Tuesday, January 5, 2016

In Honor of Bozo's "Reasonable Gun Laws"

A repost of my version of reasonable gun laws.  I've written on this topic before and part of this will come from two posts: here and here, along with some new thoughts.

Let's start here: any adult with normal rights can walk into a sporting goods store in most places and walk out with a shotgun or a rifle with no waiting period.  But if they wanted to buy an AR-15 or a Mossberg 500 from the factory or from a store in another city, why does it have to go through a local FFL's hands? Why can't anyone order a rifle or shotgun from an online gun store, their favorite Big Outdoor Store, or even an Amazon.com kind of "online superstore", and have the gun shipped to their house?  It was sold by an FFL that did the NICS check, so why does another one have to get involved?  It used to be that way, until the GCA of '68.  What advantage is there to society from shipping it to an FFL?  It's not like the second FFL prevents someone from stealing it in transit - that's on the shipping company.  It does nothing but give money to local FFL holders. All they can do is look at the buyer's ID - which can be done digitally with encryption when the purchase is made. 

We all know there's no such thing as a "gun show" loophole, and that you can't just order something online from a gun store. I say, "why the hell not?"  It's freaking 2016, for God's sake.  We have the technology.

This is the opposite of the current drive to make every sale of every used firearm go through an FFL, like Obama is pushing for in today's EOs.  I think the whole FFL system is obsolete, a remnant of the way things worked in the 1930s, and does nothing that couldn't be achieved in other ways.  All it does is keep FFLs and Fed.gov worker drones employed - which seems to be the point.  I want our side to push back on the whole system.  If FFLs and these gun laws mattered, they'd prosecute people for violating them! 

We should push for, at the Federal level, complete concealed carry reciprocity across the country.  Those places that still deny the human right to self defense need to be dragged, kicking and screaming into the modern age. I'd prefer reciprocity for both open and concealed carry, although you know that would be a hard sell to every Evil Party senator and representative.  Heck, we have a hard enough time getting it passed in Florida with the treacherous Stupid party politicos, who are nominally on our side. 

There's also a silly hodgepodge of waiting periods for a handgun.  In some places it's 3 days, in others, 5 days.  Here in Florida it's state law to eliminate the wait if you hold a concealed carry permit.  If there's a waiting period, why can't you order a pistol from Bud's (for example) and wait 3 or 4 days for UPS to deliver it? Again, you'd fill out the background check with the FFL who's shipping it, why does it need to go to another FFL?  With today's computer security, you could verify age, do a NICS check - anything the local shop can do - online. The whole idea of a wait was a "cooling off" period, so that a hothead doesn't go buy a gun in a moment of anger and then go kill someone, but I personally have a hard time believing there were large numbers of that sort of crime anyway.  It's an extension of the ban on Saturday Night Specials, which (as far as I can tell) only had the effect of removing cheap, reasonably functional guns from people who couldn't afford better ones, and caused some smaller arms companies to either fold or change their product line.  Another government penalty on the poor.  But, fine, we'll play your infantile waiting game -- now how does waiting 3 days to pick up a gun in your city differ from waiting 3 days to get it delivered by UPS or FedEx?

Why are silencers - glorified mufflers - regulated as if they were machine guns?  Why are we required to have a muffler on a car, motorcycle or lawn mower, but we're required to not have one on a gun?  This was originally to keep people from shooting the King's deer (poaching game), but I think the problem today is Hollywood.  They created this illusion that a silencer reduces the 155 to 160 dB of a gun shot down to a barely audible, and it just isn't so.  Silencers should be completely deregulated - not even the $5 "any other weapon" class - just over the counter at your local store.  Did you know that there's nothing like an 80% lower in the construction of a silencer; no stage that's legal?  If I have a lathe (like I do) and they find pieces that someone thinks could someday become a silencer, I've broken the law.  The ban is total. 

This one actually is for the children.  And for anyone who moves next door to gun ranges or clubs and gets disturbed by the sounds. 

We should eliminate postal restrictions against mailing of firearms. We can ship them via UPS, or FedEx, why not USPS?  Don't they need every penny of revenue they can get?

Get rid of the stupid “sporting purpose” tests for firearms. The Heller decision makes it very clear that the Second Amendment isn’t about duck hunting. This particularly affects imports.  No restrictions.  

Get rid of the stupid laws on short barreled rifles and shotguns.  The idea that a shotgun barrel 18.05" long is fine, but one that's 17.95" is some sort of killer monster weapon is just silly.  It's there simply to create law violators.  It's also one of their most enforced laws - probably because it's really easy to measure barrel length.

The last time I did some looking at John Lott's data, his studies had been peer reviewed 30 times and never refuted.  There was one author who said Lott couldn't prove "More Guns Equals Less Crime"; but neither could he (the reviewer) disprove it.  Lump this one under the rule for reading medical studies: correlation does not equal causation.  However, and this is important, there can't be causation without correlation.  When you look at global rates of gun ownership vs homicides, there's almost a perfect inverse relationship between the number of guns in private hands and murder rate, across the globe. 
While cross-cultural studies have their troubles, and some countries are only classed as countries in the loosest sense of the word, in most cases the countries with the most gun ownership had the least homicide. 


8 comments:

  1. Yep, of all the systems that are "broken" that Glorious Leader Chairman Maobama talks about, the gun buying one is broken the worst.

    Here in Kommifornia, the waiting period is TEN days, which is especially galling if you already own a gun of the type your new one is.

    I already OWN several pistols, so why do I have to wait for another new one?

    You used to be able to walk out with a long gun, but that changed last year.

    I already own 4 other rifles, and three shotguns, yet I had to wait TEN DAYS to pick up my AR when I bought it.

    Insanity.....

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  2. Make no mistake this isn't about gun murders, gang violence or criminals. It is part of a century long effort by the far left to disarm the American public. They have passed 10,000 gun laws so if laws could prevent bad people from getting guns it would have already done so. So it is NOT about safety or lives lost. So ask yourself why now? There is clearly a big anti-gun push on by the far left so why now? I believe that our government knows the S--T is about to hit the fan. Our economy is a shell our government is bankrupt and we are staring another great depression in the eye. While at the same time China is taking over the Pacific, Russia is eyeing the Atlantic as he takes over the ME and half a dozen really nasty countries have joined the nuclear club. I think when the SHTF there will be a takeover of our country one way or another. But how do you do that if everyone is armed??? The answer: first registration then confiscation. It's coming folks. Obama really is the Machurian candidate.

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  3. You guys couldn't tell I was softly crying when I wrote this...

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  4. "We should push for, at the Federal level, complete concealed carry reciprocity across the country. " I really have an issue with anyone, Left, Right, in the middle, or around the back, pushing for anything at the Federal level. Don't usurp State's rights; pet causes are not justification. The Fed should step in any time a State violated individual liberties as protected by the Constitution.
    At the end of the day, our elected politicians and their appointed bureaucrats can do anything the people let them do.
    I am commenting because I agree with your take otherwise and appreciate your taking the time to write it.

    eli

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    1. Eli,

      Thanks for the comment; this is a tough one, because the best course of action for the Fed.gov is to never deal with them unless you have to, and I agree with you on that. But I think we're at the point you describe, "The Fed should step in any time a State violated individual liberties as protected by the Constitution.". Are you familiar with the stories about people having to change planes in New Jersey or New York, needing to stay overnight due to weather or something, and then getting arrested for having a gun that the TSA approved for travel? Check out this lawyer's practice.

      Sounds like state gun laws, the New Jersey/New York airport extortion racket, and the recent examples of Virginia dropping other states' permits?

      The reason we have federally mandated low-flow toilets today is that the manufacturing companies essentially begged the feds to get involved. They were getting a quilt of laws being passed or proposed all across the country and they hardly ever agreed. They asked congress to simplify it.

      I know the mantra from the states that "driving is a privilege and not a right", but driver's licenses are portable state to state with every state accepting every other. That would be a massive improvement for carry permits.


      SiG

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    2. Eli: "The Fed should step in any time a State violated individual liberties as protected by the Constitution."

      Per your statement, the Feds already did - gay marriage is now legal everywhere. And SCROTUS already decided it was "Constitutional" (even though we know that's BS).

      One of the nice things about states' rights is that, if they violate your rights you can still move to a state that doesn't. With Federal law, you cannot. Your only protection would be if the state you live in defends you against the Federal encroachment upon your rights.

      Our Constitution is meant to deny that power to the Federal government and retain it for the states or the people. Not the other way around.

      SiG: I haven't done it in eight or ten years, but it used to be legal to mail long guns, just not handguns. I mailed an AR-7 rifle back to the factory when they were being made by a company with extremely poor quality control, somewhere between Armalite and Henry. I sent it through the mail, with the USPS's blessing (I checked beforehand, of course). Has that changed? I haven't been paying attention to that.

      I do know a couple of air gun companies (Pyramid Air is one) told me they couldn't ship an air rifle to my PO box. I checked with my local Postmaster (this was last year) and he said it was completely legal to ship to my PO box.

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    3. I thought so. This is something I copied from an old post, and I looked it up back then. I'm pretty sure you can't get a gun delivered by USPS, but then I wouldn't bet much.

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