On April 17, the bill to expand background checks on gun buyers failed in the Senate, and the fatalistic shrugs in Washington were so numerous they were nearly audible. The legislation had been a modest bipartisan compromise, supported by 90 percent of the public and lobbied for hard by the president. A group backed by Michael Bloomberg had spent $12 million on ads pressuring senators to vote “yes.” When the bill fell short—by just five votes—it seemed to confirm a Beltway article of faith: There’s no point messing with the National Rifle Association (NRA). And that, many assumed, was the last we’d be hearing about gun reform.
But then something unexpected happened. Some of the senators who’d voted “no” faced furious voters back home. […] One of the country’s best-known gun-rights advocates, Robert Levy, said the NRA’s “stonewalling of the background-check proposal was a mistake, both politically and substantively.”
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This proves itself to be bullshit from the get-go with its “supported by 90% of the public” lie.
No shit.
But not supported by the armed (with cash too) and dangerous NRA, so it was tossed under the nearest bus.
Actually, complete BS of the article lies in the wider quote:
“The legislation had been a modest bipartisan compromise, supported by 90 percent of the public and lobbied for hard by the president. A group backed by Michael Bloomberg had spent $12 million on ads pressuring senators to vote “yes.””
Something modest, bipartisan, compromise that 90% of public supports and have had free 12 Mil $ tossed for its passage… fails. Sorry, facts don’t add up. If indeed all of the above applied – every Left and Right politician would run to support it. It failed because it was NOT modest, NOT bipartisan, NOT compromise, with far less than 50% of country supporting it and only dictatorial rich Progressives in want of control pouring money for it.
What I’d say would be a modest compromise: make background checks mandatory for all gun purchases… BUT make an independent organization with documented interest in legal gun ownership, gun safety and gun rights in charge of it, taking all responsibility and control from the Government who has vested interest in diminishing gun rights and who have proven eager to violate existing gun laws for its own benefit (Fast and Furious…). All background checks done by NRA and Government legally banned from accessing any of the related data. Would make Bloomberg head explode.
The New Republic article is titled “This Is How The NRA Ends.”
I’ll believe it when I see some incumbents voted out.
April Fools was a 2 months ago.
The bill certainly would not have passed the House.
Plus:
Wouldn’t have prevented the Connecticut school shooting (he used his mom’s gun)
Wouldn’t have affected the Boston bombers.
I have a feeling the new law would have been highly ineffective, so why not congratulate Washington on “caring” and “making an effort or gesture”.
And congratulate them again for failing to anything, which is likely far better than the alternative.
A guy who is big on having government agents raid businesses looking for ashtrays or salt on tables or drinks that are too big, now supports disarming the public.
You might be able to get 90% of a group to support free ponies and unicorns, but it’s not like they are going to go out of their way to vote someone out of office who won’t vote for a law to mandate it.
Reading the article, the group is more interested in destroying the NRA’s strategy of supporting Democrats who vote with them. They are taking out the Democrats who voted with the NRA, even though one of them used to be a member of Bloomberg’s group.
I’m confused by the name Mayors Against Illegal Guns. They are already illegal, so there’s no point in passing a law against them.
But seriously, if these anti 2nd amendment nuts can’t get a bullshit bill like this one past after dancing in the blood of a couple dozen dead white suburban kids, maybe it’s time they take up a new hobby beside pointless crusades that just drive up the demand for guns and ammunition.
The article speaks of the decline in gun ownership since the 1970s, but says nothing of the rise in ownership since 2008.
Is that something like the decline in teenagers who admit to using drugs or alcohol in surveys because, you know, they aren’t stupid enough to admit to something the government wants to track and penalize people for?
When I hear about any gun amendment bill I figure its another ploy for the scu, uh, politicians to get a few more thousand bucks before some holiday.
I think you are on to something.
“Guns” is good media issue and both the anti-gun and pro-gun people can raise tons of dollars, which go to politicians.
Enriching the pro-gun and anti-gun politicians, and they don’t have to do anything extra to rustle up the funds.
I love how Bloomberg used $12 million of New York City’s $$$ for marketing. Why not his own billionaire $$$ bucks?
I figure the whole registration thing would be useless and would not prevent doodly squat.
Politicians like laws that are a lot of sound and fury.
“Feel good” laws.
Guns are one of the great boogeymen of the know-it-all, post baby-boom generations. Progressive idiots forget that their cherished liberal democracy was won by previous generations who had guns.
Then there’s this:
http://breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/05/28/Gun-control-supporters-facing-recall-bids-in-Colo
I’ve been a member of the NRA for more than 20 years, and I’m not leaving because they are the only organization of any significance that lobbies for the individual’s right to own and bare arms.
Yes, they shoot themselves in the foot regularly, but compared to Michael Bloomberg, they are saints. Heck, compared to Michael Bloomberg, Stalin was a saint.
Do they have bare legs as well?
Sorry about that above. As usual, the phone starts ringing just as I’m finishing a post not giving me much time to proofread.
Of course, it depends. Are we hunting bear or bare? Does a shoulder pad count?
“Some of the senators who’d voted ‘no’ faced furious voters back home.”
That’s odd, the same thing happened to Mary Landrieu in Louisiana and she voted Yes.
Holy Crap!!!
Not a sane post above me. How do so many gun nuts wind up on a tech oriented blog? Yea, I know==this isn’t a tech oriented blog….. and you’se guys aren’t gun nuts either.
So much like religion: “If it could be reasoned with, there wouldn’t be any.”
REGARDLESS–of what position you take, its telling “how” those positions are arrived at/maintained. Above we see the simple denial in the main closely followed by the irrelevant straw man.
NO ONE above addresses the MERITS of the bill.
Heh, heh: Silly Hoomans
I was rather “ho-hum” about gun issues until I saw the sheer dumb-fuckery of the laws that were being proposed.
If someone wants to govern through statistics and social understanding and in the context of citizens rights, fine.
If they just want to lump one foolish idea on top of another because they don’t like guns, they can go fuck themselves.
I believe in science, effective government and citizens rights for those that deserve them.
1) The proposed laws wouldn’t change shit for gun violence or make it worse by criminalizing decent people. Science fail.
2) The government neglects things they could do today to deal with the criminals. Effective government fail.
3) The purpose of government is not to bother honest and decent people. Citizens rights fail.
These bills are so fucked up and offbase, they aren’t even “wrong”.
We don’t need more Chicago’s or Detroits. Let these fools do their stupid failed social experiments in their own backyard and maybe one day if they ever actually fix a problem they can point to an example.
But they have no examples of their foolish ideas working. And they can keep them to themselves.
Bobbo’s here
http://tinyurl.com/3wk44f8
Nah–it won’t. Ironically, Blowhards hardly ever support their positions when challenged. Just observe: they will suck each other’s dicks in a small circle and think they have the answers. ((Like you, I reference “The Cleaner Arrives” from Pulp Fiction))
Nope — here!
http://youtube.com/watch?v=NWptPCY_uOw
Any of you BlowHards want to identify what is wrong with Universal Background Checks?
Hint: Don’t go off the rails with “what it could lead to” wild ass scenarios.
Go Ahead: make my day:: “try!”
Calling your audience “BlowHards” is a great way to start a dialog.
I would comment on the background check if I knew what constitutes a “Universal Background Check”.
That would be a fair comment Mextli “if” this were the start of a new conversation or new conversationists?
But its not.
My orientation to reality is not so naive—I just take the opposing position with the same qualities of expression…. you know…. completely unacceptable in reasoned discourse.
Your comment above was an exception. I don’t know LA politics enough to know what gave Ms Landrieu problems but in general, yes–running for office is affected by many issues, not just one, not just guns. Individual voters may take such single issue stances, but the electorate does not.
Hmmmmm…. ha, ha. The almost expressed assumption here is that you DON’T think the above group is a bunch of blowhards? You want me to lie to them to get their conversation? Like how Bloomberg is worse than Stalin???
Dick sucking Blowhards. Not as bad as baby killing gun nuts. Your magazine may vary.
The only solution to the gun problem is to educate and equip everybody so that people all have weapon training and a standard hand-held non-automatic weapon as soon as they reach 18 years old.
There would be no question of going up against an unarmed person as they would all be armed.
There would be no question of going up against untrained people as they would all be fair shots.
Think my solution is crazy?
Look at Switzerland…
…..or Somalia.
How did you chose your Model?
Um, in Somalia they are not well trained.
The populous is are not ALL armed in either place. Males within a certain age range in Switzerland are required to maintain militia weapons at their homes. I don’t think they carry guns around on the street on a regular basis. But I bet a Victornox is found in an awful lot of pockets.
Although msb is right that if everyone was armed and trained all the time, we wouldn’t have much trouble, we’d be more likely to all have our own personal unicorn.
Handguns for all! The weapon of choice if your in a lousy mood to pop off a few. Road rage would be more like Mad Max. Not in my state please.
The US has 4.5 million untreated severely mentally ill people with easy access to guns. You don’t need a spreadsheet to do the math.
I’m much more worried about the 2 million gang bangers wandering around the country. They’ve chosen to be malevolent, violent parasites as a life style.
And that 4.5 million number sounds grossly inflated. It’s the type of number you get when you add all the people who are thought to be depressed rather than potentially violent to others.
The number is rather obvious when you think. If you’re clinically mentally, then you don’t qualify for health insurance. The public treatment of these types of illness’ has been cut for years.
There was a steady decline in spending from the 80’s on to 2002 when it flattened out. The continued drop was offset by increases in spending through the VA. Nowadays Vets are also losing this support with more cutbacks.
Mood disorders (various types of depressions) affect over 20 million Americans. Schizophrenia, between 2-3 million Americans. Anxiety disorders affect 40 million Americans. PTSD affects 7 million Americans. 4.5 million untreated people is a low ball estimate.
Even if the 4 t million mental defective number was accurate, we have what, 2-3 incidents per year of legally obtained and misused weapons? Statistically irrelevant.
1. It says a lot about you that you use the phrase “mental defective”.
2. You might be the only person who thinks that 8000 homocides per year is legal activity.
Maybe you’re mentally defective?
The article makes the case that there are 4.5 million crazy people that can LEGALLY buy guns now so we need to pass the expanded background check bill. It is typical fear mongering “OMG! they’re handing out guns to crazy people!”
The 8000 homocides are mostly gang/drug related and with illegally obtained weapons. No background checks, registration, etc. will stop those.
As I said, you can probably count on one hand the actual “crazy people” that buy a gun LEGALLY and use it in a rampage each year.
…… and there we have it: when you DON’T KNOW and more relevantly DON’T CARE what the facts are….. feel free to say whatever BS you want.
You do reveal some sensitivity to the notion that “too many” deaths of the innocent white people like yourself might be a bad thing?
1-2, or a handful per year is acceptable to you for your right to bear arms.
Have you thought about what a maximum number of innocent deaths per year might be in order to start looking at ways to reduce that number???
Have you and now you find you have to lie about it to maintain your comfort level or have you NEVER seen those numbers yet you like to think you have enough facts to maintain your opinion?????
IOW===>just what kind of stupid are you?
Silly Gun Nuts===making up BS and eating it as if it were chocolate ice cream. They love it so.
The 8000 homicides are mostly gang/drug related…
Bullshit.
Yea, the FBI is lying in their crime statistics…
The US has 4.5 million untreated severely mentally ill people with easy access to guns. You don’t need a spreadsheet to do the math.
That’s right! YOU NEED TO HELP THEM OR LOCK THEM UP!
YOU DON’T NEED TO PERVERT THE CONSTITUTION TO DO THIS EITHER!!!
But then I suppose you think that the knee jerk reaction over 9-11 which instituted the Department of Homeland Security was a real good idea too.
Looks like this article caused Obama and Bloomberg to be targets for some ricin letters. Is it possible that this post was the catalyst? Should Uncle Dave be audited?
1. The “90%” number is bogus….
2. Criminals and the insane will obtain whatever weapons they need.
3. The “Universal Background Check” is just a first step towards Registration, something that intelligent people should find to be anathema.
4. Law Abiding Citizens don’t necessarily have easy access to guns, other than those obtained from friends or members of club groups of some kind. Some are bought at gun shows, of course.
5. Criminals almost never try to use legitimate sources. Those who don’t make it past the “Brady Check” – numbering in five figures – are almost never prosecuted, but they are rejected. It’s much safer (and more likely) that they’ll get them by theft, or “back alley” deals with other criminals.
6. The UBC is an attempt to shut down all private transfer of firearms. Then, as the good folks at BATFE have been trying for years, legal _sources_ for buying firearms will slowly be choked off. Like DC where you can now own a firearm, but you can’t buy one there…. (This may have improved by now.)
In short, balderdash. Punish the criminals, not the law abiding….
When you dial 911, the Police will be there in plenty of time to draw the chalk line around your body. Better response time? You’re on your own….
Yes, I’m an NRA Lifer….
…And if you DON’T think AMERICAN’S can MANUFACTURE GUN PARTS that a monkey can assemble into a WORKING WEAPON or create a BLACK MARKET for something that mostly CRIMINALS will use then you’re DELUSIONAL!
Just look what a few nut cases did with a few bombs! Last time I looked, they didn’t buy their bombs at the local bomb store!!! Even the explosives they used weren’t exactly sold as explosives either.
Imposing restrictions on a fundamental right is NOT the answer. Because if you agree that we should now edit the BILL OF RIGHTS (which you would do if you impose any sort of gun restrictions) then you need to ex-patriot yourself right the hell out of the USA!
Like any SANE person, I do NOT want to see anyone get SHOT! But when I look at cars/trucks and things like road rage or even drunk driving, this anti-gun agenda does seem way out of whack with priorities. It’s obviously another NON-THINKING knee jerk REACTION! But I do empathize with the rage against the senseless violence. Perhaps now is a good time to remind you that there’s a WAR going on — SEVERAL of them!!!
Funny. You say we’d have to edit the bill of rights to limit access to guns.
But, the First Amendment has limits. You can’t spread Libel, you can’t yell fire in a theater, you can’t promote hate speech. All of these are reasonable limits on the First Amendment, and no editing necessary.
When you lean on the “spirit of the Second Amendment” as an argument, you forget the fact that single-shot muzzle loaders were the technology when it was written. What would gang violence be like if every hoodlum in the street had a 5′ long muzzle loader they had to swab and pack before every shot?
We also eliminated slavery, let women vote, then let blacks vote. Those were all positive “edits” to the Bill of Rights. The founding fathers were atheist adulterers who had no problem taking a payoff here and there. They weren’t perfect.
Using your examples, there would be no First Amendment protection for speech on the Internet (or radio, TV) as they were not invented in the 18th Century.
As for your comparison of slavery, the founding fathers did make compromises to keep their young nation together. The counting of slaves as 3/5 was a way to encourage slave owners that there would be a benefit to freeing them.
Regardless, the Constitution was amended, according to the defined process, and Slavery was correctly banned. If you want to “edit” the Second Amendment, there is a defined process.
1. Perhaps, though I’m fairly sure it was above 86% at one point.
2. Yes… but so can the non-insane, which you folks like to pretend isn’t true.
3. I see, so you don’t think car registrations are good? What about planes? So I can go buy a crap car and run it into you and your family a few times, drop it by a river and there’s no problem from your end, yes? Registrations are a reasonable solution, since you can then track guns back to where they came from and determine the underground channels to shut off. And if you are a “law abiding” citizen, as you say you are, then you can register as many as you want, so what’s your issue?
4. perhaps not ten minutes, but if I want a gun I can run down and get one fairly quickly. Perhaps you have more issues than normal people?
5. Yes, so what? Those that are rejected haven’t committed a crime yet, so they have to work harder to try. Unless you are assuming everyone who gets a gun is a criminal, of course. That’s the whole idea behind deterrence, to make it tougher for someone to do something bad. People will do horrible things if you make it simple for them to do, take a look at the various civil-war, terrorist and dictator actions going on.
6. COMPLETE bull. We will never be able to get rid of guns, since there will always be an industry to make and sell them and never enough support to remove the second amendment entirely. If we wanted to remove guns for personal use, we simply increase taxes on bullets by 500$ a box. Or make you buy them one at a time, per day.
It’s sad how hard these folks want their governments and fellow citizens to fail so they can use their precious guns. “Patriot” no longer seems to mean what it used to.
Fun to read what an NRA Lifer dreams about and fears.
Imagine now that our government has been “trying” for years to squeeze off the sale of guns?
Its like the religiously maniacal complaining from pulpits, tv and radio stations, and street corners across the land that there is a war on Religion.
UNLESS you are currently on your knees in group prayer, and UNLESS you are right now lining up crosshairs on an home invader, some people/too many people feel “they” just aren’t free.
God, Guns, …… what was that other thing???
Silly Hoomans.
This is God’s will.
98.2% of US adults reject to join the NRA and don’t want them to dictate assault weapons policy.
Lmao, if its “gods will”, why bother with laws at all?
God looks down “I was going to send a guy on a shooting spree, but they have background checks! Me damn it!”
God works in mysterious ways .
So do magicians I don’t worship them either.
Any solution that begins with “If Only We All …” is utter bullshit.
That’s why I’d want a system where the government gives us weapons and everybody is armed.
I bet people would be real polite and think twice before pissing people off.
“If only we all…..” = “I bet…..”
Somalia.
The Wild West.
If Gun Nuts were in charge of finding a cure for malaria, they would add more mosquitoes to the swamp.
Silly Hoomans.
License all gun and ammo manufacturing. Put license numbers on every bullet. Tie it up in red tape. Tighten it, gradually. One good Washington desk clerk could strangle the life out of the entire arms industry in a year.
All license applications are to be notorized, then submitted in person at DMV office for accuracy and photo. Fridays only.
We have seen how well background checks have worked with hiring school teachers and bus drivers.
Orchi—please tell me your point is other than the current background check is not catching ALL the predators, so let’s do away with it entirely.
You aren’t THAT stupid are you?
The NRA should be protesting the trial of George Zimmerman.
MSNBC hates them already.
Criminals don’t obtain their guns legally.
They don’t buy them from dealers. They don’t buy them at gun shows. They don’t buy them on the internet. They don’t buy them at yard sales.
They mainly buy stolen guns from other criminals.
What is it about universal background checks that you liberals feel will affect this?
Link?…. or this is just more made up BS.
Well, for one, if Nancy Lanza filled out a form saying she had a clinically depressed (actually diagnosed, BTW) child in her household, maybe she wouldn’t have gotten her hands on several handguns and a so-called “assault weapon”.
If that ONE background check worked, 26 people in CT would still be alive.
Adam Lanza intended to go out on a killing spree, but if he had a bunch of knives or a 6-shooter, it would have been far less fatal.
Just because you can’t catch EVERYBODY doesn’t mean you can’t catch ANYBODY.