Fine. I won’t make such comments in Great Debates.
Khrist. Drunk vs High drunk wins. I may be a cock, but At least I know where I’m posting! Even the the mods? WTF? 
Or in Elections. :rolleyes:
Who said this law was supposed to be a panacea? That’s impossible without an amendment to the Constitution, which we all know isn’t going to happen. Short of that, all we can do is to try to improve the situation incrementally, a little bit at a time.
That’s exactly what I said. That “improvement” in they eyes of the Bloombergs and Bradys is absolute, total and complete civilian disarmament. They don’t want anyone to have any firearms whatsoever. None.
And they are moving towards that goal a little bit at a time. Incrementally.
And these little laws are perfect for them. They don’t actually affect the criminal element so they can move forward with more infringing laws. And they work to make it harder for legit people to get guns. And they trip up otherwise law abiding citizens who made a mistake and get turned into a prohibited person.
I don’t intend to convince an anti. I intend to convince a pro-gun person who gets fooled into supporting these laws from time to time.
The problem with your stance is that nothing you suggest will ever improve the situation. That’s not your goal, your goal is to get as many guns as possible into the hands of as many people as possible, with no repercussion when abused, with no accountability.
Excuse me if I skip over shit plans like that and actually try to hold those responsible for crimes accountable.
The goal is not complete disarmament of the entire civilian population. The goal is complete disarmament of those who should not have guns, such as people who use them irresponsibly or maliciously. Disarmament of others, if it happens, is a side effect.
And “we shouldn’t have this law because criminals will just break the law anyway” is an argument that can be made against any law at all, and it is in all cases a terrible argument.
One more time: do you oppose all background checks? As in, there should be none at all for any firearm purchases?
Sorry but my observation is that is precisely the goal. Especially by those like Bloomberg who bank rolls these campaigns. Enough people who don’t think that’s the goal get fooled into supporting things like this.
Is that a stated goal by Bloomberg et al. or just pro gun rights propaganda?
If it’s illegal to sell firearms to convicted felons, how can that be determined without background checks?
Frankly, none of these kinds of laws go far enough. Strict licensing and severe penalties for unregistered weapons is the only logical solution. Also, we need a mechanism to keep guns away from paranoid schizophrenics and other mentally ill people.
If someone is so dangerous then why are they free?
Before someone brings up the Nazis I’ll tell you what: Just give me my 10 years. In 10 years show me data that this law lead to significant reductions in gun related crimes in Washington State. In fact, forget significant. Show me moderate and I’ll concede the arguement.
Because it is not a crime to be mentally ill. Just like law abiding gun owners who suddenly become criminals and shoot the innocent. If you think we should lock up the former, then we can lock up the latter.
You’re joking, right? You can’t possibly think that there aren’t dangerous people walking about free. In parts of this state, the prisoners have been let out because the counties can’t afford to keep them locked up and the local populace refuses to pass any tax increases.
How about if it prevents one death or one assault? Or is that not significant to you? What if the death is your loved one; does it become significant to you then?
It would be foolish to argue against something when only looking at either the cost or the benefits, and not both in combination. A law that prevents one death is not effective if it causes 2 more.
The law is not bad only because it will not be effective as pkbites writes, but because it will not accomplish the goal of reducing gun violence and will also impact otherwise law abiding folks negatively.
And in other news, Washington State is now being sued by the SAF among others and seeking an injunction against enforcement of I-594.
The SAF picks their plaintiffs very well I must say. Non-residents of the state enjoy the same second amendment rights to self defense as residents. To borrow a firearm in WA after I-594, a background check is required at an FFL. Under I-594, FFLs cannot transfer firearms to non-residents. This means that visitors traveling to WA that do not bring their own firearms are completely prohibited from exercising their second amendment right to self defense. And that’s just one prong of the suit. If you are flying in, the airline handles the firearm during transit. Under I-594, the airline cannot return the firearm to its owner without an FFL performing the check, and as above, the FFL is prohibited from executing the transfer to a non-resident.
Great job indeed, spend taxpayer money passing, defending, and scuttling a useless law! I’m sure the lawyers will be grateful for the fees.
A bald statement based upon your opinion does not make it a fact. You (and I) have absolutely no way of knowing whether or not it will be effective, nor what goals it may or may not accomplish. To oppose legislation based on a supposition is just foolishness in the extreme.
:rolleyes:
Every law is either supported or opposed based on supposition. :smack:
Given that it is the subject of litigation if it is stricken it will not be effective. I oppose this law not necessarily based on the effectiveness or lack thereof, but because it is poorly written, and violates the constitution as the claim made by SAF outlines.
I don’t have a problem in theory with background checks, but a lot depends on their implementation.
The first question I’d ask is, how easy is it for a private citizen to get a background check done on another citizen? How long is the wait, how much hassle is there, and how much does it cost? If these barriers are high, I can see the courts slapping down the law. If I own a .22 rifle worth $50, but I can’t sell it without taking up hours of my and the buyer’s time and I have to pay $75 for the background check, then the law has made that gun unsaleable.
If a poor person wants to buy a $100 gun for self-defense, but the background check is $100, that just doubled the cost of the gun and perhaps put it out of reach of that person. So there’s a disparate impact argument that could be made as well.
It also seems that the law makes it illegal for a potential buyer to handle the gun or test-fire it before making the decision to buy, since you can’t give control over to a non-family member even temporarily without getting the background check first. That could have an impact on the value of used guns.
The problem arises when the background check is used as a backdoor method to impose actual limiits on purchase. For example, if a law mandates a background check, but doesn’t provide additional funding to the agencies required to do it, it might result in background checks that take 6 months to process. If that’s the real goal of the law - to put hurdles in front of law-abiding citizsens to discourage them from buying the gun in the first place, I think the courts could easily find that unconstitutional, even if the concept of a background check is not. At the very least, the court could mandate that background checks be made available within a reasonable time for a nominal fee.
Does the background check have to be done for each gun sale? If I buy a gun tomorrow and go through the background check hassle, and then I want to buy another gun next month, do I have to do it all over again? If so, that sounds pretty onerous. Even here in Canada you only have to do it once - get your firearms acquisition license, and you can buy any non-restricted gun you want, with no delay, by simply showing your card to the seller.
I noticed that this law was opposed by rank-and-file police in Washington, as well as by the Washington Council of Police and Sheriffs. They say it’s an unfunded mandate that will take police resources away from other, more important problems, and that it won’t do any good in the first place.
Finally, I have to note that Democrats are always complaining about big donors corrupting politics (i.e. the Koch Brothers and others). Yet the funding disclosure for this initiative shows that three billionaires alone (Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer, and Paul Allen) contributed 6-7 times as much money as the entire funding on the ‘no’ side. And that the amount of money spent by the ‘yes’ side was about 10X greater than the ‘No’ side. So is billionaire money in politics a good thing or not?
It’s a bad thing. But until there is comprehensive campaign funding legislation that withstands judicial review, you don’t expect liberals to disarm unilaterally, do you?
Seems like a bit of a self-contradictory argument; that the background checks should be cheap, and yet have a large, qualified agency to make them fast, too. Someone has to run the checks, and maintain the data that they depend on, and those people will want to get paid. What if the true cost, in staffing, equipment, and overhead, to process a background check is $100; is it fair to pass that cost on to the buyer, or is it an onerous burden that should invalidate the law?