Gun laws
I have been a registered Republican my entire voting life.
I confess to voting split tickets and have no objection to loudly supporting better qualified candidate of a different party.
But today I am embarrassed and ashamed of the Republicans in Congress.
They aren’t “real” Republicans; they are National Rifle Association (NRA) flunkies.
I’ve owned guns for years. I fired a .22 rifle at age 6 and since have fired a number of other rifles, revolvers, pistols, and Derringers. I have never shot anyone even when legally allowed. I did my time, voluntarily, in the U.S. armed forces.
While I prefer to hunt with a camera, I understand hunters armed with rifles and bows.
What I FAIL to understand is the need for a hunter to have a fully automatic rifle with a 30-round clip or a person in need of self-defense with a fully automatic pistol with a high-capacity clip.
Nor do I understand the need for armor-piercing shells.
Caveat: My Number 1 Son is a cop, and while his enlightened department issues and insists that all its officers wear “bullet resistant” vests, the vests won’t stop an AK-47’s bullet nor an armor-piercing bullet.
The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution – all 27 words of it – states simply that “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
That would suggest that a person who was a member of “a well regulated Militia” had the right to “keep and bear arms.”
Given our love of guns for hunting and, unfortunately the need for self defense (there simply are too few cops and they take too long to get where they are needed), U.S. citizens have enjoyed the right to own firearms.
Since the U.S. does have a standing military and reserves (both with a capital “R” and as each state’s National Guard), it seems in my mind that the average citizen has no justifiable need for a fully automatic weapon with a high-capacity clip; in other words, Joe (and Jane) Citizen isn’t going to be defending the nation from invading armies.
If we – American citizens – fear a take-over by invading hordes or a megalomaniacal Commander in Chief, a/k/a President of the United States (POTUS) sending troops to take away (more of) our Constitutional and States rights, then using semi-automatic – or even single-shot – weapons with standard clips of 8-to-10 rounds could provide the citizens with sufficient fire power to overcome enough of the “enemy” to acquire the enemies’ (fully automatic) weapons. Heck, this can be achieved with a decent hunting bow and suitable arrows.
I am NOT in favor of banning firearms a la New York City where only the villains have guns; we see that this encourages crime rather than reduces it.
I am not necessarily in favor of registering allowable (semi-automatic and single-shot) firearms and clips.
I most assuredly AM in favor of national background checks of potential weapons purchasers and I AM in favor of a ban on fully automatic weapons and a ban on large-capacity clips.
No one seems to object to a limit on the number of shells a shotgun can hold, and - for the most part - a shotgun is either (a) a hunting gun or (b) a defensive weapon and no one seems to be pushing for a full automatic 12-gauge shotgun.
Further, there seems no loud complaint that functional machine guns, mortars, Howitzers, and similar weapons are restricted to military ownership and use even though the NRA defends the rights – apparently of anyone, citizen or not – to own assault weapons with high-capacity clips.
By the way, what, pray, is the difference between a true machine gun and a fully automatic rifle other than bullet capacity?
To be fair, none of the recent disasters – see Senior Legislative Attorney Janet L. Kaminski Leduc’s report to the Connecticut General Assembly at http://www.cga.ct.gov/2013/rpt/2013-R-0057.htm - have been caused by fully automatic weapons. The report did not specify if high-capacity clips were used with semi-automatic rifles and pistols.
In an article titled Twelve facts about guns and mass shootings in the United States at http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/12/14/nine-facts-about-guns-and-mass-shootings-in-the-united-states/ , author Ezra Klein
• Cites a study by Richard Florida that concludes that “Deaths are significantly lower in states with stricter gun control legislation. Though the sample sizes are small, we find substantial negative correlations between firearm deaths and states that ban assault weapons (-.45), require trigger locks (-.42), and mandate safe storage requirements for guns (-.48).”
• Includes, as a graphic, results an August CNN/ORC poll that asked respondents whether they favor or oppose a number of specific policies to restrict gun ownership. Unfortunately, as with most poll results, no demographics are provided and the phrasing of the questions was omitted, making the results suspect and arguable regardless of an individual's position on gun control.
The poll, keeping the above caveat in mind, indicated that the gun control measure most favored was a requirement for background checks. Closely behind this was a prohibition of gun sales to the mentally ill and felons (with neither “mentally ill” nor “felon” defined). Other popular measures were gun registration, a ban on high-capacity clips, a ban on semi-automatic weapons, and a limit on the number of guns per individual.
I suppose the NRA’s position on any gun control is that once “the camel gets its nose in the tent” the rest (of the camel) will quickly follow; in other words, if any gun control laws are passed, more restrictive laws will follow.
That may not necessarily be true.
IN Florida the main concerns are protecting children, preferably by keeping a weapon out of sight and out of reach or, failing that, storing the weapon in a gun safe or, minimally, using a trigger lock to prevent the weapon from firing. In a vehicle, a gun owner may carry the weapon inside a private vehicle as long as it remains secured in the trunk, inside a gun case, inside a closed box, or inside a closed glove compartment.
Against that, Florida concealed carry permits are relatively easy to acquire, albeit for a fee. The state does not require a permit to purchase a weapon or gun registration, nor does it ban assault weapons (e.g. AK-47) according to a Wikipedia entry at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_Laws_in_Florida .
My personal “bottom line” is that we DO need some gun control laws. The most important is having a national background check. It’s simply too easy and too common for a person in State A to relocate to State B to buy a weapon there that the person could not buy in State A due to a criminal or mental health issue. At the same time, both criminal and mental health issues need to be clearly defined. A case of obsessive-compulsive disorder is hardly the same as paranoid schizophrenia; likewise shoplifting is far different from battery or any crime with a weapon of any type.
If the Janet L. Kaminski Leduc report, ibid., is accurate, a ban on assault rifles is a waste of time. Most of the shootings were done with semi-automatics.
The idea of limiting the number of guns owned by an individual is worth consideration. But that means gun registration that both the NRA and this scrivener oppose.
Unfortunately, the people we sent to Washington seem to prefer extremist obstinacy to working for the welfare of the country; perhaps they just are working for their self-defined owners at the expense of their constituents.
