills (and actual laws) explicitly intended to take away the right to abortion under any circumstances.
But back to the topic, I (regrettably) predict this will go one of two ways… either:
a) Various knees will turn to water and the outrage over the recent shootings will be allowed to subside, probably as part of some political deal to make gains in some other area, or
b) Something substantive will be put forward (or enacted by Executive action, since there’s _zero_ chance of anything but “guns for everyone” getting through the GOP caucus in either house), and this will trigger a reflexive, horrifying spasm of violence by the nuttiest of the nutballs on the far right wing.
It will be painful, and there will be deaths, but I actually think (b) is both the only way forward and the better of the two alternatives.
Doug wrote:
Hahahahaha! That’s very funny, Doug. Their ‘priorities’, as evident from what they’re pushed so far is yet another symbolic attempt to repeal ‘Obamacare’ and declare that single-celled, fertilized eggs are ‘people’.
Deny firearms due to “people who have been hospitalized for serious mental illnesses”? I’m surprised at you, Doug, have you forgot your Con Law, that little matter of Due Process?
Although, if the mental health professionals, who notoriously lean Left, were to file for a judge to determine a person should be temporarily denied firearm purchases, that might work. If only they would.
Same problem with the refusal to deny people on the “Terror Watch List” – you know the list you aren’t allowed to even know you are on or to know why your own it or who put you on it. Or to challenge your listing in court.
Right now, gun vendors call their state police who operate the checking program. The state runs against the databases to determine if the person is prohibited due to previous proceedings that used due process, such as convicted felon or adjudicated as mentally unstable. Now, the real problem has been the mental health officials not updating their portion of the databases.
So, problem number one, denying someone their rights under the Constitution without Due Process
The only thing that might change the picture on gun control is if it brings out enough psychopaths:
Two men walked the streets of Portland armed with assault weapons earlier this week because they said they wanted to “educate” residents, who reacted by fleeing and calling police.
Warren Drouin and Steven Boyce told KPTV that they were forced to take drastic measure to make sure people were aware of their Second Amendment rights after 20 children in Connecticut were massacred with same type of AR-15 rifles they were carrying.
“We’re not threatening anyone,” Drouin explained. “We don’t have that type of criminal behavior.”
But KPTV’s Kaitlyn Bolduc reported that the demonstration created a “state of panic” in Portland’s Sellwood neighborhood.
“Employees inside of E Hair Studio hid in the back of the salon and locked there doors, while other ran for help for fear the two were really there to cause harm,” Bolduc said.
Police spoke to Drouin and Boyce and said the conceal-carry permit holders had not broken any laws.
The men insisted that they understood that people were on edge after recent mass shootings but hoped residents would approach them to ask questions during future demonstrations.
The governor of NY is “off the radar”?
If you look at Sen. Feinstein’s propose legislation, you’ll find not direct confiscation but a plan to make ownership so onerous and expensive as to force surrender of the firearms. She proposes to apply NFA rules to the undesired weapons. Expensive annual “tax”, criminal (felony) penalties for the firearm being accessible by someone who hasn’t been previously disclosed by onerous notarized paperwork, etc.
So you may make your claim as they’ve not written the word confiscation but if the reasonable impact is the same, you can hardly oppose calling them what they are “gun grabbers”.
@Doug Mataconis:
But empirically, Republicans do severely curtail access. Your pal Bob McDonnell just passed another bill to close abortion clinics a few weeks ago. Naturally, you did not care, and have no regrets about that development, or anything McDonnell has done.
I wouldn’t characterize them as being gun control proponents as there is already a great deal of gun control laws on the books. Calling them gun control proponents gives false implications about their intentions.
I still think this fellow has the right ideas. He definitely has studies to back it up including the Harvard study on gun control and murder/suicides.
http://ordinary-gentlemen.com/blog/2013/01/great-fact-little-fact/
But why only fund “gun violence” research? Why not fund violence minimization research. That would seek to investigate the whole spectrum of violence regardless of the implement used. It would embrace mental health, societal and legal remedies. Perhaps even ending the drug war. Or, dare we admit, arming school personnel or expanding lawful carry?
Horrible violence was done at Sandy Hook, why is the immediate reaction by so many, including Obama, to seek “gun control” that would have not have had any impact on reducing the violence done at Sandy Hook or daily on the streets of Chicago. Shouldn’t we be examining how to minimize the violence in society rather than mindlessly going after one implement as if gun violence is so much worse than other violence? Or as if in the absence of guns, the violence wouldn’t be done with other implements?
I think actually enforcing the current laws would be a good place to start. Crack down on the straw purchasers along with an ad campaign along the lines of click it or ticket. That would go a long way to keeping guns out of the hands of those who shouldn’t have them.
Ending the drug war would go a LOOONG way towards reducing the violence in this country and many others. That’s a fact. Just like it’s a fact that gun violence has been on a decline for decades (AWB or not).
@Doug Mataconis:
Heaven forbid, calling some asshat out on his inflammatory rhetoric for “REVOLUTION!!!!” that other asshat’s WILL take serious would take you away from your far more important posts on how Sarah Palin STILL is beside the point in the GOP.
Really Doug, how is it you get up in the morning, look in the mirror, and convince yourself that somehow, someway, you are going to say something worth while during your day?
@JKB:
You dumbsh!t mf’er… GUN violence is the ONLY violence forbidden by LAW to research. Get yer head outa yer ass.
I think gun control advocates should spend some serious time studying the temperance movement. If you want a model for successful political action to ban something, then that is it.
Their current strategy doesn’t make much sense to me. Blaming the NRA for failures and for the lack of progress on gun control is isn’t going to go anywhere without building the necessary political support. And the gun control movement doesn’t seem interested in really building its political base for the most part.
The hope that national attitudes would fundamentally change in response to the recent tragedies and enable substantial gun control legislation was, and remains, a false hope. It seems unlikely the gun control movement will even achieve success on the low-hanging fruit. Instead of yet again whining about the NRA, the gun control movement should put on its big boy pants and do the long, hard, tedious work of building and inclusive movement
You got a reference for that?
But really, you are telling me that it is prohibited by law to research gun violence? Even using private funds? Outside of federally funded facilities? It is at misdemeanor or a felony? Couldn’t the Justice Department have not run a gun violence research operation like they did when they ran guns to Mexican drug cartels?
And…you lose, immediately, with your invocation of the Gestapo.
Doug, here’s a hint: duly licensed public officials carrying out their official duties as mandated by the laws enacted by the duly elected legislature in a representative democracy are not the Gestapo. They are not even like the Gestapo. They bear no resemblance, in any way, to the secret police of a fascist dictatorship.
You should be ashamed of yourself. Alas, you’re not bright enough to be.
This is also why we don’t have any laws against child pornography. If Joe and Dan decide over the fence to exchange some child porn for cash, how is any government entity ever going to be able to regulate that? Outside of some Gestapo-like inspection force that invades the home of every person who has a computer, how exactly could we prevent things like that from happening? It’s for that reason that we’ve never tried to ban child pornography and we never will.
@Doug Mataconis:
Doug, if you wanted your readers to address that point, YOU SHOULD HAVE PUT IT IN YOUR ORIGINAL POST.
YOU are the one who acknowledged the NRA engages in fearmongering as a fundraising tactic. And look what agreeing with you got me: A scolding about “both sides.”
To hell with you.
@Rafer Janders:
Perhaps Doug use of Gestapo was emphatic but the point remains. One shouldn’t have to surrender their 4th amendment rights
in order to enjoy their 2nd amendment rights.
As such, the imposition by the government of their inspectors upon those who choose to lawfully exercise their right to keep and bear arms is not tolerable. I would presume to make the argument that such imposition would be deemed to be an intolerable requirement as to exercise one right means surrendering another right.
With all due respect, bloggers that are higher on the food chain than the OTB gang found time to comment on this. Lame excuse.
@Doug Mataconis: Godammit, Doug, the last Republican VP candidate just said that sh*t.
You call him an outlier?
The point is not legislation this year. The point is the slow and steady stigmatization of gun ownership, and in the meantime completing the picture of the GOP as an extremist bunch of old, southern white men.
Republicans think they’re safe in their little gerrymandered districts. They are, for now. But if we can make more and more people see that the GOP is a regional southern party, that it is backward, sexist, racist and homophobic, as well as being blindly stupid, we cut off all avenues for growth in the GOP. They won’t get near the White House, won’t take the Senate and will eventually die off even in the House.
Every time some ancient white hee-haw geezer stands up in Congress and talks about mah guns, and how the gubmint is out to git me, we cement the Democratic hold on youth, women, minorities and sane people.
@JKB:
I know, it’s, uh, crazy, isn’t it? The more people understand about mental health, the more liberal they become.
@ JKB
Have you ever been around a paranoid schizophrenic who has been smoking meth? Are you seriously saying we need to fight for their rights to have a gun?
Funny that. Well, not really. Mental health gigs don’t pay that well, there is an element of compassion and wanting a better society that goes into that kind of work. Kind of leaves the right out.
Despite some of his writing, Doug is not a child. He is, in fact, a licensed attorney. And yet he doesn’t seem to know how the law works. When possession of a dangerous object or substance, such as for example grenades, bazookas, meth, whatever, is banned, the police don’t go door to door searching every home to make sure that no one has that item. Rather, the legislature passes a law banning possession, and that’s it. We rely on most people to obey the law, though we recognize that some won’t. If the police catch someone with that item, that person’s in trouble, and the example of them going to jail persuades some of the slackers to comply.
Similarly, if a law was passed banning possession of home arsenals, the Gesta..excuse me, the police, would not have to go door to door. We’d simply pass the law. Most would comply, some wouldn’t. Some of those who wouldn’t would eventually be caught. We’ll never have perfect compliance, but we don’t expect to, and we don’t let the fact that not everyone will comply with a law be the reason that we don’t pass laws in the first place.
I can’t be bothered now, but I am willing to bet that if I searched the archives, I would find a post by Doug saying, “Those Obama supporters who want a national health insurance law had better not get their hopes up. They will face massive resistance from the health insurance lobby, which has always defeated such efforts in the past. Freedom loving Americans will never submit to such massive government intervention in the relationship between patient, doctor, and insurer”.
let’s see here, that crazy kid in conn. was actually quite brilliant from all accounts- crazy still and should have been institutionalized…
so given that, do you folks really think he could have bean deterred by an absence of guns? read about the “bath” massacre back in the day if you care to….killing people is quite easy if you’re really determined.
why aren’t we up in arms about all the “crazy” people that are allowed to walk amongst us? they should be behind walls, just like criminals. but our “free society” doesn’t permit it it…..another liberal failure.
Let me ‘splain something to you , Doug.
I am a mutant. I have Nail-Patella Syndrome. Sometimes we are okay, sometimes we’re not. I have a 50% chance of passing the gene to my children. There is no guessing how severely they’d be affected.
So, I gave up good early marriage prospects where I knew men would like children because I didn’t think I should pass on the gene. I was extremely careful about contraception.
When I was 36, I met a man whom I adored who had two sons and a vasectomy. After a couple of years, I had my IUD removed, and so was viable to pregnancy.
Ryan comes along and tells me that if I get raped after that IUD was removed that I should bear that child?
Where ya’ll come from?
So I give your ilk about the same regard when it comes to gun control.
We all know what they look like , don’t we?
“Gun Control Proponents” are well aware of the stifling impact of the NRA and the cult of gun ownership in this country. Probably half the Republican base fears that Obama will take action to confiscate their guns.
Well, he is a libertatian…
Oh absolutely! If Lanza’s mother hadn’t possessed those guns, he simply would of rooted around in the silverware drawer and killed over two dozen people with nothing more than a pair of steak knives…
@Tsar Nicholas:
Yes, they’re so air-headed that they earned the wealth that enables them to live some of the best places in America. What the hell is wrong with them?
@al-Ameda: Oh, hell. Plenty of them of air-headed. Don’t say you haven’t met them.
But no good woman (or man) should find a card for Saw, Inc, Specializing in Machine Guns card in a box of gauze.
I wish whoever is writing the script for my life would make it a little more believable, for God’s sake.
@ Janis Gore
All I can figure is that a lot of guys on the right really believe “the bitch wanted/deserved it.”
That’s the only way I can figure it. I think they really despise women.
@anjin-san: They certainly don’t think we should have agency.
Re: the pic up top
Make that pistol pink, and stick it in your ear.
We are natural born citizens, too.
So the plan is to alienate the citizens who join the police, the military, the hunters, those preferring the ability to defend themselves, the gamers, the action movie fans, the rural residents as well as the ghetto residents.
So to achieve this master plan, are you willing to stigmatize movies that involve firearms, especially those that glorify the violence, video games, comic books, stories of American history, stories of military actions and soldier memoirs?
Perhaps you’ll ban rap music, skeet shooting, John Wayne movies. military awards for valor, Medal of Honor citations, cop shows, etc.
Yeah, that’s a good plan.
@JKB: Way we’re going women will need them for self-defense.
Fending off the f**kin’ Republicans.
I’m not saying we need to fight for their rights, I’m saying the Leftist mental health “professionals” do, along with the ACLU and other “civil rights” groups.
The VA Tech killer was able to buy guns because the mental health types were refused to keep the database up to date.
But if you want to deny people firearms for mental health reasons, then we need to have a due process in place to permit that. It exists but it must be used and the results must be kept up to date in the databases, including when individuals rights are restored. Some moron with a psych degree isn’t enough, the matter must be presented to a judge with the person allowed to present a defense. You know, that whole Constitution stuff.
Are you wiling to be stigmatized to have the defensive capability?
That sounds like a position for an arbitrator.
Hard to stigmatize me, hon. I’m still leaning toward a 12-gauge shotgun.
Might blow out the wall, but it will cow the interloper.
Replace the word drugs with guns are many of you are making the same argument you dismiss from drug prohibitionist. Why people can’t see they aren’t keeping ideologically consistent arguments is beyond me. At any rate: two points–1. there are 300 MILLION people in this country with 30K gun deaths. Being killed with a gun is an extremely rare occurrence. Legislation aimed at preventing an unpredictable >1% occurrence is a complete waste of time no matter how good the intention. When I hear people say that no one should die from guns they sound like fools. Virtually no one dies already! And the ones that do a large percentage of them were targeted by people with axes to grind and would have been assaulted with other tools. 2. No one is willing to stand up and that drugs is the reason many people have the intent to kill in this country–either illegal drugs, alcohol, or psychotropic drugs, or drug trafficking. We can save lives tomorrow by simply ending drug prohibition. When is the last time someone got killed over bootleg liquor? This is the most medicated, drug ingesting society on the planet–you think that doesn’t have and effect on people wanting to get a gun and kill people–think again. With people wasting time trying to stigmatize gun owners, why not do with drug abusers and alcoholics what we did with smokers? That’d whittle away a good portion of the homicides and suicides.
@Janis Gore: You don’t think I made that up, do you?
Some sh*t is so appalling you throw it away reflexively.
Not sure exactly what you are saying – can you run it through the babble to English translator?
I go to county mental health commission meetings where I live, and we were talking about record keeping just the other day. Record keeping is indeed a mess, but not because of “leftists.” It is due to programs being badly underfunded, staffs being horribly overworked, and equipment being outdated.
As a society, we have chosen to do deal with this problem adequately. Yet we have money to provide corporate welfare for oil companies.
“I undersand that we have war heroes. What I don’t understand is why we don’t have peace heroes.”
John Lennon
@JKB:
Oh, don’t be an ass. I’m not talking about people who use guns for legitimate reasons, like police, soldiers, etc…
I’m talking about isolating your cult. We just don’t want your illness to spread to a new generation. Like smoking, we need to have younger people understand that private gun ownership is something foolish people did back in the old days before they knew better.
No reason you should object to that, right? Doesn’t directly affect you. You can grow old and die within the cult. Be buried with your arsenal. Just don’t spread your sickness to other people.
@Pharoah Narim:
So, the kids at Newtown were killed in the drug war?
Moron.
I take a relative who is mentally ill to meet with his psychiatrist once a month. He is a professional – not a “professional” – I love your chickenshit implication that these people are not qualified.
What do you do for a living bubba?
Here’s the political reality. Something will be done about guns. It will not be perfect. The usual suspects will cry and threaten. And when they brandish their weapons against our tyrannical government they will quickly discover themselves living in a Radley Balko nightmare.
The militarized police will shoot their dog, bust down their door, take their weapons, and throw them into jail. That’s not “political reality.” That’s just reality.
@ JKB – Let’s look at two of your statements on this thread:
You can’t even be consistent across on thread. What was it John Galt said? Oh yes, “the expedience of the moment”…
There’s no end to my admiration for Radley Balko’s work.
@Janis Gore:
I wish I could say the same. He’s a mixed bag at best. Good on certain things, dreadful on others……you know, like most libertarians.
Balko says:
Which sounds smart….
Until you realize we are the government.
@anjin-san:
The mental health professionals don’t seek to institutionalize or petition the courts. Or update the NICS when someone is deemed a mental health risk. So I’m not sure how one hopes to keep guns away from those adjudicated dangerous.
@Herb: Until you realize we are the government.
Well, if we are the government then our possession of firearms isn’t a problem. In fact, we should have free access to select fire and fully automatic firearms, along with tanks and nuclear weapons.
Oh, that’s right, we are The People, the government is an entity we empowered to run the day to day affairs of state but now it wants to deny use the right to firearms that can be used to stop it from over reaching it’s mandate from The People who created it.
@JKB:
Here’s one way.
Relevant quote:
Oh that terrible nanny state…..
@ JKB
How much experience do you have with the mental health care system? Any real experience, or are you, once again, spouting stuff you get from Google and right wing blogs?
I have a great deal of experience with community mental health. I help take care of a patient. I go to the meetings. I’ve been inside locked down hospitals. Lots of hours at the clinic – waiting rooms, sessions with social workers. 5150s. 5250s. The psych ward. Competency hearings. NAMI.
You?
@JKB:
Look, it’s very amusing to hear people talk like this, as if the world we lived in was a philosophical thought experiment.
Just last week in the town where I live, a guy killed his wife’s family and holed up inside his house. (It even made the national news.) When he shot at the police with his AR-15, they killed him dead, much to the relief of the entire community.
No, 1776 won’t happen again. (Sorry, Alex Jones.) When you shoot at the cops or the FBI or the national guard or whatever government agent busting down your door and shooting your dog, you’re not defending yourself from tyranny. You’re just a common criminal, a danger to society, and when they come to take your guns (or your life) you shouldn’t be surprised if someone says, “Well……what’d you think was gonna happen?”
@Herb: He did save Cory Maye’s life, and he’s doing further work with the Innocence Project.
I’m a journalist, too, and I understand that my work is different from his. But that doesn’t mean that I can’t respect it.
He didn’t do that with a gun. But he is still fighting with ‘The Pen is Mightier Than the Sword”, trying to take down bad medical examiners in MS
I read his story about Steven Hayes in the Clarion Ledger out loud when my brother was in the hospital in Jackson, 2008.
@Janis Gore: On Cory Maye and the Innocence Project, Balko definitely deserves kudos.
But then listen to him complain about texting and driving laws (among other things). Like I said, a mixed bag.
When he’s right, it’s not solely due to his ideological preferences. (After all, one doesn’t need to be a libertarian to think innocent people should not be in prison and that crooked MEs shouldn’t be testifying.) But when he’s wrong….it’s almost always because he hews too closely to libertarian nonsense.
It’s a common problem among the libertarian set and why I consider them to be mostly useless.
And why I’ve been an independent since 1976!
http://youtu.be/a-7XWhyvIpE
Good band , don’t you think?
@Janis Gore: I agree. It’s the only way to be.
Pretty cool. My country.
So, do the youngsters even know it exists? Our world, I mean, Herb.
My capture is that the youngsters are pretty goddamned stupid.
No offense.
@Doug Mataconis:
Doug,
I guess you forgot that to progressives, what any conservative says applies to all conservative but what any progressive says does not matter and is never applied to any other conservative.
I wonder if all of the people saying that they want tougher gun laws but do not want to ban guns are willing to point to their posts saying that the District of Columbia was wrong in the Heller decision when DC claimed that individuals have no right to own firearms and that it was legal for a city or state to ban all handguns?
Let’s pick this out , SD. What is your point?
I can’t find it out of that mess. Try again.
@Janis Gore: For once, SD was pretty clear.
1) Liberals tend to pick the most inflammatory statements from a conservative and ascribe it to all conservatives, while refusing to apply the same standard to inflammatory liberals.
2) The people who are calling for “common-sense” gun control laws were noticeably silent during the Heller case, which involved DC not “regulating” guns, but banning them outright. Very few advocates of “common-sense” gun measures spoke up and said DC had gone too far with its outright ban.
That help any?
@Janis Gore:
Depends, I guess. I’d say stupidity is pretty well represented in all age groups. I’ve actually observed several people in my own life get stupider as they aged. It’s not pleasant.
@Jenos Idanian #13: Thanks, Indy. I’m glad you speak Racist and are willing to interpret.
As to the substance of your comment……oh, there was substance?
Could be wrong.
I’m just not that interested in guns.
What do you think about this machete?
I really don’t care much for contact sports, either.
I like yoga.
Born in Baylor Hospital in Dallas, TX, in 1957.
If I don’t stay out of Rushing’s Boots in Ferriday, LA, I’m going broke. It smells like a shoe repair shop. Which it is.
I’ll be Jerry Lee Lewis’ 12th wife.
Nobody has a sense of humor anymore. Probably hard when you can’t find a job.
Good morning. Try Community Dark Roast in the coffee pot today. i don’t do $7 coffee.
@Herb:
How is it racist to point out that the District of Columbia was found to have been violating the constitutional rights of its citizens and that almost all progressives agreed with the District of Columbia?
Where were the progressives when the District of Columbia that no one has a right to own any firearm and that the Second Amendment means that the District of Columbia is allowed to have National Guard units?
You want sugar in that coffee, SD?
Damn, you’re boring, but nobody needs to do without coffee.
And i suspect you all pretty stupid still.
I need a job y’all. Otherwise I’ll have time on my hands, and you know what that means.
@superdestroyer:
You misunderstand. I’m not saying your comment was racist…..
I dunno. Ask a “progressive.”
@Janis Gore: (You alright over there?)
Barely, hon.
I will be okay. It takes some time.
Listening to these wise asses does me no good.
But the puddles outside have dried up. It’s not likely that I’ll go to pick a radish and drown in my own yard.
Tomorrow would be my 19th anniversary.
Pretty condescending headline and post. While I don’t speak for all proponents of some form of gun control, I think the vast majority of us are plenty aware of the political realities of this fight.
That doesn’t mean we should do nothing. As we’ve seen upthread, there are plenty on the gun rights side who are a-okay with allowing those with severe mental illness to have military-grade weapons. Float that in a public poll and see how people respond. There are things we can do that wouldn’t impinge on an individual’s right to bear arms.
The problem, of course, is that the NRA and its advocates seem to believe that the Second Amendment, unlike any other, should be free from restrictions. What the government needs to do is present a compelling interest in enacting restrictions. I think there are plenty of compelling interests, and I do think there are some that could and would meet with the approval of the majority of citizens. This is what scares the NRA.
The freedom of religion doesn’t permit one to engage in human sacrifice, even if it is a core tenant of the religion. The freedom of speech doesn’t permit one to yell fire in a crowded theater. The right to bear arms should have some controls too. Is it in the public’s interest to keep weapons out of the hands of the mentally ill? I’d say yes. Is it in the public’s interest to ensure that private sales of weapons don’t transmit AR-15’s to convicted felons? I’d say yes. Is it in the public’s interest to ensure that those who have weapons in their home secure them? I’d say yes. And so on.
The “we can’t possibly enforce this without Gestapo-like raids” argument is ridiculous and childish. It’s similar to drinking and driving: just because passing a law can’t guarantee that every driver who violates this law will be caught does not mean the laws to prevent it are meaningless.
I am not interested in confiscating anyone’s guns. But I do think that the gun culture in this country is reaching a dangerous tipping point. Jon Stewart had an interesting line the other night when he was discussing this. He said, “technology has democratized carnage.” He’s right. Advances, if you call them that, in the design of these weapons have made them easier to handle and faster to kill. And our laws ensure they are available to just about anyone. There needs to be a balance here. But the NRA doesn’t accept that–they want to expand access as the weapons get easier to handle AND more deadly.
James is so much better than I am.
@Jen: Whoa. So is Jen.
What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, you know.
About these vaccines…
Some men are remarkably stupid, don’t you think?
@Michael Reynolds: Did I say all killings were drug killings? I think I included the mentally ill and drug-fueled rampages in there also. Your selective reading and demagoguery is getting old….clown. You hate guns–don’t buy one–isn’t that the same type argument you make with people that oppose altering Marriage laws? When first starting coming to this blog I used to think your posts made alot of sense—until I saw that you are exactly the same type of person you hate in the conserva-clowns. You just happen to have taken up a different set of postions. Gun ownership is a sickness? Liberalism is a disease? Yup–cut from the same cloth. And moron?–common dude you’re a writer. I expected better — a@@ hat.
@JKB:
Just what exactly do you think you and your sad little firearm are going to do against a squad of Marines? A platoon of Marines? A company of Marines? A tank? An Apache helicopter?
You try to stop the government from overreaching its mandate with your assault rifle, and see how long it takes you to be vaporized inside the crater from a drone missile strike.
@Pharoah Narim:
You know what 100% of gun murders have in common? Guns.
Drug gangs can’t do drive-bys with knives. A crazy person cannot slaughter 20 little children with a baseball bat.
The gun you buy is a threat to everyone else in society. You introduce an instrument of death into society. You have no good reason to do it. It is an anti-social act. It is no different than if you were brewing up vats of Sarin gas in your basement, or growing petri dishes of smallpox.
And in trying to justify the threat you pose to society you throw a lot of dust in the air and talk about all the screwed-up people we may have. Well, guess what: a paranoid schizophrenic with a banana ain’t much trouble. A paranoid schizophrenic with a gun is a disaster.
It’s the guns. It’s just the guns. They are the problem.
@michael reynolds:
What about a pool? I hear those are deadly.
The Tea Party cycle tested the equivalence of stupidity and emotion to reason. That didn’t last too long. The Romney campaign took one step back, and tested whether smart people could win with stupid claims. The final answer was no.
Both strategies demanded that voters accept stupid ideas, at least for a moment.
The problem “gun advocates” face is that their public positions, their positions at the margin, make the same sort of appeal to stupidity. There is no smart argument against magazine restrictions and bullet buttons. So, they try the stupid ones, to see if those will have a following.
Add in swimming pool arguments, etc.
Doug might be right that “they can’t take our guns” is strong, but he might be wrong that stupidity on lesser changes will prevail.
@michael reynolds: No but dealers stab and beat each other to death in a semi-common way. More people are killed with hands than with rifles.. Hell more people are killed with hands than with shotguns too.
But “It’s the guns. It’s just the guns. They are the problem.”…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster
http://www.newstimes.com/local/article/New-Milford-historian-unearths-account-of-984284.php
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/diane-dimond/orange-county-serial-killer_b_1222710.html
@matt:
So your argument rests on examples that are a century and two plus centuries old respectively.
Show me data that says more people are murdered with hands than guns.
@matt:
67% of all homicdes are committed with guns. How do you get a majority out of the remaining 33%?
@Janis Gore: Let me reassure you that Ryan’s bill is extremely unlikely to pass the House. If it does, it is almost certain to be stopped by the Democratically-controlled Senate. If it somehow does, it will surely be vetoed by Obama. And there is no way in hell it could get 2/3 of the House and Senate to override Obama’s veto.
I’m sorry your ladyparts go into hysterics when a conservative puts forth a bill that you don’t like, but you really don’t have to worry about this one.
@JKB
Still waiting to hear about your mental health bona fides. Or is is just “this is what Rush says?
@michael reynolds:
Um, Michael, they held the guns in their hands. THEIR HANDS, MICHAEL!
Guns don’t kill people. Hands kill people.
@michael reynolds: 60% of murders are committed with the usage of guns.
You know for a writer you seem to lack reading comprehension. No one claimed more people are murdered with hands than with guns.
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-2011/tables/table-20
@Rafer Janders: Reading comprehension.. How does it work?
Micheal claimed that guns are the one and only problem when it comes to murder.
So I provide proof that Micheal is full of shit and all you can do is make a weak attempt at heckling.
@matt:
And yet earlier you wrote:
I see what you did there. “I didn’t say guns. I said rifles. Learn to read,” said the Weasel.
@Jenos Idanian #13:
It’s good to see that Representative Ryan has such a high regard for a woman’s ability to make her own reproductive health care choices.
@al-Ameda: Almost as relevant as Obama’s regard for fetuses that are inconsiderate enough to survive an attempted abortion, huh?
If anyone hasn’t figured it out, matt was in all likelihood talking about “handguns” when he typed “hands,” and those people interested in a “serious discussion” about “common-sense solutions” fixated on an obvious slip of the fingers instead of actually addressing the point.
And if I may continue matt’s likely point: far more people were murdered with handguns last year in Chicago alone than were killed with “assault rifles” in Newtown, Connecticut. Why is it that these “serious” people above are more concerned with white suburban children than inner-city blacks?
@Jenos Idanian #13:
as your linked article points out:
@Herb: Uh the whole discussion involving me has always been about rifles. I’ve commented many times over how handguns are the popular tool for murder not my hunting rifle. So I guess how dare I continue with that line of reasoning when confronting someone that claims there’s absolutely no reason for guns to exist?
@Jenos Idanian #13: No I was literately talking about hands as shown in the FBI reports on crime in the USA. Micheal himself has stated over and over that I have no reason to own and operate a rifle. John Persona and others have had long conversations with me in other threads about banning semi-auto rifles or just “assault weapon’ rifles. I’m not really interested in picking up the defense for handguns as I don’t actively use one to hunt and mine is solely for defense. I leave the defense of handguns to those that hunt with them as I’m not particular familiar with the intricacies of hunting with a handgun.
Handguns are predominately used in murder because they are small and thus easily concealable. So when you go to cap the dude that ripped you off you can easily carry it hidden on your body when en route..
The love ghetto folks are suddenly getting from the GOP is something to behold…
Keep treating us to the penetrating bursts of insight…
@matt:
I apologize if I didn’t get that “hands” meant “handguns.” We all have the one, we don’t all have the other.
But I still don’t see the point. Handguns or rifles or shotguns, who cares? You shouldn’t own any of them.
Here’s what we know: Just about 70% of all homicides are with guns. There’s a reason for that: guns are really good at killing people. In fact, that’s why our soldiers carry guns. Because of the whole ease of killing.
I’m sure you’ll agree that 100% of gun homicides are committed with guns. Right?
So the question is, if we had fewer guns would we have fewer homicides? The evidence of every single civilized first world nation is yes. We have the most guns by far. And we have the most murders by far. Why? Because as I pointed out above: guns are really useful for killing people.
We will always have crazy people. Until they find some magic pill, we will have mentally unstable folks. What we have to do is not let them have guns. I assume you agree with that. No guns for crazy people, right? No guns for criminals. Right?
Here’s how crazy people get guns: They buy them because the NRA has stymied efforts to do real background checks. So, right now, make no mistake, a paranoid schizophrenic can buy a gun and ammo and an extended clip. And that’s the case because the gun cult wants that to be the case. The gun cult resists any effort to stop that.
Also, criminals can get guns. How? By going to a gun show or buying them privately. And why can they do that? NRA, that’s why.
Both crazy people and criminals also get guns by stealing them. From you. Or they use a relative’s gun — like in Newtown.
Have I said anything so far with which you disagree? Any errors in the above? No?
Okay, then Step One is obviously to keep crazy people and criminals from getting guns. Which means defeating the NRA which wants criminals and crazy people to have guns. So, are you ready to work with Democrats to close the gun show loophole and the private sale loophole and demand background checks on all gun purchases?
If yes, we can go on to discussing the next step. If no, then you have no interest in solving the problem and ar simply a cultist.
I’ve been shooting for longer than a lot of the NRA cheerleaders have been alive.
Hell yes.
@anjin-san:
And as we know you have some experience with people close to you having a mental illness. This seems like the very minimum we should all agree on. And the truth is I think most gun owners do agree with this. No sane person wants a felon or a mentally disturbed individual in possession of firearms.
@michael reynolds: Let me know once you get around to actually reading what I typed out.
Then we can talk about your complete ignorance of the law, statistics and of the geography of the USA.
Well, judging from the down vote, it seems like someone does…
@anjin-san: Well the law of averages dictates that there will be some lesser then stellar individuals out there.
Nuance also causes issues because of how we as a society deal with mental health issues. Getting on a list seems to be way easier then actually getting off the list in this country. See the no flight list for example.
@ matt
Experience has taught me that allowing the perfect to be the enemy of the good is a losing proposition. I reject the proposition that we simply need to give on on the idea of keeping guns away from people who are psychotic because it is hard.
The right loves to talk about American exceptionalism. Being great involves rolling up your sleeves and doing the actual hard work. It’s not accomplished by slapping a USA #1 sticker on the SUV.
@matt:
In other words, no, you won’t support even the most obvious and rational of measures.
@anjin-san: Indeed I’m only cautioning that we should be careful about such activities is all. That being said a version of NICS for mental health patients seems to me to be a reasonable course of action.
@michael reynolds: We could have a lovely conversation if only you could be bothered to actually read what I type. Unfortunately you seem intent on fighting a characterization of me instead of actually reading and responding to my comments. You have made repeated factual errors in your statements about guns and me. You don’t seem to care though which is why I believe you’re not interested in an actual dialogue.
In case you have decided to have a real conversation with me I’m going to provide a link to give you a clue about how wrong you are about current gun control law.
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/nics
Here’s a bonus link to help you understand what the Brady bill and other laws require.
http://www.atf.gov/firearms/faq/brady-law.html#comply-brady-law
I clearly meant hands as shown in the FBI statistics.
That statement clearly shows that you have no real rural or farm life experiences. I’ve shared many personal stories with you and everyone else. In those stories I explained how having a gun either saved my life or my livelihood. Most of this country is wild and animals don’t care about your laws.
Wow interesting the percentage of homicides involving a gun increases every post you make. The FBI statistics clearly shows a 60-63% involve guns (depending on if you include non states). Did you also notice that the majority of victims were friends or acquaintances with their murderer? You know why? Because a lot of murders involve illegal activity of some sort. Another large source of murder is spouses killing each other. So assuming you don’t own a gun and neither does your wife your chances of being murdered with a gun are lower then getting hit by lightening.
Your question has been addressed by a Harvard study here.
http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/jlpp/Vol30_No2_KatesMauseronline.pdf
A further reading of the decline in violence in this country. Interesting tid bits galore in this article.
http://ordinary-gentlemen.com/blog/2013/01/great-fact-little-fact/
According to the FBI crime database hands are damned useful for killing people too..
NICS.. Expand it to include mental health patients with the appropriate safeguards. Part of my multistage plan that I’ve posted many times.
That’s as mythical as the story that the NRA stymied the banning of AP rounds. Do look up the story on that one sometime because you’ll find it quite interesting. Long story short. The NRA opposed the original bill because it was written so vaguely and poorly that it would of banned regular ammo including hunting ammo. The NRA then assisted in writing the bill that was then passed.
You probably mean magazine and not clip.
Yes and no. A NICS check is required if a dealer sells a gun to a non licensed person at a gun show. Now private sellers can buy a table at a gun show and sell their stuff too and they aren’t required to do a NICS check. Just like I’m not required to do a NICS when selling my gun to my friend. I’ve stated before that I’d like to streamline the NICS paperwork and to expand it’s capability so that private sales can be included. AS it is right now it’s nearly impossible to force NICS checks on private deals. Just for the record if someone can’t pass a NICS then it’s still illegal to sell the gun to them as a private seller. Interesting fact is that most murder weapons aren’t actually bought at gun shows. They are usually stolen and bought off the street from the local drug dealer or gangbanger.
No they don’t. My guns have never been stolen or used in an illegal manner. I secure my weapons and I do so in a manner much better then oh say the police.
http://theadvocate.com/news/police/4899663-123/arrests-in-stolen-guns-from
Or say a shooting range
http://www2.nbc4i.com/news/2012/feb/09/4/number-guns-stolen-shooting-range-jumps-97-ar-927618/
There are already very serious laws covering the straw purchasers. This is touching on the problem that I’ve covered in the past about not fully enforcing the laws already on our books. Straw purchasers when caught usually get a slap on the wrist and are let free. I believe a click it or ticket style campaign would do a world of wonder for slowing down that illegal activity.
You really channeled the crazy and certainly built an impressive straw-man in this paragraph.
I’ll go one step further and link the exact thing I said in the last 4 threads on this subject.
We need a public option with strong treatment options for mentally ill people (especially for the poor).
We as a society need to stop glorifying violence and insisting on using it to solve our problems (Iraq the drumbeat for war with Iran etc).
We need to stop glorifying everything military even when clearly we shouldn’t be.
We need to close any NICS related loopholes and provide for a free easy way for private sales to involve a NICS. That will fix the gun show loopholes that do exist.
We need for some tightening in CCW requirements with training and background checks as a minimum requirement.
We need to stop militarizing the police and focus on community outreach. Removing the stigma of snitching will increase the chances of discovering a shooting plot before it happens.
We need to look at our culture and ourselves in an honest light.
We should consider a national FOID card like system with required training classes. I’m worried about this bit because we cannot even get a national ID passed. There’s also the problem that such a requirement will become a manner for the government to restrict ownership solely by passing ever ridiculous fees. There’s also the unintended consequences of such a precedent
@anjin-san: Is that how you rationalize your total lack of concern for inner-city denizens? ‘Cuz that’s what it sounds like…
@Jenos Idanian #13: I think women should have unlimited access to big guns for jackasses just like you.
@Janis Gore: So, you’re sexist, too? Or is that just another symptom of your hysteria?
I got no problems with women with guns. Hell, I like it. And I’m curious just what offense I have committed that would merit me being killed, or threatened with death.
Between your hysteria and violent tendencies, I find myself hoping you don’t have any guns. That kind of mental instability is just what led to the Newtown shooting.
Wouldn’t be anything like the Newtown shooting. Those were helpless children.
You’re a grown man with an offensive mouth.
Who says I’d hurt you anyway? I’d just like to watch you run.
@Janis Gore: Yup, I got an offensive mouth. So shooting me is an option?
Nice to see that you hold the 1st Amendment in the same contempt as the 2nd Amendment. Tell us, are there any parts of the Bill of Rights you actually respect?
I suspect your hysteria over abortion makes you at least partial to the 3rd Amendment…
You’re free to express your opinion. And I’m free to call you a low bumbitch in return.
Why so sensitive little guy?
@Janis Gore: I’ve been called worse things by better people than you. And only your veiled threats of violence were worth noting.
That, of course, and your rank hysteria about your ladyparts’ inalienable rights. Your threat to me was far more plausible than Ryan’s bill becoming law, and I only noted that threat as a point of argument.
The insufferable vanity of man.
@JKB:
So you think that the nuts who buys guns because, say Obama was elected president, are equivalent to, “the police, the military, the hunters”?
Michael Reynolds: Indeed I share your concern for reducing violence no matter how rare. Heck, I long for the days a good ole fashioned @ss-whipping settled beefs. Right or wrong, both sided lived to see another day. What’s Im not interested in is what happens most of the time there is a problem to solve: People say, “Lets pass a law!” The law gets passes (which mirrors other laws already on the books) and people go away feeling good about themselves and the fundamentals that caused the problem in the first place is never addressed–guaranteeing that whatever it was we want to prevent will continue occurring.
I won’t say there is no legal prescription here but I will say there is a limited one–for the simple fact that laws require enforcement infrastructure and resources– and because these “assault weapons” are nothing more (in terms of capability) than ugly semi-auto hunting rifles. No one engaged in military operations would use these things… which is why you never find them on the battlefield in places that rebels are fighting against gov’t forces. You’d get torn to shreds by men using real assault weapons. There are some things we can do to improve gun safety and lethality technologically but it would be a a long term project to socialize those modifications.
Has anyone asked themselves why there is a problem with enforcing the laws already on the books? We couldn’t execute a gun ban in this country anymore than we can execute a drug ban. If you want a sneak peak at how aggressive gun regulation would turn out, check out the ridiculous cat and mouse that takes place between the FDA and supplement makers.
Instead of a direct assault against the problem we need an indirect assault that in the long term would yield results. Some fires you make worse if you pour water on them–to put them out you simply starve them of other fuel sources. Along the way we can limit magazine capacity, have universal background checks and police the gun show exception. Bottom line is we need to get people working again, we need to get people access to mental-health care, drug rehabilitation, and we need to study the effects of anti depressants and take action on the results. We took lead out of the environment and people started getting along better–what else is still out there in the environment causing similar effects on human behavior? We don’t know because not many well-funded scientists are looking at it.
If I were king for a day, I would restrict ownership of semi-automatic weapons to anyone who has served in the military either active duty, reserve, or guard. Everyone else can get by with revolvers, bolt, or lever actions. Want more? Join the guard or reserves for a term. One enlistment or appointment would give you lifetime rights. I believe that would would comply with the Constitution as well as limit the pool of ownership to a population more likely to have mental health care, drug treatment, and domestic violence resolution, as well as a population that knows the reality of weapons and not the fantasy marketed about them.
BTW–a schizoid with a knife would kill you dead unless you are trained to defeat a knife attacker (and even then you’d need a bit of luck). Knife wielders can be lethal after about 1 hour of google searching. A cut or stab in any one of 10 or so places on the body will kill you if you don’t get help within 3-5 min.
Take a look at the KagroX Twitter feed for a realistic look at how “legitimate, responsible” gun owners are actually handling their business. A sampling:
There are dozens, if not hundreds, of such examples in that Twitter feed. This is how many of the “legit” gun owners actually “protect the family”, secure weapons,defend themselves, and hunt . These are the folks who we should trust,according to the gun cultists, not only to have semi-automatic weapons, but to carry them into public places after three hours of “training”.
Please free up my comment, moderators.
@ Jenos
Well, my plan is to make it easier for them to get health care, go to school, and have halfway decent housing.
Yours apparently is to give them more guns.
@anjin-san: They don’t have guns right now. After all, there are LAWS against that and everything.
Seriously… that could work. Let them have guns legally, knowing that if they don’t obey the laws and act responsibly, they can lose their guns and go to jail.
Isn’t that the same kind of argument used for letting illegal aliens get driver’s licenses?
This sudden sympathy for inner-city minorities by many of the same people who just a few months ago were arguing for laws that tried to restrict the right to vote among those same inner-city groups is so very touching…
Seriously… that could work. Let them have guns legally, knowing that if they don’t obey the laws and act responsibly, they can lose their guns and go to jail.
Yea, your plan is working out very well. Four gun murders in Oakland the day before yesterday.
Let’s extend right wing concern for residents of inner cities a little further. We can lay off a bunch of cops and teachers, give an oil company a multi-billion dollar tax break, and build an aircraft carrier.
@Doug Mataconis: There IS no middle of the road on this issue. “Shall not be infringed” doesn’t leave a whole mess of wiggle room for the gun grabbers.
Free men can be armed, if they feel the need. Serfs cannot.
And since the ones all worried about guns being controlled, are all big government types, should we make mention that the very reason the second amendment was put in place, was and remains protection from government?
Every despot in history was a gun grabber. Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Mao, Pol Pot, Castro, etc… and now Obama.
Ponder; How can Obama stand in support of armed revolutions all over the middle east and yet ask why civilians need to be armed with “Assault Rifles”?
@ Florack
Do you have a count on how many times you said “the Constitution is not a suicide pact” when Bush was wiping his feet on it?
@ Florack
Hmmm. Obama just won a landslide in a free election. He was in office because he won the election prior to that. It’s sort of what the founding fathers intended.
Safe to say that you are ignorant of the meaning of the world “despot” – perhaps you should look it up.
@Eric Florack: “Free men can be armed, if they feel the need. Serfs cannot.”
And here’s the root of the problem: You’ve got a bunch of pathetic losers who have never been able to get ahead in life, burning with resentment and hatred for those who have actually accomplished something, who decide to pretend their life of failure is actually a proof of their “freedom.” And they cling to their guns to prove that they are “free,” that no evil gummint is going to force them to be serfs…. you know, like the people who actually have successful careers and relationships.
I’d pity people like Florack and Jay Tea… but once they’ve decided to make themselves feel like big man by arming themselves, the time for pity is over.
@An Interested Party: This sudden sympathy for inner-city minorities by many of the same people who just a few months ago were arguing for laws that tried to restrict the right to vote among those same inner-city groups is so very touching…
I’d be fascinated to see those proposed laws. Unless, of course, you’re trying to say “we should treat voting at least as seriously as we treat buying Sudafed” laws and asking people to prove they’re who they say they are and legal to vote, in which case you’re (typically) full of crap.
@anjin-san: Yea, your plan is working out very well. Four gun murders in Oakland the day before yesterday.
And I’m sure all those murders were committed with legally-registered guns by members of the NRA, of course.
@anjin-san: And they were all committed with assault weapons, I’m sure.
@ Jenos Idanian Who Has No
Pony TailBrainSo since gun laws don’t work perfectly, or in some instances well or at all, we should just give up on the rule of law – after all, some people ignore the law. So which laws should we, according to your world view, abandon? Rape laws? Well, wait now, the right sometimes does not seem to have a big problem with rape. (she should have fought harder!)
No, since the law is not perfect, since people often ignore it, we should just give up. Then we will have… Somolia! The logical conclusion of GOP politics! Or maybe the Soviet Union – a third world nation with a ton of nukes. There are so many happy places Cantor & Co. may lead us to.
@ Florack
Really? Because guns were invented roughly 1000 years ago, and despots have been around quite a bit longer than that. We have already established that you don’t understand what “despot” means, perhaps you should look “history” up as well.
@Eric Florack:
I agree, the cult of gun ownership in this country is a public health problem, and public health problems maybe handled through the 14th Amendment.
@wr: LOL. You really don’t think much of yourself, do you? Or, the founders, for that matter. I mention the latter since you seem opposed to the foundational concepts they laid out.
@anjin-san: So did Hitler. Chavez. That little Gargoyle in North Korea. I suppose all this matters not to you.
@michael reynolds: You might wanna check the stats before expounding again. The facts don’t mesh with wat you’re selling… big shock though it is.
@ Florack
I had a feeling that one might be too complicated for you to follow.
@stonetools: What’s your point? I’m pretty sure that everyone who posts here are already aware that there are quite a few morons out there.
What do you propose that would of prevented such things?
@stonetools: I’m not sure I get your point.
Are you advocating for mandatory gun safety classes for everyone? If so I would agree with you as guns are not toys and kids should be taught such a thing at an early age. All the kids in my family are taught from a young age that guns are never toys and that’s probably the reason my family has zero accidents in the last 90 years (stuff kind of gets fuzzy past then family wise).
or are you trying to point out that there are morons out there? Well I don’t know what you would do about that but I think Darwinism might be your friend on that matter. Micheal certainly seems to support the notion of fewer potential gun owners.
For the first link you provided I believe the person that shot the boy should be arrested and charged with at least negligent discharge of a firearm or whatever is the equivalent in that area if not outright child neglect related charges. If the adult is the parent I definitely believe social workers should be investigating the kid’s environment at home. There’s plenty of laws outlawing what that adult did and he should pay the price for his blatant disregard for safety.
In reference to your second link it appears that once again an adult was being completely irresponsible. First off the child should of never been capable of accessing a weapon like that. Second off the child should of been taught already that guns are dangerous and should not be touched. I believe the woman should be charged with what are obviously several firearms related violations. Once again this is a story of someone breaking gun control laws and not being charged. This just one example as to why I believe we need to start enforcing our current laws.
In your third link it’s apparent that several laws were already being broken before the “accident” even occurred. A 15 year old boy cannot legally possess a handgun. Had the 15 year old boy been properly instructed in firearm safety this never would of happened. Had the owner of the gun followed firearm safety this would of never happened. Assuming the owner had not secured his gun properly (safe/triggerlock etc) I believe he/she should be charged too. Just for the record the bit at the end about background checks is complete bullshit. As I stated earlier a 15 year old cannot legally possess or purchase a handgun so requiring a background check on private sales would of had no effect here.
Fourth link. It’s readily apparent that the gun owner should be charged in this case. Once again we’re dealing with a case where had the kid been properly instructed in firearm safety tragedy would of been averted. Certainly the owner of the gun needs some instructing and I believe being charged for their crime would be a good start.
Your fifth link is why I choose my hunting companions very carefully. It’s always been an inner fear that I might get accidentally shot. My extended family as a whole hunts several times a year without incident. In this case the shooter should be brought up on criminal charges. I believe the shooter was being excessively negligent and should be held responsible.
You probably should be happy about the “teen” that castrated himself as you won’t have to worry about him spreading the stupid. On that subject I’d like to ask something. Since when is an 18 year old a “teen”? Maybe that’s part of the problem when society doesn’t expect an 18 year old to act like an adult.
Frankly there’s absolutely no excuse for accidentally discharging a firearm while cleaning. It’s blatantly obvious that you’re completely unworthy of owning a firearm when you can’t do a simple safety check when you pick up a weapon. I fully advocate for that person to be charged with negligent discharge of a firearm or whatever is the equivalent in Florida. He was being incredibly irresponsible and should pay the price for it.
@wr: Oh, look, the pathetic moron wr shows up to bayonet the wounded — with his plastic spoon that came with his Happy Meal.
You worthless loser — you are so terrified of your fellow Americans, you can’t trust them with anything. You need the government to protect you from your fellow citizens, who you don’t dare trust with their own guns, their own money, their own choices on health insurance, nothing. Because they might make a choice you don’t approve of, and do something that scares you.
Give me your address. I’ll send you a box of Depends for all the pissing in your pants you must do. And a plastic Spork, so you can feel a little braver when you try to bayonet the “wounded” in these threads where you wait until others smarter than you (which is pretty much everyone, including our hosts’ children) get things going.
@Jenos Idanian #13: Wow. Really touched a nerve there, didn’t I?
Sorry I hurt your feelings. But if your sole goal in life is to be a jerk, people are going to treat you like a jerk. You want a dime’s worth of respect? Act like a human being, not like a poo-flinging monkey.
You’re right about one thing, though — I can’t think of anything much more terrifying than a lonely, bitter, stupid, hateful bigot like you and Florack armed with assault weapons. I saw the news from Aurora, thank you. Although that’s probably more Bit’s speed — I figure when you snap you’e more the Sandy Hook type… anything bigger than a ten year old would scare you too much…
@wr: The one chance you might have to hurt my feelings, chump, is if you said something insightful, and early in a thread. At that point you’d give a smidgen of guilt.
And I’ve said several times — don’t own any guns, don’t want any guns. But unlike you, I don’t demand that everyone else conform to my decision.
And here’s something else that just occurred to me. The Atlanta mother who shot the intruder? She had both children and a gun in the same home! Good god, she was so totally irresponsible! Things would have been SO much better if she hadn’t had a gun in a home where there were also small children…
@Jenos Idanian #13: Nice to see you’re feeling better after your juice and cookies. Next time, be sure not to skip the nap.
@Wr: Since you’re in a solicitous mood, would you care to share the last time you actually said something relevant and new to the topic at hand? The last time you broke your pattern of coming in near the end of a discussion and engaged in pre-juvenile cheap shots?
At my age, the memory starts to go. Especially on trivial matters like you.