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NY Daily News Stops Making Sense on Universal Background Checks

Robert Farago - comments No comments

 

If you’re a “low-information voter” who supports universal background checks (UBCs) avoid reading reports on the subject. Even the most fervently pro-disarmament media outlets are having real trouble making the case for UBCs—once they explain what that actually means. And how they would “work.” To wit this from nydailynews.com: “Even under the new restrictions, [Aurora, Colorado spree killer James] Holmes might well have been able to buy guns because he was not diagnosed as mentally ill until too late. But he dramatically illustrates why America needs a foolproof system for separating those who have been officially classified as mentally ill from weapons.” Huh? You want to run that by me again . . .

Holmes was exactly the person who should have been confined and whose record should have been transmitted to the national background check database. More, as soon as the doctor reported his “homicidal” tendency, the law should have required police to seize — yes, seize — all of Holmes’ weapons.

Nope. Still not getting it. Especially not the foolproof part of the program. Doesn’t Holmes’ case prove that the existing background check system doesn’t work for gun store sales?

And what does that failure have to do with “strengthening” background checks to include private sales? While we puzzle over that piece of the puzzle, how does the News reconcile this:

The gun lobby has conjured the fantasy that expanding checks to cover the 40% of weapons sales that now escape them would lead to a national gun registry and, from there, to governmental seizure of weapons. This is propaganda by paranoia.

with this:

Despite the screamingly obvious need for thorough national background checks, Schumer has been negotiating for weeks with Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn, who says he supports background checks — except he wants a system that would immediately destroy the records.

After a gun sale was consummated, there would be no way to verify whether the buyer had submitted to a background check. So why should buyers and sellers go through the hassle?

Schumer is pushing for a searchable database so authorities can trace a gun found in a crime back to the point of sale, where the background check could be verified. But the gun forces recoil from this basic law enforcement tool without regard to the lives hanging in the balance.

I’m confused. Is a federal gun registry the NRA’s paranoid fantasy or a basic law enforcement tool? I’m going with C: universal background checks are a way to enable further gun control leading to eventual confiscation. Which is A without the paranoia.

And anyway, isn’t the reason to “go through the hassle” (thanks for acknowledging the infringement on Americans’ right to keep and bear arms) to stop people like James Holmes from buying guns? So, if it doesn’t work now . . .

By the News’ own admission, “The National Rifle Association and, if you can believe it, even crazier gun crazies appear to be winning the day.” Call me crazy, but I like the sound of that.

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Robert Farago

Robert Farago is the former publisher of The Truth About Guns (TTAG). He started the site to explore the ethics, morality, business, politics, culture, technology, practice, strategy, dangers and fun of guns.

0 thoughts on “NY Daily News Stops Making Sense on Universal Background Checks”

  1. Hollow Points are meant to be used on non-armor targets for stopping power, Full Metal Jacket and Armor-Piercing FMJs are meant to penetrate targets and armor targets. What’s not to understand?
    Yes I’d rather be shot with a FMJ and hope it doesn’t hit a vital organ or my spine as Hollow Points do cause more tissue damage and tend to break up or expand more greatly than FMJs but it’s just sickening when the gungrabbers get their facts wrong. Calling a hollow point “armor-piercing” is just stupid. I’d have just an oz of respect for these crazy people if they could at least get their facts straight.

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  2. The fact is, as has been shown many times in other circumstances, that no matter how many restrictions are placed on it nor how how loudly it’s proclaimed that “We’ll never use it that way!” if the data is available, someone will eventually come up with an exigency strong enough to rationalize breaking down the chinese wall. Once that happens the first time, the creep begins, and that wall is just a little bit weaker with every successive use, until it may as well no longer exist. It may take years, or it may take weeks, but nature runs to entropy, and the fall is inevitable.

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  3. I’m going through the same thing right now. Actually I just got off the phone with them. They lostm application for renewal but cashed the check. I’ve sent emails with no returns and their almost impossible to yet ahold of on the telephone. My card expired on 4/1 as well. They are suppose to be having a supervisor call me back to tell me what to do but I’m not holding my breath.

    Reply
  4. Afghan vet you don’t know WTF you are talking about. The M14 beat the FAL in head to head tests and beat the AR10 as well. The M14 beat the FAL in terms of accuracy, reliability, and parts breakage during the U.S. service rifle trials in the ’50s. Not only that, the M14 kicked that FAL’s ass in cold weather testing. I never have understood why FAL fans think an adjustable gas system is some great feature? The M14 has a self regulating system with no adjustments to fiddle with. Aside from the detachable magazine, the M14’s gas system is really the biggest upgrade over the Garand. As far as the AR10 goes, it wasn’t ready for prime time. Armalite used a stupid aluminum barrel with a steel liner that ruptured during torture testing. The AR10 might have been a good rifle, but it wasn’t thoroughly debugged. The U.S. picked the most thoroughly capable rifle of the three they were testing. Stating otherwise is just sour grapes.

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  5. “Unless you’re engaged in a lifestyle that’s going to put you at risk, you’re not going to be the victim of violent crime going to a baseball game.”
    Because criminals only victimize people whose lifestyles put them at risk. Has this guy ever heard of ‘wrong place, wrong time’? Although, I guess being a baseball fan who attends games in person is a lifestyle that would put one at risk of being assaulted by a drunk fan of the opposing team.

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  6. Taking a training course in the snow doesn’t seem that dangerous to me, but this seems crazy. I’m really curious how they maintain safety in the pitch black.

    If it’s home defense, then you know the environment, at least.

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  7. The police don’t have any civil rights offered to them by the Constitution that I do not. They most certainly do not have the right to kill people “just ’cause (it’s safer.”)

    If, god forfend, I or a friend, spouse, neighbor ended up in a use of force situation we face the possibility of ending up like George Zimmerman. Police on the other hand, not with nearly the frequency that shitty movies and TV would have you believe, face these situations more often than any civilian I know. LEOs do this with the benefit of training and often foreknowledge of their own peril. So they should be held to more, not less stringent standards and punishments than the average civilian.

    That’s just good common sense. As a result of this reasoning I wouldn’t object to a law stating that the firearm of a police officer was to be revoked after an unjustified shooting. I would even go so far as to say that judicial review panels and criminal courts not be the only criteria which matter in these cases that should the state or municipality be found liable for damages in civil court then the officer responsible for the charges being brought should lose their firearm.
    The important thing to me would be that this law apply to the officer only as relates to their duties as a LEO. Meaning while in uniform they’re unarmed. It would not be acceptable to deprive them of their god-given civil rights without a criminal conviction after all.

    I personally may be a harsh guy from a disciplinary stand point but I’m not a dick, and I’m certainly not as infantile and puerile as a gun-grabber with regards to law and logic.

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  8. Since when do we believe anything a Cop says.
    They lie, don’t trust them. If they are told to go get your guns, thirty of them will beat the crap out of you, your wife and your kids
    Don’t drop your guard…

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  9. Mistrust of the government isn’t a new idea. That’s how this country got started in the first place! To remove that from our culture is to remove a fundamental and essential aspect of being an American. You might as well tell the French not to eat cheese and drink wine!

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  10. So self defense isn’t foolproof; and so I should give it up and die cowering and pleading? Yeah that sounds much better. Where is my gene pool skimmer…there’s some shit floating on the top.

    Reply
  11. i just wached 4 helicopters fly over my house today around 11am in st.louis, mo….they were not very far from the ground…anyone else seein them lately?

    Reply

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