In debates between anarchists and statists, the burden of proof clearly should rest on those who place their trust in the state. Anarchy’s mayhem is wholly conjectural; the state’s mayhem is undeniably, factually horrendous.
Robert Higgs
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]
It started when I was a small child. I knew I was somehow different from many of the other children I played with. As I grew older, I sensed the difference – while other boys played football or dreamed about their first car, I’d collect my .22 and some ammo and stroll down to the rifle range on our farm to go plinking. When I became a teenager, my Dad’s gift of a .30-06 triggered a familiar tugging sensation. On my 21st birthday, when I received a Colt Trooper for a birthday present, I knew.
Like many millions of similar unfortunate Americans, I suffer from Ballistically Induced Penis Enlargement Syndrome (BIPES). Endowed with small penises (or in some cases, no penis at all) sufferers of this malady feel a psychological imperative to compensate for penis size by the acquisition of firearms.
Unfortunately, in a liberal world that enthusiastically embraces other sexual identity crises, those with BIPES find themselves the butt of ridicule and mockery. None would dare mock a member of the LGBTQ community – in fact, there are special hate speech laws that provide extra protections for this group. Taxpayer monies are spent to surgically correct the physical configurations of women who want to gain a penis, or men who want to discard a penis.
Yet, within this liberal Utopia of sexual identity empathy, victims of BIPES – a group that outnumbers the LGBTQ community manyfold – and even intersects it in some cases – are outcasts. How can liberals be so unfeeling? Why does this bigotry against such a widespread, yet innocuous medical condition prevail? No protections exist for hate speech against gun owners, who ironically have the skills and means to act upon violent threats efficiently and effectively, but patiently endure the threats and epithets. The treatment for BIPES victims is heavily taxed, restricted, and constantly threatened with eradication. And if, by some chance, a gun is used in a crime, the entire community is threatened with extinction. If a lesbian commits a sex crime, is there a liberal outcry to ban dildos?
It’s time for the tide to turn. BIPES sufferers need to embrace our affliction and demand our due. With gender-change operations costing tens of thousands of dollars, and the cost for AIDS treatments spiraling upwards, is it too much to ask for BIPES patients to also receive the treatment we so desperately require? With quarterly to yearly treatments, BIPES can be controlled. Many BIPES patients struggle to find funds for treatment. Some go without. In a nation where every other sexual malady has become a matter of public health concern, with funding available for treatment, the relatively low cost of treating BIPES should not be a concern.
Help treat BIPES, provide us with the treatment we need. Cease the mocking.
End the embarrassment and embrace us in your liberal fold.
A Barrett .50 is worth a year of compensation – please help.
Via email from Mike B. we have a letter from the mayor and city council of Moscow Idaho advocating for a kitchen sink full of gun restrictions including an “assault weapon” ban, magazine restrictions, ballistic fingerprinting, armor piercing ammo ban, explosives ammo ban, recording ammo sales, mandatory safe storage, waiting periods, elimination of private sales, restricting the number of firearms purchased in a given time period, and all guns be sprinkled with fairy dust daily.
It appears the zombie infection broke out far from the front lines. Don’t worry. We know how to handle it.
The fundamental difference between them and us is that we think they are stupid, and they think we are evil. Thinking we are evil justifies, in their minds, all the offenses and abuses they heap on us.
It’s been a good thing that this division existed, though, for a long time. I say that because when we think we have confronted evil, we destroy it.
Phelps
February 4, 2013
Comment to Quote of the day—Sebastian
[He has some very good points.—Joe]
Never underestimate the stupidity or gullibility of people.
I’m not sure if Moan-ami thinks we are gullible or they are just incredibly stupid. But who could believe these two contradictory thoughts in their head at the same time? Let alone say them in consecutive sentences?
Nobody is trying to take away your gun rights. Just military style assault weapons and limiting magazine gun clips.
Those guns and features most subject to attack are those in most need of protection, and are protected, by the Second Amendment.
The anti-gun people keep changing the definition of an “assault weapon”. Is it two or one “evil features”? Does it have 10 or seven round capacity? Does it have to have a pistol grip or just a thumbhole stock?
All you need to know is what the ultimate definition will be. When RebelNOTRacist asked:
Please define for me what you mean by “assault weapon.”
Gail Cornelius candidly responded with:
Anything that is no[t] muzzle loaded.
If Freud were alive today, he just might contend that gun-obsessed guys in America never made it out of the phallic stage. With such a fun plaything, who would want to—right? If you substitute “penis” for “gun” in our national discourse, you’ll understand the gun thing. The right to bear a “gun.” Obama’s not going to take away my “gun.”
…
Gun owners contend that they should have the right to a concealed carry and should be able to stand their ground, in other words, whip it out whenever they feel threatened or whenever they feel like it period. Whip it. Whip it good.
If you’re reading this and you’re filled with indignation, you may just need a high-capacity gun to make up for your shortcomings. In the meantime, I’d recommend some good old fashioned Freudian analysis to move past the phallic stage.
Ann Tinkham
January 23, 2013
Freud and the Right to Bear Arms
H/T to timmytink (@timmytink) who, on January 30, 2013, tweeted:
If you substitute “penis” for “gun” in our national discourse, you’ll understand the gun thing. poplitix.wordpress.com/2013/01/23/fre…
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!
Amazingly enough there is a lot more in her blog post. What isn’t amazing is that my friendly comment congratulating her on becoming QOTD for a Markley’s Law Monday was in moderation for a while then deleted (Reasoned Discoursetm!). Anti-gun people are so predictable. It’s no wonder we have names for their behavior. I’ll bet evidence of Peterson Syndrome would be easy to find too.
She really gets into the gun equals penis thing. I started wondering if it was penis/gun envy or simple deprivation. It doesn’t really matter though. Dr. Joe’s cure for everything should solve her problems.—Joe]
Gun control advocates really do not understand the fire they are playing with, with much of what is being proposed. How many millions of Americans are you prepared to imprison? How many are you prepared to kill? What is the count of ruined lives, broken families, and ruin are you willing to inflict to try to achieve your rainbow farting unicorn utopia where every gun turns into a flower? Widespread disrespect for the law by millions of Americans is not going to bring that about, and in fact, may only serve to create larger unregulated markets, and far more willingness to engage in law breaking people would not be willing to engage in under normal circumstances.
Sebastian
January 28, 2013
Gun Control Requires Our Willing Compliance
[Another way to look at this is that people generally “play by the rules” as long as the rules are reasonable and the other side plays by the rules as well.
If the rules are unreasonable and/or the other side does not play by the rules people get angry and have a strong tendency to ignore the rules. They “play” rough and play to win by any means possible. The new New York State “rules” for gun owners are completely unreasonable. They were pushed through without input from those most affected and are a gross violation of the Second Amendment “rule”.
The other side in this political contest shouldn’t push us so far that we decide to play to win by any means possible. They wouldn’t like us when we get angry.—Joe]
For a long time I never really understood battered person syndrome where someone would stay with, go back to, or find a new partner that also abused them. Why couldn’t they see what everyone else thought was obvious? How could they think that was normal?
I understand better now. Even though I’m not a psychologist I’ve dealt with a number of crazy people in my life and I’m getting pretty good at recognizing “crazy” when I see it and what to do about it. This book helped a bunch: Stop Walking on Eggshells: Taking Your Life Back When Someone You Care About Has Borderline Personality Disorder.
It turns out a close parallel can be drawn between those that tolerate and even seek abuse in their personal relationships and our current relationship with the anti-gun people and our governments.
Read this and look at the parallel:
Since the victim is not at fault and the violence is internally driven by the abuser’s need to control, this self-blame results in feelings of helplessness rather than empowerment. The feeling of being both responsible for and helpless to stop the violence leads in turn to depression and passivity. This learned depression and passivity makes it difficult for the abused partner to marshal the resources and support system needed to leave.
We are told that “gun violence” is our fault. We are abused for something we had nothing to do with. We are told we must change and tolerate yet another abusive act. But no matter how much we concede, no matter how much abuse we put up with they always come back and abuse us more.
It’s driven, as in the battered person syndrome, by the abuser’s need to control. It is not because of anything we have done wrong.
We are dealing with a form of insanity and we tolerate it.
You don’t think so? Let me give some examples (see also this blog post).
The anti-gun people want to outlaw guns that are “small and easily hidden”. They want to outlaw “.50 caliber sniper rifles” that are large and powerful . They want to outlaw guns that are “deadly accurate”. They want to outlaw guns that can be used for “spray shooting from the hip”.
You would think that perhaps a gun that fires an intermediate cartridge and is of medium weight and is not easily hidden would be acceptable to them. Nope. Such a gun, when capable of full auto” was called an “assault rifle” by the Germans during WWII. The anti-gun people, utilizing their talent for twisting words and preying on the ability of the public to be easily confused, banned these type of guns as “assault weapons”.
These intermediate power, intermediate size, with intermediate rates of fire, semi, not fully, auto guns were called “assault weapons” and banned.
So some guns are too big. Some guns are too small. But no guns are “just right”. Some guns are too accurate. Some guns can be wildly “sprayed”. But there are no guns that are “just right”.
That’s crazy talk!
To anti-gun people and the press even a hundred rounds of ammunition found in the trunk of a car or in someone’s home is cause for concern. If the police decide to search someone’s car or home the finding of a few hundred rounds of ammunition will nearly take the breath away from the talking heads in the media. If it was within a few blocks of a school they make sure the implication is that each one of those rounds could, and should, be translated into the intent of the gun owner was to kill at least that many children.
This fascination with the number of rounds of ammo reached the point that in 1994 the U.S. Congress was contemplating requiring an arsenal license for people that had more than 1000 rounds of ammunition. There was talk of something similar again after the Newtown Connecticut shooting.
If I am going to the range for practice it is about 400 rounds per handgun and 100 for a rifle. If I were to go to a regional match I would take at least 1000 per gun. If I were to attend a weekend class the minimum round count is typically about 1500.
1000 rounds and they want to require a special license? I can put 1000 rounds of .22 LR in my coat pockets. Do they want me to license my coat?
And even in the most horrific mass shootings only something on the order of 100 rounds are fired. How could a restriction on owning more that 1000 rounds possibly make any difference?
That’s crazy talk!
Of what benefit is it for guns to be registered? I’ve blogged about this many, times before. It is exceedingly costly and contrary to what you see on T.V. and at the movies it has near zero impact on solving crimes. But still the anti-gun people insist on gun registration.
That’s crazy talk!
If there were a very clear correlation between highly restrictive gun laws and lower violent crime, suicide, and/or accidental injury or death by gunshot then we could have a meaningful discussion about the merits of firearm regulation. But despite over a 100 years of gun regulation in this country there still isn’t any conclusive data any of the gun laws have improved public safety in any of the instances where they have been implemented.
A decent case can even be made there is more violent crime where firearms are banned. Yet in response to a mass shooting in yet another “gun free zone” they demand still more “gun free zones”.
That’s crazy talk!
I’ve blogged about this too. But the more succinct version can be expressed in two sentences.
Background checks to prevent some people from gaining access to firearms is like checking ID to prevent underage drinking and smoking. How long does it take your average high school dropout to find a way to light up while drinking a beer?
Yet even most gun rights activists and gun rights “leaders” don’t object to something that is expensive, time consuming, and open to abuse.
The anti-gun people want to expand a system that clearly doesn’t and can’t possibly work any better than ID checks for underage drinking and smoking.
That’s crazy talk!
Who needs to buy more than one Bible a month? Why do Bible owners get all upset about the minor inconvenience of restricting people to just one Bible a month? It would cut down on trafficking of Bibles from states with lax Bible laws to those with strict Bible laws.
Is that crazy talk? Yup. It’s also crazy talk when you substitute “gun” for “Bible” in that paragraph.
[If you want to claim Bibles aren’t “responsible” for killing people like guns are then substitute “Koran” or “Communist Manifesto” and reevaluate before you engage me in that debate.]
The anti-gun people want waiting periods before someone can take home a newly purchased gun. When asked why, even in the age of nearly instant background checks, they said they wanted a “cooling off period” so people wouldn’t buy a gun when angry or depressed and used it to harm someone else or themselves without having a few days to think about it.
It that were true then why did they insist on waiting periods even for people that already owned dozens of guns?
That’s crazy talk!
It’s not going to get any better if we continue to tolerate this misbehavior. It’s not in the psychology of the individual that batters their partner and it’s not in the history of governments.
We are better than this.
We must do something about this bad relationship. We need to recognize we are enabling it and we need to place the blame where it really belongs. Only then can we have a normal, healthy relationship. But most of all we have to recognize we have made only feeble attempts at “couples counseling” (the courts) when we probably should be trying to “get out of the relationship”.
I submit that every politician, federal or otherwise, who runs on a claim of support for the 2nd Amendment should be faced with the following question:
What gun control laws will you work to repeal first?
I look forward to a day when gun haters are forced to debate the question of how they can reasonably accommodate our demands. If that day does not come, and soon, our defeat is inevitable.
Brennan Bailey
January 31, 2013
From the gun email list at work.
[Only in rare cases can you win a battle or a war if you only defeat the attacks of your enemy. To win you must eventually go on the attack.
When you attack you are better able to chose their weakness which is far superior to defending your own. That is why we made progress on concealed carry for the last 20 years. Their denial of the right of self-defense was their greatest weakness. Prior to this strategy our opponents were close to banning handguns. The names of our opponents reflected this. Examples include National Coalition to Ban Handguns and Handgun Control, Inc. They say, in their own strategy documents, they should delay the attack on handguns in favor of an attack on “assault weapons” because of lack of progress.
“Assault weapons” were a softer target than handguns even though they had more interest in banning handguns. Our attack on their denial of a right to self-defense is a good part of the reason they could not make further progress on the handgun front.
With our success on the concealed carry and self-defense front we were able to make progress in the culture war and in the courts. We now need to find a new weakness to attack while continuing the attack in the courts on their continued denial of the right to self-defense.
At this point I don’t have any clearly winning ideas for a new front to attack. The most plausible would seem to be:
The problem with the suppressor front is that it probably doesn’t motivate the vast majority of gun owners.
The problem with attacking the NICS check is that background checks seem like a great idea on the surface. It’s a “no-brainer” at first and even second thought. This will generate even less support from the majority of gun owners than making suppressors easy to obtain. It will be difficult to convince even strong gun rights activists background checks are pointless.—Joe]
You cannot claim to defend the second amendment while supporting or openly accepting the NFA of ’34 and GCA ’68. Or background checks. It makes absolutely no sense.
Progressive president FDR knew exactly what he was doing. Before 1934 you could buy a Thompson sub machinegun by mail order with no paperwork. Or a BAR. Or an M2, et al. The second amendment said so. It was understood. The convenient ruse was Prohibition. Never let a crisis go to waste. Prohibition naturally led to gang warfare, widespread corruption and a general degradation of society, just as the “War on Drugs” does today. Then, as now, the violence and degradation guaranteed by a profitable, government-enforced monopoly for criminals is used as a tool to intimidate you into accepting infringements on your rights. It isn’t so much a conspiricy as a natural progression for those in power.
You don’t HATE children, do you? Of course not, and so you must give up more of your rights, and your children’s rights. Remember that, Grasshopper; this “for the children’ or “for the good of society” crap demands giving up not just yours but your neighbors’ and your children’s rights – so now who hates children? Who hates your grandchildren? Since you gave up THAT little bit (NFA, GCA, NICCS, et al) you have ceded the enemy’s point. You’ve agreed that restrictions on gun ownership are a legitimate and sensible way of addressing crime. You’ve proven to everyone that, under the right pressures, you’re willing to give up more, and more and more, until you’ve forgotten what the right was in the first place. Which is where we are now. You’re dancing someone else’s dance and you don’t even know it. It works so well that many of us are afraid to articulate the true meaning of the second amendment in public, for fear of being branded as extremists. That cheap, transparent game is as old as the hills, but it’s so effective, over and over again, that many of you reading this are still falling for it. Cowards. Don’t think that your clever rationalizations make you less of a coward. You’re clever cowards.
If we allow ourselves to be suckered by proposals for “mental health” screening for gun purchases, for example, just watch how quickly the number of people being determined to have “mental health” issues starts to climb, and climb, and climb exponentially. Don’t ask later, in bewilderment, (NRA) how it could have come to such a state of affairs. It will. And you will have helped it along (which means you’re crazy, which means you can’t have guns ; )
No, Young Grasshopper; the only way to fix this is to rediscover Original Principles, then articulate them clearly, then stand our ground, and then win it all back. The enemy wins through subtle lies, mind tricks, degradation, intimidation, smear, and outright lies. We are better than this. We win with the truth, and with the courage to stand up for it.
Background checks to prevent some people from gaining access to firearms is like checking ID to prevent underage drinking and smoking.
How long does it take your average high school dropout to find a way to light up while drinking a beer?
I haven’t said much on the Feinstein “assault weapon” ban because at the Federal level I don’t think it has that great of chance at passage. That isn’t the case with “universal background checks”. I therefore have put some effort into addressing the stupidity of background checks.
I am, however, going to give a token effort to the “assault weapon” ban.
Surprisingly the Violence Policy Center is our friend here. This was from September 13, 2004 in response to the expiration of the previous AWB:
…renewal would have done little to stop this flood of assault weapons. Conversely, the end of the ban only makes official what was already known: assault weapons are readily available in America. The only difference is that the arbitrary distinction between pre- and post-ban assault weapons is now gone.
They are admitting that the 1994 AWB made no difference and that the renewal of it would make no difference either. Since then there have been millions of “assault weapons” sold to the general public and tens of millions of magazines for them. So just exactly what do they think the benefit would be to an AWB today? Either they must advocate for something like confiscation or they must concede such a ban will have near zero effect in “stopping the flood”.
@sebastiansnbq @antvq16 @tedcruz They certainly enhance a firearm’s lethality and accuracy, and allows shooters to fire from the hip.
CSGV (@CSGV)
Tweeted on January 30, 2013 in regard to the function of a pistol grip on a rifle.
[Spoken like a complete ignoramus. The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence once again proves they don’t know what they are talking about.
—Joe]
Sadly that elevator doesn’t even get up to the point of cognition where a gun can protect the innocent from harm. You’re conversing with a mollusk.
DirtCrashr
In a January 4, 2010 comment to Tilting at windmills
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]
I couldn’t begin to count the number of times I’ve been told either directly or indirectly by anti-gun activists and politicians that nobody is going to take guns away from U.S. citizens. Frequently if you listen to them for another 30 seconds they will tell you the guns they plan to ban next. When confronted with this discrepancy they will tell you what they really meant was nobody was going to take all the guns away. And there is no slippery slope.
Yeah. That really puts me at ease.
I guess I should ignore little things like this police chief saying Americans can be completely disarmed within a generation.
Or political pundits outlining How to Ban Guns:
If you read the fine print you will find he has zero regard for the Fourth Amendment as well as the Second. Neither are even identified as a speed bump in his grand plan.
The guy is clearly delusional as he apparently expects gun owners will willingly cooperate with the gun registration if they “make it super easy to do.”
And if his grand plan, with him given credit for it, were to be accepted and implementation began it’s unlikely his kids would be shot. I’m pretty certain all his worries would be very short lived. They would be very intense, but short lived.
Joe and I, and several other bloggers, have referred to this photo as an example of how different people can look at the same thing and see something completely different;
You see either a beautiful young woman or an old hag, or maybe both in rapid succession. It depends on your “wiring”. My theory is that most men will key in on the young woman because our brains are wired to notice them, but I have no evidence whatsoever to back it up other than watching other men in their cars or out and about, looking at young women. If the military could devise a system that efficient at locating enemy combatants, we’d never lose a battle. (Yeah; I see you guys zeroing in on all the women – it’s like a magnet drawing in all those iron filings you never knew could possibly be on your floor, or something)
A search for that image brought me to this site, which is great. I now do not remember what exactly it was I wanted to say using the above image as an example, but that first link also links to this site, where I found a great gift. The person who does most or all of the posts demonstrated the concept, and did so with regard to gun rights! This is a VERY beautiful juxtaposition (or something) on the subject, on a site that SPECIALIZES in perception and illusion art. How great is that?
First I found this, posted on January 12, 2013;
“We should all stop being petty about each other, learn to be tolerant, and stop aggressively intruding our ways on others. I think if we all learned to do this, we would find our place under the sun, and these differences wouldn’t even be brought as important.” (emphasis mine)
Excellent (the author sees the beautiful young woman). I couldn’t agree more.
And then I found, written by the same person (Vurdlak) on December 16, 2012 (on page three as of the day this is written)
“I have to say I’m still under shock after reading what happened in Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut (USA). My heart is broken, and I can’t seem to understand how such horrible things are even possible. What is happening with our species?! I also read how pro-firearms lobby suggests that every teacher should be allowed to keep firearms in their class (for protections)?! Are those lunatics for real? What makes you think this wouldn’t cause another incident??! I for one wouldn’t feel safe sending my kids to school where teacher keeps a gun in his desk. All this literally makes my stomach hurt. Owning a gun should be heavily regulated, like rest of the world does it – period.” (emphasis mine, for various reasons I’m sure you understand)
And there’s the old hag, and the author is just about ready to beat the shit out of you if you insist it looks like a young woman if you look at it differently. It don’t think it can get any better than that.
I could go on and on with a thousand or more words, fisking that last quote, but I think this audience already understands it completely.
Anyway, to change the subject entirely; check out those links. WOW! I got lost in there for about an hour before I knew it. Now my eyes hurt a little bit. I love that stuff (you probably should avoid it of you’re epileptic – some of that stuff wanted to make me dizzy).
I now remember noticing sometime in junior high school that, looking at a shadow alone, you have zero information to tell you whether the shadow figure is “facing you” or “facing away from you”, hence the moving silhouette of the woman that can be seen to rotate in either direction. Did I tell you I love that stuff? Speaking of shadows; a few weeks ago my wife had a football game on the tele, and you know they use computers to “paint” the scrimmage line and the first down marker line on the ground for the TV audience, while showing the players above it. Pretty sophisticated programming, I figure. Anyway, the thought hit me at that time that it would be really stinking cool if there was a program that could delete the players’ images entirely, and only show their shadows, so you see a game played by teams of two-dimensional silhouettes painted on the turf, fighting over a two-dimensional “ball”. Yikes! Joe?
The anti-gun people insist “improved background checks” and even “universal background checks” should not be controversial. Let me try to explain why they are both pointless and completely unacceptable to thinking people.
The claimed purpose of background checks is to prevent “people who shouldn’t have guns” from acquiring them. That is a noble objective. It sounds so reasonable and “common sense” that I want to agree without giving it even a seconds thought. It’s an excellent idea! It’s such a great idea we should apply that to some other dangerous things. Let’s have background checks before people can purchase recreational drugs. Far too many people abuse them and destroy their lives and frequently the lives of others. Keeping recreational drugs out of the hands of people that would likely abuse them is just “common sense”. Right?
Oh! That’s right. We have something way beyond background checks in place for most recreational drugs. We have banned them not just from “people that might abuse them” but from everyone. How’s that working out? How long does it take the average high school dropout to find a way around the ban? Yeah, that’s right, Einstein. The average high school dropout can get all the recreational drugs they want within an hour anytime of the day, any day of the week. So just how effective you think a background check would be in reducing the abuse of recreational drugs?
Now apply what you know about the recreational drug issue to firearms. A background check is totally pointless.
Universal background checks can only claim effectiveness if they can be enforced. Prostitution is illegal in most states but if a beautiful woman leaves a $100 bill on my nightstand when she leaves in the morning (yes, stretch your imagination a bit, or a lot, for purposes of illustration) how does the government enforce the “no sex for money” prohibition in this case? It was a “private transaction” between willing parties. Do you think either party has an interest in disclosing the transaction to the police? And even if they do there is a significant obstacle in that it becomes a “he said, she said” problem.
In the absence of gun and/or gun owner registration the case of the “private transaction” between gun owners boils down to the same thing. The government, and perhaps one party to the transaction, can claim no background check was done. As long as the person being prosecuted keeps their mouth shut and the transaction wasn’t recorded it is going to be impossible to prove that a background check wasn’t performed. Remember, in order to get the Brady Act (“instant” background checks for gun transactions) passed the law states that all record of passing background checks must be destroyed. Searching the records of all those authorized to perform background checks would be a violation of Fourth Amendment rights.
Even if a background check is performed it only requires a stolen or fake ID to defeat it. The fake ID doesn’t even have to be for a real person! The check is not against a “white list” of people that are “allowed” to have guns. The check is against a “black list” of people that are disallowed from possessing guns.
If you still advocate for background checks for firearms I can only think of two possibilities:
Now that we have it settled that background checks are completely pointless let’s proceed on to the “unacceptable” demonstrations.
Unacceptable demonstration number 1:
Background checks cost money and time. The FBI portion of them is “free” to the people doing the transaction. But really that just means the government is wasting scarce law enforcement resources using money they obtained through taxes (obtained at gunpoint–oh, the irony!). The only people authorized to do background checks are people with Federal Firearms Licenses (FFLs). Because it is time consuming they always charge a fee and you must do a face-to-face transaction. This adds more wasted time and money to the transaction. A transaction which is a specific enumerate right.
This pointless waste of time and money is unacceptable at any time but when the government is deeply in debt and the economy is doing poorly wasting precious government and private resources it is even more so.
Unacceptable demonstration number 2:
If law requiring universal background checks is passed it will only be a short time before the politicians will “discover” the “loopholes” that prevents the law from working as intended. These include the lack of gun registration and the lack of defense against fake IDs. Any attempt at gun registration in the U.S. will result in massive non-compliance on a scale that will make alcohol prohibition look like first graders failing to stay in a straight line while waiting to go on recess. Look at the non-compliance experienced in the failed long gun registration in Canada. Multiply that by three (the difference in per capita gun ownership rate), multiply that by two (U.S. citizens trust the government less than Canadian citizens), then add ten billion rounds of ammunition (annual consumption by private citizens). Or look at New York state, multiple by fifty (the citizens of other states included in the non-compliance) and multiply that by ten (the citizens of New York state have the option of moving to a freer state, with no place to escape the resistance will be more fierce), then add ten billion rounds of ammunition.
The “ID loophole” was identified years ago by the Feds and they passed a law requiring “Real ID” by the states. How’s that working out?
For the government to force this sort of situation upon the people is unacceptable.
Since demonstrating that background checks are pointless the continued insistence upon forcing them upon the people this must mean that those continuing to advocate for them are either evil (option 1 above) or have the comprehension skills no better than that of an above average German Shepard (option 2 above). Despite the existence of blue dog democrats we have never elected someone so stupid as a real dog to a Federal office (Senator Patty Murray is not a counter example, she is capable of reading and comprehending most Dr. Seuss books). One can only conclude those advocating for background checks are evil or are doing so under duress.
Good people don’t knowingly and willingly cooperate with evil. It is unacceptable.
Background checks are pointless and unacceptable. We are better than this.
Even compromising with those that advocate for them is the moral equivalent of compromising with people that want “common sense” limits on the 13th Amendment or someone intending to rape your 10 year-old child. The response must be an exceedingly firm no.
Update: I almost forgot, as pointed out by Tim S. in email a few days ago, there is a form of background check almost all gun owners would accept. That is if there were an “endorsement” on your state ID card (such as drivers license) like the restriction for corrective lenses or endorsement for motorcycle or commercial drivers license. It wouldn’t be much, if any, more effective than that currently proposed by the anti-freedom people. But it would eliminate the concerns over registration and most of the expense and wasted time. If such a thing is offered as a compromise to the anti-gunners expect it to be vigorously rejected. They know it doesn’t meet their “needs” and as such will refuse to give in.
Update 2: See also the conclusions which can be drawn from this study.
The only thing a gun is good for is killing. That is it’s only purpose, and nobody needs a gun for anything other than killing.The NRA seems to be full of a bunch of morons who just want to kill things, instead of doing something constructive.
Holden_McGroin
January 19, 2013
[Their ignorance is astounding.
—Joe]
As I mentioned Saturday morning on Twitter I went to the Seattle gun “buyback” (how can you buy back something you didn’t own to begin with?
I went with a fair amount of cash to buy things that were of historical value or something I might be interested in owning. I had fantasies of buying an AR-15 for $250. No such luck. The sidewalk in front of the site was packed with other private buyers:
The sidewalks approaching the site from every direction had people on them too:
I did get a chance to look a few guns being brought in. I was only interested in one, a semi-auto 30-06 with a Leupold scope on it. Someone else quickly made an offer and got it for $125.
One of the guns, an old shotgun, literally fell apart as the owner tried to hand it to someone to evaluate. Another gun I saw was an old .22 revolver with the muzzle all covered in rust. The guy I was sort of hanging out with told the owner, “You couldn’t get $5.00 at a pawn shop for it.” The owner agreed and said that is why he brought it. A $100 gift card for something that probably wasn’t safe to shoot was a good deal.
I talked to another guy that said he got rid of a junker for $100 as well. It was literally, a “Saturday Night Special” an old Bryco of some sort. He had a great big smile on his face about getting a $100 for that.
I talked to quite a few of the guys there. You could tell who the gun guys were. They were all happy, talking, and smiling. I didn’t take any pictures of them but there were people turning in guns who looked like timid “grass eaters”. Many of them wouldn’t sell to the private sellers. One told the guy I was with, “I won’t sell to anyone without a background check.” The would-be buyer told him that he had a concealed pistol permit (background check required) but that didn’t faze the seller. So apparently it wasn’t about background checks.
I asked several buyers if the police gave them any problems. Only one guy had some problems. He was told he was parked on private property and had his table on private property. Even after he was told he had permission of the property owner the cop continued to harass him and told him he didn’t have a business license and that he was going to give him a “Ticket that will cost you $1000”. The buyer held his ground (before showing up he had asked the Seattle police, the ATF, and a lawyer if it was okay and got the go ahead from all of them) and the cop eventually went away without writing a ticket.
One guy I talked to categorized the sellers into two groups. 1) People getting rid of junk and 2) People who want to save the world. I didn’t have a good sample but it sure looked to me like there were a lot more in the first category than in the second.
There were a few guns of value that made it to through to the police so the politicians, and news media declared success when they ran out of money about 11:45. I have to wonder how many more guns were purchased by private buyers after the police closed up shop. I really need to make a bunch of very cheap single shot guns out of tubing, a piece of wood, a nail, and rubber band or make the rounds at the pawnshops before the next “buyback”.
I hung around for probably 45 minutes before leaving. With all the competition I figured I wouldn’t get my hands on anything of interest and I had other things I wanted to do.
Just as I was leaving the guy I was hanging out with jokingly asked if I had anything I wanted to sell before I left. I told him the only gun I had was the $2000 STI on my hip. He “offered” me $10.00 for it. I told him, “Screw you!” He told me, “I appreciated the offer but prostitution is illegal in Seattle.” We both laughed and I left.