Authored by Tho Bishop via The Mises Institute,
On Wednesday, the Republican controlled house voted to further federalize gun laws in this country.
While Ryan McMaken has noted the danger in further centralizing gun legislation, there is another deeply troubling aspect to this bill: it expands the ability of the Federal government to restrict Americans’ right to bear arms.
During the legislative process, the NRA supported merging the bill aimed at nationalizing concealed carry permits with another piece of legislation aimed at “fixing” the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS.) Obviously this legislation was inspired by the failure of the US Air Force to report the criminal record of Devin Kelley, who went on to commit a horrific shooting in Sutherland Springs, Texas. While the motivation to do something after this atrocity is entirely natural, unfortunately this bill is simply another example of the Federal government using its own failure to justify expanding its own power.
After all, the “Fix NICS” bill doesn’t seek to punish the US Air Force for its failure to properly process paperwork. Instead, it provides $760 million in additional funding for the Department of Justice to establish new guidelines to ensure compliance among Federal agencies. That funding can also be used “to ensure maximum coordination” between State government and Indian tribes with the NICS.
While the idea of bolstering the already existing Federal gun registry may strike some as relatively benign, it’s important to understand how it has been used in the past.
As Congressman Thomas Massie noted in his own criticism of the bill:
When President Obama couldn’t get Congress to pass gun control, he implemented a strategy of compelling, through administrative rules, the Veterans Administration and the Social Security Administration to submit lists of veterans and seniors, many of whom never had a day in court, to be included in the NICS database of people prohibited from owning a firearm. Only a state court, a federal (article III) court, or a military court, should ever be able to suspend your rights for any significant period of time.
While Republicans and supporters of the NRA may not fear the Trump Administration coming after their guns, it is obviously reckless to grant additional power and resources to future administrative states that may be quite hostile to the right to gun ownership. To put it simply, there is never a good reason to give Federal agencies the power the revoke an individual's ability to lawfully purchase a weapon without due process.
Further, if one needed an example of how dangerous it is to centralize gun legislation in Washington DC, look no further to what gun owners in states like Ohio and Hawaii are currently facing. Both states, having recently legalized the use of medical marijuana, have placed those who need it with the choice of either owning a gun or receiving life-improving medicine.
In 2011, the Federal government sent a letter to licensed gun dealers reiterating that marijuana users were prohibited from owning a gun – even if it they have a medical prescription. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld this decision last year. Hawaii, which requires gun registration, has gone as far as to sending letters to permitted gun owners with marijuana prescriptions requiring they turn over their weapon. While the state is currently asking for “voluntary cooperation,” it could be a matter of time before it turns into compulsory compliance.
While the simplicity provided by nationalizing laws is an understandable appeal, especially if you’re a gun owner who frequently travels, political centralization is never the answer. By supporting this flawed attempt at “National Concealed Carry Reciprocity,” the NRA and their supporters in the House have sided with the power of Federal agencies over the Second Amendment rights of Americans.
You have to break a few eggs compromise a few principals to make an omelette confiscate a few guns.
NRA has only ever conceded rights. It's controlled opposition. The Bernie Sanders of the 2A movement.
NRA is the biggest piece of shit Fraud Gun Organisation out there. These Scum Fucks help write the Gun Control Act of 1968.
Stick with “Gun Owners of America.”
I'd sure like to see the names of the people who actually wrote and lobbied for this. Yep, those names would be mighty interesting...
I can smell the Israel from here
NRA = Bad
GOA = Good (Gun Owners of America)
The NRA is a bloated profefessional fund raising (Begging) organization, playing the heartstrings of 2nd ammendment advocates.
They are like the AARP, United Way, Red Cross, et al. they all just have a differnt segment of society to fleece.
Let's see how American will take it when one of their ammendment rights goes up into smoke.
My guess: it will take 1 free hamburger for each citizen at least before they all sell out and hardcore resistance will even need fries with that before they surrender...
Most probably they'll use discount coupons to convince people to bring in their weapons at first. That will yield about 50% of all guns.
then they'll ban bullets.
and in less then 2 years, they'll control the territories.
LOL! If there is one thing that should be crystal clear to everyone now, it is that "laws" that cannot be enforced are meaningless.
Just ask John Corzine. Moral hazard can be a real motherfucker.
Trump lied to you again! He was put in to disarm America.
Fuck off shill. Since when does RINO Swamp Rat = Trump?
Its . . . . BUDGET TIME in the Imperial City!!!
Too much fake news, gonna go read this thing myself. Stay tuned.
After all, the “Fix NICS” bill doesn’t seek to punish the US Air Force for its failure to properly process paperwork. Instead, it provides $760 million in additional funding for the Department of Justice to establish <SNIP>
What bullshit ... any excuse to spend money and not hold people accountable
Indeed. John Corzine and Hank "tanks in the streets" Paulson approve.
If the Kulaks were armed, the Bolsheviks could not have starved them all to death.
Perhaps, perhaps not.
What they weren't were organized ...
for them: innocent even if proven guilty
for us: guilty even if proven innocent
bottom line: dc are tyrants
left wing propaganda
I tend to agree. There is no way I would ever give up my guns with out a fire fight. Period.
I hear a lot of people speak like that, but would you really? You're going to get into a firefight with the police who come to your house to confiscate your weapons, while your wife and kids are inside? Really?
Don't get me wrong, I understand the sentiment. I just question if those saying things like this have really thought them through, or its just bravado.
I do not wish it but Once the order is given I send my family to Japan. I go hang out in the woods with in sight and wait, I rig the house to blow upon entry.You don't fight a war with wife and kids.
There are a few things worth dieing for. .Gov are monsters who have murdered billions. Taking guns from the US is the last obstical they face. I would die but it would be for a rightous cause.
.Gov always draws first blood. They have no justifable reason to eliminate the 2nd amendment and make criminals out of all gun legal owners.Only power and control which they already have far too much of.
It won't happen that way. You might hear some rumors ahead of time but not substantiated enough to send off the wife and kids. Then one day when you are out shopping or at work they show up at your home and ransack the house and take all the guns along with whatever else they want. They leave the wife with legal papers saying you are required to appear in court or else they wait for you to come home and arrest you. The other method is to bust in your door in the middle of night and you might get a shot off but not likely.
"I tend to agree. There is no way I would ever give up my guns with out a fire fight. Period."
Careful! They may give it to you...
Fukda corrupt elected political turds for repeatedly screw tax paying U.S. citizens. Hang em all!
If the Brits had our 2nd Amendment rights .... there wouldn't be so fucking many Muslims in England ?
2nd amendment rights did not save us from the same fate.
I throw NRA mail away these days. Never again. Traitorous cucks and controlled oppo.
The NRA is a gov agency.
NRA is a BS organization. Watch out for wolfs in sheeps clothing.
I agree with this. Any political club you build will in time fall into the hands of the opposition. Political winds constantly shift the balance of power. Any growth of federal power simply further enables the leviathan. We lost our state’s rights to protect blacks. Now they slaughter themselves in our inner cities. Unintended consequences are a bitch.
The power to compel a state to allow carry is the power to compel a state to disallow carry. The power to override New York is the power to override Texas. As soon as the Democrats get back in charge in DC, they can just invert the language of the bill to outlaw carry in any state.
If the Republicans wanted to advance gun rights, they should have repealed all Federal gun laws.
This is true, but it’s a pipe dream. Too many liberal conservative politicians will never stand up for the 2nd.
There is no such thing as voluntary cooperation with law. It is always compulsory.
Molon labe.
The NRA's business is to preserve the NRA and not the 2nd Amendment.
Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people":
First, there will be those who are devoted to the goals of the organization. Examples are dedicated classroom teachers in an educational bureaucracy, many of the engineers and launch technicians and scientists at NASA, even some agricultural scientists and advisors in the former Soviet Union collective farming administration.
Secondly, there will be those dedicated to the organization itself. Examples are many of the administrators in the education system, many professors of education, many teachers union officials, much of the NASA headquarters staff, etc.
The Iron Law states that in every case the second group will gain and keep control of the organization. It will write the rules, and control promotions within the organization.
https://www.jerrypournelle.com/reports/jerryp/iron.html
Life is about choices, you want to smoke pot? Then don’t own a firearm.
Priorities are a bitch.
never known true freedom, eh? your lack of vision is why we can't defeat these assholes. quit being a basic bitch.
This Von Mises Bishop is an Obscurantist piece of droppings; like all Bishops of old.
What has just happened is that the NEO-con lobby of GOP in Congress has just received a wake-up call.
It is now clear all Neocons suffer from a genetic defect called Huntington's disease.
All those with this genetic disease fell into the cesspool of "Clash of Civilization" ideology that spawned the current Bushist-Saud takeover of oil patch and concomitant plague of perma-wars and Jihad coupled now to Evangelical Armageddon kneejerks.
It was attributed to one Samuel H who was no Daniel come to judgment!
Bishops and Samuels of Huntington's dilemma seem to sufer from same defects :The desire to impose Inquisitional torture and exemplary burning, under Agent Orange and remote Stinger missiles type punishments to supposed enemies as well as innocent collaterals; when its not waterboarding in Gitmo; a one sized solution for all deviants to their demented logic.
NO MORE ! There is a solution and its Halleluyha ! All Neocons can now be cured of this DEADLY DISEASE that has spread to all continents as we speak.
And here is the good news :
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/dec/11/excitement-as-huntington...
All Neocon degenerates please take heart there is now a possible cure to your mad cow status!
I think that PENNY has now just dropped!
The Mises institute is "obscurantist"? Really?
Methinks you're an imbecile.
They have just pulled their head out of their "gold" is the only safe value money dogma of Hayekian baked neoliberalism to embrace "Bitcoin" mania... at the drop of Cinderella's shoe!
Head up ass voodoo economics is not a sinecure to the death of fake money capitalism.
No more than 2nd amendment "kill before you get killed" wild west Jesse James logic.
Guns don't kill but owning one won't make you forget, you know, that experience you had when you were young and, well, drunk. Yea, that's right you were drunk.
I think you were drunk when you wrote whatever the hell that senseless nonsense meant !
Many folks who are psychotic - insane in laymen's terms - have never spent a day in court, but have spent many days in psychiatric wards. Does Tho Bishop think all of them should have unrestricted acess to firearms?
NEVER give a dime to the "NRA."
They are Statist sell-outs!
If I hadn't already stopped being an "NRA" member last year....I certainly would quit now!
I inherently distrust ANY further legislation concerning firearms. ALL firearms laws restricting possession would be anathema to the Founding Fathers, who if one studies the subject at all would likely fight for the right of We the People having access to any and all weapons in possession of the federal government. Remember, the Constitution was written only a few short years after a very long revolution, and the 2nd Amendment has absolutely NOTHING to do with "hunting", it was to abolish an out of control government (kind of like we have today). Of course, the Founding Fathers could not have imagined some of the weapons we have today and I certainly don't want my ex-wife in control of a nuke, but it is an arguable point for those who have studied this subject objectively.
Lastly, my concealed permit should be like my drivers license--there should be no need for any more legislation than that.
We have enough gun laws now. New laws aren't going to EVER fix crazy or stupid.
"... (kind of like we have today)....." Kind of? The government we have today makes king George look like a libertarian. The Second ammendment doesn't mean anything when those that have it are a bunch of candy asses and are at the point where "life is so dear and peace is so sweet".
The job of the NBA is to co-opt our responsibility and to give us a false sense of security that someone is fighting for us. A bunch of fat old men living high on the hog are never going to protect you the way you would protect yourself.
The gov sure as the sun shines won't protect the 2nd Amendment, they haven't done it yet. The job of the federal government is to stop any of the 50 states from making laws that infringe on the 2nd Amendment - in that the 2nd Amendment is not left up for the states to regulate. Regulating the 2nd Amendment is not a power that's given to the states because it's explicit to the federal gov to enforce the right to bear arms on to all 50 states so you don't end up with states like Illinois that infringe on it's citizens rights.