The NRA thinks you're stupid

[spanone]

By Michael Nutter

(CNN)The National Rifle Association thinks you're stupid.

Realizing the outrage of the American public that someone could take a cheap device known as a "bump stock" and convert a killing machine, an AR-15 rifle, into a weapon of mass destruction on the streets of Las Vegas or Anytown, USA, they've decided to throw us all a big bone. Drum roll please ... the NRA has announced and told their supporters in Congress that it is OK to support "some regulation" of bump stocks!

It is an amazing display of disingenuous and cynical political sleight of hand that, in a week in which America has seen death and maiming delivered rapid-fire in the most deadly mass shooting of Americans in modern history, the NRA grudgingly agrees that some regulation of these devices is OK.

And, you should best believe and know that they will be at the negotiating table with Congress trying to make those regulations as lenient as possible, because that's what they do! Let us not be fooled that this is a breakthrough or a change in behavior on the part of the NRA or its water-carrier, the Republican Party.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/06/opinions/nra-and-gops-bump-stock-ruse-nutter/index.html

[Atticus]

1. Condescending bullshit! They don't even bother hiding their hypocrisy any more. nt

[Laffy Kat]

3. And we'll fall for it hook, line, and sinker.

We ARE stupid.

[GaryCnf]

4. They think we're even more stupid than that.

Did you ever wonder why the NRA supports new "regulations" banning bump stocks instead of new "legislation" banning bump stocks?

Think about the process through which regulations are enacted. Look at how many of the regulations putting even a popular piece of legislation like the Clean Air Act into effect STILL have not been finalized. Once a regulation is drafted, it has to be published as a proposed regulation and have an extended period where written comments can be made. After that, public hearings are held all around the country. The comments then have to be addresses by the promulgating agency either by explaining why they have been rejected or, all too often, by modifying the regulations. If modifications are made, the modifications go through the same process. (I should also mention that, as we are seeing now, every time there is a political change, the agency itself starts over at square one) Then, after a final regulation has issued, the lawsuits begin. It can take twenty years to actually put a regulation into effect.

Will enough people remember Paddock in 20 years to push this through? Who will be submitting the most written comments? Who will attend the hearings?

Using the regulatory process sounds the death knell for any even mildly controversial proposal. The NRA knows it. They won't harm whatever "reputation" they have left in most people's eyes by getting involved in the drafting of regulations because they don't care. They can kick the bump stock can down the road so far that it won't matter what's in it.

Anyone who is truly concerned about bump stocks needs to remember:

LEGISLATION NOT REGULATION.

[Lee-Lee]

5. That's actually not true at all in this case

The decision on what firearms and firearms accessories are legal is based solely on opinions issued by the BATFE tech branch. A manufacturer sends them plans or a prototype and they either respond "this would be legal under the law" or "this would not be level based on X, Y, Z."

There are no hearings, no rulemaking process, none of that. The BATFE tech branch guidance is what the BATFE agents and Federal Prosecutors use to determine what they will arrest and/or prosecute for, because the BATFE tech branch will testify about legality based in those letters.

And they often do go back and change their minds and issue a letter revoking a prior approval letter.

They could do that right now with bump sticks.

[GaryCnf]

7. NRA propaganda

BATFE does not have the authority to arbitrarily declare that bump fire stocks fall under existing regulation/law. The law has to actually cover it and it doesn't.

26 U.S.C. 5845(b) specifically provides that a "machine gun" is a weapon which fires mores than one shot "by A SINGLE function of the trigger." A bump stock is a (non-mechanical) device which facilitates MULTIPLE functions of the trigger. NO regulator, no BATFE tech, and no court can read "single function of the trigger" out of existing law AND THE NRA KNOWS IT.

[Lee-Lee]

8. You are either intentionally dishonest or haven't read the statute you cited.

Read the whole thing:

(b) Machinegun
The term “machinegun” means any weapon which shoots, is designed to shoot, or can be readily restored to shoot, automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger. The term shall also include the frame or receiver of any such weapon, any part designed and intended solely and exclusively, or combination of parts designed and intended, for use in converting a weapon into a machinegun, and any combination of parts from which a machinegun can be assembled if such parts are in the possession or under the control of a person.

As a part solely intended for that use they could do it. Look up the infamous case where the BATFE once ruled a shoestring was a machine gun if tied to the charging handle of a rifle and then looped over the trigger. They later changed the ruling to say the shoestring wasn't a machine gun but if a person tied a shoestring to the gun like that it was turning that gun into a legal machine gun- even though the trigger was still operating once for every shot. Under that precedent they could easily rule the same for bump stocks.

[GaryCnf]

9. What do the words "by a single function of the trigger" mean to you?

There is a reason cases are called "infamous." It's because what they hold is BS AND it is why they get reversed.

As for what I am being . . . it's called a lawyer.

[Lee-Lee]

10. It wasn't fully reversed

To this day the ATF ruling is that if you tie a string between the operating rod and the trigger and full it so that the force of the operating rod going forward pulls the trigger it is a machine gun.

That is still a "single function of the trigger" per shot.

It's just using the motion of the operation of the firearm to help pull the trigger faster, the same basic concept that bump stocks operate on.

[GaryCnf]

15. With the shoe string

Once you pull the trigger, the weapon will keep firing more than once without further human intervention, in other words, after a single function of the trigger. If everything worked as planned, you could set the firearm on a bench in a rest, pull the trigger, away and the gun would fire until the magazine emptied.

With a bump stock, once you remove the human pulling the trigger, the gun stops firing.

Seriously, this isn't a close call.

[Lee-Lee]

16. No, your wrong

With the shoestring mod a person has to keep pulling the string to hold tension for it to work.

You couldn't set it on a bench and walk away with it firing. That statement is an absolute lie.

[GaryCnf]

17. Are you seriously

saying that the fact that a shoestring doesn't maintain a constant tension (because it stretches) makes it different in the way it operates than if it were, for example, a piece of machined steel providing the same connection. Are we going to have an argument about whether you would suddenly be wrong (and, conversely, that I would suddenly be correct) if the "shoestring" were made from a material with a greater elasticity rebound?

[Lee-Lee]

18. Here is the actual letter from the BATFE

Note the very clear wording.

The device caused the weapon to fire repeatedly until finger pressure was released from the string

Here is a picture of it:


The string pulled the trigger that then went back forward and as long as the pressure was held on the string the bolt going forward would pull the string and that pulled the trigger.

It required the shooter to maintain tension on the string. Your statement that the shooter could start it and leave the weapon and it would keep firing is an absolute lie.

And it is in concept essentially the same as a bump stock- it uses the movement of the weapon as it fires to allow the trigger to be pulled as rapidly as is mechanically posisble, faster than just a finger, but still only fires one shot per pull of the trigger.

[GaryCnf]

19. You keep saying

That the shoestring helps you pull the trigger faster. The finger doesn't pull the trigger. It maintains tension. In other words it prevents the energy generated by the movement as the bolt is forced back from dissipating before the gun itself fires another shot.

I know you know this. You're practically saying it yourself.

[aikoaiko]

6. On the other hand, this is movement on the NRAs part.

We haven't seen movement like this since the Virginia Tech massacre when the NRA worked with Democrats to help fix Virginia's report on who is prohibited from owning firearms.

I get it. To many folks who want to reduce access to firearms, the NRA response is inadequate.

To them I say remember the massive, organized, well-funded push for gun control in 2012 that was led by President Obama and VP Biden that completely failed. It failed in part because the proposals went too far (AWB) and included things that had nothing to do with the Sandy Hook massacre (universal background checks). It was easy for the NRA to dig in their heels.

There was a chance to mandate secure storage (which was a key issue in the Sandy Hook massacre), but the gun control movement decided they wanted to swing for the fences instead.

[Initech]

11. Yeah - look at who their spokespeople are.

Ted Nugent, Kid Rock, Alex Jones, and Dana Perino. Bunch of winners they are!

[Binkie The Clown]

12. They are absolutely correct. Referring to their membership, that is.

Gun suckers are propelled by fear, so it takes very little to dupe them.

[sarisataka]

13. The feeling is mutual nt

[Skittles]

14. they KNOW their fans are stupid