I suggest we start with introducing and forcing a vote on taking all the scary looking rifles and magazines that hold more than 10 rounds away from everyone who is tasked with protecting members of Congress, their buildings, POTUS, the VP, the White House, all the places they go, and all federal agencies. They’d surely be fine with that?
Democrats demand 1,000% excise tax on ‘assault weapons,’ high-capacity magazines
More than two dozen House Democrats put forward legislation Friday that would slap “assault weapons” and high-capacity magazines with a 1,000% excise tax, a change that would raise the price of a $500 weapon to $5,000 in a bid to reduce access to guns across the country.
Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., and 24 other House Democrats introduced the legislation Friday. It’s the second time Democrats have put forward the idea.
Beyer and 37 Democrats proposed the same idea last year when Democrats controlled the House, but it never moved.
The text of Beyer’s new bill was not out as of the weekend, and it was unclear if any changes were made from his 2022 version. His bill from last year imposed the tax on any magazine or related device that can accept more than 10 rounds of ammunition.
The same 1,000% tax would be imposed on any “semiautomatic assault weapon,” which last year’s bill defined as a semiautomatic rifle or pistol with a fixed magazine of 10 rounds or more or that have other various features.
Under that rule, a weapon that normally costs $2,000 would force customers to pay more than $20,000, a change Beyer argued last year could help “curb the epidemic of gun violence.“
Would it? Doubtful, but, they know this, and the idea is to make it more difficult for law abiding citizens. If the issue was so bad they would suggest restricting government from having them, as well. I wonder what the statistics say on how many government owned firearms are stolen?
This would be shot down by courts, especially the Supreme Court, but, Democrats do not care. It’s essentially a poll tax on a Constitutional right, meant to price law abiding citizens out of their Right.
I demand that all Democrats go have intercourse with themselves. Why not? Nobody else can stand them.
Democrats are famous for corrupting the process with taxes. This is no more than a redo of their infamous poll taxes that they use to keep blacks from voting once we forced them to give up blacks as slaves. They’re always trying to take away peoples inalienable rights even as they make up rights out of the sky for perverts and weirdos.
but that’s the nature of despotic regimes and there’s nothing more despotic than the Democrat Communist Party of America.
And how many rinos are going to vote yes on it?
It wouldn’t take much of a legal scholar to see that a 1000% tax has no revenue-generating purpose but is clearly an effort to”infringe” on the peoples inalienable rights.
If you need a reference for “infringe” look up the second amendment
no one seems to asks them what happens when we’re all disarmed?
There are more firearms in the US than people. We will never by disarmed.
Once they have total power and control, the ruling ultra-right is more likely to disarm us than President Biden.
Our distinguished host wrote:
Would it be? It doesn’t follow the historical restrictions test in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v Bruen, but it’s not a restriction on ownership; it’s a tax, and Chief Justice John Roberts famously allowed Obysmalcare to stand by calling it a tax.
But it’s interesting in one way: were it to pass, it would be saying that wealthy people with private security could arm their guards with semi-automatic weapons, but we peasants couldn’t, in practice, buy them.
Of course, the vast majority of homicides are committed not with AR-15s and the like, but handguns, many of which were stolen, bought on the black market, or otherwise illegally possessed. The Dems are going after the weapons used in a few highly-publicized mass shootings, many of which had white victims, while in St Louis, where 84 out of 96 homicide victims, and 72 out of 75 identified suspects, so far this year are black, this proposal will do nothing to inhibit the carnage.
We have plenty of available semi-auto assault-style weapons to satisfy our mass shooting needs. We’ll still have ample opportunities to mourn dead kids in schools, dead moms in malls and Walmarts and dead dads at work. It’s highly, highly unlikely that the far-right would ever permit the seizure of assault-style weapons, but it’s been a valuable political point for two decades.
The astute Mr Dana is exactly correct that as big a problem is the easy access to semi-auto handguns by street criminals. For whatever reason, the mass of Americans are more bothered by random mass killings in schools, churches, theaters, workplaces and parks than the nightly gangbang shootings in St. Louis, Kansas City, Houston, Chicago, Louisville, Cincy, Cleveland, Baltimore, Tulsa, Memphis, Dallas, Miami, Indianapolis, Jackson, New Orleans and on and on. It’s possible that it’s exactly because of the randomness of most mass shootings. Most average Americans lack the opportunity to intersect with drug gangs.
How do we keep the cheap (under $300), easily available semi-auto handguns out of the hands of young criminals? Kids walk around cities flaunting their pistols!
I think we should pass a law mandating the death penalty for any violent firearm related crime. (i.e a second person must be the victim, not the mere position of a weapon, and self-defense is a valid legal defense, even against law enforcement, if you can justify it.)
Why limit the death penalty just two firearm related crimes? Are people less dead if they’re stabbed to death?
I think it’s time to reestablish the death penalty for capital crimes and that should include rape. We should also increase the amount of time in prison sentences. If you watch any old police TV shows you’ll see that the penalties meted out by the courts or a lot higher at least 25% higher than they are today.
Even in the states in which capital punishment is an option, and death sentences are not carried out that frequently. Even the Lone Star State, with 196 people on death row, carried out only three executions in 2021, five in 2022, and five so far this year, a rate which will in no way clear out death row. Making capital punishment mandatory “for any violent firearm related crime” will simply pile up more people on death rows across the country, hugely increasing expenses, without any reasonable probability that we’ll actually execute more criminals.
The mayor of St Louis City just signed a bill banning open carry of firearms, since teenage punks were walking around downtown with AR-15s slung over their shoulders and waving Glocks around. The bill DOES not permit confiscation of the firearms, only a $500 fine and community service or jail (for over 18s). State law in MO does not allow police to stop people carrying firearms openly.
The answer is, of course, that the gov’t should encourage “good” and “Patriotic” citizens to openly carry guns to keep the punks in line!!