Posted on 04/19/2015 11:04:19 AM PDT by Brad from Tennessee
The Obama administration is unfairly blocking tens of thousands of military veterans from owning guns, a Republican senator is charging.
The FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) is filled with military veterans who are essentially banned from owning guns, even though they may not be a danger to society, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) wrote this week in a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder.
The gun ban "effectively voids their Second Amendment rights,” Grassley said.
At issue is whether these veterans are suffering from mental illnesses.
According to a 2013 Senate report, the Department of Veteran Affairs is responsible for reporting more than 143,000 beneficiaries, including about 83,000 veterans, to the “mental defective” category of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.
Any federal agency can report people to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, but the VA's recommendations account for about 99 percent of the people who are listed in the mental defective category.
Being listed blocks veterans from purchasing guns.
However, Grassley claims many of these veterans should not be precluded from owning guns. . .
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
I served in the U.S. Army for 25 years as an infantryman, including service in Vietnam as a Reconnaissance Platoon Leader in the Central Highlands and as a Rifle Company Commander in Northern I Corps.
Idiots not withstanding ... Welcome home brother. As you know ... If you were not there you can't understand.
The dumbest A1C that gets out after 4 years has the same 2nd amendment rights as someone that served long enough to get a retirement, or someone like me that had a split service and only got 12 years of service, with 18 years out in between.
Gun rights shouldn't be based on that, in my opinion and the law as currently written in the Constitution.
/johnny
That’s far less a problem.
What is a problem is that it is not VA doctors that are diagnosing a veterans as having mental health problems, so they should be prohibited from having guns. Instead, it is VA *bureaucrats* who are banning guns based on a weird reason.
A medical/legal power of attorney. A veteran *temporarily* transfers his M/LPOA to a family member because he is to have major surgery, in case something goes wrong, then after he pulls through his surgery and gets better, he cancels the transfer.
The VA bureaucrats do not care. They *interpret* this as to meaning that the veterans was *mentally incapacitated*, so should have his guns taken away. “Because once is forever.”
This is why it is such a sky high number of veterans have been affected by this.
Ironically, PTSD cases are some of those *least* likely to misuse firearms. Often they are firearms averse. This is why Chris Kyle was helping veterans at a shooting range, to get them comfortable with having and using guns again.
you are argue against an argument that I am not making. What our government is doing is essential denying a Constitutional Right away from a veteran because he has sought medical treatment for a benefit that he earned by serving for his country. This right, of course, does not require any military service at all. But, some administrative by the VA without no benefit of due process takes that right away.
This is a political act by those who don’t agree with your opinion.
First, I am a disabled veteran who is 100% service connected. I am not a war time veteran but I served and I almost died while training. My MOS was going to be ASW and I was slated to go on to become a RSS. Through no fault of my own while simulating a P3 flight and observing Hypoxia (the Navy’s only free high) my Oxygen mask didn’t fit right and I ended up with Decompression Sickness Type 2. I spent 13 hours in a hyperbaric chamber and as a result came out of that with O2 toxicity and luckily my paralysis was temporary. I had damage to my cranial nerve and other damage done to me. I cannot fly commercially nor can I ever go scuba diving in my life. I can never finish my private pilot’s license I was working on before going into the military. My service connection comes from training in the line of duty not from some car accident on a weekend pass or something stupid I did. Btw RSS is two steps down from SEAL training although the intensity gap is huge. I was in Pensacola at the time Smurfing was allowed in RSS school. Also had I not been medically discharged, my time in would have included part of the first gulf war.
I have come to despise the VA for various reasons, the two majors one, they gave me diabetes type 2 and continue to deny a pill can do that and second I almost died had I followed the ER doctor’s instructions to come back on Monday after having a 104.9 degree fever and a severe abcess that was infected.
I did not ask to be disabled. I did not want to have the bends. It happened though and it was a risk I was willing to take. When I signed on the dotted line and later rose my hand to swear to give my life to the defense of this country and for you to sit there and say what you can say to me freely, I did so knowing that at some point in my career whilst in the Navy, I could lose my life at any time. I gladly take that risk for you and for those who cannot.
If I am digging into your wallet, know this, it took me 22 years to get my bachelor’s degree because I cannot get financial aid because I need a note from my doctor saying I can perform after I graduate. The VA has repeatedly said that they will not do that because even though I have seen some doctor’s for more than 5 years, they still did not know me. Then upon completion of my degree, I have not been able to find a job because the recruiters always ask why haven’t you worked. I tell them because I am disabled veteran and had a hard time getting money for school. Recruiters have hung up on me for saying the D word. They have also never called me back. I had one recruiter accuse me of sitting on my behind and just collecting the check every month.
So yes I take great offense to the phrasing that you use that I am digging into your wallet to collect a check when I have done everything in my power to return to becoming a productive member of society. One other thing I worked so many different jobs before I got my 100%. I did not get it right off the bat. At one point I would wake up at 5PM on Tuesday and not go to bed until Saturday morning around 5AM. I had three jobs and went to full time school. I made the dean’s list that semester.
Mentally ill is painting a broad brush across a lot of illnesses and is stereotyping all those with mental illness. If I said everyone who was sick could not have a gun then that means if you had ever had a cold in your life you would not be able to own a gun. Not all mental illnesses are the same nor are they severe. Someone who has ADD has a mental illness. Someone who has Alzheimer’s has a mental illness. Someone who has been raped might possibly have a mental illness after they were raped. Someone who has survived a plane crash might have a mental illness after. A person been consistently bullied on the internet might acquire a mental illness.
So here is an idea why don’t you take your money put it back in your wallet because this veteran doesn’t need a handout from the government. Instead give me a paying job so I can become a productive member of society. Oh and I would also like to own a 9mm so I can defend myself as I have been shooting guns since I was 11 years old but can’t own one now that I have had my accident while on active duty while serving in the United States Navy training to become a ASW/RSS in Pensacola Florida.
Yeah, as a veteran and a gun owner, I don’t mind if mental defectives are prevented from having a fire arm. Look what happened to Chris Kyle.
Neither VA Doctors or Administrators have the legal authority to revoke a Constitutional right. Such an act requires adjudicated by a court of law. Doctors may diagnose brain injury which is essential what PTSD describes. Soldiers who see a buddy disassemble into hundreds of body parts right in front of them or see a buddy’s face turn into a mass of goo experience a physical, electric shock to their system. Reaction to that event differs depends on each individual. Some can sleep it off and drive on. Most take more than a while and often requires some kind of help with a result of complete healing. A few are never the same and an even fewer are so disable that they should be prohibited from owning a firearm.
Liberals think that all veterans are raging lunatics likely to commit mass murder, they believe that’s the only type of persons who join the military.
> I don’t give communists any opportunity to deny anyone their gun rights. They will morph that into denying everybody.
And this is a core issue because you know they will anyway they can so that only their own are protected in the end...
Never, ever give an inch to those people. We will not be moved. Period.
My cold dead fingers.
I take the view that every man has the right to bear arms. Our God-given rights are not purchased from the government.
Let me clarify something, Diabetes Type was the side effect of taking a particular medication in the course of my treatment prescribed by doctors at the VA. Second, I was in the Army National Guard before I transferred to active duty Navy. I was trained on various weapons like an M16 in the Army. My MOS while in the Army was 31Mic (designation is no longer). The bends was most likely caused by the result of heat exhaustion from running in the Florida sun for a physical test while in Aircrew school.
I have been diagnosed with over 17 diagnoses because I went into the VA ER to talk to someone. I have been admitted to the lock ward because I went in to talk to someone not to be admitted to the hospital. I have been admitted against my will, have had to take off my shoes and pants and be watched by an armed security guard all because I wanted to talk with someone and had no one else to talk to. I am no danger to society nor am I to myself.
I moved into a neighborhood and a couple neighbors lied to their children because they thought I was some crazy sex nut. My house has been vandalized and lies have been told about me. And yet I chose to live in a house so I am not on the street as some homeless veteran. I have never taken to the bottle and I have never to taken to drugs to drown my sorrows.
I have only wanted a job that I wanted to do, a family and a peaceful life.
I have yet to accomplish any of those all because of my accident.
If they get away with this the PTSD list is next.
I have a BIG problem with an individual's unalienable right being denied arbitrarily by a bureaucrat without due process in a court of law.
“Neither VA Doctors or Administrators have the legal authority...”
This has not stopped them from doing so.
“...According to Senator Burr, at least 149,000 veterans have had their 2nd amendment rights stripped from them, simply because they had a fiduciary appointed for them to manage their financial affairs...”
Amazing, another example of the Obama Administration ignoring the law. When citizens ignore the law, we call them criminals. When politicians do it, we call them Democrats.
If you are getting benefits for the injuries you sustained, fine. If you are putting in for PTSD because of an oxygen mask mishap, then I might well have a different opinion of you.
I think we might be able to agree that they need fewer bureaucrats and more medical professionals.
I know you'd like to ensure that veterans like Eddie Ray Routh manage to keep access to all of the guns that they want. I don't think he has a gun right now. Perhaps you should take him one.
Ah, so the Second Amendment is conditional on receipt of government benefits. Your concern seems to be primarily that they are 'in your wallet'.
Well then. You have just banned Welfare, Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, and maybe even Obamacare recipients with your criteria.
Democrats will love your view.
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