"they are quite literally trying to induce an arms race"

[phantom power]

It looks like the gun legislation that Congress is considering is stalling out not just on the assault weapons ban, but on what’s probably an even more important part of the bill, universal background checks. Republicans just aren’t having it, and Harry Reid is considering taking it out of the bill in the hopes that it will pass. Sadly, this was entirely predictable. As I’ve noted before, the rule of thumb is that if a regulation would cut into the profits of the gun industry, their lobbyists and Republicans will resist the regulation. Apparently, a loophole that allows criminals to buy guns from private dealers is just too profitable for gun manufacturers, and they’re going to resist closing the loophole, even if that means the murder rate remains high. As noted at Think Progress, universal background checks are effective, popular, and inexpensive, so quite literally the only thing standing in the way is a lobby that is intent on protecting gun industry profits above all else.

Making sure that criminals can get their hands on guns increases gun industry profits in two major ways. The most obvious is that if criminals are buying their products, gun manufacturers make more money directly. Even if they’re buying them secondhand, that increases demand on manufacturers, since someone has to buy them firsthand to sell them to the secondhand market.

But beyond just that, the gun industry benefits from having a lot of well-armed criminals around, because their presence justifies the purchase of more guns for the non-criminal consumer. Gun marketing is largely fear-based, which is why Wayne LaPierre is always on about how the world is just about to collapse into chaos and you need a mini-arsenal of his industry’s products to protect yourself. They need people to believe that the streets are clogged up with criminals wielding guns, because that’s how they convince you to buy more guns and bigger, more expensive guns. They are quite literally trying to induce an arms race, which is why, inevitably, the answer to every question of personal security is to buy more guns and line the coffers of the gun industry. If guns stopped falling in the hands of criminals and the nightly news didn’t have a relentless flow of gun murders to report on, people might start to believe they’re safe, and they would buy fewer guns.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/03/20/universal-background-checks-threaten-gun-industry-profits-so-they-have-to-go/

[RagAss]

1. What exactly will remain in the bill?

[ChangeUp106]

5. School Safety

Which of course means armed guards. And who first proposed that idea?

[slackmaster]

2. Wharrgarbl

The author has NO CLUE why people buy firearms, and even less of an understanding of the psychology of how people behave when prohibitions are being proposed.

[villager]

3. good article. it is indeed entirely about profit over human lives

n/t

[ProfessionalLeftist]

4. WTF? No assault weapons ban. No universal background checks...

..then why the effin pass anything? What's the point? Seriously.

Why pass a bill the entire objective of which has been stripped from it?

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

6. Why! It's progress!

Oops. Forgot.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

7. To pass a bill.

It's like a score card.

Look! We got one!

Doesn't MATTER if it actually does anything.

[winter is coming]

9. And then they'll say, "We've already handled it. Perhaps we'll re-visit the issue

in 10 or 20 years."

[adieu]

8. Because people judge

the book by the cover and not its content.

[stevenleser]

10. Thanks for this. nt

[BlancheSplanchnik]

11. wonder how many NRA bigwigs have investments in the prison industry.

the gun industry benefits from having a lot of well-armed criminals around, because their presence justifies the purchase of more guns for the non-criminal consumer. Gun marketing is largely fear-based, which is why Wayne LaPierre is always on about how the world is just about to collapse into chaos and you need a mini-arsenal of his industry’s products to protect yourself.

[EC]

12. Makes me believe that the NRA is made up of

wife beaters and small time hoods that are afraid of background checks. What else could I think?

[badtoworse]

13. More like junk yard dogs...

where their civil rights are involved.

[bemildred]

14. Henry Miller:

For the man in the paddock, whose duty it is to sweep up manure, the supreme terror is the possibility of a world without horses.

-- Henry Miller in Tropic of Cancer"

Thus the defense business needs foreign enemies, the health care business needs disease, and the gun business needs criminals and violence.