Feinstein legislation is the Obamacare of gun control
Legislative overreach reveals the agenda
Senator Dianne Feinstein has released a summary (reprinted at bottom of post) of the legislation she intends to introduce in the Senate early in January.
It contains many provisions which have no chance of passing, and thereby dooms the legislation. Such sweeping legislation is a gift to opponents of any legislation because it calls into question the motives of Feinstein and others pushing what is the equivalent of Obamacare for gun control.
The bill promises to stop the 1) sale, 2) transfer, 3) importation and 4) manufacturing of military-style assault weapons, handguns, and shotguns as well as high-capacity ammunition feeding devices. It also allegedly calls for a ban on all weapons capable of holding a magazine with a greater than 10 round capacity (which includes many standard issue police handguns).
The bill, as it stands, is an exemplary demonstration of what political suicide looks like.
In one sweeping stroke, Feinstein intends to instigate the pro-gun lobby, alienate the majority of Americans who oppose re-instating a federal assault weapons ban, and run head long into a constitutional battle, all without even the faintest hope of bill passage.
While the bill sounds great on paper if you’re playing to a politically progressive base, it will do little if anything to actually address gun violence in this country….
Efforts to address issues of gun violence have to focus on pragmatic, bi-partisan solutions rather than politically divisive and practically ineffective legislation.
Newark Mayor Cory Booker laid out a fantastic case for immediately effective reforms that do nothing to ban or restrict the legal sale of firearms. His calls for pragmatism fell on largely deaf ears.
There is no reason that federal background checks should not be universally required for the purchase of firearms. There is no defensible justification for why 75% of states are able to ignore mental health checks for firearms purchasers. Not requiring individuals to report lost or stolen firearms hampers legitimate enforcement efforts by making it more difficult to distinguish between legal and illegal guns and should have been addressed years ago.
All of these issues can be addressed quickly and effectively without requiring wholesale prohibition of whole categories of firearms. Reforming and enforcing the laws already on the books receives popular support and ensures that gun control can be made more effective without attacking the rights of legal gun owners.
Ah, but that’s the catch. By proposing such sweeping legislation Feinstein shows that she is more interested in attacking the rights of legal gun owners than in stopping criminals. The agenda is revealed in the overreach.
Summary of 2013 legislation
- Bans the sale, transfer, importation, or manufacturing of:
- 120 specifically-named firearms;
- Certain other semiautomatic rifles, handguns, shotguns that can accept a detachable magazine and have one or more military characteristics; and
- Semiautomatic rifles and handguns with a fixed magazine that can accept more than 10 rounds.
- Strengthens the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban and various state bans by:
- Moving from a 2-characteristic test to a 1-characteristic test;
- Eliminating the easy-to-remove bayonet mounts and flash suppressors from the characteristics test; and
- Banning firearms with “thumbhole stocks” and “bullet buttons” to address attempts to “work around” prior bans.
- Bans large-capacity ammunition feeding devices capable of accepting more than 10 rounds.
- Protects legitimate hunters and the rights of existing gun owners by:
- Grandfathering weapons legally possessed on the date of enactment;
- Exempting over 900 specifically-named weapons used for hunting or sporting purposes; and
- Exempting antique, manually-operated, and permanently disabled weapons.
- Requires that grandfathered weapons be registered under the National Firearms Act, to include:
- Background check of owner and any transferee;
- Type and serial number of the firearm;
- Positive identification, including photograph and fingerprint;
- Certification from local law enforcement of identity and that possession would not violate State or local law; and
- Dedicated funding for ATF to implement registration.
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Comments
How does this accomplish anything to prevent a crime? Doesn’t it imply that the legal firearm owner somehow is liable? Doesn’t it imply registration and regulation of what constitutes a “legal reason” to possess a firearm?
Requiring federal background checks also means that the feds know who owns what. How does that comport with the plain language of the second amendment anyway? What part of “shall not be infringed”allows the feds to decide who may own weapons or to regulate what sort?
Not necessarily. One simple check to ensure an individual doesn’t have any recent criminal activity recorded does NOT mean anyone needs to record that he is buying a particular firearm, ideally the inquiry itself is archived and erased after a certain time so there is no specific record of a firearm purchase at all. Whether that’s something that actually happens or not is questionable — and any system for anything is subject to abuse.
Remember, as we are fond of saying, rights carry responsibilities.
The FBI is supposed to purge all personal data from a NICS check within 24 hours. In theory, the only person who would hold information regarding the name of the buyer and the firearm transferred to them would be the FFL holder (except in states with registration). The ATF is prohibited by law from keeping records of firearms owners but there have been instances where they’ve scanned or photographed dealer bound books during routine inspections.
The system is supposed to protect the privacy of lawful firearms owners but it’s only effective if the Justice Department adheres to the law. Do you trust Holder to obey the law?
The FBI was /supposed/ to do that, but they were not for a while, then I lost track. They may have started purging records while Bush II was in office, but I trust him about as much as I trust… well, never mind.
Some of the comments sound like people who are not “gun nuts” or part of the “firearms conspiracy”, and there’s a lot to know.
Intro for the intellectually inclined:
http://www.guncite.com
These people are careful in order to prevent the opposition finding a mole hill to make a mountain range out of. I think most of the readers here will appreciate their care.
How about a quick background check before anyone is allowed to write a column, post on a blog, appear as a guest on a news show, call in to talk radio, participate in a protest?
With rights come responsibilities.
I talked to two NYC cops this past Monday for about fifteen minutes, and they were totally supportive of licensed concealed carry permits. They even complimented me and said they bet that I was pretty good with a handgun. I had to admit that I am “okay,” but not great and would choose a shotgun if I had to defend myself at home. We agreed that it was a shame that the brave principal and counselor in Connecticut didn’t have a shotgun or a handgun to pull on Lanza- she might not have killed him, but she might have stopped him.
As usual, the Left has the exactly wrong approach.
I told the NYC cops that I’d give up my guns as soon as Bloomberg and other celebrities and politicians give up their armed bodyguards. They thought that was HYSTERICAL!
Bumper Sticker on Senator Feinstein’s Prius Limo:
SPOONS CAUSE OBESITY!!
talk about warrantless surveillance…
“It contains many provisions which have no chance of passing, and thereby dooms the legislation.”
I’m not as confident as you are professor…and as far as Kogan’s assessment that the legislation is political suicide for Democrats well, there is no such thing. They can do or propose anything they want. MAYBE it won’t pass, but it won’t do any harm to the Democrat brand either.
I couldn’t understand the political suicide claim either.
Would Feinstein’s bill have made a difference in the 2012 Presidential election? In what Congressional races, let alone control of Congress?
See Manchin, walk-back…
The answer to your question is yes, and yes.
I’m with you on this. Who among us thought ObamaCare never had a chance to pass. Gulp.
They have trash to “compromise” with, for a change, and something to get the rabble worked up about because we are soooo unreasonable.
Feinstein has a lock on her seat. There just aren’t that many ways to blast her out of it.
Note that the ban on magazines is a POSSESSION ban. Not just a manufacturing ban. (at least as far as any summary I’ve read).
This means that if the law passes, currently law abiding citizens will instantly become criminals. There would have to be some way of collecting those magazines from lawful owners.
This is a violation of the 2nd, 4th and 5th amendments.
Feinstein, I would assume, is certainly aware of all this.
I believe that the game plan is that, after a time of rancorous debate and discussion, the bill will be amended to drop many of it’s constitutionally questionable parts and concentrate on a registration of ALL weapons held by civilians.
History shows that registration precedes confiscation. All previous confiscations by government have been facilitated (it was actually a requirement) by registration so that the government knows who possesses a weapon and where they are with positive identification.
There currently is a requirement in the EU that all EU member states must have all weapons owned by civilians registered by 2015. There was an article about how Germany has 5.5 million registered owners that are currently registered with the State.
This program by the EU and the UN attempt to regulate/eliminate the civilian ownership and transfer of weaponry in the world will soon be a common story run by the State Media to soften up the electorate into acceptance of Registration as being a rational and logical move that cannot be argued against unless the person so doing has nefarious or evil motives. That will soon be the narrative.
Just because the State Media has quieted down somwhat about gun control does not mean anything. They are conversing and discussing plans to make registration seem to be a mild and rational solution while neglecting to remind anyone of the past history of all registrations leading to confiscation.
We have seen the Media aid in the election of an individual who at the least is inimical to the founding ideals of this nation. They succeeded by maintaining a united and uniform approach by how they framed stories to what stories where ignored they will now apply that technique to the implementation of liberals highest goal; the disarming of the American people.
Any politician who falls for this feint and claims that it is reasonable and logical is enemy of freedom and the Nation and should be targeted for defeat in 2014 or the next opportunity to remove them.
How fu*ked up have we become? States are now legalizing a drug that is prohibited under federal law, and many others are decriminalizing anything less that commercial quantities. Yet, the Feds do nothing (for the record, I say the war on drugs is useless). However, when it comes to a Constitutionally protected right, these same states and Feds are completely okay with regulating, criminalizing, confiscating and destroying.
The difference is that to control the masses, They need opiates, like drugs, booze, free sex, gambling and sports. Guns legally owned by citizens, on the other hand, are the antidote to absolute control. Guns empower People.
I’m starting to remember those words, written during the founding, about a government that becomes destructive to its ends…
“This is a violation of the 2nd, 4th and 5th amendments.”
Justice John Roberts will approve it as a tax.
jakee308 has it right. registration is the necessary step prior to confiscation, federal databases would be a map for attacking gun owners and filling the gulags. Any citizen would do well to immediately punchase guns privately, to stay off the ATF lists. this is a line in the sand, anything like registration would be a call for civil war. if enough gun owners take one cop or soldier with them, the state will falter.
and what Solzhenitsyn thought about self-defense–
“And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?… The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If…if…We didn’t love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation…. We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.”
Just look at the Warsaw Ghetto. When the Jews who were left realized that it was a fight for their very survival, oh how did they fight! In fact, the Ghetto held out longer than the entire nation of Poland did in September 1939. The suppression of the ghetto uprising was certainly a Pyrrhic victory for the Germans.
I took a look at Booker’s proposals and, while I don’t see anything inherently bad about them, they will, at best, only provide marginal improvements. His first, that all firearm sales be forced to go through FFLs, has been in place in several states, in particular my own state of California. The record is that this has not reduced gun crime, and in fact California lags other states in enjoying the current national reduction in violent crime in general, and gun crime in particular. In addition, many California communities run by Democrats (which, in California, is most of them) have used our law requiring local approval of gun dealer licenses to launch a war on gun dealers, enacting onerous restrictions on them and driving them out of business. Gun shows as well have been driven out by closing off public venues they can operate in, despite the fact that no private gun sales can take place at these shows. So, in practice, universal background checks don’t significantly (or even noticeably) reduce crime, and the anti-gun forces that advocate these laws historically then use them as leverage to further stigmatize gun ownership.
What is happening here is the deliberate conflation of “rights” and “privileges”.
You are privileged to operate a motor vehicle. If you operate it outside of the established laws you can expect to be fined, jailed or have your privilege to drive revoked.
There is nothing written in the Constitution enumerating the operation of a motor vehicle as a right.
On the other hand, you have an inalienable right to possess firearms, a right that the Constitution specifically enumerates as inalienable and something that cannot be infringed upon by government.
When government tries to regulate the sale, possession or use of these firearms, they are infringing upon our inalienable rights by imposing limitations that are justifiable when imposed upon privileges – this is the conflation.
We must never forget that the Second Amendment was put into place for exactly the circumstances that we are now facing – a tyrannical government that is hell bent upon destroying the fabric of our nation through social and economic terrorism.
These are the people that so worried James Madison and the other Founders. Times such as the ones we are living in right now are the reason they recognized the right to bear arms as essential to the public good as they knew full well that eventually a person like our president would come to power.
Again, as with other questions…
two words…
civil disobedience is our last line of defense, and it is a powerful one.
It’s the old liberal obsession with preventing crimes by banning guns, in defiance of the U.S. Constitution. First of all, it is futile to expect that crime can be prevented by a weapons ban in any society; it’s been tried, doesn’t work. For those who didn’t pay attention in History classes, the Romans system existed in one form or another for about 700 years without any police arm. All adult male citizens were REQUIRED to be armed when in public. An armed society is a polite society. In the U.S., from 1865 to 1900, some 600 murders were documented in the American West. This was very definitely an armed society. There were 800 documented murders in 1886 in New York city alone, which was already beginning to experience repressive laws with respect to firearms, UNLESS, a person was affiliated with the Tammany Hall political machine!
“It’s the old liberal obsession with preventing crimes by banning guns, in defiance of the U.S. Constitution.”
Yes, and no. They’re not obsessed with “preventing crimes.” They couldn’t care less about “preventing crimes.” They want the end of private gun ownership as every Leftist regime in human history has because it represents both a repugnant expression of citizen empowerment and autonomy and an obvious form of psychological and material resistance to government power.
This has nothing to do with the safety of children and everything to do with the power of government and making sure the people do not have the means to fight tyranny.
I have the solution to school violence – all those cops that take early retirements on bloated pensions? They have to spend one day a week at a school as an undercover security guard. Works for me.
How “undercover” do you think a retired cop will be?
Crisis, opportunity, power grab. It’s always that simple, always the same. The Left requires no in-depth political analysis or understanding. Psychologically speaking, it’s a different story.
“It contains many provisions which have no chance of passing, and thereby dooms the legislation.”
I demur. That is a feature, not a bug. It enables the Dems to blame all future gun crimes on Republicans. As I wrote early this month,
The Feinstein bill is just another tool in the toolbox.
The beauty of the Constitution of the United States is that it is written such that it can be plainly understood by the very citizenry to which it belongs. It is not something that must be translated through politicians, justices and lawyers in order to be comprehended by the average American – it belongs to you and to me – it is accessibly to all if one simply stops long enough to read and comprehend it.
The Second Amendment is a limitation upon government, a limitation that disallows infringement.
The purpose of this limitation is so that political power ultimately rests with the people and not with our government; it is our ultimate weapon against tyranny and the push by the progressives has begun to alienate us of this right
As such, the proposal of Senator Feinstein is unconstitutional on its face.
But…
We must now contemplate the mindset of the progressive.
I come to politics through the defense of my industry from the attempts by progressives to implement onerous regulation upon the use of pesticides. I have watched these despicable environmentalists in action – they care nothing for the environment and are utterly ignorant of the subject matter they are attempting to regulate, but rather they are hell bent upon political power and shutting down commerce that they are offended by regardless of the hurt they inflict.
I have learned the hard way that to try to accommodate them or to compromise with them is foolish. They will take the half-a-loaf and then immediately set about trying to regulate you out of the half-loaf you have left.
In other words, you cannot “Martin Luther King” them, you have to “William Tecumseh Sherman” them. Give them no quarter – at all.
Such is the case here with Feinstein. She is not stupid. She knows that her legislation is unacceptable. But she will press it in order to get half-a-loaf; she is applying the Emmanuel Principle to achieve her goal in exploiting the corpses of dead children to achieve a political goal.
Nothing less.
And mark my words, she will never be satiated – progressives are never satiated. They will immediately come for the rest of the loaf until there are no firearms in private hands in this nation.
They keep coming and coming like the zombies in Night of the Living Dead.
This is a good time to recall the lessons of the ancients (funny how phrases in Latin and Greek are so apropos in the modern era – why do you suppose that is?)
Si vis pacem, para bellum
and
μολὼν λαβέ
(If someone wants to throw in a little Sun Tsu, please feel free)
I see DiFi as engaging in classic horse-trading/negotiating.
There is a tactic called “anchoring” where you set the bar high, knowing it will be lowered eventually.
This is also remarkably stupid drafting. Naming specific weapons invites simple renaming.
You saw this during the Nixon wage and price controls with cuts of meat, for instance.
IF I owned a Bushmaster, I would rename it Dianne. I would think appropriate thoughts as I stuffed rounds up its chamber, too….
Yeah, Diane Feinstein (whose intemperate remarks allowed Richard Ramirez to avoid capture) is from that old-school where you ask for the moon, sun and stars, when all along you just wanted the moon and a warm place to sh!t.
Friends of mine are talking about starting a gun company that manufactures exclusively in Texas and sells only intrastate, thus avoiding many of the onerous gun regulations. Building AKs really ain’t all that difficult. Take one apart sometime and look at it. Ditto for the hi-cap AK mags.
Yep. By design…
The AK was from the ground up designed to be built by the unmotivated and less-skilled, and used by the most primitive and benighted.
It was brilliantly successful.
When they specifically named the Colt AR-15, Bushmaster developed the XM-15 to get around the assault weapons ban. This isn’t about assault weapons (whatever that means), it’s about banning all firearms.
The Left and their compliant Fifth Column media have effectively made guns that “look like military weapons” into military weapons.
Today it’s “guns that ordinary people don’t need to own”. What next, cars? After all, a Ferrari, Porsche or even high-end Corvette “look like race cars”. Do “race cars” need to be driven on city streets and roads? Let’s ban anything with more that 4 cylinders. After all, the same rationale will no doubt apply.
How about people in NYC getting pushed in front of trains? That’s what, twice in a month? Maybe we should ban trains. Maybe we should ban trains that go real fast and are hard to stop. I know… let’s ban trains that go more than 30 mph and take more than 30 feet to stop. After all, more people have died by NYC subway than by sugary soda.
People laugh at us when we talk about that slippery slope. Well, as more and more people begin to slip, I think that laughter will turn to panic, but by then, it may be too late.
It’s time to apply Alinsky to the Alinskyites!!!1
Booker is saying there are a lot of things that can be done, INCLUDING the assault weapons ban that President Bush supported.
Feinstein is not the first legislature to offer an aggressive bill expecting that it will be altered and watered down along the way.
Take this issue, the “Fiscal Cliff ” any other crisis of the last 4 years & it is the political or leadership class attempting to cover their ass with, words, paper or other b. s. so the public at large doesn’t catch on they’re a bunch of posturing fools. This includes the media. They cause all this crap thru their clueless ineptitude & have no idea what to with the result. Look at the eyes of Boehnor, Reid, Di Fi, Obama, any of the media twits & its pretty clear they are in way over their heads. They built this mess, they own it.
So basically, everyone is dumb? The politicians, the media, everyone I can’t buy that. It is the classic “everyone is an idiot except the people in the room” argument.
Just say no. This is all about taking power away from the people and giving it to the government. Criminals will never follow these supposed gun laws and any bill that limits guns or ammunition will just push up the price on the black market (where criminals purchase them anyway). How long before the government bans anyone who has ever taken an anti-depressant from owning a gun? Those who wish to commit mass-murder and are willing to die to do it,will find a way to do it anyway. The only way to stop them is a good guy with a gun. The second amendment was written to protect our freedom from a tyrannical government.
•Requires that grandfathered weapons be registered under the National Firearms Act, to include:
Feinstein here is using this intrusive provision to attempt a universal inventory of weapons, to be included in a future mass confiscation.
Talk about encouraging normally law-abiding citizens into massive civil disobedience.
“A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state,…” and knowing know that possession of firearms is a right owned by the people, how can the Federal government ban military-style firearms? By state statute, I and every other citizen of my sate between the ages of 18 and 70 inclusive are members of the “unorganized militia.” Banning military style firearms with high capacity magazines cannot be a reasonable regulation under the 2nd Amendment.
[…] As Dan Mitchell likes to say, “Bad government policy leads to more bad government policy.” If the previous gun-control law didn’t work the answer must be even-tighter regulations meant to discourage ownership, the inevitable destination of which is outright confiscation or its equivalent — “the Obamacare of gun control.” […]
To coin a phrase: “Squirrel!”
Don’t fall for the “gunshow loophole”. There is none. What the gungrabbers want is licensing and registration. But, you say, they only want a “background check” for private sales. Uh, I’ve been a bureaucrat most of my life and I’ll tell you how it falls. A “background check” is meaningless unless you know who has what, when. Like a library card. Books out, books in, who has the book. So I want to sell/give my next door neighbor a gun, say one as small as a paperback book. Now no one knows how many guns I have or what they are. So how will the bureaucrats know I have made a sale without having an inventory of ALL the guns I have? Well, we can’t have that, so let’s register every gun. And those that aren’t registered are “illegal”. Oh, and we need a license fee to PAY for all this. So, problem solved? Ever heard of a moonshiner? Drug dealer? Licensing and registration didn’t solve those problems and neither will this solve the “gun” problem. Gungrabbers hope most people turn guns in because it’s “too much trouble” to keep them. And when that doesn’t work, that $5 a year FEE to license your gun is now $100, $500, $1000 a year. Oh, and YOU registered them, so guess what? Just like when New York City residents “registered” their evil “assault weapons”, once they are tied to you, THEY OWN YOU! And just like NYC, they will use that registration list to confiscate them. Remember, Canada spent ten years and billions of dollars trying to get a “registration list” of all firearms. They claim about a 50% success rate. Who knows? Because a majority of shotgun and rifle owners (Canucks never allowed the dreaded “assault rifle” without registration) never gave in to the registration scam. Don’t you do it. And there is a thumbnail of why a “private sale background check” is just the camels nose that much farther into the tent.
Confiscation follows registration. What happens after confiscation?
http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills
I guess the real question is… if this bill was already law, how much jail time would Dick Gregory be facing?
http://www.firearmsandliberty.com/snyder.aw.ban.html
Just a snippet of the article.
Now, let’s assume that the president is right, that assault weapons are indeed beloved by violent criminals, and that their rapid fire and large ammunition capacities make them eminently suitable for the evil designs of drug lords, gang members, lunatics and extremists. We still have one question. Are the rights and liberties that the law permits to the law-abiding dictated or determined by the choices and behavior of the lawless?
The essence of the “weapon of choice” argument is that, because criminals and madmen use these guns to commit crimes, the law- abiding must give them up. But to ban guns because criminals use them is to tell the innocent and law-abiding that their rights and liberties depend not on their own conduct, but on the conduct of the guilty and the lawless, and that the law will permit them to have only such rights and liberties as the lawless will allow.
Keep in mind, it’s not Ms Feinstein we have to be concerned about; we know how she’ll vote.
It’s the wishy washy Reps and Sens that are there for themselves and are not concerned about the Nation but about their career and their position in the power structure.
There will be many that will see registration as a rational compromise.
By the way; why do WE have to do the compromising all the time? Liberals NEVER compromise. We should at least get mandatory shall carry licenses if being required to register becomes law. There should then be a right to travel through any state with a weapon since there will now be a Federal registration database. How likely is it that gun owners and Constitutionalist will get some RATIONAL compromise for surrendering some of their rights?
Meanwhile: we have seen the willingness, nay the imperative, for too many R’s to “reach across the aisle” and compromise. Those compromises sell our rights to the highest bidder promising future backing for some legislation the compromisee intends to promote. We who are compromised never see the profit from that bargain though.
Time to make it clear now that any compromisers won’t be around to collect on their iou’s from their fellow bipartisans.
Why are we complimenting Booker’s case for regulatory reform when it is provided in response to an event that his proposals would not have affected in the least ?
That is nothing more than trying to take advantage of the tragedy for personal gain, nothing more.
Either make proposals that would have – in some practical way – have altered the events in Newtown, or prevented them, or STFU.
[…] Feinstein legislation is the Obamacare of gun control (legalinsurrection.com) […]
[…] is simply not present for firearm confiscation, nor even the registration as imagined by American Sen. Dianne Feinstein. This being the case, we can see that whatever the hew-and-cry at the moment, it is unlikely that […]
[…] This antithesis of the 2nd Amendment, Prof. William Jacobson (LegalInsurrection.com) calls the “Obamacare of Gun Control” has two clear objectives, the neutering of the 2nd Amendment, and the disarming of […]
[…] antithesis of the 2nd Amendment, Prof. William Jacobson (LegalInsurrection.com) calls the “Obamacare of Gun Control” has two clear objectives, the neutering of the 2nd Amendment, and the disarming of […]