Who doesn't support background checks?

[BainsBane]

[Squinch]

1. Snort!

[BainsBane]

12. Sums it up nicely, doesn't it?

[NYC_SKP]

2. I support background checks. And despite this I've been called names on this board.

Gun nut, gunner, gun polisher, etc., by people who really aren't paying attention.

I'm recommending this post.

:kick:

[BainsBane]

4. As to the vast majority of gun owners

[pintobean]

3. Facebook Nooz

[Earth_First]

5. 'Facebook Nooz' is what you make of it...

Personally, I have no issue with fact checking something that doesn't pass the smell test.

Many don't, however that's where I/we come in...

[cherokeeprogressive]

6. Who just stopped beating their wife???

[BainsBane]

7. That's a separate thread

[safeinOhio]

8. Gun owner that favors

registration of all handguns too.

[BainsBane]

11. Good for you!

Make sure you let your elected representatives know.

[neverforget]

9. The NRA's influence far exceeds their actual numbers.

It's amazing that those nuts such as Wayne LaPierre have such influence in our society.

[BainsBane]

10. The problem is the minority has the passion and dedication

We need to make it as much of a priority as they do. We can't throw our hands up in the air and say nothing will change. We need to punish at the ballot box politicians who vote against reasonable gun control. We need to make our voices heard and not give up.

[neverforget]

13. I agree 100%.

Never give up doing the right thing.

[AlbertCat]

17. The problem is the minority has the passion and dedication

and the media that supports and covers them while ignoring everyone else.

[BainsBane]

31. You can't let the media be an excuse for not acting

Those who support gun control need to be as relentless in contacting their representatives and voting against those who oppose gun control as the other side does.

[krispos42]

27. Guns owners feel they have to become politically involved to keep owning guns

People that don't own guns have to do, literally, nothing, to keep not owning guns.

So the people that don't own guns, that don't have to live with the consequences of the passage of these kinds of laws, tend to have very shallow support for the idea. After all, not owning guns, they don't feel their rights are under attack, and they don't feel like a segment of the population is waging some kind of cultural war against them.

The people that own guns, however, bristle at the fact that people that are ignorant of how guns and ammunition work are writing stupid, ineffective laws. Gun owners gather routinely at things like shooting ranges, and at shooting events, and share their misery and disappointment and exasperation with each other.

Non-gun-owners don't gather around and talk about how much better those new guns laws make them feel.

People that own AR-15s get really cranky when lawmakers like Senator Feinstein tells them they can't own AR-15s anymore, but that other kinds of semi-automatic rifles that feed from detachable magazines are perfectly fine.

Or that rifles with protruding pistol grips are evil, evil weapons that must be banned, but take the same rifle, put on a traditional straight grip, and all of a sudden it's fine.

[ManiacJoe]

14. You ask the wrong question.

The concept of background checks is a good one and the vast majority of folks support it.

Various implementations can be good or bad. This is where the objections come in to the picture. Many folks believe "better no law than a bad law".

[BainsBane]

15. Because it is

Keeping guns out of the hands of felons is better than working to make sure felons have access. The rest is all bullshit and smokescreen for people who don't give a damn about anything but guns.

[ManiacJoe]

21. Your first sentence was good.

Things fell apart with the second.

[BainsBane]

16. Besides, whenever I ask a gunner what was wrong

with the Toomey-Manchin background check amendment, he goes on about something not even in it.

[ManiacJoe]

20. You did point that out to him, yes?

[rrneck]

23. Have you figured out how to make it work without registration yet? nt

[NickB79]

18. The only halfway coherent argument I've heard against it

Is that the Supreme Court might declare it an illegal federal attempt to regulate intrastate commerce.

I say pass the bill, wait the 10 seconds it will take the NRA to file suit (you know they or someone like them would), and let the USSC make that decision.

Every gun I've ever purchased was through an FFL, so universal background checks make no difference to me.

[rrneck]

19. Well, wouldja look at that?

[Mr.Bill]

22. Who doesn't support background checks?

People who can't pass them or have to lie to pass them.

[ManiacJoe]

24. Same thing, is not not?

[Mr.Bill]

25. Pretty much.

But you have people who can't pass them even if they lie. Like people with criminal records.

[krispos42]

26. People that don't want their guns registered

Given the example of the NSA, it's not a bad reason, either.

[BainsBane]

28. Which is illegal, and was made double illegal by Toomey-Manchin

[krispos42]

29. Do you trust the government...

...to NOT keep a secret registry?

It might not be as accurate or timely as a formal registry, but I'm pretty sure they'd create one just the same.

Remember, we live in an era where whistleblowers get arrested and tortured, while the crimes they reveal go unpunished.

[BainsBane]

30. They don't keep a secret gun registry

It is specifically prohibited by law. They do keep a list of felons and those adjudicated dangerous. I'm sick of gunners worrying so much more about felons than the people they kill. Everything is tracked, your SS number to everything else. It's time to get over the NRA stoked conspiracy theories that govt is coming after your sacred guns. At some point human life has to matter. What the polling data consistently shows is those who oppose background checks and worry about the black helicopters swooping down are in the minority. I still need to look at your proposal. At long as it keeps guns out of the hands of criminals, that's fine. But why then should you be arguing against it here? I'm sick of people talking out of both sides of their mouths.

In the threads I put up, I encouraged people to call representatives with ANY VERSION of a background check proposal they could support. Dozens made clear the lip service they had been giving to supporting background checks all this time was pure fabrication, a deliberate distortion to justify their relentless disruption on gun issues.

[krispos42]

38. Of course they don't.

Unlike emails and text messages and phone calls, which they will keep forever and troll through at will, they won't do this with firearms-transfer paperwork. Of course not. It's specifically prohibited by law, right?

And after another mass-shooting event, the anti-gun president at the time, and the anti-gun congressional members at the time, won't outlaw certain types of guns without a grandfather clause, and they most certainly won't use the firearms-transfer paperwork to further that cause. It's specifically prohibited by law.

*snort*

And I'm sure that when the next Ed Snowden or Brad Manning come forward, Congress and the DoJ will leap into action and arrest those high-level government employees that violated the law.

It's time to get over the ACLU stoked conspiracy theories that govt is coming after your sacred emails. At some point human life has to matter.

There, now it's a right-wing talking point.






Look, I'm opposed to the government using its power to watch everything people do. I don't know your opinion on the NSA spying scandal, but I assure you that the very same reasons I am upset at the NSA storing all of my emails is the same reason I am upset at the idea of the ATF storing all of my gun data. You can't collect this much data on people and NOT have it abused. It's that simple.

[DanTex]

37. It you oppose background checks because of a "secret registry", the you are part of the 5% most

extremist gun fanatics in America. Which is basically the point of the OP. The gungeon represents a tiny minority fringe, further to the right on gun issues than your average Tea Partier.

[krispos42]

39. So you think that the government won't keep the data?

The same people that store every email, text, and phone call you make... they're not going to store background data illegally?

That there won't be secret administration legal opinions letting them do so?

That there won't be secret federal judiciary legal opinions letting them do so?


You really thing that the surveillance state won't bleed over into the gun-buying background check system, given a chance?


Here's what will happen:

The DoJ or the DHS will keep a secret database of gun owners, shrouded in secrecy thanks to the provisions of the Patriot Act and the secret web of legal opinions that make such surveillance legal.

When they use that database to find information, then will then, to keep the database (among others) secret, use traditional investigative methods to arrive at the same information.

I heard on the Best of the Left podcast just recently, they had a clip from the Thom Hartmann show talking about the DEA's secret special operation surveillance squad. They use illegal methods to track drug trafficking, then back-tracked to make it legitimate.

Exclusive: U.S. directs agents to cover up program used to investigate Americans

By John Shiffman and Kristina Cooke

WASHINGTON | Mon Aug 5, 2013 3:25pm EDT

(Reuters) - A secretive U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration unit is funneling information from intelligence intercepts, wiretaps, informants and a massive database of telephone records to authorities across the nation to help them launch criminal investigations of Americans.

Although these cases rarely involve national security issues, documents reviewed by Reuters show that law enforcement agents have been directed to conceal how such investigations truly begin - not only from defense lawyers but also sometimes from prosecutors and judges.

The undated documents show that federal agents are trained to "recreate" the investigative trail to effectively cover up where the information originated, a practice that some experts say violates a defendant's Constitutional right to a fair trial. If defendants don't know how an investigation began, they cannot know to ask to review potential sources of exculpatory evidence - information that could reveal entrapment, mistakes or biased witnesses.

<snip>

"Remember that the utilization of SOD cannot be revealed or discussed in any investigative function," a document presented to agents reads. The document specifically directs agents to omit the SOD's involvement from investigative reports, affidavits, discussions with prosecutors and courtroom testimony. Agents are instructed to then use "normal investigative techniques to recreate the information provided by SOD."

<more>

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/05/us-dea-sod-idUSBRE97409R20130805

But of course, the ATF won't do this, right?

[rl6214]

40. And how did you make up

Um, come up with that number?

[DanTex]

41. Gee I wonder where we could find some poll data about background checks....

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=background+check+poll

[rl6214]

42. Gee, isn't it your type that normally whines when someone doesn't post a link to where their stats

Came from?

Yeah, normally.

[BainsBane]

45. Tell your friend the bunny man

to quit snooping through my journal. He also needs to learn to take a joke.

[rl6214]

46. Still stalking I see.

Don't you have someone at home you can stalk?

[BainsBane]

47. Look at the name attached to this OP

[rl6214]

48. Look at the name that I replied to

It wasn't yours

[BainsBane]

49. If you don't want to hear from me

Don't enter my threads. I've never once sought you out. The only time I've ever encountered you is when you entered a thread to whine about the fact Democrats on a Democratic site called Democratic Underground have the nerve to support Democratic Party policy on gun control. The world is so unjust.

[rl6214]

50. Yeah, so un Democratic of President Obama to say gun ownership is a private right

So doesn't fit with your agenda.

[BainsBane]

52. Not at all

You haven't even bothered to ask what my so-called agenda is.

[pintobean]

51. Snooping through your journal?

Journals are viewable by anyone - not just members. If you don't want something to be seen, don't put it in there.

[BainsBane]

43. LOL

You aren't very subtle, are you?

[Logical]

53. Oh for fucks sake. Explain how they would even begin to collect them if they wanted to......

300 million guns? Paranoid much?

[krispos42]

54. Sure.

First off, let's set the groundwork, shall we?

I'm told repeatedly that "nobody is coming for your guns", but also that "assault weapons are weapons of war that don't belong on our streets".

Okay, so, presumably, the targeted guns will be "assault weapons", whatever definition is being used.

So, first thing to do is ban sales of new "assault weapons", on a federal level. Again. Theoretically, this would fix the number of "assault weapons" in existence. Of course, considering that the defining characteristics of "assault weapons" are based on combinations of secondary characteristics, but whatever. Let's pretend.


Next thing, is you then create a registry of currently-held "assault weapons". People have a year to register them with the state police or the ATF or whatever.


Then, you ban the transfer of "assault weapons". People that own them, can't sell them to anybody but the police. Nor than they be passed on to friends or family after the owner's death. And because the ban is on the federal level, you can't sell them to an out-of-state buyer.

Now, at this point, you have an effective ban on ownership of "assault weapons" in about 70 years time; when the few remaining "assault weapon" owners are at least 91 years old.


But I predict during that very very long time frame, any or all of the following will happen:

1. The definition of "assault weapon" will be continuously expanded to include all semi-automatic long guns.

2. The definition of "assault weapon" will be expanded to semiautomatic handguns, and possibly revolvers as well.

3. With the banning of "assault weapons", gun makers will create new designs, tactical designs, to fill the gap. These guns, even if they are manual-action (pump action, lever action, bolt action), will incorporate many or all of the same secondary features that define "assault weapon" for semiauto guns, and probably feed from AR-15 and AK-47 magazines as well. So as these guns become more popular, logically, shootings with them will also increase. Eventually, this will lead to expanding the definition of "assault weapon" to magazine-fed long guns of all kinds.

4. After another mass shooting (statistically likely; they've been happening since the repeating firearm was invented), the politician will say "these weapons have to be gotten rid of! We know where they are, so let's get them! Confiscation with compensation!" This will happen regardless of the weapon actually used; it will invariably be initially reported as an AR-15 or AK-47 by breathless news anchors.



This system depends on honest gun owners turning in their guns for reasonable compensation and to avoid going to jail; this would take the bulk of the banned "assault weapons" out of civilian hands, although probably not from the people that need to be disarmed the most.

Next, would be pointed letters from attorneys-general to the owners of the now-banned guns that are delinquent on turning their guns in. This gets a few more percentage points turned in.

Finally, the police conduct a few well-publicized raids on empty houses; they simply use surveillance on a few select homes, wait until the house is empty, and break in and seize the delinquent guns. They nail the search warrant to the door on their way out, make sure they do a big media push on what they're doing, and offer an amnesty turn-in period.

This brings in a few more percentage points of guns.




I find this far more realistic, and based in precedent, than the NRA's "jackbooted thug" vision of mass raids by SWAT teams and shootouts between them and innocent gun owners.

[MineralMan]

32. Only people who sell firearms and people who won't pass a background check.

That's who opposes universal background checks.

[BainsBane]

33. You'll noticed that even licensed gun dealers support them

So evidently only the ones who sell weapons illegally oppose them.

You'll see a lot of gunner excuses about a registry, despite the fact the law already outlaws a gun registry and Toomey-Manchin double outlawed it.

[MineralMan]

34. While a majority of gun dealers support them,

there is a sizable minority that opposes them. Follow the money.

[HereSince1628]

35. Yes, but I do have concerns about what is being checked

and how it is interpreted.

[BainsBane]

36. The only change would be to expand it to private sellers

unlicensed dealers who sell at gun shows and online. Whether it covers personal transfers differs according to different bills. So that would cover those with felonies, restraining orders, or adjudicated a danger to themselves and others. It would not include typical mental health records. That I would oppose for a host of reasons.