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What is it with gun control advocates? Do they not understand the entire point of the United States Constitution? Hello? It’s a document whose sole purpose is to limit the power of the federal government—so that the government doesn’t become a tyranny. Tyranny. As in a system that disarms citizens (duh) so that it can deprive them of their natural, civil and human rights. Like . . . Nazi Germany. So while while those of us who value our life and liberty mark the 75th anniversary of an incident that teaches us what happens to a disarmed populace the Boston Globe “celebrates” the 50th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination with a call for universal background checks. You know: all sales monitored and approved by the Uncle Sam. Gun registration. Talk about myopia . . .

It’s hard to see how this bill would be a burden on the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding gun purchasers, since most Americans live within 10 miles of a licensed gun dealer, and the average background check takes just minutes. But that’s the argument opponents used to stall the bill.

No it’s not. The main objection: gun registration -> confiscation -> loss of liberty -> mass murder. Is that so hard to understand?

Globe editorialist Renée Loth is free to call that logic chain unwarranted paranoia (in a country where the government has slaughtered unarmed native American and interned unarmed Japanese Americans) but she has no right to mischaracterize gun rights advocates’ objection to universal background checks.

Question: is this willful ignorance or ignorant ignorance? Yes. That said, Loth isn’t wrong about the NRA’s equally flawed justification for opposing universal background checks simply because private sales aren’t causing a crime problem.

The National Rifle Association opposes requiring background checks for all private sales, noting that “acquisitions from strangers are the exception, not the rule.” But even one sale to the wrong person is too many. In October of last year, Radcliffe Haughton killed his wife, Zina, and two other women at a Wisconsin hair salon where Zina worked, then turned the gun on himself. Zina had obtained a restraining order against Haughton, who had a history of domestic violence, which specifically prohibited him from buying a gun. He would have failed a background check at a licensed gun dealer, but he was able to get a .40 caliber Glock handgun through Armslist.

It took only one privately purchased gun to kill those three innocent women. And of course, it only took one gun to kill Kennedy.

And it only takes one gun to protect ourselves from government tyranny. One gun at a time, anyway.

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55 COMMENTS

  1. “It’s hard to see how this bill would be a burden on the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding gun purchasers, since most Americans live within 10 miles of a licensed gun dealer, and the average background check takes just minutes. But that’s the argument opponents used to stall the bill.”

    Why couldn’t I see this before? Because what’s good for “most Americans” is good for EVERYBODY, RIGHT?

    I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. One nation under (insert relevant personal authority here), indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. One Size Fits All.

    • I am not staking a position one way or the other on voter ID laws. But many people who oppose those laws like pointing to a 90-year old vet who lives 90 miles from a DMV center as a basis for objecting to them but have no qualms with imposing the same burdens on gun ownership.

  2. And it would have only taken one gun, in Zina’s hands, to defend Zina and those three innocent women from her psychotic husband.

    Case closed.

    • One minor correction to logistics: It would have taken only one gun in Zina’s or any of the other three women’s, or any of the passers-by…

      While Zina certainly had an incentive and if necessary, a good reason, to be armed, there is no reason why each and every one of those women should not have taken on the same responsibility for their own safety.

      • Do not overlook the fact that the estranged husband did not need a firearm to quickly and easily kill all three women. He could have walked into the studio with a one gallon glass jar of gasoline, smashed it on the floor, and tossed a match. Or he could have driven his car through the front wall/window at high speed. Or he could have purchased a machete and delivered one blow to the back of the neck of each woman. (And note that a “handy man” could purchase some flat steel stock for a few dollars, sharpen it with a bench grinder, and wrap the handle with tape to make a sword instead of using a machete if there were background checks on machete purchases.) Finally, the man could have used steel wire to garrote the poor women.

        There is no end to the number of ways that a determined assassin — and that is what the estranged husband was — can kill their target. All we can do is be prepared as best as possible to respond to such an attack.

  3. Any excuse to print the same thing over and over.
    We know Lee Harvery got his through the mail.
    Cant do that anymore.
    But where did the gun used for the 3rd and killing shot come from???

  4. Well oswalds came from the mail but I’m sure the guy on the grassy knoll got his through the gunshow loophole…

  5. You wouldn’t understand; you haven’t lived in Massachusetts. I did, for 59 years, until I got the hell out of there and moved to America, aka Arizona. If you want to transfer a gun to a relative or good friend in MA, you have to fill out a form and send it in to the Department of Public Safety. Fortunately, many people fill out the form and send it directly to the circular file. MA sucks, as do NY, CA, NJ, CT, MD, etc., etc.. What happens in those People’s Republics has nothing to do with what this country is all about. The Boston Globe is a commie rag, just like its owner, the NYTimes. Here in AZ, we have the AZ Daily Star, which wants to be the Boston Globe when it grows up. Same cancer…just hasn’t been excised yet.

    • I lived there for two years. It was enough for me. Half of my stuff had the stay out of state at my parents house. The gun laws in MA are full retard.

    • And then some. First of them were produced near the turn of the century. Gotta be very selective, though. A lot of the post Wwii ones I’ve seen are garbage.

      Not unlike Oswald’s, actually….

    • The earliest ones date to 1891, and production pretty much stopped in 1945, so all of them are 50+ years old.

      They are OK rifles, the action is really really fast, but accuracy is not great. Getting ammo is difficult.

  7. The government does in fact get records completely wrong. I’ve pulled over male drivers who were listed as female on their driver licenses and vice versa. One man remarked that the DMV would charge him to get the mistake corrected, so he leaves it as is.

    My motorcycle registration is currently under contention – I paid the fees late and let the insurance lapse. I paid the fees, had fees withheld from my state tax return, and then paid a reinstatement fee. I’ve got AAA insurance. My registration “doesn’t exist” on the DMV website, and it isn’t on the automated call line. Further, I have photographic and bank records of my transactions – especially the one stating that my completed registration will be coming in the mail. That was literally on 6/21/13 at 8:14 pm. Yet I have no registration as of this writing. It’s a good thing that its only my registration, and not something of greater importance such as my healthcare (screwed up by the government and Obama) or my criminal history.

    There are also many times when I’m working the road when the “system” has been down or unusually delayed. I’ve had days in a row where I’ve been unable to run driver histories, stolen vehicle checks and warrant searches. I’ve had warrant returns from a stop I’ve made hours before, with the driver long gone.

    So why would any sane person subject themselves to such a flawed system at taxpayer expense? The “system” can let criminals go and vilify the innocent. Of course, those who are politically connected can usually handle such little “snafus.” The rest of us have to burn time and resources against government employees who have no personal investment in such matters. I bet most people reading these pages have an experience such as mine.

    Since much gun ownership is dependent upon government blessing, it is clearly evident that the government has infringed upon American gun rights, and those of the slave states in particular. The government is not very good at policing itself, and has little incentive to reveal its own incompetence. I see no reason to expand the government, or to trust in its operation without scrutiny. What we desperately need as a nation is a return to the limited government that our forefathers intended.

    • Yep everytime I do a NICS check they have to run me twice. The first one gets delayed for reasons unknown the second comes back no problems as does the third if the LGS owner is overly cautious.

    • This is what my well meaning friends who I have debated don’t get. The system will be used to abuse good people just because the governments system is flawed. It does not matter if your paperwork trail shows you did the right things, you will still have to go through the court system. They might even hold you in jail until trial time depending on how scary they think the gun you obviously didn’t register correctly was. That is why when people try to use cars as a basis for gun control I cringe. Nobody goes to prison for a legit error on registration or licenses. People will go to jail for legit errors on firearms. This is why the UBC needs to continue to be fought.

    • What is more is that NICS can come back with three responses:

      – Pass. The purchaser gets his gun.
      – Denied. The purchaser does not get his gun.
      – Delayed. You have to tell the purchaser to come back later.

      Now, here’s the rub: The FFL can get a “delayed” for three days. After which time, if the FFL hasn’t gotten a “denied,” they can transfer the gun.

      Personally, I’m not transferring a gun unless there’s a “pass.” There are other FFL’s here in Wyoming who have told me of getting a “delayed” back from NICS, calling back after a week, still no progress.

      Seemed like the guy was OK, so he let him have the gun.

      Three more weeks go by: Back comes a “denied.” Now WTF? The dealer has to go get the gun. Calls the local police. They’re not interested in doing anything. Calls ATF. They can’t make it out for a week or more.

      So dealer goes and gets the gun. Fortunately, there wasn’t a problem.

      Another case: FFL calls NICS. Gets a “pass.” Transfers gun.

      Next day, gets an urgent call from NICS. Their bad – they really meant “denied.” Now WTF? NICS people tell the FFL to call the ATF. Calls the ATF, tells them, takes down the info from the ATF agent. The ATF says they’ll take care of it.

      Then there are the dozens of cases people denied who, upon appeal, were approved. Some people have to get their own special ID with the FBI/ATF to make sure they don’t get delayed in the future.

      NICS works reasonably well for a lot of people. For more than a few cases, it fails and fails badly in both directions.

      People’s rights should not be contingent upon a faulty IT database.

  8. A well-armed population, able to organize into an effective and independent fighting force, is necessary to ensure the freedom of the People and the security of the free Republic. Therefore, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

  9. But even one sale to the wrong person is too many.

    Yes it is. But it’s not enough to violate my rights.

    We don’t want to sell a gun to somebody that is likely to use it in a crime. So open the NICS system and let private sellers run their own checks. Does it really matter if an FFL runs the check or the private seller does it?

    Oh, yes it does. The private sellers don’t keep records, and any attempt to make them do so would be unenforceable.

    It’s not about the check, any anyone who says it is is stupid or lying. It’s about the records. Just the records. Always the fvcking records. And the records have one purpose. Just one.

    • And they’ve shown their hand on this over and over. Last time it was on the Coburn proposal, which would have done exactly this. I believe Mark Kelly actually came right out and said “but where are the records?”

    • “But even one sale to the wrong person is too many.”

      I don’t agree. Even with private gun ownership completely outlawed, someone will be able to get a firearm or some other object to use as a weapon; market forces and all, ingenuity, or even brute strength. Don’t sell firearms to people in handcuffs, in K-12 schools, in prisons and jails, in mental hospitals, or in courtrooms during criminal trials. That’s about it for arrest, incompetence due to age, imprisonment, adult incompetence, and criminal defendants in a courtroom being tried. Sometimes ‘wrong persons’ will get guns. It’s very important that our criminal justice system imprison people for legitimate crimes and deliver appropriate sentences to be carried out. It’s paramount that individuals have the free exercise of their right to keep and bear arms for times when the system gets it wrong or ‘just one of those things’ happens in day to day life. Government cannot save us and I wouldn’t want it to anyway. My government needs to let me worry about me in my everyday life. I’m a big boy now. I’ve got this! And if I don’t then that was my own problem, not government’s.

  10. We all know those women would be alive today, because they’re invulnerable to all forms of harm other than bullets. They certainly wouldn’t succumb to an attack with a machete, which anyone can purchase at any hardware store, no questions asked. Or with a baseball bat, available at sporting goods retailers across the country.

    Nope, just bullets.

  12. //start of rant
    To say the purpose of the Constitution is to limit the power of the federal government is to imply that the federal government is an entity in and of itself with power to do what ever it wants, which is quite the opposite of reality. The Constitution is actually the founding document or charter for the federal government. It specifies what powers the citizens of this country have granted to the federal government. The best place to see this is in the 10th amendment, which basically states that if a power isn’t in the constitution, then the federal government doesn’t have that power. Because of this the proper reading of the bill of rights isn’t that it protects the citizens rights, because if a right needs protecting from the government then it isn’t a right it is a privilege that the government bestows on the citizen. No the proper reading of the bill of rights is a series of examples of things the federal government is not allowed to do. Just because a right isn’t protected in the bill of rights doesn’t mean that the citizen shouldn’t have a reasonable expectation that the government won’t infringe upon it. We need to quit using the liberal/communist/socialist definition of what the constitution is and adopt the correct interpretation based on what the founding fathers established.
    //end of rant

    • The purpose of the Constitution was to charter the Federal government and enumerate its powers. The purpose of the Bill of Rights was to keep the Federal government in check by setting limits on Federal actions and powers.

    • I don’t know if I’d call this a rant so much as a treatise. I’ve tried to explain the same thing to various people, but have never been able to express it as well as you have. Thanks for that.

      In the interim, I’ve been flogging the Tenth Amendment Center

      Don’t Comply! Nullify!

  13. The crux of the problem is that most folks cannot get their mind around the fact that the 2nd Amendment is to protect the means of armed rebellion against a government that overreaches and doesn’t listen to the petition of the people for redress. Especially as our Government approaches that threshold

  14. Robert, great that you’re emphasizing the real purpose of the constitution! I was born in Mass (not my fault) but was wise enough to GTFO and moved to Texas. Glad you wrote the article, but I’m afraid that you can’t expect much from people dumb enough to stay in Mass.

  15. I laugh at the 90% support argument.

    Suppose 90% wanted the US government to pass a law to track down and eliminate every ginger in the US. Would the NY Times and the Boston Globe support the law just because 90% wanted gingers dead?

    I realize this is a strawman, but majority rule always degenerates to mob rule. And mob rule is a fickle bitch.

  16. I believe it to be willful ignorance on the part of the most rabid antis. I believe it to be simply ignorance or rationalization on the part of those gun owners (and some ‘gun rights’ groups) who still feel that we must somehow engage in “reasonable discussions’ and have ‘common sense compromise’. Even if all of the crime statistics indicated that private gun ownership increased crime significantly, we would still need the Second Amendment to prevent tyranny and we would certainly need to exercise the individual natural right to self defense. Indeed, the higher the crime, the more one would tend to need to defend ones self. It is better to be free in a nation with high crime than to be in servitude in a nation with low crime… at least in my opinion. Typically, the more free one is, the more risk that can come along with it (a subset of the responsibilities of freedom). Freedom, risk, and responsibility are inseparable. Compromise on the RKBA and we, as individuals and a nation, present and future, will suffer. There is no escaping that reality.
    ————-
    Our Constitution restrains government in an attempt to prevent tyrannical behavior by government. I think many people see the Constitution’s utility as ‘kicking in’ once a government becomes a tyranny (mostly or completely). You know, a ‘line in the sand’. The Constitution’s real value lies in its preventative property; as an effective deterrent to tyranny. The Second Amendment implies both a deterrent and a solution to tyrannical government. It has great utility not only before full on tyranny but afterwards as well. Each and every day of our nation’s existence, the Constitution has been the document standing guard; persistently re-asserting the authority of the People over their government. My view has always been that the Constitution is there to head off all of the ‘little tyrannies’ in addition to the ‘grand tyranny’, into which our government WILL devolve to if we, the People, fail to keep it in check. That power check is impossible, after AND before full tyranny, without an individual, un-infringed right to keep and bear arms. The deterrent value isn’t there and the ability of the People to restore our Republic is absent without it. The 2A makes very little sense if the right of the people to keep and bear arms can be infringed.

  18. If he bought it on Armslist,even private party sales has to go through an FFL because no guns can go through the mail without an FFL.So the transaction was illegal OR they did do that,he cleared a background check and as in Nevada,the Courts broke the law by not releasing records to Public Safety(NICS)

  20. “Loth isn’t wrong about the NRA’s equally flawed justification for opposing universal background checks simply because private sales aren’t causing a crime problem.”

    I wouldn’t call that a flawed justification. It’s a perfectly reasonable argument. While the antis are arguing on bad faith, and violent crime isn’t their real issue. That is their claim — that we need more gun control to reduce violent crime. So if they want “universal background checks” to reduce crime, then how much crime would it reduce? What percentage of crimes were committed legally with owned guns that did not go through a background check? If it’s 1%, it doesn’t justify a huge expensive system that ignores 99% of the problem. The same could be said for bans on assault weapons, “high capacity” magazines, .50 caliber rifles, etc.

    While Ralph’s three kind’s of gun control advocates might very well hit the mark. And gun control might be part of a progressive end game to force their laws on an unarmed populace. And the true believers might not care if crime will skyrocket because that will only allow them to pass even more laws expand the prison system. Et cetera. Regardless how true all that might be. It sounds nuts to the average person. So your main objection, “gun registration -> confiscation -> loss of liberty -> mass murder” gets dismissed as right-wing conspiracy theory. That it is a valid principled and historical argument makes no difference.

    The antis present themselves as wanting to prevent violent crime. And almost everyone wants less violent crime. People see these horrible mass shootings presented in the media, and wish they could have been prevented. Most people don’t know anything about guns or criminology. They wouldn’t know John Lott from a .458 Lott. They can’t define an “assault weapon”, but they know it sounds bad. So when they hear the argument, fewer guns is less crime, it makes intuitive sense to them. That’s why the NRA and others make these pragmatic arguments. It’s necessary to address the issue as it is presented to the average voter. The vast majority of those who support more gun control are not gun control advocates with ulterior motives. They aren’t these progressive bloggers or astroturf asshats who want to ignore the facts. They are just people who simply want less violent crime. Which is a good thing. They want the same thing that most gun rights advocates want.

    A major factor for the increased support for gun rights that has occurred in the last decade is the internet. With access to more information, more people support gun rights and oppose increasing gun control. Their motives or ideology hasn’t changed. It’s simply that when presented with the facts, they see that gun control does not achieve its stated goal of reducing crime.

  21. Come on people, the only goal of “gun control” is civilian disarmament. Any argument about the dangers of any firearm — and hence the justification for a gun control law — applies to all firearms.

    Think about it. Handguns can be incredibly cheap and very easy to conceal … which is why criminals use handguns in almost all violent crimes. According to gun control proponents, that is a compelling reason to ban them. Semi-automatic rifles with 30 round magazines are more expensive and much harder to conceal than handguns but they their projectiles have a lot more energy, often twice the magazine capacity of, and are more accurate than a handgun. According to gun control proponents, that is a compelling reason to ban them. How about shotguns? The Aurora movie theater spree killer killed most of his victims with a common shotgun. And the 2013 Navy Yard killer used a common shotgun to kill all of his victims. There is no doubt, a common 12 gauge shotgun loaded with buckshot is able to do a lot of damage. They are available everywhere and can actually be quite inexpensive. According to gun control proponents, that is a compelling reason to ban them as well. Finally, deer hunting rifles are capable of immense destructive capability for several reasons that compel gun control activists to ban them.

    Gun control advocates want to ban all guns. There is no point debating them about the features, safety, beneficial uses, or destructive potential of any given firearm or class of firearms. Rather than debate them, simply stand up for your rights. Inform them that rights are not subject to majority approval. Tell them that it is offensive when they tell you what personal property you may or may not own. Make them understand that they are bullies. If they are a woman, ask them how they would feel if they could only use feminine hygiene products that you approve, that they must pass a background check before purchasing their feminine hygiene products, and that they must register their feminine hygiene products. If they are a man, ask them how they would feel if they could only use shaving products that you approve, that they must pass a background check before purchasing shaving products, and that they must register all of their shaving products.

  22. The Federal Government has no say in the private sale of used goods within the borders of a state and between two of her citizens. Period.

    • It also has no authority to regulate what people can put into, or take out of, their own bodies. Or to discriminate on the basis of marital status. Or any of billions and billions of other things “we” are letting them get away with.

      It’s definitely past time for blanket Nullification.

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