Coito ergo sum wrote:Seth wrote:
Wow! Got the point in one post! Good for you. You see, CES is exactly right, no specific "gun laws" are actually required at all, because everything bad that one can do with a gun is already prohibited by other laws. And if you don't do anything wrong with your gun, why should there be a raft of laws controlling every little thing about them, from "drop tests" to magazine capacity to banning cosmetic items?
That is not exactly true, since there are some reasonable regulations that can apply directly to guns, such as "if you transport your weapon within city limits, you need to keep it in the trunk or a locked cabinet" or, manufacturing safety regulations, regulations concerning sales of weapons (such as business licenses to register gun merchants). Reasonable regulations could include regulation of the kind of ammunition - such as "no rocket propelled grenades," no "home use stinger missiles," and no poison tipped bullets, or whatnot. There could also be reasonable regulations such as "if you commit a felony using a gun, you can't own one anymore." There are lots of reasonable regulations that would allow a "well regulated militia" (all the people) to have a right to bear arms which is, well, "well regulated."
But the right to keep and bear arms is NOT dependent upon membership in the Militia, and never has been, as the Supremes said in Heller. It's an individual right, not a collective one. Of course there might be "reasonable" regulations, but the question is "why should there be other than proscriptions on misusing arms?"
People already own rocket-propelled grenades, hand grenades, field artillery, tanks, machine guns and claymore mines. All of those are legal to own if you meet the requirements of the NFA and pay the tax. It's hardly necessary to have a specific law that says "don't fire your artillery field-piece anywhere that someone can get hurt by it" now do we? That would be covered under the existing criminal concepts of assault, criminal negligence or other laws that protect individuals and their property against someone using ANY tool, weapon or substance to harm them or their property.
If you want to keep poison-tipped bullets around, so what? So long as you don't use them to harm anyone, who cares? The point being that like guns, criminals who desire to use poison bullets against another person will do so whether there's a law against it or not, so why bother, why not just prosecute them for the underlying crime of murdering or injuring someone if they do such a thing?
As for transport laws, no, there should not be any such laws. First, an unloaded firearm is useless for its intended self-defense purpose, which violates the concepts outlined in Heller and the emerging line of cases that are defending the private individual's right to keep and bear LOADED arms (effective arms) in public and in their homes. So long as you do not misuse that weapon, it doesn't matter if it's loaded or not, now does it? And if you do misuse it, why you are already liable under a host of other laws proscribing dangerous, careless, or negligent behavior. We don't need specific gun laws.
As for "if you commit a felony you can't own one anymore, that is not "gun control" legislation, that is PEOPLE control legislation that dictates personal conduct as a consequence of bad behavior. Such laws are appropriate because they do not regulate weapons per se, nor do they affect anyone who isn't a felon (for example).
Seth wrote:
Law-abiding people should be allowed to carry whatever firearms they wish to carry,
Not poisoned tip weapons - not a 2000 to 6000 round per minute minigun - not an M-61 Vulcan - not stinger missiles or rocket propelled grenades. Not in my opinion, anyway.
Why not? If they are law-abiding, they won't misuse them. If they are criminals, they won't obey the prohibition, so what's the point of creating the prohibition except to disarm the law-abiding citizens but not the criminals. I know people who own both Miniguns and Vulcans and RPG's. Nobody with a Stinger, since the military doesn't sell those to civilians. None of those people have ever done anything remotely unsafe merely by possessing those arms, and they generally just shoot them quite safely in appropriate areas, like the Knob Creek Machinegun Shoot the weekend after next near Fort Knox, Kentucky, at which I will do some shooting myself and will observe literally hundreds of people with lawfully-owned machine guns, including Miniguns, having a rollicking good time shooting the crap of out cars, busses, and all sorts of other fun stuff. Happens twice a year, and is one of many such shoots nationwide every year.
And did you know than since the NFA was passed in the 1930's, only ONE lawful owner of a machine gun has ever murdered someone with his machine gun, and that happened to be a Sheriff's deputy who killed his wife. This, in spite of the fact that there are more than 400,000 legally-owned machine guns in the US. Pretty damned good safety and law-abidingness record if you ask me.
Seth wrote:
wherever they wish to carry them (with the consent of the owner if it's private property),
Not courthouses or high schools, for example, and particularly not the arms I listed above, and others like them, in courthouses and high schools. I don't want some pissed off litigant awaiting the judge's ruling while holding his M-16, or a fucked up high schooler with a gun.
Did you know that in most school shootings, the only one with a gun is the fucked-up high schooler? That's why such massacres happen, because state and federal laws create "gun free zones" that are nothing more than gun-free hunting zones for criminals. Had even ONE teacher or administrator been armed at Columbine High School, things might have turned out much differently. It certainly changed how law-enforcement responds to "active shooter" incidents.
As for courtrooms, on more than one occasion people (including prosecutors and judges) have been murdered by pissed off litigants OUTSIDE the doors of the courthouse, where the shooter knows unarmed people will be present. I'm fine with disarming people while they are actually inside a SECURED facility that is well-patrolled with armed police officers ready to take on someone who tries to attack the building, but it should be required that the entire building be fully secured, and that at security screening points there be gun lockers that members of the public can use to store their firearms while in court, but which allows them to re-arm themselves before they exit the building.
Seth wrote:
in any peaceable manner, concealed or otherwise, and it should be totally unremarkable that they do so.
Whether something is "remarkable" is like whether something is "good" or "bad," purely subjective. I think it should be quite "remarkable" that someone straps a minigun to his SUV and rides down Main Street with it on a busy night.
Why? So long as he never discharges it inappropriately, all he's doing is adding to the safety and security of the community in the event that someone ELSE decides to unlawfully use their firearm. And if he does decide to discharge it inappropriately, it would be nice if everyone else on the street was able to respond to such an attack with overwhelming return fire, rather than everyone else being a government-disarmed potential victim that such a person can shoot at with impunity, knowing nobody's going to shoot back at him. You see, if a criminal wants to hose down a crowd at a shopping mall with a pintle-mounted minigun, at the moment in many places, there's very little to stop him from doing so at present. It would be far better if more civilians were armed so they could respond to such situations, don't you think?
Oh, and at the moment, it's perfectly legal to do exactly that in any state where it's legal to own a machine gun.
Seth wrote:
Only if they MISUSE their firearms should they be subject to legal sanction.
Not "only."
Of course "only." If they don't misuse them, what would be subject to legal sanction?
Seth wrote:
and "don't use your gun carelessly or recklessly,
That too would seem to be subsumed within current crimes, like "criminally negligent homicide" or "manslaughter," where specific intent to kill is not an element of the crime.
Yup.
Seth wrote:
because if you do you will go to jail for a long time."
Oh, wait...that's already the case, and more. Firearms in the US are the most closely-regulated consumer product in the world already.
That's highly debatable. I think prescription pharmaceuticals come to mind as a consumer product which is far more highly regulated than firearms. One needs a license to manufacture them,[/quote]
One needs a license (a number of them actually) to manufacture firearms, and unlike pills, every single firearm ever manufactured in the US must be serially numbered and the records kept FOREVER and given to the government on demand.
they require a prescription to take them,
No, they require a prescription to ACQUIRE them, as do firearms in many states. [/quote]
No firearms require a prescription. Only some firearms require a permit or a license, and only some require registration.
A prescription is nothing more than an authorization to purchase, and many states require a citizen to get a "firearms owner's permit" prior to purchasing any firearm. And for every firearm sold commercially in the US, the seller must fill out and retain permanently the Form 4477 and obtain a NICS background check at the time of sale.
Seth wrote:
only a certain profession can issue those prescriptions and that profession has to be licensed,
All commercial sales of firearms must be done by persons licensed to do so by the federal government.
Not all sales of firearms are "commercial" sales.
So? Not all transfers of drugs require a prescription. Only some of them require it, and even then many such transfers take place illegally without one.
A person doesn't need a license to sell his rifle.
Depends on the state.
A person commits a felony if he sells his prescription painkiller.
So? That's one distinction among many. I still say firearms are more heavily regulated than prescription drugs are.
Seth wrote:
You cannot be in the business of even FIXING firearms without a license.
In the business? Yes. But, you can fix your friends firearm, or your own. You can't diagnose your friends illness and prescribe him even an aspirin. That's practicing medicine without a license.
Horsepucky. You can give all the advice you like, and all the OTC drugs you like to anyone you like, so long as you do not falsely represent yourself to be a physician. As for prescription meds, no, you cannot dispense them without a license, but again, that just balances the comparison because you can't "dispense" guns commercially without a license either.
Seth wrote:
they can't be imported into the US for sale,
Foreign firearms that do not meet the "sporting purposes" test cannot be imported.
No prescription meds can be imported for sale at all.
Wanna bet? I get my prescription meds from India and the UK, via Canada, all the time. And big Pharma imports drugs all the time, pursuant to permits and licenses.
Seth wrote:
Further, all imports of firearms or even firearms components are strictly regulated by the federal government with severe penalties for smuggling.
There are far more restrictions on the same conduct for pharmaceuticals, both state and federal.
I'd say on balance it's about equal on that point.
Seth wrote:
manufacturers are subject to inspection,
Firearms and ammunition manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers are subject to unannounced inspections of their facilities and records by the BATFE. Persons owning Class III (NFA) firearms or destructive devices like machine guns, short rifles, short shotguns, explosives and other controlled devices are subject to inspection of their storage facilities and paperwork. The paperwork for such devices must always be with the device/weapon. Additionally, you must OBTAIN PERMISSION from the BATFE before moving an NFA item between states. To get this permission you must tell the BATFE exactly WHEN you will be moving the weapon across state lines, and exactly WHERE you will be going, and what ROUTE you will take (so that they can make sure you aren't transporting it through a state that bans such devices) and when you plan to RETURN to your home. (This requirement, by the way, is why I don't own any NFA firearms...too much paperwork and I don't like inviting the BATFE into my house whenever they decide to inspect my paperwork and gun safe.)
At most, that's the same as pharmaceuticals, which are subject to inspections and regulations of the same kind.
Only for distributors. Users of legal prescription drugs are not subject to such rules.
Seth wrote:
carrying a prescription pharmaceutical without the prescription on hand is illegal, and reams of pages of other regulations apply.
The same is true of firearms, and that's just the FEDERAL regulations.
False, because I can carry a rifle without a license, because it doesn't require a license.
Depends on the state.
I can't carry prescription antibiotics in my pocket without a prescription, or I'm committing a felony. Score another one for pharmaceuticals being more highly regulated than guns.
Like I said, on balance firearms are still more heavily regulated.
Seth wrote:
Firearm regulation in states ranges from just a few pages in the law codes, to a fair bit of regulation. Most state regulation deals with licensing and registration, and the restriction of certain types of weapons. But, they're really not all that complex or closely regulated, at least not compared to pharmaceuticals and the like.
I disagree, though it might be a close call. Every aspect of firearms manufacture, sale, possession, carrying and use of firearms is strictly regulated, right down to when and where you are allowed to shoot it.
You disagree, but in every instance/example we've discussed, the prescription pharmaceutical industry is far more regulated, or at most (inspections of manufacturers and licensing of manufacturers) they are about equivalent.
We disagree.
It's just not true that "every aspect of firearms manufacture, sale, prossession and carrying and use of firearms is strictly regulated." In most states the purchase, possession and carrying of long guns is hardly regulated at all. Just some rules about transporting it in a vehicle, sometimes, and about whether it can be loaded, and whatnot. But, I can go to Dick's Sporting Goods 5 minutes from here and buy a deer rifle and a box of ammo, walk it out to my car in hand, put it in the trunk, and drive to the woods, load and shoot a deer same day. I can't go to the drug store and buy an antibiotic. Game-set-match - QED.
And I can go to the pharmacy with a prescription, which is the equivalent of the Form 4477, buy some Cipro and down them before leaving the premises.
At best it's a draw.
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S
"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke
"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth
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