As the USA Today reports, this is supposedly partly due to the emotional slippage of time, as we move further and further away from actions of Adam Lanza. We can also presuppose that Americans realize that the laws offered (and in some cases, passed) will do little to nothing to stop the perpetrators. And that most of the legislation is aimed at law abiding citizens and their 2nd Amendment rights
Four months after the shooting rampage at Sandy Hook Elementary School, a USA TODAY Poll finds support for a new gun-control law ebbing as prospects for passage on Capitol Hill seem to fade.
Americans are more narrowly divided on the issue than in recent months, and backing for a bill has slipped below 50%, the poll finds. By 49%-45%, those surveyed favor Congress passing a new gun-control law. In an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll in early April, 55% had backed a stricter gun law, which was down from 61% in February.
Meanwhile, Barack Obama and the “independent from Obama” (snicker) group Organizing for Barack Obama Action are still pushing the discredited “90% want it” meme. And, look, I’ve said before that there are a few things I would support, including requirements to expand background checks to private transactions. The problem, though, is that lawmakers are doing what they typically do: overreach, go overboard, and barely touch the root cause(s). Do you want to stop a good chunk of gun violence? Make the punishment harsh. How about corporal punishment and/or requirements to do “hard time” (this could apply to quite a bit of crime, too)? Sure, it won’t stop all gun crime, but it might make some think twice.
But, the liberal push for gun control is not about the criminals, it is about disarming the public at large, regardless of the consequences. See “Chicago” for the end results. They want Everyone Else disarmed (interestingly, liberals generally refuse to give up their own guns, if they have one).
“And, look, I’ve said before that there are a few things I would support, including requirements to expand background checks to private transactions.”
Reasonable people can disagree on this point, but this is how I see it:
(1) ANY backgrounds checks are childish foolishness, since those who wish to unlawfully cause harm to others simply do not submit themselves to background checks before doing so. Background checks merely inconvenience the law-abiding. It follows, then, that background checks are pointless and ALL background checks should be discarded for both reasons of practicality and Constitutionality (. . . the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed).
That does NOT mean that just anybody should be allowed to have a gun. But the law should focus on the wrongdoer, not the law abiding. Catch a “bad guy” with a gun, or catch someone using a gun to commit a crime, sentence him to a long prison term. Murder with a gun can be a capital crime. But the law-abiding citizen who has done no wrong nor intends to do wrong should not be forced to jump through a useless governmental hoop in order to exercise a Constitutional right.
(2) The power to approve a gun transfer is the power to deny a gun transfer. Who is going to do these background checks? Obviously the government. What if the government simply chooses not to fund the office that is responsible for these background checks, or to vastly underfund it? Background checks that are never completed, or are completed only months later, are effectively a prohibition on transfers.
(3) A policy of background checks presumes that there will be one or more classifications of people who are ineligible to receive a firearm. Who defines these classification? Is it just people who have been convicted of violent felonies? Of any felonies, violent or not? Of misdemeanors (and applied ex post facto, as has already been done in domestic cases)? People diagnosed with schizophrenia? People who sought treatment for transient depression after the death of a child/spouse/parent? Soldiers suffering PTSD, however mild? Soldiers who fought to preserve our liberties who, after suffering the horrors of the modern battlefield, sought prophylactic counseling to ensure they didn’t carry home with them the psychological baggage of PTSD?
Or how about just anybody who meets with a doctor who decides to anonymously put them on the “black list” for gun ownership, without the patient even being aware of the assignment?
(4) Background checks result in the creation of ownership information. Do we really trust those who wish to take away our guns enough to place this information in their hands, to use at some future date when they have another momentary majority in government?
Background checks are bad, bad, bad, with no positive offset whatever.
Anyway, just my two cents.
[Sorry for the duplicate post, used the wrong username in the first one. Feel free to delete the post above.]
“And, look, I’ve said before that there are a few things I would support, including requirements to expand background checks to private transactions.â€
Reasonable people can disagree on this point, but this is how I see it:
(1) ANY backgrounds checks are childish foolishness, since those who wish to unlawfully cause harm to others simply do not submit themselves to background checks before doing so. Background checks merely inconvenience the law-abiding. It follows, then, that background checks are pointless and ALL background checks should be discarded for both reasons of practicality and Constitutionality (. . . the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed).
That does NOT mean that just anybody should be allowed to have a gun. But the law should focus on the wrongdoer, not the law abiding. Catch a “bad guy†with a gun, or catch someone using a gun to commit a crime, sentence him to a long prison term. Murder with a gun can be a capital crime. But the law-abiding citizen who has done no wrong nor intends to do wrong should not be forced to jump through a useless governmental hoop in order to exercise a Constitutional right.
(2) The power to approve a gun transfer is the power to deny a gun transfer. Who is going to do these background checks? Obviously the government. What if the government simply chooses not to fund the office that is responsible for these background checks, or to vastly underfund it? Background checks that are never completed, or are completed only months later, are effectively a prohibition on transfers.
(3) A policy of background checks presumes that there will be one or more classifications of people who are ineligible to receive a firearm. Who defines these classification? Is it just people who have been convicted of violent felonies? Of any felonies, violent or not? Of misdemeanors (and applied ex post facto, as has already been done in domestic cases)? People diagnosed with schizophrenia? People who sought treatment for transient depression after the death of a child/spouse/parent? Soldiers suffering PTSD, however mild? Soldiers who fought to preserve our liberties who, after suffering the horrors of the modern battlefield, sought prophylactic counseling to ensure they didn’t carry home with them the psychological baggage of PTSD?
Or how about just anybody who meets with a doctor who decides to anonymously put them on the “black list†for gun ownership, without the patient even being aware of the assignment?
(4) Background checks result in the creation of ownership information. Do we really trust those who wish to take away our guns enough to place this information in their hands, to use at some future date when they have another momentary majority in government?
Background checks are bad, bad, bad, with no positive offset whatever.
Anyway, just my two cents.
While I agree with much of what the multiple personalty poster above me says, ;) , his post does raise some interesting questions.
1) While it may seem that background checks fail to stop people, the fact of the matter is that according to the FBI, over 1 million people over the past 14 years have failed a background check to own a gun. The number one reason? A felony of violent misdemeanor conviction.
No right is absolute. The Founding Fathers understood that. The issue is whether a background check constitutes a great impediment to gun ownership.
For example, the right to vote is sacrosanct in the US, but yet eligible voters still have to prove their eligibility when registering and conservatives have rightly called for ID’s at polls when voting. Are those restrictions limiting the right to vote? If we demand people prove they are eligible to vote, is it wrong to prove people are legally able to own a weapon?
A second example is the First Amendment which states “Congress shall make no law…” yet Congress has made laws preventing the publishing of classified documents. There are SLAPP suits which prevent the publishing of intellectuall property or statements that will harm others. All these have been passed by Congress.
I agree more with Teach on this issue that I don’t have a problem with closing the “gun show loophole” and (and the “and” is critical) punishing those who do lie on applications or have commit a crime with a weapon.
3) I am not sure I am willing to agree that there are classifications in the current law, but I do agree with the proposed bill there would be.
4) The current law on information requires that the background check data be destroyed within 48 hours. Once again, that seems reasonable. However, the proposed law expanded that time frame and that is just one point where the proposed bill jumped the shark (again and again and again.)
“1) While it may seem that background checks fail to stop people, the fact of the matter is that according to the FBI, over 1 million people over the past 14 years have failed a background check to own a gun. The number one reason? A felony of violent misdemeanor conviction.”
And how many of them were prosecuted? Statistically, none.
For all practical purposes Chicago has a perfect “background check” system–EVERYBODY is denied the lawful transfer of a firearm, law abiding and criminal alike.
Yet they have the equivalent of a St. Valentine’s Massacre every week. Background checks don’t work when the bad guys needn’t bother with them.
“3) I am not sure I am willing to agree that there are classifications in the current law, but I do agree with the proposed bill there would be.”
This must simply be a misunderstanding, of course there are classification in the current law. You yourself point out that the current background system kicks out people with a felony record. By definition, “felony record” is a classification of people not lawfully permitted to accept transfer of a firearm.
Finally, I certainly agree that the 1st Amendment is subject to strict scrutiny limitation, as are all our Bill of Rights. That’s a completely separate matter than background checks–which, by the way, are not applied to any other Constitutional rights, nor would they likely be permitted. Need a background check to make a blog post, send a letter to the editor, purchase a bible or practice your religion?
I agree. But the stat on how many were refused still exists. I agree that there should be prosecution on those who lie on applications for background checks. It should be easy to to. When the application comes back, the dealer can verify the answers to make sure the person did not check the wrong box and then turn the application over to the police.
I don’t think there are classifications as you believe them to be. There is either “eligible to have a firearm sold to them” or “not eligible.” That’s it. “Go” / “no go” is not a classification as I think you are using the term any more than “pass” / “fail” is a classification.
I am going to disagree in that there is a background check for eligibility when registering to vote. There are other rights and amendments that allow for verification which is a background check as well.
As I said, I can see closing the small “gun show loophole” and prosecuting people that violate the law more fully than is being done now. However, the bill that was defeated went far beyond that and therefore it needed to go down in defeat.
Agree that background checks would target ONLY law-abiding gun owners.
An acquaintence of mine buys guns from friends of his, and he sells guns. No background checks, ever. He is not someone I would call a law-abiding citizen.
There are many millions of gun transfers like his every year. Those people will continue to deal in anonymous guns. ONLY honest citizens will be targeted by background-check laws — which will not make ANY difference in gun crimes [which have anyway declined by more than 50% in the past three decades].
It is crystal clear thet Obama wants to disarm Americans. But he bit off more than he could chew when he went up against the NRA. Senators care more about being re-elected than they care about what Obama wants.
I think we should make it illegal to break the law. Pretty crazy, huh?
Then we’d need no more gun control measures, and no more immigration laws.
We need to have as strict restrictions to vote as we do for buying a god-given-right firearm.
Teach, from your quote of the news article, I got this sense:
There, fixed it
Well, I think what we get from the polls is a public which thinks “well, we could use some real world, meaningful, fact based legislation which would actually make a difference”, and then the public sees the legislation and goes “WTF? This makes no sense. Did we move Congress to Colorado where pot is now legal?”
I think it is forcibly mandatory that all new congressmembers must smoke meth. That is the only thing I can think explains Rep Ryan’s, Sen McCain’s, Sen Graham’s and Sen Rubio’s actions. They must be smoking something to think amnesty for 15-20 million illegal border invaders will help our staggering economy and high unemployment.
And I KNOW that our Republican reps in the House are smoking something. How else to explain their passage of the anti-liberty, anti-privacy CISPA bill. Or the fact that they have yet to do anything more with Fast & Furious, EPA, DHS, etc, and all the anti-American bills that the Democrats pushed through years ago when they were in charge of the House.
Have we overturned the lightbulb ban?
Have we defunded EPA, DoEnergy, DoEd?
Have we defunded the free phone program?
Or are the Repubs just going to argue and complain and whine?
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[…] The Pirate’s Cove – Support For Gun Control Slips Further […]
[…] The Pirate’s Cove – Support For Gun Control Slips Further […]
[…] The Pirate’s Cove – Support For Gun Control Slips Further […]
[…] The Pirate’s Cove – Support For Gun Control Slips Further […]
[…] The Pirate’s Cove – Support For Gun Control Slips Further […]
Hey, your comment cookies completely forgot me suddenly (in the last week or two). Is that something you’ve changed, Mr. Teach, or is it on my side?
It’s pretty flunking annoying to have to re-type my name and email every time I want to comment on a site that I’ve been visiting for 8 flubbergusting years.
Sorry about the excessive cursing.
I call bullshit. Are you even an American citizen? Where do you live in the United States that you are subject to a background check in order to vote?
I both vote and own/CCW guns in the United States, and I can assure you that the hoops one has to jump through in order to do the latter are vastly greater than the former.
Indeed, in Massachusetts they neither ask for ID when you register to vote NOR when you actually cast your vote.
Some “background check”.
When I acquired my firearm license I had to provide a great deal of personal information (well beyond my current address, which is all that’s required for voter registration), personal references, and fingerprints, all under the pains and penalties of perjury.
Tell me where in the US anyone has to do that to vote.
As for the matter of “classifications”, I was correct in that there was a misunderstanding–in that you don’t know what a classification is.
Having two categories of individuals, one of whom can own firearms and the other of which cannot, IS a classification. Class A: Those who can legally own firearms. Class B: Those who cannot legally own firearms. That is already the current state of the law.
Sheesh. This is not rocket science.
Sorry, should have made clear the above post was directed at gitarcarver.
Incidentally, admitted there are states where firearms transfers are less complex than in MA. Nevertheless, all “background” check transfers require a NICS check.
There is no US jurisdiction that I’m aware of that requires even a NICS check in order to vote. No background check at all.
Yeah, Kevin. It’s a bit off. Mine doesn’t remember whenever I close the page down. It will remember for as long as I have TPC up. Even if I have my browser open, if I close the tab that has TPC, and then reopen TPC – it will forget me.
But then, that’s Teach for ya. Tease.. and then forget. Sigh. He must be planning to head for Congress.
In every state you must prove you are eligible and meet the requirements to vote. It is part of the registration process. In obtaining a firearm, you must demonstrate that you are eligible to be able to purchase a firearm.
Nope.
No, there is no misunderstanding. There is a misunderstanding in your original reply where you said there are or could be multiple classifications based on felony convictions, mental health issues, etc. I said there were not at the this time those types of classifications and that it was a simply “go / no go.” That’s not a classification, but even if it were, is it not the classifications your brought up and that is my point.
Have a good day.
gitcarver,
You certainly are wrong about California. I was not asked anything when I registered, or when I voted. I was asked to sign my name both times, but that was all.
Also, see here:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123068520570944301.html
And here:
http://www.americanthinker.com/video/2012/11/programmer_testifies_about_rigging_elections_with_vote_counting.html
Voting fraud is rampant. Don’t you remember the many news accounts of voters voting for Romney, and having “Obama” appear as their vote? Time after time! And the precincts that showed Obama getting 10 – 15% more votes than the total of all the registered voters? And numerous precincts that showed ZERO votes for Romney, out of many thousands of votes cast?? You couldn’t get a thousand Lutherans to all agree that the Pope is Catholic. 91% of blacks voted for Obama. But not 100%. Do you really believe that NOT ONE VOTE went to Romney in multiple different locations??
Democrats have learned to game the system, and they cheat like mainland Chinese. The Attorney General is owned by the Dem Party. Who is going to prosecute federal voter fraud?
You sound incredibly naive to me.
The only proof needed, for many locales, to get registered, is a request for an application. There are no checks to see if you are registered elsewhere. THere are rarely checks to see if you do indeed live in the district.
SOME… some districts ask for proof such as a copy of an electric bill. But, that has happened to me only in one of the many districts I have registered in. I have not told the prior districts to take me off of their roles.
Only a few places have asked me for an ID. Here in OK, they don’t ask generally. Only time I was asked was when I voted in the early voting last year. I do show them my ID just to make a point. Funny, few elections before, I ended up showing the volunteer ladies how to look up my name in the book and pointed it to them.
[…] The Pirate’s Cove – Support For Gun Control Slips Further […]
Thanks so much for that info Mr. Gumball_burrito. I’m so very happy to hear that it’s not just my problem. I kind of thought, in the back of my mind, that this was some kind of penance for the fact that I dislike big butts (and I cannot lie). Glad to hear it’s not.
FIX THIS, TEACH!
For California:
The new system could shave a week or more from the paper process, according to Dean Logan, the L.A. County Registrar-Recorder. Until now, every would-be voter had to fill out an application, sign it in paper form and mail or deliver it to elections officials before being added to the voter rolls.
The online system will search the Department of Motor Vehicles database for the applicant’s driver’s license and other identifying information and match it to the electronic form. The potential voters can authorize elections officials to use an electronic image of their DMV signature to complete the application.
County elections officials would still need to verify the information, though, and those without driver’s licenses or state identification cards must still register on paper. (emphasis mine.)
I am not saying there is not voter fraud, but the question was asked “what other right requires a check of some sort to be exercised?” One such right is the right to vote. The system is supposed to verify your information when you register to vote. That is the same thing as verifying your information when you purchase a weapon. Is the gun check deeper and more “invasive?” Yes. That doesn’t mean the verification to be eligible to vote doesn’t exist. We are not talking about degrees, we are talking about the existence of the verification of the information.
And just so you know, I am for an id check at polls when voting, but that is not what we are talking about either. We are talking about registering to vote.
Agreed GC.
I personally think a photo-ID should be mandatory to vote.
The left loves to call that requirement a poll-tax and fight tooth and nail against it. They call it an undo burdone. yet, having people pay a background check fee, a registration fee, and an FFL fee (if applicable) are considered by them way to lax when a person wants to exercise their 2nd Amendment rights.
They want to increase the poll-tax on 2nd amendment rights, a right outlined to protect a right that was already god-granted to humans outside of the constitution, yet reduce or eliminate the ID requirements when it comes to voting – a right that only exists because of the Constitution.
.
http://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2013/04/25/violent-crime-rates-in-the-us-continue-to-plummet-far-below-the-gun-free-uk
.
OMG Smokey, scary facts!
We don’t like facts in this country. Hasn’t the unabashed scientific research consensus ON the global climate change taught you anything?
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