Congressional Democrats’ Coordinated Attack on Firearms

There’s a reason public approval ratings for Congress have not climbed above a paltry 26 percent since Democrats took the House of Representatives majority last January. One needs to look no further than the string of radical gun control measures introduced by various members. All represent the intentions of Congressional Democrats to deprive law abiding Americans of their constitutional right to defend themselves. The most challenging is discerning which is the most problematic or irrational.

Most recently, presidential long-shot U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) introduced legislation, H.R. 2359, titled the “Freedom from Assault Weapons Act” that would ban all versions of modern sporting rifles (MSRs) and establish a mandatory “buy back” program for all rifles currently in circulation. Since the government can’t “buy back” something it never owned, the real word for his proposal is confiscation. The language of the bill directs the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to establish a surrender period of two years after which he would jail any individual in possession of such a firearm. Congressman Swalwell’s press release on the bill claims there’s no accurate number of how many modern sporting rifles are in private ownership today. The National Shooting Sports Foundation estimates there are more than 16 million in the homes and gun safes of law-abiding Americans just since 1990. MSRs have been available on the commercial market since 1963, so the number is much higher. The congressman has no concrete plan as to how the ATF would effectively enforce this law short of door-to-door searches of American homes. When questioned about effective enforcement, Swalwell seemingly threatened gun owners with nuclear weapons.

Congressman Swalwell’s bill also reveals that his priorities lie not with keeping Americans safe, but rather with an overly broad and purposefully-inflammatory proposal meant to propel his presidential campaign forward. Regularly available data shows that criminals' misuse of modern sporting rifles make up less than five percent of all unjustified homicides in the United States. The majority of homicides are committed with fists, knives and blunt objects, followed by the criminal misuse of handguns. Of those, the vast majority are illegally-obtained through theft or the black market. At the very least, it is worrisome to see a congressman and candidate for president propose stripping law-abiding citizens of their fundamental rights without even understanding the relevant statistics behind the issue he is trying to address.

Democratic Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) is also responsible for another misguided gun control bill that targets bullets rather than guns themselves. H.R 1705, or Jaime’s Law, would require a “universal background check” for all purchases of ammunition. What the congresswoman and co-author U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) call another component of “common sense gun control” is anything but, if for no other reason than it is in fact already illegal for those individuals legally prohibited from possessing a firearm to also own ammunition. Furthermore, H.R 1705 is named after Jamie Guttenberg, a student who tragically lost her life in the horrific Parkland school shooting in 2018. Since that day, we have learned that the murderer was able to purchase his weapons legally, as the FBI, local law enforcement and school authorities failed to act on glaring warning signs and downplayed previous criminal behavior. Knowing this, it is sad to see Congresswoman Wasserman Schultz attach a victim’s name to a bill that would have done nothing to prevent the tragedy to begin with.

Senator Blumenthal, in addition to going after Americans seeking to buy ammunition, is also determined to open the gun manufacturers to a cascade of frivolous lawsuits by introducing legislation to repeal the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA), which currently prevents firearms manufacturers and dealers from being held liable when someone commits a crime with their lawfully sold, non-defective product. The PLCAA does nothing more than codify bedrock principles of tort law. Sen. Blumenthal says that this bill is “simply about gun violence victims getting their day in court” but the reality is he hopes to do irreversible harm to the Second Amendment by bankrupting firearm manufacturers with mountains of legal bills from hundreds of lawsuits.

Criminals are responsible for the crimes they commit. That is the same if crimes are committed with a firearm or with a car. It is nonsensical and blatantly wrong to hold a firearm manufacturer, or any other industry, liable for the criminal misuse of non-defective products sold lawfully. People in this country do not hold Ford or General Motors accountable for the negligent use of their cars and we should not create a legal precedent for a double standard with firearms.

Anti-gun politicians are trying to outdo each other with absurd and irrelevant gun control proposals. There are real solutions that work but It’s clear political posturing and peacocking for media is being substituted for effective policy.

If gun control actually works, why are the cities where guns are most difficult to purchase also the ones with the highest gun related murder rates? Especially Chicago.

Actually though, Chicago is not even in the top five per capita. St Louis, Detroit and Memphis are the top 3. Chicago is not even the top 25, but they get a lot of publicity because of the number of murders, but according to per capita data, not even close to the worst.

https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/most-dangerous-cities-in-the-united-states.html

But still a great example, Illinois has some of the toughest gun laws in the country, especially in Chicago, and the total homicide rate right now is 230 by gun this year, 252 total. I think I read a while back no handguns are sold in Chicago at all. So why did 230 people end up shot and killed this year so far? If it continues at that rate, Chicago is on track for another over 500 this year. If it were only the thugs and gang members, maybe I would be less concerned, but innocent bystanders and children are getting caught in the crossfire. II read about several kids under 12 years old the past couple of years. Unacceptable.

http://heyjackass.com/

Of course this is not only a gun issue, it seems to be a police incompetence issue too. Scroll down, you’ll see a “Homicide clearance Rate” section -

No Suspect Charged 219
Suspect Charged 22

I’ve also seen some interviews and comments making the same point, police don;t seem to be doing their job, and of course their dingbat mayor was completely useless, the police officers actually turned their backs on him at one point. Didn’t Chicago recently get another snowflake mayor? I’ve slept since then...

Other areas it’s the same, tougher gun laws usually coincides with higher firearm crime rates. That’s because criminals get their guns by theft or black market, not the local gun store and background check.

I went to a pawn shop, happened to get the best price (surprised me) and did the background check. And didn’t like it, Background checks have done absolutely nothing to prevent or even reduce crime. Criminals don’t get background checks. Criminals laugh at background checks, all firearm laws in fact.

Last time I checked 60 to 70% of all felons released for whatever reason were back behind bars within 2 years. Half of those were arrested with illegal firearms in their possession. They are criminals because they don’t care about the laws to begin with, and most figure another year tacked onto their sentence for a firearm is no big deal. I’ve known people who told me they could “do 2 years standing on my head”. That’s how useless the prison system has become, criminals are not afraid of the punishment any more. That’s another huge problem, prison is no longer a deterrent.

It’s crazy, I don’t have any answers, but I do know what is not the answer...gun control.

So why do they want more, then more, then more!

Well, as LBJ said, they were just beginning "to disarm the criminal and the careless and the insane." And our current crop of D@mocrats considers anyone and everyone who disagrees with them to be criminal and/or careless and/or insane. And since D@mocrats also consider 'Political Correctness' to be The New Law of the Land (the Constitution being so old & racist & homophobic & what all), that means "[a]ll of our people who are deeply concerned in this country about law and order" are D@mocrats and other devoted followers of PC, not average Americans like us.

Make sense now?

;^)

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