Gun Control Debate

[Dave_LF]

Honestly, if a 4-year-old is advanced enough to brag about his shooting skills online, then maybe there's an argument for letting him do it.

[Inanna]

Ha-ha, Dave. I think it was her* bragging, not the son. There seems to be a typo in the item.

To be fair, my 3 yr old did once taunt Teremia on Fitbit.


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Please bear with my typos & grammar mistakes. Sent from my iPhone - Palantirs make mistakes too.

[Alatar]

So. Given the latest atrocity, would anyone really object if Obama used his last few months in office to ram home some gun control? Can he?

[Túrin Turambar]

A 54 seat Republican majority in the Senate, and a Supreme Court which has not shown signs of changing its views on the Second Amendment since D.C. v Heller suggest that it'd be very difficult (as far as I know - the USSC watchers here will be able to give a better answer).

Curious aside - when I looked up D.C. v Heller on Wikipedia to remind myself when the case was, I noticed a name that I recognised in the list of plaintiffs. Tom Palmer, a senior fellow at the Libertarian Cato Institute, who I heard speak (very well) in favour of free trade in Sydney last year. Palmer is gay, and he joined the plaintiffs on the basis of an incident which happened when he was confronted by a large gang shouting homophobic abuse. He produced a concealed 9mm pistol, and they fled. Curious that I'd met one of the plaintiffs in Heller without knowing it, and also tragically ironic that the same approach to private gun ownership with limited regulation which prevented homophobic violence in Palmer's case has apparently been a significant contributing factor in a mass act of homophobic violence which has claimed fifty lives.

[Cerin]

I don't know if there's anything the President can do on his own. This falls squarely on the shoulders of a cowardly Congress, who are too afraid of the NRA to pass a ban on assault weapons. The National Rifle Association is very effective when targeting office holders for defeat who cross them, so members of Congress would have to put the public welfare before their career concerns if anything is to be done.

[River]

It's possible that someone else in that club was carrying and just didn't open fire for whatever reason. Maybe they froze. Or maybe they realized that it would not help. What does a man do against such reckless hate?

So. Given the latest atrocity, would anyone really object if Obama used his last few months in office to ram home some gun control? Can he?

If a room full of gunned down first-graders couldn't effect a change this won't either.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

At a PBS Newshour town hall two weeks before this latest horror, President Obama said this:

“I just came from a meeting today in the situation room, in which I’ve got people who we know have been on ISIL websites, living here in the United States, U.S. citizens,” Obama said at the town hall, using another name for the Islamic State group. “And we’re allowed to put them on the no-fly list when it comes to airlines, but because of the National Rifle Association, I cannot prohibit those people from buying a gun.”

“This is somebody who is a known ISIL sympathizer, and if he wants to walk into a gun store or a gun show right now and buy as many weapons and ammunition as he can, nothing’s prohibiting him from doing that even though the FBI knows who he is,” the president said.

Two weeks before Orlando.

Meanwhile, I can not even express how disgusting I have found the actions of Donald Trump in response to this horror.

[Frelga]

Trump just keeps plumbing new depths.

Here's a piece by John Scalzi that should be required reading.

Thoughts and Prayers – Whatever

[yovargas]

At a PBS Newshour town hall two weeks before this latest horror, President Obama said this:

“I just came from a meeting today in the situation room, in which I’ve got people who we know have been on ISIL websites, living here in the United States, U.S. citizens,” Obama said at the town hall, using another name for the Islamic State group. “And we’re allowed to put them on the no-fly list when it comes to airlines, but because of the National Rifle Association, I cannot prohibit those people from buying a gun.”

“This is somebody who is a known ISIL sympathizer, and if he wants to walk into a gun store or a gun show right now and buy as many weapons and ammunition as he can, nothing’s prohibiting him from doing that even though the FBI knows who he is,” the president said.

Is that true?? That can't possibly be true?? How in the world could that be true?? It is unfathomable...........

Meanwhile, I can not even express how disgusting I have found the actions of Donald Trump in response to this horror.

I fully, genuinely, honestly, thoroughly do not want to have even the slightest bit of knowledge of what Trump is saying or doing right now. I would like to have a few blessedly Trump free days if that is humanly possible anymore.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I wish the rest of our lives could be Trump-free.

[Primula Baggins]

At a PBS Newshour town hall two weeks before this latest horror, President Obama said this:

“I just came from a meeting today in the situation room, in which I’ve got people who we know have been on ISIL websites, living here in the United States, U.S. citizens,” Obama said at the town hall, using another name for the Islamic State group. “And we’re allowed to put them on the no-fly list when it comes to airlines, but because of the National Rifle Association, I cannot prohibit those people from buying a gun.”

“This is somebody who is a known ISIL sympathizer, and if he wants to walk into a gun store or a gun show right now and buy as many weapons and ammunition as he can, nothing’s prohibiting him from doing that even though the FBI knows who he is,” the president said.

Is that true?? That can't possibly be true?? How in the world could that be true?? It is unfathomable...........

It's not unfathomable, it's politics as usual. The latest attempt to (at least symbolically) pass such a law was in December 2015.

Here's what happened:

Senate rejects ban on gun purchases for people on terrorist watch list

The Senate turned aside a measure Thursday that would prohibit suspected terrorists from buying guns, as a marathon vote series to amend an Obamacare repeal bill morphed into a heated debate over the reach of the Second Amendment.
Though it would not become law — President Obama is poised to veto the underlying bill — Democrats wanted to put senators on record in the wake of yet another mass shooting Wednesday that killed 14 people in California.
Five days earlier, a gunman killed three people at a Planned Parenthood branch in Colorado, bringing gun control back into focus as Congress debates how to prevent homegrown terrorism and whether to defund the women’s health care group targeted in the post-Thanksgiving incident.
Lawmakers voted 45-54 to reject an amendment by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, California Democrat, that would bar people on the terrorist watch list from acquiring a firearm or explosives if that person was likely to use them to commit violence.

From the Washington Times (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/201 ... nate-part/)

Legislators from rural or conservative districts will likely lose their seats if they don't vote exactly as the NRA wishes, and they know it.

[Alatar]

Your political system is fundamentally broken. There's no other explanation for this.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I wish I could disagree with you, Al.

[yovargas]

But HOW THE F*CK DOES EVEN THE GOD DAMNED NRA OPPOSE A BILL THAT WOULD PROHIBIT SUSPECTED TERRORISTS FROM BUYING GUNS??????????

[Primula Baggins]

They say it's because someone might be on the list in error, and one person wrongly prevented from buying a gun is worse than all the actual terrorists or would-be terrorists who have been allowed to do so.

Yes, it's insane.

[Cerin]

Not meaning to trivialize this, but I wish someone related to one of the Orlando victims would sue those 54 members of Congress. People blame the NRA, but it is really the members of Congress who bow to the dictates of the NRA that are to blame.

[Jude]

Has anyone tried suing the NRA? If so, how did that go?

[tinwë]

That would be a good place to start, since nothing else seems to do any good. The vitriol that was leveled against even the most modest gun control efforts after the Sandy Hook massacre was breathtaking, all the way to the point of claiming that the whole thing was staged by gun control advocates as a way of taking people's guns away from them. Sales of the AR-15 assault rifle, the weapon of choice of mass murderers everywhere, skyrocketed after Sandy Hook, and my guess is they will again now.

I'm afraid there is no deed so loathsome and despicable that it will ever convince some people that our love affair with guns is a clear sign of insanity.

[yovargas]

If we, as a country, can't agree that suspected terrorists shouldn't be able to legally buy guns, it feels like any damn progress on any damn thing is hopeless.

[RoseMorninStar]

Yovargas, I agree. It's a sad situation. The NRA puts out some mighty good propaganda and strong arms elected officials. Greed, sadly, is a huge factor.

I believe the Newtown community has a lawsuit against the makers of the AR-15 riffle that looks promising.

Guns are not allowed in an establishment where alcohol is served, so none of the patrons should have had guns. There was an armed guard however, a paid off-duty police officer who traded shots with Mateen. Additionally, 2 nearby responding on-duty officers also took shots at the gunman before he took hostages into a bathroom.

Open firing in a crowded situation, especially for inexperienced, would likely result in unintended victims. Even the experienced policemen couldn't get a clear shot at him. The scenario where a 'good guy with a gun gets the bad guy with a gun' is only about 3%.