DC Starts Nation's First Gun Re-registration - With a Few Glitches

DC News FOX 5 DC WTTG

You need reminding

BTW, I CAN pass (and have passed) a security clearance.  In case you forgot, professional licenses reguire background checks.

I can see why registration and background checks could be scary....

I can just imagine this as a reason for owning a firearm and putting it on an application to buy and register one.

No wonder people want to call them "Modern Sporting Rifles"  (only if the sport is "shoot the kindergardener in the classroom").  More fun here

Gun Re-registration Begins in D.C.

Emily Miller writing for the Washington Times

For the first time in the United States, a citizen who has legally registered a gun will have to submit to a renewal process. The consequences of not knowing about this new law or missing the specific 60-day window are dire.

Starting on Jan. 2, every single D.C. resident who has registered a firearm since 1976 must go to police headquarters to pay a $48 fee and be photographed and fingerprinted.

The Metropolitan Police Department estimates there are at least 30,000 registered gun owners.

If the registrant does not go to the police station within three months after a set time frame, the registration is revoked. That citizen is then in possession of an unregistered firearm, which is a felony that carries a maximum penalty of a $1,000 fine and a year in jail.

The gun itself is put into a category of weapons that can never be registered, just as though it were a machine gun or a sawed-off shotgun.

The city has not made clear how it will enforce the law, but the police are in possession of all registrants’ home addresses so confiscation and arrests would be simple.

D.C. Re-Registration Requirement to Take Effect Jan. 1

Guns dot com

Starting Jan. 1, D.C. gun owners who purchased a firearm between 1976 and 2010 will have 90 days to re-register their firearm with district police.

Failure to re-register one’s firearm may result in fines ranging from $13 to $1,000 and jail time of up to one year, according to Gwen Crump a spokesperson for the Metropolitan Police Department.

“A person who fails to renew their firearms registration within 90 days of the deadline (meaning, 90 day renewal period + 90 day grace period = 180 days total) will have their firearm registration canceled, will be in possession of an unregistered firearm, and may face criminal charges punishable by a fine up to $1,000 or 1 year in jail, or both,” Crump wrote in an email.

Naturally, the gun-rights fanatics are up in arms about this, led by their favorite daughter Emily Miller. But it's really all bluff.  They feel constrained to object to any and all gun control laws always pretending they're much worse than they really are.

The fact is these requirement in DC don't go nearly far enough. I would have the re-registration done yearly, there would be no on-line option after the first time and the gun would have to be presented every time as proof of continued ownership.

That's the way to put an end to straw purchasing and improper sales of guns.

The other question that arises out of all this is, when will the confiscations begin? That's what they always say is the reason to resist registration, right? It's all a pretext for the eventual door-to-door confiscations that, as day follows night, will absolutely come.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Guess what? There's A Massive Secret Database Of Gun Owners!

And it's not in the hands of FEMA or some other evil gumment agency!

While the National Rifle Association publicly fights against a national gun registry, the organization has gone to incredible lengths to compile information on “tens of millions” of gun owners — without their consent.

But in fact, the sort of vast, secret database the NRA often warns of already exists, despite having been assembled largely without the knowledge or consent of gun owners. It is housed in the Virginia offices of the NRA itself. The country’s largest privately held database of current, former, and prospective gun owners is one of the powerful lobby’s secret weapons, expanding its influence well beyond its estimated 3 million members and bolstering its political supremacy.

That database has been built through years of acquiring gun permit registration lists from state and county offices, gathering names of new owners from the thousands of gun-safety classes taught by NRA-certified instructors and by buying lists of attendees of gun shows, subscribers to gun magazines and other sources.

More here

The NRA Built A Massive Secret Database Of Gun Owners

Buzz Feed

The National Rifle Association has rallied gun-owners — and raised tens of millions of dollars — campaigning against the threat of a national database of firearms or their owners.

But in fact, the sort of vast, secret database the NRA often warns of already exists, despite having been assembled largely without the knowledge or consent of gun owners. It is housed in the Virginia offices of the NRA itself. The country’s largest privately held database of current, former, and prospective gun owners is one of the powerful lobby’s secret weapons, expanding its influence well beyond its estimated 3 million members and bolstering its political supremacy.

That database has been built through years of acquiring gun permit registration lists from state and county offices, gathering names of new owners from the thousands of gun-safety classes taught by NRA-certified instructors and by buying lists of attendees of gun shows, subscribers to gun magazines and more, BuzzFeed has learned.

NRA spokesman Andrew Arulanandam declined to discuss the group’s name-gathering methods or what it does with its vast pool of data about millions of non-member gun owners. Asked what becomes of the class rosters for safety classes when instructors turn them in, he replied: “That’s not any of your business.”

The vast size of the NRA’s database and its sophisticated methods of analyzing the public mood go a long way to explaining the organization’s enduring influence. Even in an age when opinion polls show gun-control measures gaining in general popularity and when wealthy benefactors like New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg are spending millions to counter the NRA’s lobbying and advertising budgets, the NRA has built-in advantages.

The NRA won’t say how many names and what other personal information is in its database, but former NRA lobbyist Richard Feldman estimates they keep tabs on “tens of millions of people.”

New York's Assault Weapon Registration Begins

 Associated Press/Philip Kamrass, File - FILE - In this Saturday, Jan. 26, 2013 file photo, gun enthusiasts gather during the annual New York State Arms Collectors Association Albany Gun Show at the Empire State Plaza Convention Center, in Albany, N.Y. Key measures of New York's tough new gun law are set to kick in, with owners of guns now reclassified as assault weapons required to register the firearms and new limits on the number of bullets allowed in magazines. As the new provision takes effect Monday, April 15, 2013, New York's affiliate of the National Rifle Association said it plans to head to court to seek an immediate halt to the magazine limit. (AP Photo/Philip Kamrass, File) 

Yahoo News

Key measures of New York's tough new gun law kicked in Monday, with owners of firearms now reclassified as assault weapons required to start registering the firearms and new limits on the number of bullets allowed in magazines.

As the new provisions took effect, New York's affiliate of the National Rifle Association planned to file a court request for a federal injunction to immediate halt to the magazine limit.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo calls those and other provisions in the state's new gun law common sense while dismissing criticisms he says come from "extreme fringe conservatives" who claim the government has no right to regulate guns.

"Yes, they are against it, but they are the extremists and the extremists shouldn't win, especially on this issue when it is so important to the majority," Cuomo said in a radio interview last week. "In politics, we have to be willing to take on the extremists, otherwise you will see paralysis."

New York's new gun restrictions, the first in the nation passed following December's massacre at a Connecticut elementary school, limit state gun owners to no more than seven bullets in magazines, except at competitions or firing ranges.

This will be a good test. According to our paranoid and hysterical friends, registration is ALWAYS followed by confiscation. This is a win/win for the gun control side. Either these guys will have to admit they were wrong, or they'll have to lose the guns.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Federal Registry of Gun Transactions

The New York Times

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has been without a permanent director for six years, as President Obama recently noted. But even if someone were to be confirmed for the job, the agency’s ability to thwart gun violence is hamstrung by legislative restrictions and by loopholes in federal gun laws, many law enforcement officials and advocates of tighter gun regulations say.

For example, under current laws the bureau is prohibited from creating a federal registry of gun transactions. So while detectives on television tap a serial number into a computer and instantly identify the buyer of a firearm, the reality could not be more different. 

Wouldn't it be common sense to give the authorities all the proper tools necessary to investigate crime? Combined with closing the private sale loophole, a national registry of gun transactions would be the right thing.

Fear of gun confiscations is the usual excuse, but I don't think that's reasonable. I think many gun owners oppose this simply because they want the freedom to fly below the radar and do what they want with no interference. What that means, of course, is they're not as law-abiding as they say.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Pennsylvania Mayors Want Support for Local Gun Laws

Philly.com reports

That, the mayors fear, would be the consequence of bills pending in the state House and Senate that would penalize municipalities for enacting gun-control ordinances that go further than existing state law.

Nutter, along with the mayors of Chester, Lancaster, and Allentown - all cities which, like Philadelphia, now require gun owners to report lost or stolen weapons - spoke against the legislation at a news conference and met privately with legislators to urge them to reject the bills.

The pro-gun crowd often ridicules the suggestion of reporting stolen guns as something useless. I completely agree with that. What's needed to make it effective are sanctions. If gun owners had to pay, say a thousand-dollar fine, for each stolen gun, they'd be more careful about safe storage.

Safe storage laws are problematical because it's all about what happens inside a man's home. But, making them pay for abetting the thieves, would have a positive impact.

Well then, in that case, no one would report the stolen gun, you say?  There's an obvious solution for that. Registration of guns. If guns were registered to specific licensed owners, those owners would be responsible for them in a way they aren't today.

In this way, one of the major supply chains of guns flowing from the legal world to the illegal world would be severely diminished.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Gun Registry in Illinois

The Rev. Michael Pfleger talks with Mayor Rahm Emanuel

The Chicago Tribune reports

Mayor Rahm Emanuel wants a statewide gun registry in Illinois, an idea some lawmakers quickly dismissed Thursday as ineffective and an insult to gun owners.

The proposal would require anyone who buys a handgun to pay a $65 registration fee. To register a gun, a purchaser would need to provide his name, address and phone number, along with the weapon's manufacturer and serial number and the place and date of purchase. The registry would be in addition to the firearm ownership standards all gun owners must already meet.

Sounds good to me. What do you think?

Background Checks for All Gun Sales

via NPR

Patricia Maisch, one of the people who helped halt the Tucson shooting , holds up a photograph of victim John Roll, a federal judge, while testifying before a Senate subcommittee on Tuesday. Maisch testified in support of legislation that would strengthen federal power over the states' handling of background checks.

Supporters of the legislation want to keep guns out of the hands of more criminals, domestic abusers and people who are mentally ill. They say that might have made a difference last January, when a gunman in Tucson, Ariz., killed six people and wounded 13 others, including U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Jared Loughner, who has been charged in the shooting, is being treated after he was found not mentally competent to stand trial.

Is the reluctance on the part of pro-gun folks to come on board with this due to the fact that in order to make universal background checks effective, registration and licensing would be the logical next steps?

Requiring background checks on every sale would greatly improve the current situation because many lawful gun owners unknowingly and innocently allow their guns to flow into the criminal world. This would cease.  Being law-abiding folks, these gun sellers would comply with the law and require background checks before selling.

Some gun sellers, whom I like to call "hidden criminals" are staying within the letter of the law, but for personal gain or apathy, they're knowingly allowing guns to go to criminals. These activities may not be prevented by a law requiring background checks but such a law will force these hidden criminals to come out in the open. Under the new law, anyone selling a gun without a background check is engaging in criminal activity.

So, although much improvement can be expexted from this background check law itself, only when it's combined with registration and licensing will it have maximum effectiveness. Straw purchasing will be eradicated and gun flow into the black market will be drastically curtailed.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

More on the Gun Registration Issue

The Star.com published a piece in support of abolishing the Canadian Long Gun Registry, too bad they can't tell the truth.

Wendy Cukier and the CGC are grasping at straws in a desperate measure to retain any or all of the long gun registry. These are public scare tactics filled with half truths and flat out lies.

Wendy seams to be under the impression that the only thing stopping an otherwise law-abiding gun owner from going on a shooting rampage is a little piece of paper. Sick people are sick, and require treatment. I’m sure $2 billion could have been better spent on mental health issues rather than harassing law-abiding citizens.

Did you catch that? Pretending that gun control folks actually believe gun registration will prevent people from going off the deep end by using such sarcastic language as this, is absolutely mendacious.

Wendy seams to be under the impression that the only thing stopping an otherwise law-abiding gun owner from going on a shooting rampage is a little piece of paper.

Nobody thinks that. But, well aware of that fact, gun-rights extremists both north and south of the border say stuff like this and make serious arguments against it as if we actually believe it and have said it. We done and we haven't.

The benefits of gun registration have been clearly defined. They have nothing to do with preventing people from going on shooting rampages. They have everything to do with preventing guns from flowing into the criminal world. They will help the so-called law abiding gun owners to hold onto their guns and stop allowing them to reach criminal hands.

And guess what, it's been proven to work.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

The Benefits of the Canadian Gun Registry

Steve McCullough writes in the Winnipeg Free Press

I recently became a gun owner for the first time in my early 40s. I proudly own .22 and .30-06 rifles for target shooting and hunting. My experience with Canadian firearms licensing and gun-registration systems has been entirely positive and has left me strongly in favour of the long-gun registry the Harper Conservatives, as promised, are moving to dismantle.

The mind-boggling initial costs of the registry are indefensible, but its cancellation doesn't earn the people of Canada a refund. Its ongoing costs seem quite reasonable, given the scale and importance of the task. The argument it contains incomplete or inaccurate information should lead us to improve it, not delete it. No information is much worse than partial information. Requiring us to register our gun doesn't criminalize gun owners: It draws the line between law-abiding gun owners and criminals.

That makes sense to me. How about you?

Please leave a comment.

Military Suicides and How the NRA has Helped

Military.com reports

on a report issued by the Center for a New American Security, which recommends that Congress repeal a provision in last year's National Defense Authorization Act that bars military commanders from talking with troops about troops' personally owned firearms -- a factor in nearly half of soldier suicides last year. Report authors Margaret Harrell and Nancy Berglass put it this way:

"Congress should rescind the NDAA 2011 restriction on discussing personally owned weapons so that unit leaders can suggest to service members exhibiting high-risk behavior, acting erratically or struggling with depression that they use gunlocks or store their guns temporarily at the unit armory," they wrote. "Given this change in law, unit leaders should engage both at-risk service members and their family members, and encourage them to obtain gunlocks or to store privately owned weapons out of the household."

"Multiple studies indicate that preventing easy access to lethal means, such as firearms, is an effective form of suicide prevention," authors Harrell and Berglass wrote.

The situation is absolutely dramatic.

U.S. Army suicides have climbed steadily since 2004. The Army reported a record-high number of suicides in July 2011 with the deaths of 33 active and reserve component service members reported as suicides.

Suicides in the Marine Corps increased steadily from 2006 to 2009, dipping slightly in 2010. It is impossible, given the paucity of current data, to determine the suicide rate among veterans with any accuracy. However, the VA estimates that a veteran dies by suicide every 80 minutes."

In typical fashion, the conscience-less NRA, fought for this bill restricting military commanders from having personal guns registered or even discussion personal gun ownership with their troops. The result: people died.

What's your opinion? Do the gun-rights folks seem to lose sight of the big picture in their zeal for opposing gun restrictions? Shouldn't commanders of distraught troops be free to intervene in any and every way possible to help those under their command? Is the NRA's obsession with never ever allowing data to be compiled about who owns what weapons a bit exaggerated?

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Long Gun Registry in Canada Worked Extremely Well

The Winnepeg Free Press reports on what all reasonable folks already knew.

Advocates for gun control could only shrug with resignation Wednesday as Statistics Canada reported fewer murders with rifles and shotguns -- one day after Ottawa issued a death warrant for the controversial long-gun registry.

The agency's annual study of homicide rates found the number of murders committed using firearms slid seven per cent from 2009 to 2010, continuing a downward trend that's been taking place over the past three decades.

Shootings still accounted for most of the country's slayings at 32 per cent, but the number of murders committed with rifles or shotguns had tumbled to one-fifth of what they were 30 years ago.

In spite of the opinion of Police Chiefs and leading gun control groups in Canada, the Conservative government has succeeded in destroying the long-gun registry. Even as mis-managed as it was fiscally, the positive results were undeniable. 

"The evidence has been quite clear, and in fact compelling, that stronger controls on firearms generally have impact on public safety," she said.

"We've seen murders with rifles and shotguns in particular plummet as we strengthen controls over those."

Rifles and shotguns, once blamed for the majority of firearm-related homicides and most commonly used in domestic violence cases, have been the weapons most tightly regulated under the registry, she added.

In order to accomplish this sleight-of-hand legislation, they used an argument we're very familiar with in the States.

"We don't want laws that target law-abiding citizens, hunters and sports shooters. We want laws that focus on the criminal and those who use firearms illegally," Public Safety Minister Vic Toews said Tuesday in announcing the bill to abolish it.

Many times we've covered this. Gun control laws aimed at the law-abiding are necessary to help them hang onto their guns. I've outlined them here, and I defy anyone to say these initiatives would not significantly cut down on gun flow to criminals. Registration is just one part of it.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Registration of Guns and Licensing of Gun Owners from the Alien Perspective

Aliens from a distant galaxy were approaching our solar system. Identifying Earth as the only habitable planet, they came for a closer look. One of the first things they noticed from a great distance was the air traffic and high-speed train movement. Realizing these were conveyances for moving people, they marvelled at the efficiency and complete lack of collisions and near-collisions. The coordination was impressive.

Coming a bit closer they began seeing the cars. Unlike the larger means of transportation, these seemed to be involved in countless mishaps and explosions. Everywhere they looked cars were running into each other and into other objects. The death and destruction was incalculable.

One alien said to the other, since these primitive vehicles are operated by humans, why don't they assign a numerical designation to each one which could be linked to the operator. This way they could easily identify the ones causing all the trouble.

The other alien, scanning the highly-advanced computer system, said, it seems they already have done this. Perhaps it means the quantity of problems has already been reduced to the level we observe.

Coming still closer, but maintaining a distant orbit, they began to observe another phenomenon: gunshots. They recognized these as primitive projectile-ejecting weapons. With each blast their computers registered the event. They watched horrified and amazed that a civilization advanced enough to register all cars and license all car-drivers would allow this.

Wouldn't registering those guns and tying them to the users the way they've done with cars eliminate much of the damage, asked the first alien.

The other more senior crew member said sadly it's time to return and make our report.

Mom Wounds Daughter with "Cigarette Lighter"

via The Banning-Beaumont Patch thanks to our Friend Jack Cluth

A 12-year-old girl was wounded by a ricocheting bullet Sunday evening in Banning, when her mother fired a tiny pistol she mistook for a cigarette lighter, police said.

Rachel Avila, 30, told police she and her 12-year-old daughter, both of Banning, were talking with friends in front of their mobile home in the 100 block of North Phillips Avenue when Avila found what she thought was a novelty cigarette lighter, police said.

Now wait a minute, did she say "FOUND what she thought was a novelty cigarette lighter?" And that was right in front of their trailer, right? And the police buy that explanation?

The police department advised caution to anyone who finds an object resembling a firearm or a suspicious device.

"Do not handle the object and call local law enforcement for assistance," Banning police said.

Banning police Sgt. Alex Diaz said, "We're tying to find out who the gun belongs to, so we're looking into that. At this point it is considered an accident."

I guess this could be another example of why they oppose registration of guns. One guy called it "plausible deniability." That's cute isn't it?

What's your opinion?.  Please leave a comment.

Close the Private Sale Loophole

via jobsanger

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Florida), who was recently selected to head the Democratic National Committee, wants to close this glaring loophole in the gun laws. She is introducing a bill which would require a background check on all gun sales, whether commercial or private. Private gun sellers would have to go to a licensed gun dealer or a law enforcement office and get a background check done before selling any gun to anyone.

This law would not restrict the right of any citizen to lawfully own a firearm, but I'm sure it will probably be opposed by the NRA (since they oppose all gun laws and regulations, whether they would infringe on gun owner's rights or not). But recent polls have shown that most Americans, including most gun owners, would approve of this kind of law. I hope it is able to get past the Republican obstructionists in the House of Representatives.

You know what I say? Let's not stop there. That's only half-way to where we need to be. In addition to background checks on every single gun transfer, no exceptions, we need to license all gun owners and register all guns.

That would be proper gun control. What's your opinion?

Please leave a comment.

Reporting Multiple Sales

Winston Dorian has the story.

The BATFE is demanding the authority to require all of the 8,500 firearm dealers in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas to report all sales of two or more semiautomatic rifles within five consecutive business days, if the rifles are larger than .22 caliber and use detachable magazines. Yet, under existing law, the bureau has full access to every record of every firearm transaction by every licensed dealer, whether during a bona fide criminal investigation or simply to enforce compliance with record keeping requirements. This reporting scheme would create a registry of owners of many of today’s most popular rifles–firearms owned by millions of Americans for self-defense, hunting and other lawful purposes.

You'd think that guys like the gun-rights folks, who continually accuse their opponents of lying, would strive to keep it a bit cleaner themselves. But, you'd be wrong. In fact, all their accusations are just a smoke screen. The most mendacious and the best manipulative spinsters are the pro-gun fanatics themselves.

Example:The last sentence in the statement above which describes the dangerous attempt on the government's part to record multiple sales.

If they were a bit more honest, it would have said this:

This reporting scheme would create a registry of owners WHO BOUGHT TWO OR MORE IN A FIVE-DAY PERIOD of many, BUT NOT ALL, of today’s most popular rifles–firearms owned by millions of Americans for self-defense, hunting and other lawful purposes.

But they didn't say that. What they said was designed to give the impression that the government wants to compile a list of ALL gun buyers, which triggers the expected knee-jerk reaction of resistance on the part of the gun owning public.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.