First off, Red Dawn? For real? As much as I like Patrick Swaze, it’s silly to even mention a movie in this context.
Second of all, you didn’t actually dispute my statement about the definition of a slippery slope argument. There exists both fallacious and non-fallacious slippery slope arguments. And further, the tactic of opposing incremental restrictions is not one based merely on logical truisms - it’s one of tactics and strategy. We’ve had discussions on this board about this before. In that thread, RP stated: “When people invoke the slippery slope, they are almost never saying that some action will logically require another. They are just saying that the probability of the latter action is significantly increased.”From a discussion on slippery slopes from Prof. Volokh:
There is no distinction between federal or state when it comes to the individual. Does it matter to him that the person threatening them with prison if they do not surrender their property wears a badge from the FBI or from the sheriff? Your insistence on clinging to this meaningless distinction without a difference is unpersuasive.
And it’s a joke. Just because we engage in imbecilic security theater in one arena is no support to propagate the practice in other areas. And wasn’t it you who criticized this:
This is fantasy land. I might as well say that I support universal background checks, registration, and licensing as long as we also have a constitutional amendment saying that gun ownership is a suspect class and that no firearms, weapons, or accessories will ever be banned or restricted in the future and that all firearm laws will be in the future and retroactively subject to strict scrutiny with all levels of government to pay for attorney fees when they lose challenges based on the new amendment. If that happens, then sure I’d support registration. And I want a unicorn. Your proposal emboldens gun control advocates.
These are banned in CA. Suppressors are banned in many states.
Yes, I do not want prohibited persons to obtain firearms. I have no problem when firearms are taken from a prohibited person. You aren’t following the complaint. The issue is that gun control advocates engage in multi-pronged efforts. One of those is to expand the list of prohibited people. This is a backdoor way to limit those who can own firearms. So yes it’s obvious we don’t want prohibited people to have firearms - it’s in the name 'natch. But then the question becomes, who is a prohibited person, how is a new prohibited person determined, what process surrounds who can be designated a prohibited person, etc. If some bureaucrat has the ability to declare tomorrow that you are now a prohibited person, and you have little to no recourse to contest it, and the sheriff is at your door (from the state of course) to confiscate your weapons that you have dutifully registered, I think you’d be upset.
So fine - give me a constitutional amendment like I stated earlier, and then and only then would I consider any action supported by gun control advocates.
This applies to magazine restrictions, ammo restrictions, zoning restrictions, ivory bans, and all manner of incremental actions designed to impact gun ownership. These incremental efforts are what you seem either blind to, or are willing to accept because you think that gun control advocates will stop at some point. Maybe they will - but 100% of past experience does not support that idea.
You are not understanding. It’s not an argument - it’s a strategy. I’m not saying that the second must follow from the first - but it is better tactics to defend against the first reducing the possibility of the second.
Local retention of records is far more likely to result in confiscation than centralized record keeping at the national level.
I suppose people are free to redefine terms but the definition of a slippery slope is the one I gave, not the one you did. If you were using slippery slope in some looser sense, then I guess I would say that you have some concerns but the resistance to registration doesn’t seem to be appropriate for some vague increase in the risk of confiscation; it is treated damn near as a certainty.
The saying is “registrations leads to confiscation” not “registration might increase the chances of confiscation and make it easier to implement”
Of course its not meaningless. We are talking about a federal registry, not a local one. If a locality is intent on confiscation, they can pass their own laws requiring you to register and then confiscate your guns (see California confiscation of SKS), they don’t need the federal registry. They don’t have to go begging to the federal government assuming it is even legal for the federal government to share this information in this manner.
Your statement was:
“It is offensive and misguided to burden individuals who have done nothing wrong so that people who have actually done something wrong may be deterred. It also wouldn’t work.”
I was pointing out that we do this. And airport security is not the only place we do it.
BTW, it would work.
BTW, are you saying that we should just let people onto airplanes the way we let people into the movie theater? Just take their ticket and let them get on? Really?
There is a huge difference between penalizing someone for the criminal acts of others in a way that does nothing to reduce the criminal acts of others, but merely transfers almost all the costs of the costs of the criminal acts of others to law abiding gun owners. Registration imposes minimal costs on gun ownership and has several positive benefits.
What I propose is fair and reasonable. What you propose is much less so.
And did they use the federal register to track down and confiscate suppressors and SBRs and SBSs in these places? I don’t even think there is a legal prohibition to prevent the federal government from sharing this information for these purposes, is there?
The concept of prohibited persons is already out there. It already exists. If they wanted to expand the definition of what constituted a prohibited person, they have been doing a really shitty job of expanding that list.
We either both agree that a prohibited person shouldn’t have guns or we don’t. You seem to be saying that you agree unless that prohibited person is you, the concern seems to be somebody abusing their power to target you and take away your guns (which can already be done by someone getting a restraining order against you).
How about this. For every situation where a federal bureaucrat has arbitrarily abused his power in a way that resulted in an innocent person having their guns confiscated, I will give you an example of a prohibited person that murdered with a gun they acquired before they were a prohibited person (remember that restraining order example I gave you above).
That’s pretty unreasonable. You only need a majority in each house (maybe 60 in the senate) and a cooperative POTUS to pass licensing and registration. They need 2/3rds of each house and 3/4ths of the states to give you that constitutional amendment.
I think you misunderstand me. I don’t support licensing and registration as a way to appease gun control folks. I support it independent of what anyone else wants.
I don’t support in the hopes that it will make gun control folks stop wanting more. I know they want to ban all guns and would do it if it was politically possible.
I am not relying on them to stop wanting to ban guns. I am relying on the fact that they can’t get shit done without people like me (heck, they probably can’t get shit done, even WITH people like me) and I can stop whenever I want.
In what way does stopping the first reduce the possibility of the second? And by how much?
I don’t recall you ever addressing the value of registration in reducing gun violence (over a long time horizon). You seem to be standing in the way of licensing and registration for the sake of standing in the way of any further gun regulation.
I think an gun-educated and reasonable gun control lobby would be happy to trade pre-emption of state and local laws And this would be the hardest one for them to swallow but licensing and registration is a hard thing for gun rights folks to swallow), HIPAA type confidentiality rules and penalties, and relaxation of the rules on SBSs/SBRs/suppressors… assuming that their real goal is to reduce gun violence rather than just fuck with gun owners.
Maybe. At the local level infringement would need to be widespread to have a huge far reaching impact. At the federal level, one bad law or ruling and it impacts everyone.
First off, you introduced the term, I did not. Second, appropriateness has nothing to do with anything. This isn’t a game where there are rules. I’ve never asserted that confiscation is a certainty with registration because that would be foolish. Third, it is perfectly acceptable for different people to have different value assessments of various outcomes.
Look at the Connecticut law and the NY SAFE law. Compliance with those laws is incredibly low. If there were a nationwide registry, I would expect similarly low levels of compliance. That is why I say it won’t work.
My point was, so what? It doesn’t matter one bit that we do it already. Failing in one area is not a reason to spread that failure to others.
No it wouldnt. My guess is you will never know.
That really depends on how you weigh the relative benefits and costs. Analogizing this to your example of imposing insurance costs is directly on point. You acknowledge there are costs involved so then it’s simply a matter of degree.
Politics isn’t about being fair and reasonable. I want to win.
My point was - you were wrong. You stated that NFA items weren’t banned. Yes they were and you were wrong. You can’t simply retreat beyond the fact that it was at the state level. To the person living in the state, it makes no difference whatsoever.
That may be the case, but I wouldn’t expect opponents to continue to be incompetent as a strategy. Recent efforts have included expansion of disqualified people based on Rep Payee status at the federal level, and in NY allowing medical people to add people to the list of prohibited persons with no due process. There are laws proposed in CA to expand this to neighbor reports. I’m satisfied with the laws as is, and incremental improvements over time. But as for restrictions, this far, no further.
You have no idea how dedicated I am. I have long said that the NRA is too moderate.
Wait, do you deny that disallowing registration makes confiscation incrementally more difficult? To me that’s a given, but based on this I’m not sure if you agree. If you do agree, then the magnitude is irrelevant.
Registration may reduce gun crime (excluding suicide - the term “gun violence” is a construct of gun control advocates). Lots of things may reduce gun crime. The cost of registration is a bridge too far.
The gun control lobby has **never **proposed a trade of any kind. Like I said, the trade you envision is a fantasy. It’s a unicorn. When the gun control lobby actually proposes a trade, then it may be interesting but until then, your acquiescence strengthens their position.
I’m just going to go ahead and say it. I don’t think that our federal government EVER engages in widespread confiscation of firearms from law abiding citizens based on a registry that specifically prohibits this sort of use of the the registry. This country will have become unrecognizable to us long before something like that happens.
I think it is acceptable for people to have different opinions about the likelihood of future events. But when I present the fact that we have had a registry on one type of firearm for over 80 years without confiscation (even if it was used to prevent sales of new machine guns), I think it is really hard to accept the that are high risks of confiscation sue to registration. REALLY HARD.
Those laws are bullshit.
What is the compliance rate for registration of machine guns?
The registry isn’t supposed to prevent criminals from getting guns because they couldn’t register them. The registry would prevent straw purchases and fraudulent purchases by prohibited persons from legal gun owners. Registration does not require the cooperation of criminals to disarm them.
I’ve explained the dynamic of how it would work several times. Where do you think the dynamic as I described it breaks down?
YES!!! The degree matters. Unless you are really saying that you wouldn’t budge an inch no matter how many lives are saved then YES degree matters. The insurance scheme does almost nothing to reduce gun violence while imposing heavy costs on legal gun owners by making them carry the costs of criminal activity using guns. If this deterred ALL legal gun ownership (which I am sure is the fucking point of the idea) gun violence would only be reduced by the amount of gun murders committed by legal gun owners.
Some people think that being fair and reasonable is how you win. Debating things on the merits rather than saying “we have the advantage right now so suck it” sometimes works
WTF!?!?! How the heck did the fact that there was an NFA registry have anything to do with the ban? You seem to think there is a connection between the federal registry and confiscation but I don’t think it exists.
Like I said, the concept of prohibited persons is already out there. The dangers you see associated with the concept of prohibited persons does not change because of reigstration. The enforcibility of the prohibited person regime will change but I thought we all agreed that we should not let prohibited persons from having guns.
That doesn’t change the fact that one is MUCH easier to achieve than the other.
Registration makes it incrementally easier to enforce confiscation but it does nothing to increase the likelihood of confiscation. Once again we have had a federal registry for over 80 years without confiscation. I suppose if they ever decide to confiscate machine guns, the registry will make it easier but its been 80 years. What are they waiting for?
I am merely arguing that the perceived costs to you might not be correct. I agree that pinning suicides on guns is to a large extent just pumping up the body count in a cynical attempt to make the cost side of the cost benefit analysis seem higher (there is probably some marginal number of gun suicides that would not have happened absent a gun but it is at the margins). I also agree that gun registration will not reduce gun crime by people who can legally own guns when the crime is committed. But the majority, perhaps even the vast majority of gun crimes are committed by prohibited persons.
I am not acquiescing. I am proposing a trade, a compromise. I don’t think anyone on the gun control side thinks of me as an ally. Certainly not the gun control folks on this board.
What’s the difference? It’s not difficult to envision a scenario where things defined as assault weapons sometime in the future achieve a similar unpopular status as machine guns due to registries, restrictions, etc. At that point, the registries for those could be closed to, and we’re one step closer in incremental bans. You think it would work to impose registries, but the most recent registries imposed have had colossally low compliance rates. That’s why they aren’t working.
Your original statement in post #79 questioned if any of the NFA items were banned after the registry was in place. CA bans NFA items - California Penal Code references the US Code as its definitions of some of those items starting with section 12200. I didn’t say that the registry is connected to confiscation - but it is connected to bans. Bans are on the same level as confiscation in my mind - just with a longer time horizon.
The danger does not change per se, but the stakes do. And once emboldened by successfully implementing a registry, gun control advocates would accrue more influence and then the danger does increase. That’s why every single incremental step should be resisted. Did you read the article by Volokh? It’s a pretty spot on analysis of the slippery slope.
This part is the important part.
You have no way of determining the value I place on those costs, and any indication of them being correct or not would be farcical.
That’s fine, but no one on either side wants any of the terms you suggest. This is not one of those situations where if both sides are unhappy then you’re doing a good job. What you suggest is a non-starter. It’s a unicorn. Let me know when the gun control lobby proposes a trade.
I would never support registration. All the goals you offer I believe will be achieved over time or are already achieved in the majority of states. So everyone in those states has no reason to support the compromise either. Gun control advocates would never support repealing the NFA and be in favor of nation wide shall issue and reciprocity.
There is no negotiating with someone who wants to kill you. They can’t only kill you a little bit and meet halfway.
I am trying to address your issues one at a time. You say compliance would be low and I point out that compliance is really high at the federal level. Then you say that registries will be used to ban guns and I pointed out earlier why I don’t think that makes a difference. If there is political will to ban guns, we don’t need registries to do it, its doesn’t make it any easier to ban a particular gun because its on a registry (assuming grandfathering like we have ALWAYS had at the federal level, i.e. no confiscations of existing guns).
How is the federal registry connected to the California bans? Other than perhaps providing a definitional framework for what is an NFA item, how does the registry aid in banning or confiscating guns?
Why do you think gun control advocates would accrue more influence? I think the opposite would be true. They would have almost no influence for a while because people would see the problem as being addressed at least for the time being.
I read the volokh article and it says that reducing the cost of gun confiscation through gun registration makes it cheaper to accomplish. So what? The article goes on to say that if gun confiscation is politically infeasible then you shouldn’t care about gun registration. And I think this might be the fundamental difference between our positions. I think that gun confiscation at the federal level is about as close to a political impossibility as you can get at the federal level.
The Volokh article also talks about how the AWB’s value to the gun control side wasn’t in banning those particular guns, it was about creating a culture of regulating guns. It seems to me that this is about changing the momentum of gun control. If the registry was the result of a compromise then there would not be a change of momentum.
So do you agree that a registry doesn’t increase the chance of confiscation so it doesn’t really “lead to confiscation” in any meaningful sense? It might make confiscations easier to enforce but that is part of the benefit of registration. It makes it easier to enforce confiscation of guns from people who become felons or wifebeaters or become subject to a restraining order. If I am weighing the ability to effectively disarm felons on the one hand and the ease with which the government might be able to confiscate the guns of law abiding citizens on the hypothetical possibility that one day they decide to confiscate guns on the other hand, I don’t see how there can be much of a difference of opinion unless you are so far on one end of the spectrum as to make discussions of policy almost meaningless.
It has nothing to do with the value YOU place on the costs. The cost of registration is your perceived increased risk of confiscation and I am saying that the risk you imagine is largely illusory.
This is great debates. I don’t need an offer in hand from the Brady campaign for my proposal to be considered. The fact that every side of the debate hates it, tells me that it is probably either a really good idea or it is a really bad idea. You think it is a really bad idea because there is simply nothing realistic you would trade for registration or any other incremental restriction on gun ownership no matter how much merit the idea may have. The gun control side thinks its a bad idea because they resist any loosening of gun control no matter how ineffective the gun control might be.
How?
I’m not saying we should repeal the NFA. I’m saying we should deregulate suppressors, SBRs and SBSs, the NFA is more than these things. I think I can convince a gun control type to give up these largely meaningless restrictions for things that could at least arguably save lives. How many people have been killed with SBRs and SBSs or suppressors in our lifetime? And what could you really do to restrict criminal access to a hacksaw to shorten the barrel of a shotgun or rifle.
Sure there is. We do it at the end of every war.
I understand your position of not negotiating. Everything is going your way so why should you negotiate anything anyway? I’m not arguing about relative negotiating power.
You’re dismissing out of hand the challenges to your position. You think that the fact that registries can assist gun bans does not make a difference. We disagree. You assume grandfathering - based on what? You cling to the federal vs. state distinction, and I have repeatedly said that it is meaningless to the person in a state that enacts bans. Right now there is a proposed ballot initiative to confiscate ALL magazines that can hold more than 10 rounds in CA. No grandfathering. Does it matter that this is *only *happening in the most populous state in the union and not at the federal level?
So other than relying on the federal definition, how is it connected? Sure CA could come up with their own interpretation independent of the federal NFA. Do you think the existence of the NFA makes that more likely, less likely, or the same? I think it’s obvious that the existence of the NFA makes bans in places like CA more likely. It normalizes the idea of a ban.
This is baffling to me that you wouldn’t follow this. I think it’s clear that if gun control advocates are successful in some matters, it increases their influence which incrementally makes other future success more likely. Your rationale is nearly completely baseless as the latest pushes for universal background checks are largely in response to mass shooting committed by…people who passed background checks. The proposed actions by gun control advocates in response to various events are not in any way connected to the events they are trying to prevent. And you think this means that the problem(s) would be addressed? Not even close. It will make no impact, burden law abiding people, be abused, and then when it is clear the law is ineffective, additional things will be pushed because, “we have to do something!” It makes perfect sense to resist any and all potential successes by gun control advocates in efforts to marginalize and reduce their influence.
So what? So registration makes it incrementally easier to confiscate. You don’t think that’s a big deal. We disagree. Gun confiscation may be politically infeasible now, but it may not be in the future. Again you bring up the federal vs. state distinction that is meaningless, but even so, I do not share your confidence. I think there is a real possibility that Hillary gets elected, SCOTUS balance changes, then CA is fucking done and can be written off for 50 years. Other states would have their own state level protections, but it’s a real issue. Making every single politician who even thinks about gun control pay with their jobs may help to tip the scales.
Again, your conclusion that there would not be a change in momentum is unsupported. There is no basis to make this assumption. Your reading of the article is fine though - and it should answer your above question about accruing influence.
I’ve never said that it did, in any meaningful sense. I do think that it incrementally increases the possibility.
Exactly. There is no point to discussing registration because it will never be supported. Other policy proposals at the margins are fine. Registration is the nuclear option.
You started by questioning the perceived cost as being incorrect. This has EVERYTHING to do with the value placed on those costs. Unless you think the cost is exactly zero, which you admit it is not, then it is all about the perception of those costs and what the value of the costs are. Saying that it has nothing to do with the value that I place on the costs does not reconcile with your earlier challenge about the correctness of perceived costs.
Legislation and litigation. I want the ability to carry. At some point the question of carry will be litigated and it will be decided. It is already the law of the land in what, 41 states? Once that gets successfully litigated, move on to the next issue and the next.
My position includes federal pre-emption. So with that in mind…
Doesn’t matter with federal pre-emption. California’s laws are pre-empted and they get overturned.
But in what way does the NFA contribute to a magazine ban in California?
I think the notion that a ban on machine guns at the federal level somehow encourages or emboldens gun control folks to try and ban other guns is hard to reconcile with the facts. California would try to ban guns no matter what. If the federal government had NO gun regulations I don’t think California’s gun laws would be any weaker.
Did the gun control advocates become more influential and successful after the NFA? The Brady bill? The AWB?
Or did these regulations activate and mobilize the gun rights side? Do you remember the Cincinnati revolution? Do you remember the events leading up to it? It was the passage of gun control.
It is pretty myopic to think that you can only pass gun control that directly affects the particular event that brings attention to gun control. The GCA was passed after the assassination of MLK and RFK. How would the CGA have prevented those assassinations? Sandy Hook merely focused attention on gun control generally, I don’t think anyone thinks we can implement policies consistent with the constitution that would eliminate those remote events.
First of all, I don’t think it is possible to appease gun control advocates, they will keep asking for more restrictions until we live in a Mexican style environment where civilians are severely restricted and the criminals are not. Then they will continue to blame the pea shooters left in civilian hands for all the gun violence.
Not all gun laws are ineffective just the ones being proposed by gun control advocates these days. Do you think that NICS and prohibited persons is ineffective in reducing gun violence? Would you repeal these gun laws and just let gun stores put guns on the shelf and only check purchasers for ID like guns were alcohol or cigarettes?
There is such a thing as an effective gun control law. Your main problem with licensing and registration doesn’t seem to be its efficacy. Your main problem seems to be that it will somehow embolden the gun control advocates to ask for things that ARE ineffective and burdensome. You just don’t think the trade off is worth it, not that it wouldn’t reduce gun violence.
No it won’t. Not in any America that we would recognize.
YES!!! That is exactly why we will never have federal gun confiscation. Politicians in moderate purple states simply cannot support it, they would lose their jobs at the very next election and the law would get repealed the very next congress. If we ever get to the point where they confiscate guns at the federal level, things will have been moving in that direction or a very long time.
You want to get rid of bad gun laws in California? Nothing short of pre-emption is going to get your there, California will have as many gun laws as they can get away with.
My assumption is about as well supported as yours.
I think that being the sane person in the room helps you accrue influence. It gives you credibility.
So the increased risk isn’t meaningful but you will oppose it because all gun control must be opposed? Or because even this meaningless increase must be opposed no matter what benefits might accrue?
So wait, registration is the worst thing you can imagine? Not confiscation? Not a total gun ban at state levels across the country?
Registration is supported by plenty of folks. The main problem is that neither side is willing to give up meaningless stuff to get meaningful benefits.
One reason registration is so vigorously opposed by the folks at the ILWA is because Universal background Checks are the front line of the gun control debate and universal background checks do in fact greatly increase the chances of registration, its not inevitable but it paves the road. It is the most rational and likely of the large gun control policies that could get implemented. Who gives a shit about banning assault weapons or magazines, it is so easy to make those things look stupid that it only hurts the gun control side to propose it. The only places where pushing that sort of thing won’t hurt you is where politicians are tripping over themselves to implement more and more onerous forms of gun control because the jurisdiction is full of low information voters who have a negative visceral reaction to guns.
The cost to society is objective not subjective, we may differ on what those costs are but it is clear that they are minimal.
If your argument is based on the fact that you personally would be upset at the increased perceived risk (regardless of actual increase in risks) of confiscation, then I don’t know what to say. We don’t make policy arguments based on how you personally feel about things. We generally talk about them at a societal level.
I agree that we will eventually be enforcing the right to “bear arms” so then why do you think a national carry license would be unacceptable to the gun control side? Are they so stupid that they cannot see how likely this is?
And what of the benefits of licensing and registration? How are those already in place or inevitable.
I understand that the gun control side will hate the idea of pre-emption but they need to get used to the idea that gun control is not a one way ratchet if they want to get anything done.
Federal preemption? That is fantasy land. We may see nation wide reciprocity, but I think I have a better chance at playing in the NBA than preemption passing. And I can’t dribble very well. No one is pushing for this, it’s not even a figment of an idea among anyone with influence. You envision some grand bargain where meaningful trades are made - where congress has legitimate discussions about impacting the country’s credit rating instead of authorizing borrowing to fund spending they’ve already authorized. Right.
It doesn’t - that’s a separate point to respond to the idea of state level bans.
Considering Heller, McDonald, and the rise of Shall Issue is fairly recent, I would say that gun control got pretty influential for some time, and in some places more than others. And I do not remember the Cincinnati revolution. Before my time. I did read about it.
I think of it like a group of people from Saudi Arabia trained by groups in Afghanistan and lead by a leader in Afghanistan who attack the US, then we decide to invade Iraq. It’s not myopic to question the motives of proposals ostensibley in response to particular events that would have no impact on said events. It makes people who push those measures seem insincere, at best.
If the “do something, anything” movement is allowed to succeed, who knows what random thing they’ll focus their attention on next. It’s best to shut those people down.
This is not too far off the mark. I think it would incrementally reduce some gun violence. On balance, I’m not so sure.
Did you forget that we’ve already had confiscation, and there is a proposal to confiscate millions of magazines in CA right now? It’s called the People’s Republik of Kommifornia.
This doesn’t hold up to scrutiny. The AWB didn’t get repealed, it sunsetted. I still can’t purchase certain firearms based on their color. Most of the Bay Area can’t purchase ammo in the mail. I can’t purchase a standard capacity magazine. It’s not ONLY about confiscation. There are lots of other bad laws that get passed, and are not repealed. Confiscation is terrible, yes. But all those other laws, those are bad too. My point is that the distinction you draw between federal and state is meaningless to the person who is subject to a draconian state.
Not true. Silvestri in CA was won in the courts. Peruta is making its way through the courts. The 10 day waiting period for certain folks was defeated in the courts. Shit, the ban on restrictive carry in Chicago of all places was defeated in the courts. You don’t need federal preemption for that, just judges enforcing the constitution. All of this could go south in the courts as well.
Not quite. You are assuming there would be no change in momentum. I am not making the counter assumption. I am merely saying the possibility exists. That’s enough to oppose.
Those are valid reasons, but they do not comprise the totality of reasons. Those alone are sufficient, however.
You’re losing the train of this tangent. My argument is not solely based on my personal response, however you originally questioned the value I place on various costs and said that value could be incorrect. That’s not possible, definitionally because marginal utility is by definition subjective. If you like chocolate ice cream more than vanilla, but you like all ice cream, it is up to no one but yourself to decide how much vanilla you would be willing to give up in order to get chocolate. For some, a 1:1 trade may be worth it. For others, 5:1. For even others, no amount of vanilla is worth giving up chocolate. None of these choices are wrong.
Your attempt to characterize misplaced values on various societal costs and benefits isn’t useful. And yes, we don’t make policy based on individual sentiment - but we do on the aggregation of individual votes.
It’s always going to be unacceptable. But through the courts, I am hoping that it won’t make a difference what they think. And if that doesn’t work, attach national reciprocity to a debt ceiling increase or some other must pass bill.
CA already has it. Other states too. But I wasn’t referring to those things when I said they are already the law of the land. And I don’t much care for the alleged benefits either - they are like vanilla.
Because past behavior would lead you to that conclusion? That’s another unicorn.
Sounds about right. But remember, there are a number of dudes in prison who were law abiding until they snapped and killed someone. Obviously felons have to get their guns illegally, and repeat offenders fill the prisons more than any other.
Federal pre-emption is FAR more likely than federal confiscation.
I can point to several areas of federal pre-emption that were not popular with one party or the other. Confiscation at the federal level on the other hand, hasn’t happened.
But assuming federal pre-emption is impossible, is there anything that you think IS possible that you would trade for registration?
Congress will not always be dysfunctional. National reciprocity (or something of similar effect) might be forced on the states by the courts. Once the courts establish a standard of review, I envision all gun laws being measured against this standard. If it is intermediate scrutiny, I can imagine most gun laws just evaporating. In light of this, federal pre-emption might not look so bad to gun control folks. And frankly, if they keep going the way they are, people are just going to start ignoring them.
I’m sorry, I thought you were saying that the federal registry somehow contributed to the California confiscation. So federal registration had nothing to do with the California confiscation, right?
Maybe there is a generational gap. When I was younger, guns were not as partisan an issue as they are today. I think part of it has to do with unions. A lot of union guys were into guns and hunting and they always voted Democrat.
The Cincinnati revolution was in response to the NRA’s response to the Gun Control Act. The GCA (as I’m sure you know, but for the benefit of other, I will describe) was passed in the wake of the assassination of MLK and RFK. It mandated the licensing of firearms dealers (JFK had been assassinated with a mail order gun) and, prohibited the sale of firearms to Prohibited Persons by firearms dealers. At the time the President LBJ had tried to pass licensing and registration but he got shot by friendly fire from gun control nuts that tried to ban all sorts of guns, gun bans were as obviously stupid back then as they are today and the senator lost his seat in the next election for being too stupid, even for Washington.
The folks that took over the NRA were fired up because firearms dealers were forced to get a license and prohibited persons were no longer potential customers. That’s is who staged a coup of the NRA with a small cadre of NRA members, and then made it very difficult to change leadership after that by staggering the terms of the board members.
So if the Cayuhoga River catches fire and we pass the clean water act (most of which had little to do with what led to the Cayuhoga river catching fire), is that insincere? Sandy hook focused the nation’s attention on guns, not just guns wielded by crazy people who shoot little children in their classrooms.
If we go out there and tell people that gun registration would have prevented Sandy Hook and that anyone that opposes gun control want little children to die, THEN its kinda like the way they sold Iraq.
I think its best to ignore them and pass laws and policies that we want to pass regardless of what those whackdoodles think. Licensing and registration is not a “do something, anything” proposal.
Everything is incremental. Licensing and registration would not ELIMINATE gun violence, nothing will.
Once again, not at the federal level. Any proposal of a gun registry would have to include HIPAA type confidentiality provisions (even the ACLU would support that and they are not exactly friends of gun owners, not because there is anything about gun ownership that runs counter to the ACLU mission but for the same reasons that the NRA seems to have a position on taxes, religion, unions, immigration, etc.).
The AWB was not confiscation. We have had bans on other things like machine guns too. I don’t argue that this is impossible but I do argue that any ban that included confiscation of already existing weapons would fail miserably. And as I pointed out earlier, if there is political will for a ban on some type of firearm, they don’t need a registry to do it.
And what does any of that have to do with licensing and registration? Shitty gun laws is one of the costs of living in California. Its almost seems like you are letting your frustration at shitty California gun laws make you oppose sensible gun laws at the federal level without explaining how those federal gun laws are going to lead to even shitter California gun laws.
In what way does registration leave you worse off? In what way does it leave any of the folks living in states like California worse off? If there were absolutely no federal level gun laws, there would STILL be a shitload of stupid gun laws in places like California. The only chance you’ve got is to get relief at the federal level. The ONLY chance.
The federal laws don’t harm you very much when you live in California. In what way would registration at the federal level harm a California gun owner? Historically, federal regulation and the courts are the only way that citizens have gotten relief from abuses by the states.
You miss my meaning, California will always have as many guns laws as they can get away with. If one law gets overturned, they will pass another one. They are not going to give up.
I am not assuming momentum cannot change under any circumstance. I am assuming that the passage of a compromise that includes licensing and registration would not change momentum.
You are assuming that there is some realistic possibility of confiscation at the federal level (and I think you are admitting that the chances of confiscation at the federal level are probably very remote) because it happened in a state like California.
I just don’t understand why some gun control folks think I am more extreme than you are.
I was questioning your ability to measure the societal cost correctly, not how these things made you feel.
Societal costs can be objectively measured. I thought you were saying that the objective cost of registration was much greater than the objective benefits of registration.
The gun control folks might be ignorant about guns but I don’t know if they are universally stupid. I don’t think national reciprocity gets passed on a debt ceiling increase any more than defunding planned parenthood. The debt ceiling increase “might” get some budget issue attached to it but not a gun rights issue.
Registration doesn’t work at the state level. It requires the cooperation of criminals to work at the state level. it doesn’t require the cooperation of criminals to work at the federal level.
Like vanilla?
A few decades of one way ratchets going the other way ought to do the trick. Things have been sliding in our direction on almost all fronts for over 10 years.
If your rebuttal to my proposal is that the law won’t get past the Democrats, then we might as well eliminate all debates on abortion and half a dozen other topics.
Sounds about right. But remember, there are a number of dudes in prison who were law abiding until they snapped and killed someone.
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Sure, but it’s a rather small number.
Do you think our current environment where gun control advocates have focused their attention lately on universal background checks is more like your first paragraph, or your second?
First, you can’t ignore a group that wields the level of influence that gun control advocates possess. Second, I agree, licensing and registration is not a do something, anything proposal.
I have experience first hand at the lengths that gun control advocates will go if they are left unchallenged. The whole, ‘first they came for…’ line of thought. I don’t concede that the laws you propose are sensible. They don’t need to lead to shittier laws in CA - CA is an example by itself of how shitty laws can get. It’s an abject lesson in what is possible when the camel is able to stick its nose under the tent.
Registration doesn’t leave anyone in CA worse off, we already have universal background checks and registration. Increased restrictions at the federal level have indirect impacts by influencing sentiment across the country. And we do have a chance through the courts. Pertua was won in the 9th circuit before it went en banc.
Sure - and with every court loss gun rights litigators get paid. I would love to see every single city with crappy gun laws from SF to NY go bankrupt defending against a steamroller of lawsuits until they finally realize it’s not worth it to be in favor of gun control.
Well, it’s not a competition. I suspect because I am only interested in dealing with pragmatic possible outcomes. Fanciful things like legalizing full auto, constitutional conventions, etc. are in the realm of never. Same thing with registration. You push the idea, and each time it puts you further out of the realm of possibility.
I think we disagree here. I don’t think costs that costs are non-quantifiable have an objective measure. People and society have different risk tolerances and there is no correct way to measure this.
What’s to say that reciprocity can’t be included? The thing is, reciprocity is much closer to the realm of possibility (though still low) since there has been legislation already introduced that did not pass.
In addition, there was the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009 (H.R. 627) that included provisions authorizing concealed carry in national parks. It’s not out of the question to think that gun friendly laws can be crafted and forced through must pass legislation.
See the example about how much vanilla it would take to give up chocolate.
It’s not that it wont get past Democrats, it wont get past Republicans either. And I do think it’s wise to eliminate or reduce debates (at the legislative level, not on this board) that have no chance of being successful. At the legislative level it’s not a matter of theory but one of pragmatism.
While this is informative, an arrest record does not make a person a prohibited, or tell us if they were convicted.
Forgot about this part. Short answer, no. Registration is the nuclear option and would need a similar size concession.
Longer answer - no single thing would make registration worth while that would not also make registration impossible. Strict scrutiny for gun laws? That would be able to be used to strike down registration.
I don’t think that people are being tricked into thinking that universal background checks are going to stop mass shootings but I do think that there is a “do something do anything” sentiment out there that is largely handwaving hysteria. Anything that comes from that hysteria is likely to be ineffective or unconstitutional.
How much influence could they have that they couldn’t even get Manchin/Toomey passed? I agree that influences waxes and wanes and one day they may have more influence but they will never have enough influence to enact a federal confiscation of guns.
The camel’s nose? Are you kidding? Guns are already heavily regulated, the camel has been living in the tent for a while now and America hasn’t turned into California. California is an object lesson of what happens when you let California regulate guns, nothing more.
I don’t really buy into the whole laws as psychological warfare theory but even if I did, it would not apply to compromises where both sides walk away with something that they value that the other side values a bit less.
Bankruptcy is not possible. There are no damages in these lawsuits. It just means that a couple of lawyers in the state attorney general’s office are on perpetual “defending gun laws” duty.
I think its because you have the discipline to just ignore them.
As an extreme example, the polio vaccine imposes a risk on people that might not otherwise be subjected to a risk of polio. Regardless of how you feel about your personal exposure, there is a clear objective benefit to universal application of the polio vaccine. Now the benefits of licensing and registration are all theoretical and cannot be proven to the same degree of certainty as the polio vaccine but I think it is pretty clear that the benefit of licensing and registration are greater than the admittedly remote possibility of gun confiscation. If we can get rid of some of the stupider gun laws in the process, I don’t see why it shouldn’t work.
I did not know. This is pretty egregious.
I think reciprocity is about as likely as a national licensing scheme. If I were a state like California, I would prefer a national standard over granting reciprocity to a state where there are no standards for receiving a carry license.
OK I am familiar with the analogy.
At the legislative level, there is no telling what can happen. Sandy Hook was probably the singular most likely event to spur some form of gun regulation. If the gun control crowd hadn’t dropped the ball and had gone for universal background checks back then, I think they could have gotten it and universal background checks are in fact on a slippery slope towards licensing and registration.
BJS stats show that ~40% of murders are committed by felons. It is likely that a higher percentage of gun murders are committed by felons. This is just felons and does not include any other type of prohibited person or juvenile.
A lot of them fall into other categories of prohibited person (wifebeaters, people with restraining orders, people under indictment for felony, illegal aliens, etc.).
And wouldn’t it be nice to reduce murders by 66% or even 33%? Its not like we are going to get the number down to zero.
A lot of bad gun laws can exist without them being unconstitutional. The limits of the constitution are not a sufficient shield against poor gun laws. And I do think people are being mislead to believe that universal background checks are going to reduce mass shootings. Just like I think people were mislead about invading Iraq. The conflation of the ideas is too frequent and too deliberate to not be misleading. Not to everyone, but to a non-insignificant amount of people.
Did you know that after Heller, DC in its attempt to comply with the ruling adopted new laws that…you guessed it were taken not only verbatim from CA, but referenced the CA laws. Of course, the handgun that Heller tried to register wasn’t on that list so they had to revise it later, but the currentDC law still references the CA listof not unsafe handguns.
Again - there are zero compromises being proffered.
First off, those lawyers cost money. The resources of local governments are not unlimited, and in small jurisdictions, they may not have the resources to defend a barrage of lawsuits. That is one path to success. Second, while there may not be traditional damages, there are awards of attorney fees. Do you think Brady is doing a happy dance that they lost their Lucky Gunner suitand either they or their client had to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars? Did DC enjoy paying over $1M to Gura and company after losing? Did Chicago enjoy paying $1.8M after losing McDonald? DC and Chicago may be able to milk their residents in taxes to cover these costs, but smaller local governments probably don’t have the resources to support multi year litigation and pay if they lose.
Under threat of lawsuit in CA, the county of Sacramento went from being a no-issue county to a shall issue county. This was done in part because at the time, Sacramento County was facing steep budget problems and determined that it was not worth fighting pending litigation. The capital of CA is now a shall issue county.
So yes, bankruptcy is not always possible, but resources are limited and targeted litigation can have a big impact, either by making them change their laws, or making them pay. Then come election time, the voters can decide if it’s worth sacrificing other city resources to defend against what I would hope is a continual and constant onslaught of litigation.
I accept this is your view. I don’t share it.
Why? Reciprocity has been proposed as legislation multiple times in the recent past. A national licensing scheme has not. And CA will go shall issue once reciprocity is in place. No way would the citizens and legislators of CA be okay that visitors would be able to carry and their own residents would not.
There is no telling what can happen - except you think bans or confiscation is impossible. That does not reconcile. There is no telling what can happen, or what will be the catalyst for more bad things. That’s why all restrictions should be opposed.
But hey, open up NICS to the public and then require everyone to use it when selling, then we get universal background checks. Too bad that’s not what gun control advocates really want - but simply saying they want to track every gun to every person is not politically viable. Make licensing for the person, not the firearm. But I don’t think that’s what gun control advocates want either. I show a license, I can buy a gun, cash and carry. I’d be fine with that. It’s when proposals that would accomplish the stated goals are rejected, and only stricter measures are supported does it reveal what the true intentions of gun control advocates are. As long as people like Hillary, Bloomberg, Feinstein are involved there will be no compromise.
That’s why I said it would result in ineffective OR unconstitutional gun laws.
The level of deception, to the extent it exists, is not anywhere near the scale of of linking 9/11 to Saddam Hussein. There is a lot more ignorance on gun issues from the anti-gun crowd but these people also don’t care enough to make it a top 10 priority either.
Yeah, I live here. When the council first took up gun control after Heller they were contemplating only permitting revolvers (because they thought revolvers would be safer or something:smack::smack::smack:).
By either side.
Someone has to make the first move and frankly the gun control side doesn’t know enough to know what is good for them. The gun rights side knows much more about the effects and consequences and they can craft a more effective scheme. For example, despite your resistance to licensing and registration, you realize that it can be effective at reducing criminal access to guns, you just don’t like the tradeoff. When I first suggested it on this board, the gun control side was jumping down my throat for not supporting something as awesome as an assault weapons ban and trying to push this ineffective licensing and registration scheme. They simply don’t know enough to know what is good for them.
Lawyers don’t cost enough money to make a difference. The worst gun laws are passed either by large cities or by states.
Inapposite. There is a difference between filing a frivolous lawsuit (or nuisance suit) and passing a law through the legislative process.
Loser pay rules work both ways don’t they?
Some parts of what I am saying is not entirely a matter of opinion. The theoretical efficacy of licensing and registration and the remote (or extremely remote possibility of federal gun confiscation are not entirely matters of opinion.
California would rather have a national standard than have everyone in the country abide by the Utah or Wyoming standard.
That doesn’t make sense.
You are saying that when a sandy hook type event happens, anything can happen legislatively, so we should oppose everything now?
And how would you know if the required background check occurred? Are we keeping records? Isn’t that a registry?
A) they don’t know what they want. They just want something, anything.
B) licensing is for the person not the firearm. registration is for the firearm.
They are not kings, frankly I don’t think they have any credibility anymore. We don’t dismiss the notion of spending cuts because there are guys out there that want to cut the federal budget down to zero.
