Bullcrap from the Blogosphere

This time from Amanda Marcotte:

But Stop Handgun Violence does not advocate banning handguns. John Rosenthal, who led the call, is himself a gun owner, so you know he’s not kidding around when he says they are not pushing for a handgun ban.

Maybe not now, but for sure he wants Massachusetts style gun controls for the whole country, which have done a fantastic job of making Massachusetts a crime free paradise eh? No, sorry, asking the police if I can exercise a constitutional right is not “reasonable”.

What they are trying to do is demonstrate to the American public that one of the most powerful lobbies in D.C. is an extremist organization the enables criminals and terrorists. The NRA routinely opposes common sense measures, even when they fall short of gun registration, like background checks.

The NRA doesn’t support background checks? That’s news to me. The NRA has always supported NICS (National Instant Check System). But can you show that background checks have done anything to reduce crime? Criminals typically break the law in one way or another to obtain firearms.

And why exactly is registration reasonable? Do you think criminals will register their guns? The police can already trace a gun back to me if it’s recovered at a crime scene. In the immortal words of Tam:

When someone asks you about licensing and registration, pick up a pen and a sheet of paper. Tear the paper in half and hand half to your questioner. Say “Okay, this pen is a gun. The paper I’m holding is my license and the paper you’re holding is the registration. Using only these two pieces of paper, explain to me just how you are going to keep me from shooting someone?“

Exactly.

We’re living in a country where the government is tapping your phones, but because of the NRA, genuine members of Al Qaeda can waltz right into a gun show and buy a gun without getting a basic background check. Most people don’t realize that this is an issue, because they’re aware of the Brady Bill, but the federal law only covers federally licensed gun dealers, and 50% of guns sold in this country are sold by unlicensed dealers, mainly at gun shows

I’d like a citation for that 50% of all guns sold in the country are sold by unlicensed dealers at gun shows. You’re misleading people. There’s nothing special about gun shows. The Brady Act doesn’t apply to private sales between citizens and legal residents (knowingly sell to a prohibited person, or someone who isn’t a citizen, and you’re committing a felony) who are not in the business of selling firearms. Whether they are sold at a gun show, or not, is immaterial. For the record, Pennsylvania prohibits private sales at gun shows, and private sales of handguns entirely. There is no way to legally obtain a handgun in Pennsylvania without a background check. Let me tell you, it’s oh so effective.

As you can imagine, criminals and terrorists are well aware of what the laws are in this country and are going to gravitate towards these gun shows to get their guns.

Do you have real evidence of this? Or are you just repeating what John Rosenthal tells you? I’ve been to a lot of gun shows, there is police and law enforcement visible at all of them I’ve ever been to. It’s generally not the kind of place you want to go if you’re a criminal or a terrorist.

The sad thing to me—for those who’ve seen Bowling for Columbine, you’ll remember this—is that the NRA was ostensibly just supposed to be a rifle association, a hobbyist group for people who like guns. Which isn’t necessarily my thing, but whatever, free country. But they’ve drifted and turned into this hard right wing organization that cultivates paranoid fantasies about elitist liberals snatching away their guns the first chance they get.

Yep, and if it wasn’t for people like Michael Moore and John Rosenthal, who basically deceive the public to push an agenda, it would be again. NRA got involved because people started talking about banning handguns. Is it really paranoia? I can dig up dozens of quotes from people in the gun control movement that do, in fact, say they want to ban guns. Let’s just take a look at what Pete Shields, the founder of Handgun Control Inc (now the Brady Campaign) had to say:

“We’re going to have to take this one step at a time, and the first step is necessarily – given the political realities – going to be very modest. Right now, though, we’d be satisfied not with half a loaf but with a slice. Our ultimate goal – total control of all guns – is going to take time…..The final problem is to make the possession of all handguns and all handgun ammunition – except for the military, policemen, licensed security guards, licensed sporting clubs and licensed gun collectors – totally illegal.”

Granted that was 1976, but I’ve seen no indication that plan isn’t still being followed. The gun control movement has blown all credibility with gun owners, and that’s why we fight most of this stuff. It’s not paranoia, it’s what they are saying or have said.

Their psychosexual fantasies projected onto real world politics echo the same sex paranoias and misogyny underlying the anti-choice movement. They’re coming to take away your fetuses/guns/whatever the stand-in for your absent phallic power is today. These kind of hateful fantasies shouldn’t have a place in our supposedly reasonable discourse, but not only do fantasies displace reason a lot of the time, they totally trump it, as you can see with the NRA’s insane amounts of power.

If there’s anyone who’s anti-choice, it ain’t me sweetheart. Accusing people of having “psychosexual” issues, last I checked, isn’t reasoned discourse. If you want to have an adult discussion about a topic, you need to treat your opponents as reasonable adults. And you guys wonder why we don’t listen to you?

Needless to say, some of the terrorists that can take advantage of these overly lax gun laws are our homegrown ones of the Eric Rudolph stripe who target abortion clinics. That’s not the sort of thing most people who own handguns or at least support the right to own them would support, and they shouldn’t be supporting the NRA.

Come up some reasonable arguments, and then we’ll talk.