Shock Video: Gun Rights Advocate's Staff Helped Write Background Check Bill (S 649)

“A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.”
― Marcus Tullius Cicero

I’m starting to think that the only reason behind this Toomey Manchin thing was to keep Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, etc. from having another filibuster. They want to pass these new gun bans behind closed doors with no debate.

It’s easier to collect contributions if you have something to fight.

BINGO! Thank you.

I can't read minds but can tell you this much. A legislative contribution of a long term narrow interest advocate can be mighty tricky indeed. While being generally more trustworthy than any of the more highly paid political interest folks (e.g., PAC leaders), long term narrow interest activists also learn more about what they're doing, in time, than any of the rest. The CCRKBA/SAF have been believed by many to be dedicated and honest efforts for a long time. As with any complicated legislative action, though, read and think for yourself.

Transcript of the video:

"Here’s the transcript" (from Dan Sandini, Daylight Disinfectant)

When it comes to the Background Check Bill, some of you might not like what I’m gonna say, but I spent hours and hours, in Senator Manchin, with Senator Manchin and Pat Toomey going over what’s in that Bill. And, I’m a little upset with the one … this whole debates gotten so polarized that it’s really hard for anybody to be intellectually honest about what any of the Bills say. [unintelligible] I’ll be candid, unfortunately with the background check that’s really what the case is right now.

The initial background check bill that Schumer put in was horrible. There’s no way that any of us could support it. It was gun registrations, there’s no two ways about it, The Manchin-Toomey Bill despite some of my colleagues in the Gun Rights Movement talking about that it’s registration, it is not registration. Ahhh .. To be perfectly candid about it, it states in it that no guns can be registered. It also carries a section in it that any federal or any state or any gun dealer with access to the NICS Check Records who misuses those records for registration purposes commits a felony with a 15 year … up to a 15 year prison term. That’s really great protection for us.

Right Now? Any gun sold through a dealer that goes through a background check: there is no protection. If someone were to misuse that list nothing happens to them. Now they will serve 15 years … up to 15 years in prison for misusing that list, if in fact they do so. That’s great protection. It’s the first time we’ve had protection. Other things in that bill which my sides not talking about? We’re not taling about it for a reason.

If we talk about it too much, the other sie’s gonna find out about it and they’re gonna realize we’re gonna win off of this thing. The back ground check is not even a Universal Background Check. It’s at gun shows, commercial venues, or the internet. And, to be candid about it, it doesn’t cover family members, of any kind, or any friends, or any gun transaction, that’s not done at a gun show or basically on the internet. It gives protection, if you do go through the background check, you as an individual will now get both civil and criminal liability protection that you don’t have now. If somebody sold a gun to somebody who’s misused it, nobody can sue you even in a civil court for damages. That’s great protection that you don’t have right now.

There’s about 10 other important things in there. One of them them that some of you have read in the newspapers that a lot of Veterans are being disarmed so to speak once they come back from combat in Iraq and Afghanistan and all of a sudden because they were out processed and had stress problems the VA now puts their name into the NICS system they can’t own a gun, this new bill, this Background Check Bill has a provision in it to eradicate that. Their Rights will be restored.

It goes on and on. Traveling across the country. It gives you more protection so that you can take your gun from state to state than you have now.

Another important one, you cannot now legally buy a handgun in a state that you don’t live in. If you’re not a resident of the state you can’t buy a handgun. Under the so-call “Background CHeck Bill,” you’ll be able to buy a handgun in all 50 states, as long as you buy it from a licensed dealer you can buy it from anywhere you want.

There’s a Million other things in there it’s a Christmas Tree. We just hung a Million Ornaments on it. We’re taking the Background Check and making it a pro-gun bill. Unfortunately some of my colleagues haven’t quite figured it out yet because they weren’t standing in the room writing it. My staff was. I’ll be perfectly candid about it. This will probably break on Monday in the Wall Street Journal. So your getting a little of “Inside Baseball.” …

"Don’t be too confused, the NRA wrote the 1968 gun control act in its entirety."

Back in 1968, the hunters of the "you don't need an assault weapon to kill deer" school were still a power in the NRA, and most people thought that there was actually a possibility of actually getting to a "reasonable" control position. Then "Handgun Control, Inc." started the "assault weapon" steamroller, and the sheepskin fell off the wolf.

The NRA of today is a different animal from back then. The "you only need a bolt-action rifle" crowd has been schooled (Jim Zumbo incident) to reality, and the "protect the Second Amendment" faction is in full control.

I’m reading the info behind the links you presented to compare with info from Gottlieb and co., but reading will take time. Restricted to a tiny PV solar power plant here with very unusually cloudy weather for this area.

There is nothing good about any of this. There is no excuse for anyone advocating for 2nd to be mixed up in this.

Thanks for the transcript. I did watch the video FWIW. I know what you're saying too and unlike some here I know that CCRKBA/SAF are honest hard-working 2nd Amend. rights lobbyists.

I have a hard time thinking of any justification for removing HIPAA privacy restrictions re the NICS database though. Anything short of being legally adjudicated mentally incompetent in a court of law, where you have the right to counsel to defend your position, sounds like bypassing due process to me. So why would HIPAA regs need to be dropped unless they were going to go fishing through medical records?

I also don't like what I see in the travel regulations. In some respects it provides protection from local and state laws but it requires both arms and ammo to be locked up separately at all times and defines 'travel' as everywhere you are while traveling. In hotel/motel rooms and virtually all circumstances.

It allows you to transport your goodies anywhere but in effect you are disarmed the entire time by virtue of it all being locked up. I see precedents for restricting travel in ways that could go beyond transporting firearms. It's setting up a mentality that anyone who travels outside their home state is suspicious by virtue of merely traveling.