Executive Powers & Mental Health

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The only way I can see to effectively enforce UBC would require an inventory of each individual's firearms,subject to physical audit.

I would like to ask the proponents of UBC to either agree that is true,or offer a believable alternative.

IMO,UBC equates to universal registration along with submitting to unreasonable search,ie If you have a gun not registered or if you cannot produce a gun registered to you,it is evidence you have made a transfer without a background check.

Knock,knock,we are here to audit your firearms.

That goes far beyond "common sense"

Common sense tells me UBC is unacceptable
 
Will they? Criminals, by definition, flout the law. How would one more statute deter them?

The same way the current statute deterred them. It drastically reduced the number of crime guns coming in a direct FFL sale. We reduce the number coming from the secondary market, and the supply will reduce, driving up prices, and wait periods.
 
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It drastically reduced the number of crime guns coming in a direct FFL sale.
Did it, though? I've seen no significant decrease in firearms crime attributable to the GCA. When you refer to the "secondary market," you're really combining two separate things: the kind where I sell you a gun in good faith, and the black market, in which firearms flow illegally.

UBC's and such will restrict the first, but there is no evidence they will curtail the second. If we're to talk of making rights harder to exercise, then we really need (by even the most lax form of rational basis) some proof that the measure in question would have some sort of social utility.

I'm sure Elliot Ness looked great on camera smashing a few crates of booze he found in grandpa's attic somewhere, but the law he enforced did nothing to help the folks languishing in gutters and drunk tanks.
 
JimDandy, why would Joe Thug pay $599 for a Glock at CTD or $1000 for a Colt at the LGS or $1200 for my 10mm longslide, when he could buy a stolen Glock from one of his druggie buddies for $250 or some drugs?

Or when he could steal one from a glove box?

Or when he and his buddies could back a stolen truck through the wall of an LGS after midnight?

You do realize, don't you, that under the bills as presented the loan of a gun at a range could have been considered a transfer, requiring a UBC? Or that you could not let a friend borrow your firearm to go hunting?

Are you naive enough to think those were oversights, and not deliberate attempts to convert the US to NYC style regulations?

Edit: Another thought on UBCs.... How would NICS react to an attempt at a private purchase of a handgun by an 18yo, in those states where that is legal, such as Missouri? Would the system apply FFL rules, and deny due to age?

If so, would we then disallow 19-20yo LEOs and 17-20yo military from being issued firearms, or would we create yet another privileged government class?

Coming back around to the mental health side of things, I think the mentally dangerous are being used by both sides - as bogeymen by the antis, to show extreme cases of why guns (much like the foosball) is the devil! - and as decoys by our side, to give the government some target other than our guns.

It amazes me, what people will throw under the bus to achieve an agenda...
 
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This:

The problem as pointed out by professionals is that we do not have the tech to really identify dangerous individuals without a tremendous number of false positives that are done with good will or maliciously by antigun medical and mental health professionals. The truly delusional might be spotted but that's about it.

Tightening up the reporting of those adjudicated (if they are not being reported) makes sense as they can have protections and appeals.

However, laws like the SAFE act are not supported by mental health professionals who think about it for more reasons than liability.

If a poster can come up with literature that demonstrates reliable predictions of violence or such a technique, please do. It doesn't exist.

And this:

You know what I'd like to see? Laws and/or executive orders giving more money and support to our mental hospitals, rehab centers, and outpatient facilities. I'd like to see rehab and mental health counseling treated the same as other medical issues by insurance carriers and employers.

In other words, I'd like to have the conversation on mental health we were promised before they derailed it with futile and divisive attempts at gun regulation.


Are about an accurate a summary of the situation as I know of.


I would really, really like to keep the one in a fifty million guy/ gal that is mentally ill and goes around shooting people as a part of that from getting a firearm. But not at any cost. There is too much potential for abuse to be built into any government scheme. A real conversation is needed on the subject not a shortcut to banning whatever.
 
Did it, though? I've seen no significant decrease in firearms crime attributable to the GCA. When you refer to the "secondary market," you're really combining two separate things: the kind where I sell you a gun in good faith, and the black market, in which firearms flow illegally.

Actually I don't. The numbers I've seen distinctly separate Bona Fide FFL transfers, Illegal FFL Transfers, Friends and Family Second hand transfers, and Street/Black Market purchases.
 
JimDandy, are you referring to the inmate survey, where only 250 out of 2500 responded? Or are you getting your numbers elsewhere?
 
That article throws around some percentages provided by ATF, but does not explain how the ATF stats were derived.

Edit: So, the same source that said 90% of Mexican crime guns came from the US....
 
Jim, Noyes' article is nearly 20 years old, and the study it references is based on one portion of one city. It can't be taken as a reliable source at this point. In fact, the dreaded "kitchen table" FFL's blamed for criminal transfers are largely extinct now.

The article seems to be confusing how criminals seemingly get guns from dealers. If a gun is legitimately purchased from a dealer, then stolen and used in a crime, it is traced back to the dealer. That doesn't mean the dealer sold it to the criminal. It simply means the gun has been entered into the tracing system. Once a gun is in the system, it is automatically a "crime gun." There is no other classification that I know of.

Here's a fun example: I got a call for a trace a few years back. I looked it up in the books, and I found that it hadn't been logged out. There was no sale.

My blood went cold for a second. Had we had a gun stolen? Oh boy, here comes paperwork and scrutiny. Then I remembered seeing that gun in stock less than a week prior to the call. I went out on the sales floor, and there it was, on the shelf.

The gun had never left the store. It had gone from the manufacturer to the distributor to us. How the heck was it a crime gun?

As it turns out, the distributor had some sort of mixup in their records, and the inspector decided to initiate a trace. So, there you have it: a law-abiding FFL and a crime gun. Heavens, how do I sleep at night?

Now, as the article mentions (briefly), there's a big difference between an FFL and a "dealer" selling his sketchy wares out his trunk in a back alley. The article is trying to conflate the two, which is not surprising given the time, atmosphere, and culture in which it was written.
 
Tom I think you underestimate. I think an effective overhaul of our mental health system would stop most of these things and a lot of other numerically smaller instances of violence and death.
No question about it.

However, the real obstacle at this point is that anything that Obama or anybody in his admin suggests will be rejected and "strangled in the crib" even if it has value. And if any change is related in any way to "health care", they will just slap it with the "Obamacare" label.

The other problem is to get any agencies to "take ownership" at the state levels. They always refuse. As long as they won't buy in, nothing is going to get fixed.

In Cali, we passed a law that (in order to reduce illegal immigration) schools would be required to check for some kind of residency status before allowing students to enroll in public schools. The schools simply refused to do it. I suspect a similar event if the Fed passed some kind of reporting law for this into the database.
 
What can happen with mandatory reporting is that those who are not so decompensated that they are having obvious difficulty functioning will not seek treatment, and the first indication that something is awry might be one where they suffer some kind of overwhelm and do kill someone. More often than not, that someone will be themselves.

I very much dislike the idea of stigmatizing people and removing their rights just because they have a mental health diagnosis.
 
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ATF officials say that only about 8% of the nation's 124,000 retail gun dealers sell the majority of handguns that are used in crimes.

"Stolen guns account for only about 10% to 15% of guns used in crimes," Wachtel said.

Perhaps Mr. Jay Wachtel has an agenda, one happily embraced by Mr. Dan Noyes who wrote this for PBS. It seems the numbers don't match up, and FFL dealers aren't as bad as these gentlemen think they are. I would love to know what percentage of the 8% number sales were legal sales, and I would prefer to hear it from a different source.
 
The only way I can see to effectively enforce UBC would require an inventory of each individual's firearms,subject to physical audit.

I would like to ask the proponents of UBC to either agree that is true,or offer a believable alternative.
I'll disagree. There's no requirement to perform an audit now on those firearms sold by FFL's. There is, as long as the government is to be believed- a decision left to each their own personal "tin foil hat" fit- no registry. They track the firearm by starting with the firearm itself, or at least the serial number of it.

There is currently no general check that the firearm owned by the FFL is actually owned by the FFL, when you get your NICS check. From my understanding the trace process works as such-

They find the firearm. Ask the manufacturer who it was distrubuted to, who it was retailed by, who it was sold to, if the buyer still has it, who it was further sold to etc. The only time they know who had it before they ask someone, is the manufacturer. And thats because the manufacturer's name is stamped on the thing.
 
JimDandy, I don't think you answered the actual question, or else I misunderstood your answer.

To clarify, the question was how would ACTUAL USE of the NICS system be enforced, if there were no registry?
 
In that case, the same way the actual use of the NICS system for FFL's- They find the firearm, and trace it to the last 4473 indicating transfer. If the last 4473 was before enactment date, the government has the burden to prove the transfer occurred after the transfer date.
 
There's no requirement to perform an audit now on those firearms sold by FFL's.
No, but the ATF has the option of auditing the inventory of an FFL at will.

If the last 4473 was before enactment date, the government has the burden to prove the transfer occurred after the transfer date.
How long will they leave the system that way? The government won't want the burden of proof, and they'll get this changed to shift it to the owner.

Whatever "proof" I may have of a background check will become an affirmative defense, much like Form 4's for NFA items. If you can't provide proof, or if the proof somehow doesn't satisfy an investigator, charges will be pressed.
 
How long will they leave the system that way?

As long as lawyers, courts, and the people require an innocent until proven guilty premise. If they're going to convict for an illegal transfer, don't they have to prove you made an illegal transfer?
 
One would think, JimDandy, and yet dealings with courts can make one think things could easily go otherwise.

I still maintain it's better not to give the government additional tools with which they can infringe on our rights, rather than to give the government tools, and then try to force it to use the new tools in the manner we hope.
 
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