That’s beyond the scope of this thread, it doesn’t relate to the political implications of the current situation. I already went off topic by pointing out your presumably hypocrisy. (That is - you’d be a hypocrite if you’re secretly hoping that one ban leads to others, if you’re also one of those people who tell gun rights advocates that there’s no gradual attempt to erode their freedoms piece by piece or that they’re being paranoid or using a slippery slope argument).
There are two nationwide polls out this week showing a large majority of Americans favor increasing restrictions on semi-automatic rifles and large capacity magazines.
What remains to be seen? Just like on gay marriage, abortion, taxes, health care and immigration, the Republicans on the wrong side again.
… and, on all of those things, there were just as many people solidly confident that they’d never happen as there are today on this aspect of continuing to civilize our society. You can pretty much always be sure that such an assured assertion is flatly wrong; it’s just a matter of time.
SenorBeef, if you want to know what I want done, you don’t need to use your imagination. If you’re interested only in what is politically feasible, or can be made to be feasible, then what people think about it, what they define the problem to be, and what they want to do about it is pretty much the damn point, ain’t it? So, to ask again, since your interest otherwise appears to be in preventing any real change: What is the problem you, and people who think like you, are defining - or are you satisfied/resigned/whatever that the status quo is the best we can do?
Has ElvisL1ves actually said “don’t argue the slippery slope?”
I can think of at least two things wrong with this premise. One is that you’re proposing something that actually can’t be done. This is sort of a variant on the ‘they laughed at Galileo but they also laughed at Bozo the Clown’ argument. Yes, you look stupid if you say something is impossible and you’re wrong. If you’re right and it’s impossible, it’s not as bad. I’m fairly confident this is the second one because of the Second Amendment and the fact that people here own scores of millions of guns. The second thing is that I don’t much care if I’m part of the solution (and I care even less if you think I am part of that solution): I’d support sensible new gun control laws and I think the current state of affairs is ludicrous, but I’m not opposed to private gun ownership. I don’t think it’s any kind of a defense against tyranny and yada yada and I think in many cases gun owners have a skewed idea of the risks of owning a firearm, but the contrary idea - that you can’t be trusted to own a gun unless you’ve joined the army or the police force (because they’re all above reproach) makes no sense.
Presumable hypocrisy? Is that anything like not being a hypocrite?
This, 1000%. There are lots of Democratic voters who would stop voting Democratic if very restrictive gun control legislation becomes a part of the Democratic Party platform. They wouldn’t all vote Republican (some might vote for various third parties, others might just not vote at all), but they would NOT vote Democratic. And given the Republican stand on many social issues, that would be a disaster (at least from my perspective).
Obama’s executive orders look pretty mild, and I don’t think they will pose a problem - but if the Democratic Party decides to try to pass Feinstein’s Assault Weapon Ban, I think things will be different.
Yeah, that’s the thing, I didn’t want to go digging through old friends to find the specific post, so that’s why I said it that way. Maybe he hasn’t.
But certainly as a whole, the gun control side dismisses concerns that setting precedents like that will lead to more bans in the future. And invariably people will scream “slippery slope! sloppery slope!”.
The reality is that while not every gun control advocate wants a total ban, many do. But they know it’s obviously not feasible to enact. So their attitude is to ban any guns they can for any reason they can, whenever it becomes politically possible. They would ban all blue guns if they could. They’d ban all guns made on a tuesday if they could. They’d ban all guns whose model name start with the letter L if they could.
This is what assault weapons bans feel like. They scare the ignorant public who have been lied to about the capability, prevalence, and danger these guns possess. They elicit enough of a reaction that you can get support for banning them. It doesn’t matter that they’re used in a negligible amount of crimes. Any bans you can get the public on your side for are desirable.
So at the same time, they know their ultimate goal is to chip away where they can, and they’ll mock the other side for failing to compromise. But when the other side raises objections, that this is just a stepping stone and a precedent for further restrictions, they’ll mock them as if that were a ridiculous thought.
I totally disagree. It would have happened in a world where the AWB didn’t exist.
And that’s the essential political calculation that the administration is making. Correctly, I think.
In another thread I likened Newtown to Stonewall. It marks the point politically and culturally at which people started fighting back. Gun rights advocates have overplayed their hand by claiming that any attempt at any control is the start of a federal gun grab. The majority of people have never believed this - quite rightly, because it’s insane - but a passionate minority always wins over an indifferent majority. The majority has demonstrably become less indifferent. Whether this translates into a real movement at this time is less clear, but politically Obama had to make a dramatic statement to placate them. That a “dramatic” statement consists of a tiny, almost imperceptible, step proves the strength of advocates but also infuriates those who have been calling out for more for years.
Keeping things as they are has stopped being any option. From now on you’re the same as those who spent 40 years trying to block every attempt that might put the gay community into the ranks of humanity. You’ve started to look bad, and each extreme statement and opposition to change will make you look worse. That’s the political landscape Obama is reading. I think he’s handled it well so far. But I agree Congress sees the world differently.
Why stop there? Surely gun ownership is at least as bad as slavery.
It’s nonsense that the status quo stopped being an option. One guy snapped and killed some people. That happens several times every day around the world. It’s not some grand change in the universe that changed the fundamental rules of nature and civilization. Things are consistently getting better. More guns, less gun homicides every year. Saying that one incident Changes Everything was how we got a whole lot of bad shit going after 9/11. There was a big emotional hysteria, and a government was allowed to run roughshod to do what they’d always wanted to do but took a moment of hysteria to push past the public. Nothing has really changed. It’s just capitalizing on an emotional reaction.
Not quite. I said:
Times change. Slave owners were acting within their rights at the time and honestly didn’t see the immorality of it. Just like gun owners of today. I didn’t equate the two or indicate that one was any worse than the other, that was your inference. I leave the judgment of who is worse to future historians.
You (gun owners) are reaping the fruits of your own stubbornness. Rather than come to the table with proposals that make sense to you, you stamp your feet like petulant children, plug your ears, and stammer that you aren’t going to sacrifice one thing for the public safety.
I see. So the whole push for gun regulation and control, that’s really a lot like Bush and the war on Iraq. I dunno if that’s a worse analogy than the “slavery” thing that has you so upset. But I betcha that if somebody were to point it out every time they post, as if it were a telling insight, it would get on your nerves. Pretty darn quick, I’m thinking.
Are you saying that rational reactions create change? If that were true than stopping additional global warming would be our overwhelming number one priority. But what changed that conversation was Sandy hitting New York. Weather happens every day. Storms, hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards. But rational people screaming about the situation for years didn’t make a dent. Sandy made people hysterical and hysterical people demand change.
Yes, it’s true that sometimes the hysteria is misplaced and 9/11 was absolutely an example. But this is different. A small terrorist threat existed before and the same small terrorist threat existed after. The new measures were not sensible and in fact they are no longer taken very seriously although nobody could survive politically removing them.
Guns were a threat, are a threat, and will be a threat. Rational people have been demanding change for years. This emotional reaction gives them the opportunity, just as has happened a million times before. The way to bet - over the long term - is for lasting change.
That’s why this change in emotional is so threatening to you. For years opposition to the tiniest steps could easily be brushed off. This can’t. This isn’t going away. There will be a series of tiny steps. Insufficient, inadequate, over bureaucratized, too late, but steps. And the greater the opposition the faster they will happen. The smart move would be to get in front and them and offer some tiny steps first. That won’t happen because gun advocates have stormed the walls of never. And that will be disaster.
I think there has been some key misanalysis here.
Firstly, the GOP won in 1994 primarily because they crafted a very good platform that articulate ideals with wide appeal to the American electorate and campaigned vigorously on it. As someone said upthread, articulating ideas and advocating for them strongly very often works. Note the secret behind the 1994 Republican victory wasn’t “Clinton-bashing” or “Democratic-burning” or anything like that.
I also do not think it was in any way a response to the 1994 AWB. I think the 1994 AWB got the NRA a bit more politically motivated than it had been up to that point, but I do not think that explains the Republicans taking the house. In the 80s welfare reform was a big deal to most Americans. Fair or not, a lot of Americans had this belief that a large number of welfare recipients were “welfare queens” who basically lived a life of luxury on the public dime, refusing to work or contribute to society.
The Republicans were pretty smart back then, because by design every issue on the contract had been polled as being supported by at least 60% of Americans.
Gun control was not part of the contract, but things like child tax credits, welfare reform, balanced budget legislation, tort reform for frivolous lawsuits and etc were all issues that resonated then and honestly most of them still resonate now. (For example there is a claim that Obama has this undeniable mandate, but over 70% of Americans believe we need to cut Federal spending, there are still Republican issues with wide appeal.)
But anyway, the 1994 AWB was not why the Republicans took the House.
On to the next point, this idea that there is a major support now for gun control. I disagree with that. I think there is popular support for more gun control, meaning more than 50% of people support it. But I think it is weak and I think that’s why gun control has always been a problem in this country. The number of people who care about gun control all week long instead of just during times after massacres like Sandy Hook is relatively small. I don’t care if you’re talking young people, gay people, blacks, Jews, hispanics, immigrants, very few Americans are die hard advocates of gun control. Very, very few. That means while support for gun control ebbs and flows, its support isn’t terribly committed or terribly deep.
On the flip side, the support for extremely liberal gun laws has much larger support. We’re still talking a minority of voters, but it’s a much larger minority of voters than die hard gun control advocates. They are also far more activist and vitriolic than the die hard gun control advocates.
That is the reality, and I believe certain people, perhaps even Harry Reid and other important Democrats are perhaps even in this camp of strong gun rights advocates and/or feel they need their support to win elections. For this reason my prediction is a large part of the gun control legislation does not get through the legislature. I think if crafted properly, parts of it could.
A large group, larger than NRA prepper types, who support the right to own guns are the more moderate gun owners. These are the ones who might be Democrats, for example. I think the only way gun control can hurt the Democrats is when the gun control rhetoric attempts to demonize all gun owners or unduly restrict gun ownership, that can push some moderate voters away from the party at least for an election cycle. But I don’t really think this current legislative push is going to do that, I think the tragedy at Sandy Hook in a sense gives it the political cover it needs to avoid turning off the moderates.
Now, a point should be noted about the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban and the current one. By and large they were worthless laws focusing on banning weapons with specific features that often are cosmetic or unrelated to lethality. Rifles in general are used in a small number of crimes, I think under like 500 murders a year. This sort of legislation does little to stop gun violence both because it allows grandfathering and focuses on a class of weapons seldom used in crime.
But how did the 1994 ban pass? Well, it passed for the same reason these weapons are seldom used in crime. They’re expensive, not often bought by hunters or persons interested in self-defense, and thus most moderate gun owners probably do not own or are not interested in them. Pure hunters who aren’t otherwise gun enthusiasts will care less about AR-15s, same for people who just want a pistol in their house because they live in a bad neighborhood. The NRA wasn’t politically motivated enough and that core of “die hard” gun rights people weren’t politically motivated enough to stop the 1994 ban, that’s basically how it got pushed through. It was an issue relating to weapons no moderate gun owners really cared about, and even many of the die hard gun owners might not even own these weapons (not all die hard gun owners necessarily are huge collectors with dozens of guns.) I think this strong minority group and its lobby is much more politically motivated and vocal today, so that makes it much less likely to me an AWB passes.
To show how unimportant this issue was in the popular consciousness, it was just a part of a much larger crime package that passed with an overwhelming majority in the Senate (like 90+ votes), this just wasn’t a hot button issue then like it is today. The gun lobby is absolutely, definitely more powerful now than it was in 1994.
It really depends on what you’re talking about. If you confiscationists believe that all guns will go away some day and people will look back on them as barbarism I find it highly unlikely. Maybe some day they will be akin to collecting swords today, but I doubt they’ll go away.
I’ve actually studied international gun control. Most countries got much more restrictive up through the 90s, but many have started to make what I consider rational, reasonable relaxations in policy. For example in most of Europe it’s not all that hard to own a pistol, rifle, or shotgun, and there is no evidence people want to make it any harder. But it isn’t just going to the store, you have to go through government licensing and forms and training, but anyone that really wants one can get one assuming they aren’t in a class prohibited from ownership.
The UK for example has relaxed some gun controls, while reconsidering whether they should have. Germany relaxed some controls, then put some back in place after a school shooting. I don’t think there is actually a global movement indicative of pure confiscation, if that’s what anyone is implying I think they would be wrong.
I agree that an AWB would do little for reducing gun violence.
However, “one guy snapped and killed some people” in Dunblane, another in Port Arthur. They weren’t the first spree killings in the UK or Australia (and may not be the last) but they led to significant changes to gun control in those countries.
As noted, whether Newtown is our equivalent is best left to history, but the likelihood of such a response in the US is quite probable at some point.
Back to the political calculus of it all -
It seems most here agree that opinions on gun regulation do not divide completely cleanly across party lines.
Among moderate/swing voters which position do you think will appeal more (not what actually makes sense, what will appeal?)? Do nothing in response to the latest mass murders (except propose what most perceive as silly proposals like armed guards at every school) or a do what Obama is proposing?
And of the group that will solidly react more positively to the former, how many are not in districts that a Democrat already had no chance in?
That’s true about the UK and Australia, but there are significant structural differences. Namely, Westminster style systems are designed to seat a party or coalition in power and they basically get to run things. If a major disagreement breaks out and they can’t run things anymore, a new election is held. While in power, the ruling party and their premier is going to be very, very powerful. Drastic changes can happen and such with relatively little input from other parties, basically as long as the PM has support from his majority he’s very much able to pass sweeping legislation at a moment’s notice.
The U.S. system, and read the Federalist papers, is explicitly designed to make sure precisely what you are talking about cannot happen. Namely, that a passionate polity can’t force policy issues through. As checks against this we have a Senate with 6 year terms that are staggered, so no more than 1/3rd is ever up for election. We also have a totally independent legislative branch, the President can scream all day long, but if both Houses don’t vote for him, nothing can be passed legislatively. We also have a Supreme Court with life terms who also throw a bit of restraint into the system as well.
Legislation is simply not easy to pass in our system, by design. And it’s especially not easy to pass when we have divided government (which is quite often the case.)
I was reminded about a point that Rachel Maddow made on her show. Do you know how effective the NRA was in the last election with their campaign spending?
Of all the money they spent on campaigns, 0.83% went to support candidates who won or to oppose candidates who lost. Less than 1%!
That’s fucking impotent. This is a joke of an organization and people are seeing it for what it is.
You’re talking about the NRA PAC, the NRA’s power base is not traditionally from funding campaigns. Their biggest campaign spending will be in election years, obviously. Of their $200m in annual revenue they spent about 10% on campaigns in 2012.
The NRA uses money to lobby for and against legislation, and anyone who thinks they have not done a significantly good job of that are simply ignorant of not only the gun law liberalization we’ve seen in the past 20 years but some of the more activist laws passed in support of gun interests, specifically gun manufacturers.
Further note, most gun laws that actually matter in this country are State laws and will mostly continue to be so for many more years (also the whole State/Federal issue is something I didn’t mention in my earlier response about why it’s much harder for an emotional tragedy like Dunblane or Port Arthur to have a similar legislative impact here), and at the State level the NRA is supremely powerful. State legislators regularly are cowed into submission by the NRA.