It never ceases to amaze me how people will support PresBo no matter what he says, and Eugene Robinson, of the Washington Post, does just that in his article entitled "Obama's Brave Admission About Terrorism." He begins rationally enough:
Both men echo something I've been saying for quite a while, that much of this kind of violence simply isn't preventable, and tightening gun control laws doesn't change that. Evil people will perform evil deeds, pure and simple. Then he buys into every little thing that Obama is selling.
Before I address the specific proposals, I want you to read that last sentence again. Eugene wants us to implement these measures while admitting that they wouldn't have stopped the very act of terrorism he's citing as an excuse for taking these actions. Such are the thought-processes of the gun grabber.
"We must do something, this is something, therefore we must do it." That's not a quote from Eugene, but it is a fair representation of the illogical mindset he exhibits. It doesn't matter if this particular "something" would make even the tiniest bit of difference or not... something must be done!
Personally, I demand that any action has at least a realistic chance of actually reducing violent crime, but none of the proposals advanced by either Obama or Mr. Robinson fit in that category.
When he says we should ban assault weapons, it is difficult for me to take him seriously seeing as how later in the same article he describes them as "assault rifles"... two entirely different things.
(For those not gun savvy, an "assault rifle" is a fully automatic, magazine-fed rifle designed for infantry use, i.e. the gun continues to fire for as long as the trigger is depressed or until it runs out of ammunition. An "assault weapon" has no definition, as each piece of legislation that attempts to ban them defines the term slightly differently. It is a political term only, and the only things the different definitions really agree on is that they are rifles that look like military rifles (i.e. look scary), and that they are semi-automatic, i.e. A single trigger pull fires a single bullet.)
I would like to illustrate this point with pictures. This is a Ruger 10/22 rifle that we gave to our daughter. It is a semi-automatic, 22 calibre rifle, right out of the box. Nice gun, shoots well, and is a pretty wimpy weapon, firing as it does .22 LR cartridges. One thing it is NOT is an assault weapon. It doesn't qualify as an assault weapon under any ban that I've ever read.
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My daughter and her fiance bought a "conversion kit" that allows her to remove the clunky-looking stock and replace it with the "cooler" looking AR-15 platform look. Here's what the gun looks like after the configuration.
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Note that this would probably run afoul of more than one assault weapons ban... but it is fundamentally the same gun! It still shoots the same bullets with the same power and at the same rate. Legally, it is the same gun, as the BATF considers a semi-auto rifle to be the part of it that "goes bang." In other words, the part that remains when you remove the original stock:
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No matter what clothes this gun is dressed in, it is still the same gun with the same amount of deadly potential. The fact that it suddenly "looks scarier" shouldn't hide the fact that it is still the same gun you originally saw in its wooden stock. Why ban the gun in one set of clothing but not another? You can see why I say that an "assault weapons ban" simply outlaws guns that look scary but really aren't any more dangerous than most hunting rifles.
Mr. Robinson makes the common mistake of wishing for "common sense gun control laws." That's a nice little soundbite, but I doubt we'd agree on what laws displayed common sense. Usually, a gun control nut tacks "common sense" on to any draconian proposal he wishes to advance, as if calling it that makes it true.
In his mind, banning scary-looking weapons is common sense and reasonable. So is banning people on the terrorist watch list from owning a gun, ignoring the fact that many, MANY people (who aren't terrorists) are on the list without their knowledge and without any meaningful way of challenging their inclusion or getting their names removed. Such a proposal lacks due process protections, which is a minimum requirement before removing a Constitutional right.
Heck, a liberal friend of mine once described his "common sense gun control" idea to me, and said that only law enforcement and military should be allowed to own thems. So you see, the term is more a non-specific smokescreen than an actual representation of any particular proposal.
We have ample evidence that gun control doesn't work to reduce violent crime or terrorism, so it is in my mind that such proposals are politically motivated and really aimed at reducing or removing guns from private hands.
As I have said repeatedly, if you have a suggestion that might actually work to reduce violent crime, then let's hear it. If you just want to whine about your latest idea to take guns away, Mr. Robinson, then please just give it a rest.
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"A cancer that has no immediate cure" was not the most soothing metaphor President Obama could have chosen, but it was the most honest. He has no idea how to prevent another terrorist attack like the one in San Bernardino -- and neither does anyone else, including his Republican critics.
Both men echo something I've been saying for quite a while, that much of this kind of violence simply isn't preventable, and tightening gun control laws doesn't change that. Evil people will perform evil deeds, pure and simple. Then he buys into every little thing that Obama is selling.
The specific actions Obama demanded from Congress are no-brainers. Yes, individuals on terrorism watch lists should be prohibited from buying guns. Yes, the sale of military-style assault rifles should be banned. Yes, there should be better screening of foreigners who enter the country without a visa.
But none of these measures would have stopped the barbaric assault in San Bernardino that killed 14 and injured 21.
Before I address the specific proposals, I want you to read that last sentence again. Eugene wants us to implement these measures while admitting that they wouldn't have stopped the very act of terrorism he's citing as an excuse for taking these actions. Such are the thought-processes of the gun grabber.
"We must do something, this is something, therefore we must do it." That's not a quote from Eugene, but it is a fair representation of the illogical mindset he exhibits. It doesn't matter if this particular "something" would make even the tiniest bit of difference or not... something must be done!
Personally, I demand that any action has at least a realistic chance of actually reducing violent crime, but none of the proposals advanced by either Obama or Mr. Robinson fit in that category.
When he says we should ban assault weapons, it is difficult for me to take him seriously seeing as how later in the same article he describes them as "assault rifles"... two entirely different things.
(For those not gun savvy, an "assault rifle" is a fully automatic, magazine-fed rifle designed for infantry use, i.e. the gun continues to fire for as long as the trigger is depressed or until it runs out of ammunition. An "assault weapon" has no definition, as each piece of legislation that attempts to ban them defines the term slightly differently. It is a political term only, and the only things the different definitions really agree on is that they are rifles that look like military rifles (i.e. look scary), and that they are semi-automatic, i.e. A single trigger pull fires a single bullet.)
I would like to illustrate this point with pictures. This is a Ruger 10/22 rifle that we gave to our daughter. It is a semi-automatic, 22 calibre rifle, right out of the box. Nice gun, shoots well, and is a pretty wimpy weapon, firing as it does .22 LR cartridges. One thing it is NOT is an assault weapon. It doesn't qualify as an assault weapon under any ban that I've ever read.
My daughter and her fiance bought a "conversion kit" that allows her to remove the clunky-looking stock and replace it with the "cooler" looking AR-15 platform look. Here's what the gun looks like after the configuration.
Note that this would probably run afoul of more than one assault weapons ban... but it is fundamentally the same gun! It still shoots the same bullets with the same power and at the same rate. Legally, it is the same gun, as the BATF considers a semi-auto rifle to be the part of it that "goes bang." In other words, the part that remains when you remove the original stock:
No matter what clothes this gun is dressed in, it is still the same gun with the same amount of deadly potential. The fact that it suddenly "looks scarier" shouldn't hide the fact that it is still the same gun you originally saw in its wooden stock. Why ban the gun in one set of clothing but not another? You can see why I say that an "assault weapons ban" simply outlaws guns that look scary but really aren't any more dangerous than most hunting rifles.
Mr. Robinson makes the common mistake of wishing for "common sense gun control laws." That's a nice little soundbite, but I doubt we'd agree on what laws displayed common sense. Usually, a gun control nut tacks "common sense" on to any draconian proposal he wishes to advance, as if calling it that makes it true.
In his mind, banning scary-looking weapons is common sense and reasonable. So is banning people on the terrorist watch list from owning a gun, ignoring the fact that many, MANY people (who aren't terrorists) are on the list without their knowledge and without any meaningful way of challenging their inclusion or getting their names removed. Such a proposal lacks due process protections, which is a minimum requirement before removing a Constitutional right.
Heck, a liberal friend of mine once described his "common sense gun control" idea to me, and said that only law enforcement and military should be allowed to own thems. So you see, the term is more a non-specific smokescreen than an actual representation of any particular proposal.
We have ample evidence that gun control doesn't work to reduce violent crime or terrorism, so it is in my mind that such proposals are politically motivated and really aimed at reducing or removing guns from private hands.
As I have said repeatedly, if you have a suggestion that might actually work to reduce violent crime, then let's hear it. If you just want to whine about your latest idea to take guns away, Mr. Robinson, then please just give it a rest.