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2nd Amendment Thread


Muda69

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https://reason.com/2021/03/12/the-house-just-approved-two-background-check-bills-that-would-make-an-unfair-irrational-gun-policy-even-worse/

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The House of Representatives yesterday approved two bills that would require background checks for nearly all firearm transfers and dramatically increase the amount of time allowed to complete those checks. Both changes would impose substantial new burdens on law-abiding gun owners and unjustly deny people their Second Amendment rights without doing much of anything to frustrate criminals.

H.R. 8, a.k.a the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2021, would make it a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison, to complete a gun transfer unless it involves a federally licensed dealer. Under current law, such dealers are required to conduct background checks to see if would-be buyers are legally disqualified from owning guns. This bill would extend that requirement to private transfers, except for "loan[s] or "bona fide gift[s]" between close relatives when "the transferor has no reason to believe that the transferee" falls into a prohibited category.

The bill, which was supported by 219 Democrats and eight Republicans, aims to "ensure [that] individuals prohibited from gun purchase or possession are not able to obtain firearms." But it assuredly would not do that, since criminals already evade background checks by buying guns on the black market or through straw purchasers, and the people who supply them are unlikely to be deterred by an additional layer of illegality.

To the extent that a uniform background check requirement actually blocks sales, it will mainly affect buyers who pose no threat to public safety. Federal law prohibits gun possession by absurdly broad categories of people, including anyone with a felony record, no matter the nature of the offense or how long ago it happened; anyone who has ever undergone involuntary psychiatric treatment, whether or not he was ever deemed a danger to others; and cannabis consumers, even in states that have legalized marijuana.

2004 report from the Justice Department's Office of the Inspector General gives you a sense of the gun buyers who tend to be flagged by background checks. The report looked at what happens when people who buy guns later turn out to be disqualified.

Under current law, the FBI has three business days to process background checks—which makes the name of that program, the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), something of a misnomer. After three business days, the dealer is allowed to complete the sale even without a response. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) is therefore sometimes charged with retrieving guns from people who took possession of them before it was discovered that they were not allowed to own them. The inspector general found that "ATF special agents did not consider most of the prohibited persons who had obtained guns to be dangerous and therefore did not consider it a priority to retrieve the firearm promptly."

If these people are not actually dangerous, you might wonder, why were they stripped of their Second Amendment rights to begin with? Even if all gun owners complied with the inconvenient and expensive requirement that they enlist a federally licensed dealer whenever they sell their firearms (a highly doubtful proposition, given the experience in states with similar rules), the main effect would be to compound the injustice of denying people who have never demonstrated any violent tendencies the right to armed self-defense.

H.R. 1446, a.k.a. the Enhanced Background Checks Act of 2021, is just as poorly targeted. The bill, which was supported by 217 Democrats and two Republicans, would more than triple the amount of time allowed for a background check, from three to 10 business days. In practice, that means even legally qualified buyers could have to wait nearly two weeks—possibly longer, depending on holidays and other restrictions on government hours—before taking possession of a gun. For someone who urgently needs a gun for self-defense—say, a woman afraid of an abusive ex-boyfriend or ex-husband—that delay might prove lethal.

Rep. Andrew Clyde (R–Ga.) thinks the potential delay is already too long. Yesterday Clyde introduced the Ensuring SAFE-T Act, which would change the allowance for background checks from three business days to three calendar days.

"The 'Ensuring SAFE-T Act' makes sure the government cannot drag its heels in processing NICS checks," Clyde said in a press release. "I saw first-hand during the pandemic how the closure of state government offices across the country easily infringed upon our right to keep and bear arms. With these offices closed, or purported closed, three business days can turn into weeks or even months before a firearm transfer is completed. Second Amendment rights do not pause for the whims of bureaucrats no matter the circumstances. The 'Ensuring SAFE-T Act' will make sure no law-abiding U.S. citizen will be denied their right to keep and bear arms just because a government office isn't open."

Politicians who support expanding and reinforcing the background check system, including President Joe Biden, describe those proposals as "commonsense gun law reforms." But that view assumes the current system is fair and reasonable, meaning that more of the same has to count as an improvement. That premise deserves more scrutiny than it usually gets.

Yet another 2nd Amendment "solution" looking for an actual problem.

 

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1 minute ago, Bobref said:

Another example of the compulsion to regulate as much as possible.

Yep, and of course the phrase "close relative" is open to interpretation is it not?  Let's say my elderly uncle, who I have been very close with for decades, decides he wants to give me one of his shotguns. Is that "close" enough to avoid this regulation?  

 

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35 minutes ago, Goose Liver said:

Chicago and DC have the strictest Gun Laws.... handguns were banned from both cities until the laws were ruled unconstitutional in 2008. 

The Chicago case (McDonald), which was actually decided in 2010, was arguably more important than the DC case (Heller) since it extended the reach of Heller to the states. Since Heller arose in a federal jurisdiction, it’s ruling did not specifically affect state or local government attempts at gun control. Both held that the Constitution confers a right upon individuals to possess and own firearms for traditionally legal purposes, such as home and personal defense.

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Dianne Feinstein's Latest 'Assault Weapon' Bill Is Just As Illogical As All the Previous Ones

https://reason.com/2021/03/12/dianne-feinsteins-latest-assault-weapon-bill-is-just-as-illogical-as-all-the-previous-ones/

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Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D–Calif.) yesterday introduced an "updated" version of her proposed ban on "military-style assault weapons," invoking "domestic terrorism" as a justification. "We're now seeing a rise in domestic terrorism," she says, "and military-style assault weapons are increasingly becoming the guns of choice for these dangerous groups." Yet her bill, which so far has attracted 34 cosponsors in the Senate, makes no more sense as a response to terrorism than it does as a response to mass shootings.

The Assault Weapons Ban of 2021, like the Feinstein-sponsored 1994 ban that expired in 2004, would prohibit the manufacture and sale of numerous arbitrarily defined firearms, including some of the most popular rifles sold in the United States. It lists "205 military-style assault weapons" by name and also covers other guns with features Feinstein does not like. It would ban any semiautomatic rifle that accepts a detachable magazine and has "a pistol grip," "a forward grip," a folding or telescoping stock, "a grenade launcher," "a barrel shroud," or "a threaded barrel."

In contrast with the 1994 definition, which required two or more "military-style" features, Feinstein's new proposal, like the bills she has been sponsoring since 2013, says one is enough to make a rifle intolerable. Feinstein also continues to fiddle with her list of prohibited features. She no longer thinks we need to worry about bayonet mounts, but she is now sounding the alarm about the ominous barrel shroud, a covering that protects the shooter's hand from the heat generated by firing a rifle. And while her 2013 list included "a rocket launcher," that has since been excised, although "grenade launcher" is still there.

Crimes committed with rifle-mounted grenade launchers are about as common in the United States as crimes committed with rifle-mounted bayonets. Even if someone decided to attach a grenade launcher to his rifle, he would have a hard time finding something to launch with it, since grenades are strictly regulated as "destructive devices" under federal law. The rest of the targeted features likewise do not make a gun especially lethal: They have nothing to do with rate of fire, ammunition size, muzzle velocity, or muzzle energy.

President Joe Biden, who supports a new "assault weapon" ban, nevertheless concedes that the 1994 law had no impact on the lethality of legal firearms. The problem, according to Biden, was that manufacturers could comply with the law by "making minor modifications to their products—modifications that leave them just as deadly." The new, supposedly improved ban does not solve that problem, which is unavoidable when politicians target guns based on arbitrary distinctions.

Yet Feinstein insists that the 1994 ban worked as intended, because mass shootings declined while it was in effect, then rose afterward. Even without dissecting her post hoc, ergo propter hoc reasoning or delving into the debate about mass shooting trends, it should suffice to point out that if Biden is right about the practical impact of the ban, Feinstein must be wrong. If that law left mass shooters with plenty of equally deadly alternatives (which it did), it is hard to see how it possibly could have obstructed them. Nor would the lack of a barrel shroud or a folding stock stand in their way in the unlikely event that Feinstein's current bill is enacted.

"I'm hopeful that with the new administration and Democratic control of the Senate, we can finally pass commonsense gun reforms to remove these deadly weapons from our communities," Feinstein says. But even that goal is plainly inconsistent with the terms of her bill. Like the 1994 law, it does not prohibit possession of "assault weapons," meaning that millions of "these deadly weapons" will remain in circulation even if compliance is perfect.

That grandfather clause makes no sense if Feinstein really believes what she says. Her bill "exempts by name more than 2,200 guns for hunting, household defense or recreational purposes"—a completely gratuitous list that is supposed to show us how moderate and generous she is. But according to Feinstein, the guns she wants to ban are good for nothing but mass murder. The millions of Americans who own them for lawful purposes probably will disagree.

 

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The 9th Circuit Says the Right To Bear Arms Does Not Extend Beyond Your Doorstep

https://reason.com/2021/03/24/the-9th-circuit-says-the-right-to-bear-arms-does-not-extend-beyond-your-doorstep/

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The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit today held that the Second Amendment does not guarantee a right to openly carry firearms for self-defense. Combined with a 2016 decision involving concealed firearms, the ruling means that the Second Amendment does not extend beyond the home for residents of the 9th Circuit, which includes Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington.

According to the majority opinion by Judge Jay Bybee, history shows that legal restrictions on carrying unconcealed firearms, including virtual bans like Hawaii's, are the sort of "longstanding prohibitions" that the Supreme Court has suggested the Second Amendment allows. The four dissenters think history shows nothing of the sort.

"The Second Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees 'the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,'" Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain writes in a blistering dissent joined by Judges Consuelo Callahan, Sandra Ikuta, and Ryan Nelson. "Today, a majority of our court has decided that the Second Amendment does not mean what it says. Instead, the majority holds that while the Second Amendment may guarantee the right to keep a firearm for self-defense within one's home, it provides no right whatsoever to bear—i.e., to carry—that same firearm for self-defense in any other place….We now become the first and only court of appeals to hold that public carry falls entirely outside the scope of the Amendment's protections." The majority's reasoning, O'Scannlain says, "reduces the right to 'bear Arms' to a mere inkblot."

The case involves a challenge to Hawaii's highly restrictive carry permit policy, which requires that applicants demonstrate "the urgency or the need" to carry unconcealed firearms, that they have "good moral character," and that they be "engaged in the protection of life and property." As interpreted by Hawaii County (the "Big Island"), those standards limit open-carry permits to "private detectives and security guards."

Hawaii's concealed-carry policy, which was not at issue in this case, is similarly restrictive. It requires a permit applicant to satisfy the county police chief that he represents "an exceptional case" and that he has "reason to fear injury" to his "person or property."

George Young, a Hawaii County resident, unsuccessfully applied for a carry permit twice in 2011, citing a general need for self-defense. He argued that Hawaii's law was inconsistent with the Second Amendment.

A federal judge ruled against Young in 2012, but a three-judge 9th Circuit panel that included O'Scannlain and Ikuta overturned that decision in 2018. Drawing a distinction between concealed carry and open carry, O'Scannlain and Ikuta concluded that "the Second Amendment encompasses the right of a responsible law-abiding citizen to carry a firearm openly for self-defense outside of the home." After the 9th Circuit agreed to rehear the case, seven of the 11 judges assigned to it voted to uphold Hawaii's law.

In the landmark 2008 case District of Columbia v. Heller, the Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment protects the right to keep guns in the home for self-defense. Although the Court did not address the question of whether the amendment also applies outside the home, it said "nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms."

That exception for "longstanding prohibitions" is the basis for the 9th Circuit's ruling in Young v. Hawaii. "After careful review of the history of early English and American regulation of carrying arms openly in the public square," the majority says, "we conclude that Hawai'i's restrictions on the open carrying of firearms reflect longstanding prohibitions and that the conduct they regulate is therefore outside the historical scope of the Second Amendment."

Bybee reviews English restrictions on the right to bear arms in public and argues that "the colonists shared the English concern that the mere presence of firearms in the public square presented a danger to the community." He cites restrictions in New Jersey, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, although he also notes that some colonies "not only permitted public carry, but mandated it."

After the Constitution was ratified, states initially were not bound by the Bill of Rights, but their laws were governed by state constitutional provisions similar to the Second Amendment. During this period, Bybee says, "states continued to adopt laws that restricted the public carrying of arms." He cites further examples of statutes, cases, and commentaries from the 19th and 20th centuries. The majority concludes that "our review of more than 700 years of English and American legal history reveals a strong theme: government has the power to regulate arms in the public square."

As to the extent of that power, the 9th Circuit says "the government may regulate, and even prohibit, in public places—including government buildings, churches, schools, and markets—the open carrying of small arms capable of being concealed, whether they are carried concealed or openly." It adds that "we need go no further than this, because the Hawai'i firearms licensing scheme Young challenges only applies to 'a pistol or revolver and ammunition therefor.'"

The four dissenters strongly disagree with the majority's historical analysis. By their reckoning, "the critical sources on the meaning of the Second Amendment—its text, its historical interpretations by the commentators and courts most proximate to the Founding, and its treatment by early legislatures—unequivocally demonstrate that the Amendment does indeed protect the right to carry a gun outside the home for self-defense, even if that right might be subject to some regulation at its edges."

In reaching the "startling conclusion" that "a total ban on carrying a handgun outside the home does not implicate the Second Amendment right to bear arms whatsoever," O'Scannlain et al. say, the majority fails to show that its reading is consistent with the amendment's text, "that early American cases interpreted the Amendment in this way," or "even that open public carry was regularly and uncritically subject to legislative prohibitions across our country's early history." Instead, "the majority has declared that a state may constitutionally forbid all public carry of firearms, based on the utterly inconsequential fact that the lawful manner of open public carry has  historically been subject to modest regulation (but never to outright prohibition)."

You can judge for yourself who has the better of this historical argument between Bybee and O'Scannlain (although be warned that the two opinions together consume 180 pages). But O'Scannlain is surely right that the 9th Circuit's decision is an outlier. While some appeals court have overturned restrictions on the right to bear arms in public and others have upheld them, the 9th Circuit is the only one to say that right does not exist. Some clarity from the Supreme Court would be nice.

Yep, SCOTUS here we come.

 

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The 9th Circuit has long been known as the most “liberal” of the Circuits. It’s also the most frequently reversed. A study from 1999 - 2008 showed that SCOTUS overruled the 9th Circuit at a rate about 30% higher than any other Circuit.

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SCOTUS has seemingly ignored 2A cases since McDonald and Heller. I suspect that was a calculated decision by the conservatives on the court. I would be willing to bet given the changes to the court over the last four years, that’s about to change. 
 

On the state front, contact your State Senator and urge them to put pressure on Liz Brown, chair of the senate judiciary committee and give a hearing to HB 1369, “constitutional carry bill”. This week is our last chance. I want to force a vote, it’s time all the RINO’s earn those NRA ratings they all like to run on. 

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Here come the new laws..... err executive orders from Mr. Biden:

https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-gun-politics-gun-violence-violence-edc7a2c8dc505915a8ad841616d40ebe

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....

Biden is expected to announce tighter regulations requiring buyers of so-called “ghost guns” to undergo background checks. The homemade firearms — often assembled from parts and milled with a metal-cutting machine — often lack serial numbers used to trace them. It’s legal to build a gun in a home or a workshop and there is no federal requirement for a background check.

The president’s plans were previewed by a person familiar with the expected actions who was not authorized to publicly discuss them.

Senior administration officials confirmed that the Justice Department would issue a new proposed rule aimed at reining in ghost guns within 30 days, but offered no details on the content of the rule.

The Justice Department will also issue a proposed rule within 60 days tightening regulations on pistol-stabilizing braces, like the one used by the Boulder, Colorado, shooter in a massacre last month that left 10 dead. The rule would designate pistols used with stabilizing braces as short-barreled rifles, which, under the National Firearms Act, require a federal license to own and are subject to a more thorough application process and a $200 tax.

....

Practically anything with two pieces of metal pipe and nail is a 'ghost gun'.  As a youth I built a few.

 

 

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2 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

Here come the new laws..... err executive orders from Mr. Biden:

https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-gun-politics-gun-violence-violence-edc7a2c8dc505915a8ad841616d40ebe

Practically anything with two pieces of metal pipe and nail is a 'ghost gun'.  As a youth I built a few.

 

 

SF wonders if the President even knows it is already illegal to sell or transfer a "ghost gun".....(in other words, this XO is purely symbolic)

Incidentally - none of these "common sense" orders he is floating would have prevented any of the 2020 or 2021 mass shootings......

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SF thinks the President is wanting all of us to argue about these nonsense XO's (which accomplish absolutely NOTHING) and lose focus on the Southern border (that has exploded into a crisis beyond comprehension or any control) .......

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Biden's Gun-Limitation Schemes Make a Mockery of His 'Unity' Message

https://reason.com/2021/04/12/bidens-gun-limitation-schemes-make-a-mockery-of-his-unity-message/

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Just months into President Joe Biden's tenure, his early calls for "unity" look not only insincere—something we expect of any politician—but positively laughable. Last week, he threatened executive action to tighten restrictions on privately owned firearms in a move bound to infuriate gun owners, including millions of people who purchased tools for self-defense for the first time amid the chaos of the past year. Much of the country is certain to ignore his dictates, including state and local governments who have already vowed that they won't enforce such rules. Forget unity—the president has found an effective means of deepening the country's divisions.

"I asked the Attorney General and his team to identify for me immediate, concrete actions I could can take now without having to go through the Congress," the president huffed from the White House on April 8. "And today, I'm announcing several initial steps my administration is taking to curb this epidemic of gun violence."

The legality and wisdom of his proposed restrictions on arm braces and "ghost guns" aside—Jacob Sullum ably dissected those schemes elsewhere—Biden's plan to bypass Congress is a wild departure from his insistence at his inauguration that "my whole soul is in this: Bringing America together. Uniting our people. And uniting our nation." After all, he's bypassing Congress specifically because lawmakers are very definitely not unified around an anti-gun agenda. That includes Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), from Biden's own party.

Also not unified around attempts to restrict self-defense rights are states and localities the federal government relies on for most of the muscle to enforce its laws.

"On Thursday President Biden is expected to announce a series of executive actions addressing gun violence," Arizona's ABC 15 affiliate noted before the president's speech. "No matter what those actions are, there is a very good chance that in Arizona, they'll be ignored." The news story came after Gov. Doug Ducey signed a bill prohibiting all political subdivisions of the state from using personnel or resources to enforce laws incompatible with Arizona's own gun regulations. 

Wait. States can go their own way on gun policy? You bet. 

"Although the federal government may use its power of the purse to encourage states to adopt certain criminal laws, it is limited by the Tenth Amendment—which prevents the federal government from directing states to enact specific legislation—in its ability to directly influence state policy or requiring state officials to enforce federal law," a 2014 Congressional Research Service report concluded with regard to marijuana. The results of the constitutional principle are seen in the in the states that have legalized marijuana, as well as sanctuary cities that refuse to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement. Guns are just another area in which states can tell the feds to enforce their own laws without local assistance.

Many individual gun fanciers are equally unimpressed by the president's desire to limit access to firearms. In March, as gun control bills worked their way through Congress and Biden hinted at executive action, FBI background checks for commercial firearm sales hit a new record at almost 4.7 million, up from 3.7 million a year earlier. The AR-15 pistols and DIY gun kits targeted by the president's orders are in especially high demand among buyers picking them up while they're still available. Presumably, people rushing to pay rising prices for soon-to-be restricted items aren't doing so because of their eagerness to surrender them once the rules change.

So much for unity.

Biden doesn't require state, local, or individual cooperation for his pick to head the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, but the selection of David Chipman is a clear indicator that "unity" isn't a priority at the moment. As an advisor to Giffords, a group dedicated to severely restricting self-defense rights, Chipman mocked gun owners, saying in 2020, "They might think that they're die-hard, ready to go, but unfortunately they're more like Tiger King and they're putting themselves and their family in danger." He also advocates to the point of dishonesty for the federal government's bloody conduct during the 1993 Waco fiasco. His nomination is a red flag to gun owners.

"David Chipman, whom President Biden seeks to empower in order to continue his long train of abuses going back to the Waco, Texas murders committed by agents of the federal government, has led a career marked by outright lies, opportunism, and a brazen willingness, if not outright desire, to assault the natural rights of the American people," the pro-gun Firearms Policy Coalition objected.

There's no guarantee that Chipman will formally gain the ATF post (only one nominee has been confirmed to the position since Senate approval was first required in 2006) but no "unity" can be found in an appointee who is openly contemptuous of, and despised by, a large segment of the population.

That's a large and growing segment of the population, as FBI figures demonstrate. Nine of the ten top recorded weeks for firearm background checks occurred in the past year, and two of them were last month. Last year concluded with a total of 39.7 million background checks, the highest annual count recorded. While there's not a one-to-one correlation between background checks and sales, there's no doubt that ownership is through the roof, including millions of new owners: "40 percent of sales were conducted to purchasers who have never previously owned a firearm," the National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade association, revealed last August.

Gun ownership is increasingly diverse, too. It's surging among African-Americans repelled by biased law enforcement. It's also soaring among people with left-of-center political views who would normally be expected to constitute the constituency for tighter restrictions and nominees like Chipman. These new owners joined the ranks of people who realize that a chaotic era and a politically divided population require them to look to themselves for self-defense rather than rely on government institutions. Biden is going to face some challenges convincing even many of those who voted for him to unite behind his attacks on their ability to defend themselves.

Of course, politicians often rely not on a united population, but on one that's fragmented in ways that help them attain and hold office. Despite his inaugural verbiage, that's certainly what Joe Biden is doing. Like many of his predecessors, he strokes just enough of the population to maintain power while antagonizing the rest. That's been an effective strategy for lots of political officials who don't care about the long-term consequences, but it's brought the country to brink of disaster and made thoughts of unity a national joke.

 

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A basic fact confirmed by every study ever done by anyone is that legal gun owners commit violent crimes at an absurdly low rate. It’s almost non-existent. That’s with the laws as they are now, and have been in the past. So, what is the issue driving further restrictions to be applied to those legally possessing firearms, if it’s not simply political pandering?

The argument seems to be that legally acquired weapons are somehow finding their way to subsequent owners who acquire them in transactions that do not include background checks and other “safeguards” against guns falling into the hands of those who shouldn’t have them. Have there been any studies linking these types of firearms to, for example, mass shooting incidents? That’s the sort of evidence I’d like to see. Otherwise, it seems to me that there’s clearly a gun violence problem in this country, but the proposed new restrictions don’t really address that. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Loooong article but (I think) well worth the time, though Larry Correia can be a bit brusque (I'm thinking @Impartial_Observer will love this if he is still to be found here).  I won't even attempt to post the entirety of his blog post...I will just link it.

https://monsterhunternation.com/2015/06/23/an-opinion-on-gun-control-repost/

 

 

 

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Biden's Plan to Stop Ghost Guns Is Doomed To Fail: https://reason.com/video/2021/04/22/bidens-plan-to-stop-ghost-guns-is-doomed-to-fail/?post_type=video

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On April 8, President Joe Biden requested that the Department of Justice (DOJ) issue a new rule banning the creation of so-called ghost guns as one of a handful of executive actions meant to curb gun violence following the recent mass shootings in Atlanta, Georgia, and Boulder, Colorado.

Ghost guns are unregistered firearms that weren't assembled by licensed gun manufacturers or sold in highly regulated gun shops, and they're most closely associated with Cody Wilson, the founder of Defense Distributed. Wilson first drew attention as the creator of the Liberator, a functional plastic gun that could be manufactured at home using a 3D printer. 

Today, Defense Distributed's signature product is the Ghost Gunner, a do-it-yourself milling machine the size of small printer that enables anyone with enough time and interest to create unregistered firearms simply by purchasing parts online, downloading specs from an online library like Wilson's DEFCAD, and assembling the final product.

Wilson says the units fly off the shelves every time a major politician so much as mentions gun control.

"As soon as Biden says, 'in 30 days you're going to lose your ghost guns,' everyone's like, 'I gotta buy a ghost gun!'" says Wilson.

Wilson is back at the helm of Defense Distributed after stepping away in 2018, following allegations that he paid a 16-year-old for sex after they met on the adult app Sugar Daddy Meet. The legal age of consent in Texas is 17 years old, and Wilson's defense team maintained that he believed her to be an adult. His plea deal required him to pay restitution, perform community service, register as a sex offender, and serve seven years probation that discourages him from purchasing new firearms. 

Defense Distributed has been fighting off federal and state legal challenges since its founding in 2012. Biden's requested rule change is the latest front in that legal battle. The president was vague on the details, but he has asked the DOJ to issue a new rule on ghost guns within 30 days. 

Wilson anticipates that the proposed regulation will classify more gun parts, such as the unfinished lower receiver that the Ghost Gunner modifies, as firearms that would each require registration numbers branded on them.

That was the rule change proposed by the nonprofit gun control advocacy organization Everytown for Gun Safety, which was founded by former New York City mayor and philanthropist Michael Bloomberg.

Wilson believes the rule change could drive up demand for DIY guns. 

"If it's actually more difficult to buy an [AR-15] upper receiver…because it's serialized and now I gotta go through the background check and everything, I'm now going to consider for the first time making an [AR-15] upper receiver," says Wilson. 

And while Wilson was a pioneer in the DIY gun space, Defense Distributed is now just one of many players, meaning that regulating ghost guns will be more of a challenge. 

"I think the interesting thing with these sorts of laws…is there's this growing gap between what's on paper and what is enforceable in law," says Kareem Shaya, a software engineer and co-founder of Open Source Defense, a gun rights organization mostly made up of engineers and Silicon Valley programmers seeking to distance the debate over the right to armed self-defense from the left-right culture war. 

"If you look at the path gun rights have taken over the past five years, really that is the story of gun rights moving from a world of politics to a world of culture," says Shaya. "In 2020, between 7 and 15 percent of the people who are gun owners today in the U.S. became gun owners in 2020, and the fastest-growing segments within that were black people and women."

In the tumultuous year of a pandemic, mass protests, riots, and a contested election, gun sales spiked across America and especially in big cities. The National Shooting Sports Foundation, the firearm industry trade association, says that more than 5 million registered gun sales in the first seven months of 2020 were to first-time buyers.

"The thing we find is as people learn about guns, they tend to be cool with them," says Shaya. "I think arguably YouTube and Twitter and Instagram are the biggest advances for gun rights of the past several decades…arguably more important than any actual gun technology in terms of spreading gun rights." 

In the COVID-19 era, the Biden White House is framing gun violence as a public health issue. But Wilson believes the career bureaucrats at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) have long had these regulations ready to go and were just waiting for a president willing to enact them.

"Joe [Biden] was simply able to take advantage of what the [ATF] was already preparing and ready to do and kind of wanted to do for the last four years. So this might feel like a kind of warp drive or acceleration of the problem, but in fact, it's simply the problem of not being able to replace the permanent government bureaucracy that's installed in D.C.," says Wilson.

Biden is also proposing to ban pistol braces, appoint a gun control lobbyist to head the ATF, and push for more "red flag" laws that would allow police to confiscate someone's firearms if they determine that he "presents an imminent risk" to himself or others.

But Wilson says he isn't particularly worried about the effect that these rules will have on his business or on gun rights in America. 

 

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3 Young Minnesotans Sue the State for Their Right To Bear Arms

https://reason.com/2021/06/09/3-young-minnesotans-sue-the-state-for-their-right-to-bear-arms/

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Three young adults in Minnesota are fighting for recognition of their full rights as adult citizens of the United States by filing a lawsuit against Minnesota challenging its requirement that a person must be at least 21 years old to obtain a handgun permit. 

Under current Minnesota state law, carrying a handgun in public for the purpose of self-defense is illegal without a permit. And though 20-year-olds are considered old enough to vote, serve on a jury, hold public office, get married, and fight in the armed forces, Minnesota doesn't consider them old enough to be issued a handgun permit.

On June 7, Kristin Worth, 18, Austin Dye, 19, and Axel Anderson, 18, of Minnesota filed a lawsuit challenging this requirement. They're joined by the Firearms Policy Coalition, the Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus, and the Second Amendment Foundation.

"This is an action to uphold Plaintiffs' right to keep and bear arms as guaranteed by the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution," their complaint states. It cites District of Columbia v. Heller, in which the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to own and carry firearms, and McDonald v. City of Chicago, in which the court held that the right to bear arms is "among those fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty" and applies to laws passed by the states. 

The plaintiffs argue that the Second Amendment applies to all adults, including those between the ages of 18 and 21, "who are considered adults for almost all purposes and certainly for the purposes of the exercise of fundamental constitutional rights." These young adults are also entitled to exercise their First Amendment rights, the plaintiffs argue.

By requiring people to be at least 21 years old to obtain a handgun permit, "the State of Minnesota prohibits a certain class of law-abiding, responsible citizens—namely, adults who have reached the age of 18 but are not yet 21—from fully exercising the right to keep and bear arms," the complaint states. 

It goes on to include testimonies about why each of the three young Minnesotans challenging the law desire to carry a handgun for self-defense, and—in a seeming touch of whimsy—exactly which gun they would carry if they got a permit. 

Kristin Worth is from Mille Lacs, Minnesota. She works part-time as a manager and cashier of a grocery store and, as part of her job, often has to close up the store late at night and walk alone through the parking lot to her car. "Based on this general vulnerability and the prevalence of street crime, including sex offenses, in her immediate neighborhood of Milaca, Plaintiff Worth desires to carry a handgun for selfdefense," the complaint says. It notes that if Worth could legally carry, she would carry a Beretta 92x handgun.

The lawsuit is one of four recent lawsuits that the Firearms Policy Coalition has been involved with that challenge bans on adults under 21 carrying handguns. The other lawsuits were filed in Illinois, Georgia, Tennessee, and Pennsylvania. If one of these legal challenges succeeds, it might set a precedent that would overturn similar policies in states across the country. 

These challenges could also help bring recognition to the rising legal infantilization of young adults which has followed their cultural infantilization, with the legal minimum age for drinking, smoking, and other activities now raised to age 21.

I surely hope this lawsuit is successful and the law in Minnesota is changed.

 

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1 hour ago, Muda69 said:

These challenges could also help bring recognition to the rising legal infantilization of young adults which has followed their cultural infantilization, with the legal minimum age for drinking, smoking, and other activities now raised to age 21.

This is the part of the article I find most interesting. I think I know what he means by “legal infantilization” of 18-20 rear olds. But what is “cultural infantilization?”

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1 hour ago, Bobref said:

This is the part of the article I find most interesting. I think I know what he means by “legal infantilization” of 18-20 rear olds. But what is “cultural infantilization?”

https://theconversation.com/the-infantilization-of-western-culture-99556

It's parents letting their 24-year old child without a job live in their basement and play video games all day.  It's the mindset that every single activity a child does has to be scheduled, monitored, and controlled.  That is just two examples.

 

 

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FYI - A statement made when he was Governor of California.  Regarding the Mulford Act In 1967.  Meant to disarm the Black Panthers conducting armed patrols.  Who were openly (not concealed) carrying weapons........One of the only times the NRA actually supported real gun control.....

Think of it this way - I am carrying a weapon.  It's concealed because the last person I want to know I am armed is the armed person committing a crime where I would feel the necessity to draw on them.  I don't walk around displaying a gun.  That's smart.

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