How Fast Can You Turn Up The Heat?

You know the famous analogy of a frog in water, right?  If you heat it slowly, it they say the frog won't leap out of the water, he'll just sit there until he dies; but if you heat the water and toss the frog in, the frog leaps right out.

Are we heating the water too fast?  First New York, then Colorado, and at the Federal level, Chuckie Schumer floats a law that makes many everyday things into federal felonies. Schumer's bill, S.374 was supposed to be the bill to "stop illegal transfers", only it takes the idea of transfer to whole new levels.  This isn't just making illegal things, like a straw purchase, "more illegal-er", it's much, much worse.  What follows is my own combination of Sebastian's piece and John Richardson's piece at No Lawyers, Only Guns and Money.

If you left your home for more than 7 days, say for a business trip or hospitalization, and leave any unrelated person at home with the guns, you’ve committed a felony. This should be called the “denying gun rights to gays act.” Remember that the federal government does not recognize gay marriage, even if your state does, thanks to DOMA. 5 years in prison.

Actually, even married couples are questionably legal, because the exemption between family only applies to gifts, not to temporary transfers. The 7 day implication is if you leave your spouse at home for more than 7 days, it’s an unlawful transfer, and you’re a 5 year felon. I suppose you could gift them to your spouse, or related co-habitant, and then have them gift them back when you arrive back home. Maybe the Attorney General will decide to create a form for that.

Steals the livelihood of gun dealers by setting a fixed fee to conduct transfers. The fee is fixed by the Attorney General. What’s to prevent him from setting it at $1000?

Enacts defacto universal gun registration, because of record keeping requirements.

All lost and stolen guns must be reported to the federal and local government. This means everyone will have to fill out the theft/loss form, and not just FFLs. You only have 24 hours to comply. If you lose a gun on a hunting trip deep in the woods, and can’t get back home to fill out the form in 24 hours, you’re a felon and will spend 5 years in federal prison.

No exception for state permits. All transfers must go through a dealer or 5 years in federal prison.

UPDATE: Teaching someone to shoot on your own land is a felony, 5 years, if you hand them the gun. Not an exempted transfer.

The exceptions include:

Bona fide gifts between spouses

Bona fide gifts between parents and children

Bona fide gifts between siblings

Bona fide gifts between grandparents and grandchildren

Transfers made from a decedent's estate by will or operation of law

Temporary transfer between unlicensed persons if

• It occurs in the home or curtilage (adjacent property) of the transferor
• The firearm is not removed from the home
• And the duration is less than 7 days.

Temporary transfers in connection with lawful hunting or sporting purposes

• At a range if kept within the premises of the range at all times
• At a "target firearm shooting competition" under the auspices of a State agency or non-profit organization and the firearm is kept within the premise of the shooting competition.
• If while hunting to a person with the requisite hunting license during a designated season for a legal game animal.

You can transfer a gun to someone in your home for less than 7 days if the gun never leaves the house?  What exactly does that cover?  Me letting a visitor see and handle my new precious?  I suppose if I have a house guest stay over, I can loan them a gun for the night.  I can loan someone my gun if we're at a competition on a (state registered, I'm sure) range if the competition is run by someone graced with the magic pixie dust of the state, but not if the host is a for-profit group?  If I loan a friend a gun to hunt pythons in the Everglades, they're not a game animal, so is that a felony?

The end of life as we know it?  Too far, too fast, too soon?  If this thing becomes federal law, has the frog (that would be you and me) been thrown into boiling water?