# Did Rand Paul say political involvement of parents of gunned down kids is inappropriate? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 18, 2013, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003 "2013-04-18T03:03:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 12
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2013, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/221 "2013-05-07T02:13:51Z")
What do you think of Mike Weisser NRA Life Member and Sr Firearms Instructor who wrote a letter to Wayne LA Pierre telling the NRA that he did not come to the NRA Convention this year because the NRA is demanding he engage in a culture war. Weisser told La Pierre that he was on the wrong side of the war. Have you heard the latest crap coming out of the gun rights leadership. And you think Senator Diane Feinstein is unreasonable. Glenn Beck spoke to these gun right’s people. That man is nuts. I hope you don’t disagree with that. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2013, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/222 "2013-05-07T12:55:19Z")
> [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > What do you think of Mike Weisser NRA Life Member and Sr Firearms Instructor who wrote a letter to Wayne LA Pierre telling the NRA that he did not come to the NRA Convention this year because the NRA is demanding he engage in a culture war. Weisser told La Pierre that he was on the wrong side of the war. I think if he objects to the direction the NRA is taking, he should leave, agitate for change, or join (or form) a rival lobby. “Agitating for change” is exactly what he’s doing, so, good for Mr. Weisser. If a significant number of his fellow members agree, they can change the organization. I’m not an NRA member, so I have no dog in the fight over control of the organization. > [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > And you think Senator Diane Feinstein is unreasonable. Is there some reason that both sides can’t have unreasonable people? You keep trying to force reality into some binary, team-based, all-good / all-bad schema that it will never fit into. > [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > Glenn Beck spoke to these gun right’s people. > > That man is nuts. I hope you don’t disagree with that. He’s good at selling books and ad buys; nuts like a fox. ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2013, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/223 "2013-05-08T00:56:54Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > Is there some reason that both sides can’t have unreasonable people? You You brought up Feinstein as unreasonable and bad for the sane gun laws side. She is not at all unreasonable. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2013, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/224 "2013-05-08T01:52:58Z")
> [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > You brought up Feinstein as unreasonable and bad for the sane gun laws side. She is not at all unreasonable. Is there anyone advocating for more gun control that’s unreasonable, or any conceivable law restricting gun ownership that is? ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2013, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/225 "2013-05-10T02:07:41Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > Is there anyone advocating for more gun control that’s unreasonable, or any conceivable law restricting gun ownership that is? Anyone calling for elimination and banning of all firearms from private citizens including those citizens who live on farms and love to hunt. Universal background checks comes no where’s near that unreasonable demand. The 1934 Machine Gun Law appears to be quite reasonable to me. Constitutional Rights and Gun Regulation are not diametrically opposed to each other which means gun regulation is not unreasonable and having gun rights is not unreasonable. But there are way more extremists on the gun rights side than there are extremists calling for total gun bans, which is why I don’t understand why Diane Feinstein was singled out by you as someone who is harmful for the gun regulation side. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2013, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/226 "2013-05-10T12:34:33Z")
> [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > Anyone calling for elimination and banning of all firearms from private citizens including those citizens who live on farms and love to hunt. > > Universal background checks comes no where’s near that unreasonable demand. > The 1934 Machine Gun Law appears to be quite reasonable to me. Constitutional Rights and Gun Regulation are not diametrically opposed to each other which means gun regulation is not unreasonable and having gun rights is not unreasonable. Interesting…so anyone who wants the laws kept the same is a gun-rights extremist, but only those who advocate a total ban are gun-control extremists. That’s a double standard if I ever saw one. > [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > But there are way more extremists on the gun rights side than there are extremists calling for total gun bans, which is why I don’t understand why Diane Feinstein was singled out by you as someone who is harmful for the gun regulation side. Maybe that’s because you’ve defined “extremist” broadly for one side and very, very narrowly for the other. She’s harmful to the gun-control side because her baby is the assault weapons ban, which a) does nothing measureable to reduce crime, b) keeps law-abiding citizens from buying the guns they want, and c) is a rallying point for opposition, which makes it harder to pass even reasonable stuff like Manchin-Toomey. She’s a radical, and her radicalism undermines what her allies are trying to do. ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2013, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/227 "2013-05-17T05:10:51Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > Interesting…so anyone who wants the laws kept the same is a gun-rights extremist, but only those who advocate a total ban are gun-control extremists. That’s a double standard if I ever saw one. Are you saying the 1934 Machine Gun ban is unreasonable and it is the work of extremists? ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2013, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/228 "2013-05-17T05:22:44Z")
The ones who banned private registered machine gun ownership in 1986 despite a stellar, perfect record of hundreds of thousands or millions of private citizens with “machine guns” were certainly unreasonable extremists. It’s actually the worst example you could’ve picked. You could make the case that the 1934 NFA MG regulation worked perfectly - it eliminated all crime done by people who legally owned machine guns - and yet they were banned anyway. That is exactly the gun control agenda. Results don’t matter, chipping away at gun rights any way they can does. ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2013, 11:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/229 "2013-05-17T11:08:26Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#): > > The ones who banned private registered machine gun ownership in 1986 despite a stellar, perfect record of hundreds of thousands or millions of private citizens with “machine guns” were certainly unreasonable extremists. It’s actually the worst example you could’ve picked. You could make the case that the 1934 NFA MG regulation worked perfectly - it eliminated all crime done by people who legally owned machine guns - and yet they were banned anyway. That is exactly the gun control agenda. Results don’t matter, chipping away at gun rights any way they can does. Are you saying the 1986 ban banned ‘machine guns’? But I take it as a yes that the 1934 ban was reasonable. Is that your answer to my question? ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2013, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/230 "2013-05-17T12:50:55Z")
> [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > Are you saying the 1934 Machine Gun ban is unreasonable and it is the work of extremists? What? How on earth did you get that from the sentence you quoted? And again, the National Firearms Act was not a ban. > [@SenorBeef](#): > > The ones who banned private registered machine gun ownership in 1986 despite a stellar, perfect record of hundreds of thousands or millions of private citizens with “machine guns” were certainly unreasonable extremists. It’s actually the worst example you could’ve picked. You could make the case that the 1934 NFA MG regulation worked perfectly - it eliminated all crime done by people who legally owned machine guns - and yet they were banned anyway. That is exactly the gun control agenda. Results don’t matter, chipping away at gun rights any way they can does. Agree completely, the Hughes Amendment was ridiculous. > [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > Are you saying the 1986 ban banned ‘machine guns’? But I take it as a yes that the 1934 ban was reasonable. Is that your answer to my question? All this information is easy to find. An amendment to the 1986 Firearm Owners Protection Act barred civilians from ownership or transfer rights of any fully automatic weapons which were not registered by May 19, 1986. It amounted to a ban on any post-1986 fully-automatic weapons for civilians. All legal machine guns in civilian (as opposed to law enforcement, manufacturer, etc) hands are pre-1986. ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2013, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/231 "2013-05-17T17:02:00Z")
This part of SenorBeef’s comment sounds as if the 1934 machine gun ‘restrictions’ were reasonable. But to make certain I asked if I understood it correctly. > [@](#): > > Originally Posted by SenorBeef “You could make the case that the 1934 NFA MG regulation worked perfectly - it eliminated all crime done by people who legally owned machine guns.” Neither of you seem to want to answer a simple question. Do you think the 1934 law is reasonable? ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2013, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/232 "2013-05-17T17:09:26Z")
> [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > This part of SenorBeef’s comment sounds as if the 1934 machine gun ‘restrictions’ were reasonable. But to make certain I asked if I understood it correctly. > > Neither of you seem to want to answer a simple question. Or, the question was a non-sequitor to the post you quoted when asking it, which referred to your treating those who want to keep gun laws as they are as “extremists”, whereas on the gun-control side, only those who advocate a total ban on all firearms count as “extremists”. There was no mention of repealing the National Firearms Act. > [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > Do you think the 1934 law is reasonable? Yes. The Hughes Amendment is not, though. ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2013, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/233 "2013-05-18T14:55:07Z")
> [@](#): > > Do you think the 1934 law is reasonable -Originally Posted by NotfooledbyW > [@Human\_Action](#): > > Yes. The Hughes Amendment is not, though. So we have established by precedent that certain rapid fire with high round capacity magazine firearms can be strictly regulated by the Federal Government and that is reasonable and therefore must not be an infringement upon anyone’s SA right, have we not? ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2013, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/234 "2013-05-18T15:00:13Z")
> [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > So we have established by precedent that certain rapid fire with high round capacity magazine firearms can be strictly regulated by the Federal Government and that is reasonable and therefore must not be an infringement upon anyone’s SA right, have we not? The NFA was not an infringement, no. Then again, _it didn’t ban anything_. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2013, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003/235 "2013-05-18T15:03:43Z")
To clarify: there were no weapons that went from legal to manufacture or buy, to illegal to manufacture or buy, because of the National Firearms Act. ETA: Also, the NFA didn’t just regulate fully-automatic weapons, it also covers short-barreled rifles and shotguns, destrictive devices, suppressors, pen guns, and a few others. Conversely, the 1994 Federal Assault Weapon Ban made it illegal to manufacture a broad range of firearms and magazines. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-rand-paul-say-political-involvement-of-parents-of-gunned-down-kids-is-inappropriate/656003.md?page=11)