Utopia Talk / Politics / Reasonable Gun Restrictions

nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 12:43:10 Been a ton of back and forth in UP, but basically what I'm reading as consensus on the boards is this: *Bump up age limit *Require license *Psychological eval *Gun shows same laws as gun shops Responsible people of age have nothing to fear with this. Unreasonable gun restrictions: *Banning semi-autos. Anything missing?
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 12:44:05 As a gun owner, I'd have no problems needing a license and psych eval next time I purchased one.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 12:44:47 The psych eval is easily gamed, but should catch the most egregiously ill.
earthpig GTFO HOer	Thu Jun 09 12:51:28 " The psych eval is easily gamed, but should catch the most egregiously ill. " No de facto poll taxes on civil rights, please. The presumption must go the other way (folks must be granted the right in question by default), but if there's good reason to presume otherwise (domestic abuse conviction, for example, or DUI [demonstrated lack of responsibility and/or callousness when operating potentially lethal equipment]), then so be it. Re: license. On cars, I actually feel our car driver licensing scheme is reasonable. If we could work something out modeled on that, executed in good faith, I wouldn't object. But what I think would come up is that half the folks involved in crafting that legislation are those that have zero desire to be licensed themselves, so they would view it as a GOOD thing if it were too onerous to get licensed. Lo and behold, it would be silly, in fact it would be more or less exactly like getting a concealed carry permit in one of the left-leaning counties in California (good luck!).
earthpig GTFO HOer	Thu Jun 09 12:52:37 (By contrast, politicians on both sides of the aisle, certainly more than 90% of them, have driver's licenses themselves, and want their personal kids/friends/family/etc to be able to get them reasonably, and *surprise* our car licensing scheme is relatively speaking very reasonable)
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 12:55:03 EP I was summarizing what people have pitched on these boards and people didn't have much of an issue about, it is not my personal belief. murder brought up the psyche eval and I pushed back against it. My goal here is to see what consensus there is across cults (demoncrats and republitards) to see what may be the lowest friction progress towards the issue of mentally ill 18 year olds buying guns and shooting up schools
Rugian Member	Thu Jun 09 12:57:18 nhill Bump up the age limit for owning guns and voting. One should follow the other.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 13:00:38 That seems logical
earthpig GTFO HOer	Thu Jun 09 13:06:28 @Rugian Then you have to bump up the draft age too. Let's recall why we lowered the voting age to begin with. I'm ok with that, actually. If our politicians didn't have "we can draft teenagers!" in their back pockets, perhaps we would see less imperial adventurism. It wouldn't actually be a national security concern, history and current events both tell us that if it's a war you MUST fight, you will have no problem getting older people to sign up, willingly or otherwise, or getting younger people to volunteer.
Rugian Member	Thu Jun 09 13:09:44 EP Fully okay with that.
Rugian Member	Thu Jun 09 13:11:30 If we're going to treat 18-20 year olds like children (which is the direction our society seems to be headed), let's be consistent with the distribution of rights that are properly reserved for adults.
Seb Member	Thu Jun 09 13:16:32 EP: "The presumption must go the other way (folks must be granted the right in question by default)" Seems odd. Given the way US healthcare works you can be an undiagnosed person totally unfit to have weapons who has not yet had a run in with the law - that does not seem helpful. Particularly with regard to school shootings. Getting a note from a family doctor must cost less than a gun, surely?
Rugian Member	Thu Jun 09 13:20:29 "Getting a note from a family doctor must cost less than a gun, surely?" Isn't this the standard that Democrats want for allowing late-term abortions? A doctor's note? If it's good enough to end an innocent human's life, then...
earthpig GTFO HOer	Thu Jun 09 13:33:27 " Getting a note from a family doctor must cost less than a gun, surely? " Except it will not be that trivially easy. See above about half the legislators in the room viewing it as a good thing if it's prohibitively onerous. This sort of thing is why I like my "gun club" idea mentioned in the other thread. The folks running gun clubs are both gun owners AND don't want their members doing dumb shit (consequences to gun clubs for clear patterns of bad club members being totally reasonable).
Sam Adams Member	Thu Jun 09 13:35:12 "Bump up the age limit for owning guns and voting. One should follow the other." Yup.
kargen Member	Thu Jun 09 14:32:55 We need one consistent age as others have suggested. Personally I don't care if it is 18 or 21 but raising the legal age to buy a gun will change very little in the way of crime. I support a mandatory gun safety course before purchasing your first handgun. The cost can be included in the price of the gun. For rifles and shotguns I'm not so sure a mandatory course is needed but probably should be readily available for those who wish to participate. No on the evaluation. Any mental conditions should already exist in a background check. No on the background check for gun shows. A background check includes all kinds of information and the data base is maintained by the National Instant Criminal Background Check System. Only licensed dealers with an FFL should have access to that database. Colorado requires purchases at gun shows to be verified by a licensed dealer. The dealer is at the show and can require a small fee for doing the background check. That takes care of the problem with to much access to the database. If something like that were in place then I would be less concerned about background checks at gun shows. So I kind of changed my mind on this one as I typed this.
earthpig GTFO HOer	Thu Jun 09 15:49:44 The gun show things is a red herring. It's an "in theory" problem, not an actual problem. It's "so easy to get guns there" that only 0.8% of guns used in crime came from a gun show. Criminals aren't smart, typically. http://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/suficspi16.pdf page 7 This ties into the issue with the gun control proposals often being completely detached from reality of what actually does, and doesn't, feed into it. If limited political resources are proposed to be spent on moving the needle on the 0.8%, when there's a 43% and a 25% completely being ignored... Back to my gun club thing and making it illegal to report gun theft/misplacement. 8%, 6.5%, 1.5%, 0.2%, 1.6%, 3.1%, 4.6%, and some percentage of 5.9% and 2.5%. So moving the needle on 25% to 33%, call it, and I've never seen pro gun folks express serious objections to the proposal. But no no let's focus on trade shows with their 0.8% sourcing of firearms used in crimes, and 1.5% sourcing of gun type used in a crime, and some trivially small percentage by body count, that pisses off gun owners. And ignore moving the needle on the 25% to 33% in a way that wouldn't really piss off gun owners (any gun owners here that do NOT want Jack tossed in prison when he keeps having guns "stolen" or "misplaced" over and over again, that keep winding up used in violent crime, to kill, rob, etc, with? Great, then we agree that Jack needs to report each "theft" or "misplacement," along with serial numbers and other details, or he goes to prison, and if he can't help but demonstrate a pattern of "misplacing" guns over and over again, he doesn't need to have them...).
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Jun 09 16:03:09 It's not an in theory problem if you make it hard for criminals to get guns from other sources and then leave this loophole. Best to see this as a package deal.
earthpig GTFO HOer	Thu Jun 09 16:03:31 Cop: Jack, we found your pistol, number 412211 at the scene of a crime. We subpoenaed your gun club, and they say it's your pistol. What happened to it? Jack: I lost it or it was stolen, whatever. [In our reality, the conversation stops there. No laws have been broken, and no probable cause for further questioning exists. Jack can do the "Officer, am I free to go?" thing] Cop: OK. Your gun club in response to same subpoena says you also own these 12 other firearms with these 12 serial numbers. Will you please show us those firearms? We can come to your house, or you can bring them to this location at this reasonable time of this reasonable day. Jack: Oh, funny thing. I misplaced those 12 guns too. Cop: I see. It says here you did not report those misplacements. Is that all correct? Jack: Um, well, you see, the thing is... Cop: And one of those was found at the scene of a crime 18 months ago, as well. The law says you have 60 days to report a stolen or misplaced firearm that you own, was something physically preventing you from doing an inventory on your own firearms, either during that specific 60 days, or the 16 months since then? Jack: Yeah, so I'd like to speak to my lawyer at this point, please. At the very least, Jack now has his rights suspended following an investigation, which very well may lead to prison time for Jack, and locally a drying up of a non-trivial source of illegally possessed firearms, of the type most typically used in crimes that result in the deaths of innocent people, in those areas local to him (and/or a 45m drive from the suburbs where he lives, to the inner city where he illegally sells guns to people he doesn't like anyways).
earthpig GTFO HOer	Thu Jun 09 16:15:01 " It's not an in theory problem if you make it hard for criminals to get guns from other sources and then leave this loophole. Best to see this as a package deal. " Limited political capital. Only a limited modest proposal has any chance to get through. And you have to be able to then point back at actual results if you want to justify anything else. That's why the 10 year assault weapons ban (1994 to 2004) didn't do jack shit, but spur gun sales when it ended. Not only did it fail to reduce any of the major metrics, but the first major school shooting (Columbine, 1999) happened when it was in effect to boot. That's the threat of shitty ineffective policy proposals. If they get through and nothing changes, or it gets worse, you've busted your nut for nothing, and it may even be harder in the future to get anything done. That's the challenge American Dem's face WRT gun control. They don't know fuck all about guns, they don't want to, they don't know the stats, or selectively read them, they just know that this major front page story, and talking about it, and feel good proposals (that we see echoed here on this very forum), gets them the big $ campaign contributions, and (Euro friends might not be aware of this) political power within our Congress (prominent committee seat positions, titles, power, etc) is allocated based on who raised the most campaign contribution money (it's expected that they share it with colleagues in more competitive re-election races, after they give patronage campaign jobs to family of course), rather than seniority, legislative accomplishment, accolade, or any other metric.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Jun 09 16:22:12 Fair enough, I was just going on the UP consensus theme, didn't understand you were thinking in politically realistic terms.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Jun 09 16:23:12 In that regard I agree with you, you go put your resources where you can show the best results.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 16:36:20 I know fuckall about political machinations, but yes, Nim, you understood the point of the thread. Those four bullet points were the ones I've seen brought up over the past few weeks where nobody had much of a problem. As to what would succeed in our political system, that's not a discussion in which I'd have any expertise. I don't care about the statistics of "guns being used bought from gun show". It's insane that there's two different methods of buying the same thing with different laws applying. Should we have alcohol show laws, where underage kids can purchase alcohol? Organ show laws where you can purchase a heart or kidney? Ivory show laws where you can buy elephant tusks? Going back to first principles, shit makes no sense.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 16:38:12 How about pharmacy show laws where you can buy whatever prescription drug you want? Who cares about doctors right, what do they know
earthpig GTFO HOer	Thu Jun 09 16:43:07 " It's insane that there's two different methods of buying the same thing with different laws applying. " Is it? I ask as someone who has sold a 2000 lbs intelligently guided surface to surface missile(1) in a parking lot with hundred dollar bills changing hands, as well as at a S2S missile dealership. Exactly those types of weapons have in fact been used in various acts of terrorism and mass murder. But it's statistically such a trivial percentage of all missile homicides that we do not talk about it as a problem, rational beings that we are. (1) AKA a "car"
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 16:43:43 And yes, I know the laws aren't specifically "gun shows" they are categorized as "private sellers". The point is the same, nonetheless.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 16:47:28 EP The laws are not significantly different between selling a car privately and at a dealership. You don't require a background check at either of them. But please, continue with a new analogy demonstrating the remarkable stretches the human mind is capable of in the name of cognitive dissonance.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 16:50:09 It does appear as if we can scratch #4 off the list at this point. Gun shows were mentioned without this uproar before, but perhaps it slipped under the radar.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 16:53:24 It's good that we aired everything out, either way, so now, what I'm reading as consensus on the boards is this: *Bump up age limit (for guns and other things, such as voting, considered to be adult endeavors) *Require license Less reasonable gun restrictions, but perhaps still somewhat of a consensus: *Psychological eval *Gun shows same laws as gun shops Unreasonable gun restrictions: *Banning semi-autos
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 16:56:34 It should go without saying that banning guns altogether is so unreasonable as to not being worth a mention. But for the sake of completeness I'll comment.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Jun 09 17:12:08 Nhill "Going back to first principles, shit makes no sense." I feel you man, I really do, but this is the shitty world we live in, there is a lot of legacy bullshit you keep having to deal with.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 18:11:54 Yeah and I didn't mean to interject my opinion there, as it is fairly irrelevant to the topic at hand. Sometimes I can't help myself. Trying to gauge what is or is not consensus across the aisles, because, unfortunately most of the discussion boils down to the puerile notion of "my team is better than your team". A side effect of the decline of the American empire, or, perhaps, a causul indicator itself, is the political polarity that has been increasing in the past decade. The next bullet point in the collapse being the decline in our reserved currency status, but that's a discussion for another time. ;)
murder Member	Thu Jun 09 18:25:01 "Then you have to bump up the draft age too." Do away with the draft altogether. If the government needs more soldiers they can increase the pay.
murder Member	Thu Jun 09 18:36:36 "*Bump up age limit *Require license *Psychological eval *Gun shows same laws as gun shops" There is no point to #1 because either someone is an adult or they are not. Also, minors have zero trouble getting their parent's firearms. mandatory license - Republicans will oppose it and kill it. psychological evaluation - Republicans will oppose it and kill it. The only chance is some weak form of red flag law like earthpig suggested. But it's a fucked up world when a dangerous individual gets their guns back as soon as s/he is "OK". closing the gun show (and private sale/transfer) loophole - Republicans will oppose it and kill it. Even trying to do the bare minimum will be opposed by Republicans. All they will agree to is more money for cops and SWAT teams, more cops in schools with more and possibly more powerful firearms, more school armed staff and maybe even students, fewer doors in schools, taller fencing, maybe razor wire, metal detectors. This is GOP America and they will not rest until every school looks like a penitentiary and school uniforms include body armor.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 18:44:31 Congrats on not understanding the point of the thread *high five* Incoming post-hoc rationalizing. Wait for it
murder Member	Thu Jun 09 18:59:10 The point of the thread was undermined in the OP.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 19:03:04 There it is, folks, right on time.
murder Member	Thu Jun 09 19:05:08 Maybe you should set your threads to invite only or delete the posts that you don't like.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 19:05:46 I don't have a problem with anything you posted. Stop projecting.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 09 19:07:35 I was merely entertained by you not understanding the point :) By all means, continue!
earthpig GTFO HOer	Sun Jun 12 17:43:13 Looks like 10 republican senators read this thread.
tumbleweed the wanderer	Sun Jun 12 18:02:57 CNN summary graphic of what's in supposed deal: http://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1536076240267841543 R's will probably still back out
kargen Member	Sun Jun 12 18:56:26 The red flag portion will be the sticky part. While many agree we need red flag laws there is still a large gap in what that actually means. For those on the left they want it to mean if a person claims another person is a threat to themselves or others their guns would be removed until the accused person can prove their competence. The right says once an accusation is made a hearing takes place and the one being accused gets to keep their guns until it is proven they shouldn't have them. Also some argument on what the punishment should be if you falsely report someone to get their guns removed. We all know that is going to happen. President Biden's remarks and the remarks under the tweet show why Republicans are so reluctant to go along with any of these proposals. All we are hearing is not far enough and a good start but.. Biden saying we will do more later is exactly why there will be more push back on this than there should be and why fellow Democrats told him to stay out of the discussions and let congress work it out.
murder Member	Tue Jun 14 01:32:38 The proposed law will do literally nothing to restrict gun purchases/ownership... and Republicans are still bitching about it. There are simply too many blue Republicans in the Democratic Party for anything to be done about this problem. The next mass shooting could kill 100 preschoolers and it wouldn't matter. The only effective thing Joe Biden could do is a national day on July 3rd to commemorate all the children that have gotten slaughtered so that anti-government types can arm themselves to the teeth. Read out every single name and show every single picture, and do it every year.
patom Member	Tue Jun 14 06:18:59 Out of curiosity, who is going to do all the psych evaluations? We don't have nearly enough psychologist or psychiatrists to handle those who currently are in need of psychiatric care. Or are they going to ask teachers to evaluate potential gun purchasers??
Seb Member	Tue Jun 14 08:35:42 patom: "We don't have nearly enough psychologist or psychiatrists to handle those who currently are in need of psychiatric care." I wonder how much of that is driven by a generation of kids that spent their formative years angsting about the possibility of death? Strikes me as a thing that is likely to have a long term impact on mental health.
murder Member	Tue Jun 14 09:08:09 "Out of curiosity, who is going to do all the psych evaluations?" It wouldn't be the kind of in depth thing you're thinking about. Just basically a questionnaire asking you about your murderous impulses. A computer could handle the initial evaluations and flag the obvious crazies.
nhill Member	Tue Jun 14 09:57:48 yeah, so easily gamed and mostly useless ;)
murder Member	Tue Jun 14 10:12:06 Not catching everyone is a poor excuse for not requiring it.
murder Member	Tue Jun 14 10:14:19 And no it's not easily gamed. Crazy people don't usually understand that they are crazy and what it is that makes them crazy. People will generally reveal themselves if given the opportunity to do so.
nhill Member	Tue Jun 14 10:41:04 You are entitled to your own opinion and I will defend your right to say it. Like I said above, it may catch a few of the most egregious offenders.
nhill Member	Tue Jun 14 10:42:16 I didn't say we shouldn't require it either, to be clear. I'm fine with it. Don't expect it to change much, is all.
patom Member	Tue Jun 14 10:58:07 Seb, the shortage of Psych professionals can be directly traced to the closing down of psychiatric hospitals and beds 40 + years ago. So many just left the field and found other employment and others who might have entered the field saw that there was not much of a career. Now we are 40 years behind. Murder, do not mistake insanity with stupidity. Many are very intelligent with IQ's in the genius category.
murder Member	Wed Jun 15 19:53:40 "The proposed law will do literally nothing to restrict gun purchases/ownership... and Republicans are still bitching about it." And in typical GOP/Trump fashion, they are already trying to further water down the nothingburger they just agreed to. ============================== "Roadblocks ahead? One of the GOP negotiators of the gun framework expressed concerns over two key elements amid drafting of the legislative text." http://www...ss/06-15-2022/cornyns-concern/
Habebe Member	Wed Jun 15 21:02:42 1. I don't like the due process issue. Same gripe I have with emergency PFAs/restraining orders. You can't be denied of life, liberty or property without due process of law.Its kind of a big deal. Could you imagine if we had red flag laws for abortion? The left would go nuts. That said this court has been playing fast and loose with the 4th amendment. Anyone read about the rights of border Patrol agents within 100 miles of the border?
murder Member	Wed Jun 15 22:05:27 "You can't be denied of life, liberty or property without due process of law. Its kind of a big deal." Happens literally all day every day. "Could you imagine if we had red flag laws for abortion? The left would go nuts." There's no need. They just outlaw it. "That said this court has been playing fast and loose with the 4th amendment. Anyone read about the rights of border Patrol agents within 100 miles of the border? I think that's just about the right to sue individual agents. The court has no say in where they can and can't operate.
Habebe Member	Wed Jun 15 22:12:57 Murder, Your a turd.
nhill Member	Wed Jun 15 22:37:02 Ok ok, get along now fellas.
Habebe Member	Wed Jun 15 23:44:54 Murder, Maybe I should elaborate more. The government should not deprive people f life, liberty and property without due process.
murder Member	Thu Jun 16 05:49:50 I understood you. But forfeiting liberty and property without due process is exactly what happens every time someone get arrested. First they take you liberty and your property, and then you get due process. Unless they take your life without due process.
Habebe Member	Thu Jun 16 10:16:47 The difference being you get to go before a judge/grandjury.And you have committed a crime. Dont get me wrong I very much have huge issues with how our legal system currently works, and in many ways you and I would probably agree to an extent (civil forfeiture) but this only makes it worse. For starters these counties that rig the the system and have 95% conviction rates+. Its BS. I was once told locally that hearsay is acceptable when a witness didnt show up, and a PD allowed that nonsense. Local.courts don't transcribe, which is also.fucked up.
Habebe Member	Thu Jun 16 11:20:31 Actually a bit off topic, but Im all for a federal law declaring that ALL hearings/trials be recorded and defendants automatically get a copy.
Habebe Member	Thu Jun 16 11:30:25 Now word on the street is they may overturn Miranda!?!?! Just a headline, didnt read the story, but that's insane and a dangerous path. The sad thing is on many issues like this, Inwould probably agree with pedo lady who just made SC justice.
nhill Member	Thu Jun 16 12:18:14 http://the...states-to-step-up-on-policing/ ^article on that
murder Member	Thu Jun 16 13:06:17 "The difference being you get to go before a judge/grandjury.And you have committed a crime." Who says you've committed a crime? "Dont get me wrong I very much have huge issues with how our legal system currently works, and in many ways you and I would probably agree to an extent (civil forfeiture) but this only makes it worse." I don't know about that, but certainly not on this issue. IMO if the police deem you a threat to others, they should take your firearms. And if a shrink agrees that you are a threat to others, then you should not get your firearms back ... ever. The state should seize your firearms, compensate you for their fair market value, and you should be banned from owning or possessing firearms from then on out.
murder Member	Thu Jun 16 13:07:37 "Actually a bit off topic, but Im all for a federal law declaring that ALL hearings/trials be recorded and defendants automatically get a copy." That should go without saying ... but it probably violates states rights.
murder Member	Thu Jun 16 13:21:41 "Now word on the street is they may overturn Miranda!?!?! Just a headline, didnt read the story, but that's insane and a dangerous path." Any and all progress will be reversed.
Habebe Member	Thu Jun 16 13:29:54 Fun fact. My old Barber Papi (aka Steve Miranda) got life for conspiracy to commit triple homocide in the bucks landings shootings near lacey park, Bucks county PA in IIRC 2007. Strange world. His brother got 2p years. And neither pulled the trigger, I beleive that guy got. life.
Habebe Member	Thu Jun 16 13:33:07 "I don't know about that, but certainly not on this issue. IMO if the police deem you a threat to others, they should take your firearms. And if a shrink agrees that you are a threat to others, then you should not get your firearms back ... ever. The state should seize your firearms, compensate you for their fair market value, and you should be banned from owning or possessing firearms from then on out." Wouldn't it just be better to lock them up on a psych hold? If you are not able to be trusted with guns for LIFE, you should probably be sent to an insane assylum, your dangerous.
murder Member	Fri Jun 17 07:37:52 Aaaaand ... lead GOP "negotiator" Sen. John Cornyn of Texas walks out of the "negotiations". I for one am shocked! The Democrats probably wouldn't agree to mandating that all students be armed with their own AR-15s in order to stop school shooters.
nhill Member	Thu Jul 21 13:08:11 bump for Hrothgar
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