Congress has wasted no time in trying to exploit the power that the Constitution does not give the federal government to regulate firearms. Today, I'll be talking about the "Southwest Border Violence Reduction Act of 2009," introduced in the Senate by Senators Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) and Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), and in the House by Representative Ciro Rodriguez (D-TX). These bills were just introduced yesterday, and are so new I can't even find numbers for them, much less details.
We do, however, have something of a guide as to what to expect, in the bills of the same name introduced last year, S. 2867/H.R. 5869. Looking over those, I'll acknowledge that as attacks on the Constitutionally guaranteed, fundamental, absolute human right of the individual to keep and bear arms go, this is fairly small potatoes.
Still, the bills call for millions of dollars of additional funding for the BATFE, and the hiring of more BATFE stormtroopers. Yeah--that's what we need--to take millions more dollars from taxpayers, and use the money to buy more jackboots for us to either kiss, or have placed on our necks.
By the way, the Senate version already has some co-sponsors, including anti-gun extremists Dick Durbin (D-IL), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), and John McCain (R-AZ). Yep--that's right--I'm calling John McCain an anti-gun extremist. If casting a vote for a ban of "assault weapons," and continued, active support for closing the mythical "gun show loophole" isn't anti-gun extremism, there would not seem to be a gun law that isn't a "reasonable restriction."
These bills are ostensibly intended to reduce the violence in Mexico (and sometimes spilling across the border), stemming from fights over the profits created by the "War on Drugs." It has become fashionable, of late, to blame this violence not on the universally failed programs of prohibition, but on "lax gun laws" in the U.S.
By the way, apparently Mexico is considering banning toy guns, now. If they do, how long before we hear calls to reform our "lax toy laws" in the U.S.?
As I said, this bill, as noxious as it is, would be a fairly minor attack on liberty. For a look at a vastly more ominous bill, check out today's Gun Rights Examiner (should be daily reading anyway).
WoG has more.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Here come the gun bills
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5 comments:
I believe the City of Aurora in our lovely state has already banned toy guns.
I wonder if it has reduced any desired statistics.
When I was a kid if we had no toy guns we picked up a stick. Are they going to ban sticks? Will 'brandishing' a stick become a crime?
Are they going to ban sticks? Will 'brandishing' a stick become a crime?
Didn't I read about something like that being implemented, or at least proposed, in England? I'm not kidding--I think I saw something about criminalizing the picking up of a stick or broken bottle.
It might not have the power to regulate firearms carte blanche, but it does have the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations, which is what they'd be enforcing here. I don't think the feds have any power to say you can't sell a gun to your friend, but they do have the power to say you can't sell a gun to your friend if he lives in Mexico. An argument could be made that the Second Amendment is so absolute that it precludes Congress regulating arms sales to foreign nations, but border control is within Congress' purview.
But this bill is likely a response to those who are going to argue that the solution to the problem is passing more gun control laws. Mexico has been putting pressure on the US government to do something about its gun laws for a few years now, but we've been lucky not to have a White House that's going to listen too closely. Obama will likely listen, and when he goes to Congress asking for solutions to the problem, we better have an alternative to pony up when the folks who want more gun laws out of this start pushing their bills. In this political climate, we are not going to have the luxury of just ignoring the problem.
It might not have the power to regulate firearms carte blanche, but it does have the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations, which is what they'd be enforcing here. I don't think the feds have any power to say you can't sell a gun to your friend, but they do have the power to say you can't sell a gun to your friend if he lives in Mexico.
The point I brought up about the lack of Constitutional justification for regulating guns is, as you point out, kind of a weak one--I think I had some defective caffeine this morning.
Still, I'll be waiting for the text of the bills, and any amendments--I can't imagine Durbin and Feinstein being involved with a gun bill, and it not eventually becoming a draconian assault on RKBA. With McCain's passionate embrace of closing the "gun show loophole," and with said "loophole" being one of the favorite scapegoats of those who claim that Mexico's crime problem is our fault, I wouldn't be at all surprised if gun shows end up coming under this bill's influence.
Obama will likely listen, and when he goes to Congress asking for solutions to the problem, we better have an alternative to pony up when the folks who want more gun laws out of this start pushing their bills.
Even if I bought into that strategy (and I don't), surely you're not suggesting that Feinstein and Durbin have co-sponsored a bill aimed at appeasing the citizen disarmers, so they don't go as far as they otherwise would.
Even if I bought into that strategy (and I don't), surely you're not suggesting that Feinstein and Durbin have co-sponsored a bill aimed at appeasing the citizen disarmers, so they don't go as far as they otherwise would.
I don't think it's aimed at appeasement. Feinstein and Durbin will push gun control solutions regardless. But it's useful to have an alternative to push that can conceivably make the issue go away, without doing much lasting damage. I can't tell you for certain that's the motivation behind the people who drafted the bill, but it seems to me it could be pushed as a viable alternative to gun control, which is certain to be pushed. I don't think the media, ATF and Brady have been prepping that ground for nothing.
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