Facebook gun ads

A stormy time for the gun lobby

commongunsense, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

tree damageWe were without power for 3 days following a terrible and violent summer storm in my city of Duluth. We were awakened at 3:30 a.m. on Thursday morning by hurricane force winds, violent thunder and constant and bright lightning. To say it was scary is an understatement. We heard trees cracking along with all of the other noises and were not sure if we would have to seek shelter. The photo here showing one tree down on a wire is minor compared to the destruction that happened all over in my part of town.

A majority of Duluth residents lost their power during the storm due to trees on wires and twisted power poles. Upon waking on Thursday morning, I checked on my friends to make sure all was well. Many had huge Spruce and other old growth trees down in their yards. A friend and I drove around a bit looking for coffee and were stunned at the awful damage done by this storm. Many streets were impassable because of downed trees and wires and debris was all over. Traffic lights were not working causing long lines of cars on the streets.

The city is recovering though many are still without power as I write. Neighbors are helping neighbors and the city has risen to the occasion. We are not used to these kinds of storms in our area. We have blizzards that cause power outages and sometimes downed wires. But this is something most of us have not seen in our lifetimes. The weather has been generally more tumultuous this summer. With many torrential rain falls and severe storms, I am convinced that climate change is real.

Also what is real is the summer of shootings of young black men and police officers. In Minneapolis, shootings have risen to one of the highest levels of recent years. This Star Tribune article revealed a different law enforcement policy to stop some of the straw purchasing that accounts for many crime guns getting into the wrong hands. From the article:

Amid signs of a rise in illegal firearms trafficking, federal prosecutors in Minnesota have hit on a novel strategy to crack down on gun violence and get shooters off the streets. Instead of prosecuting suspects for murder, where convictions can be difficult to obtain, they charge multiple defendants with conspiracy to buy and possess guns illegally.

The strategy is rooted in the successful prosecution of 11 gang members in 2014, after what authorities called an “all-out shooting gang war” in the Twin Cities. Prosecutors built a conspiracy case that produced 10 guilty pleas and a jury trial conviction of the gang’s leader, Veltrez Black, who was sentenced this spring to 15 years in prison.

Now a Minnesota prosecutor has been asked to share the strategy with Chicago authorities, who are grappling with near nightly volleys of gunfire throughout their city.

Such crimes often go unsolved because witnesses refuse to break a code of silence, prosecutors say, but firearms conspiracy cases can be easier to build.

What we know is that crime guns don’t fall from the sky. Guns start out as legal purchases and get into the hands of those who shouldn’t have them in various ways. It’s easy for anyone to buy guns legally or not, by not undergoing a background check at gun shows, flea markets or on-line sites such as Armslist or Facebook.

Straw purchasing is another way that allows the flow of guns into our streets and neighborhoods. We can do something about this if we have the will and think together about how to stop the guns that get used in shootings. Too many people are dying. There should be no excuses for not doing whatever it takes. More from the article:

The strategy is timely, given the recent surge in local gun violence. Minnesota gun deaths hit a 10-year high in 2015, according to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, and represented a greater share of all homicides (61 percent) than in 1995, when Minneapolis was dubbed “Murderapolis.” (…)

And a new federal report shows that the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) recovered and traced 2,780 firearms in Minnesota last year — up 14 percent from a year before and also a 10-year high. That total doesn’t include all guns recovered by other law enforcement agencies; Minneapolis police inventoried an average of 681 guns as evidence per year from 2013 to 2015.

In the article there was mention of the problem of stolen guns. Some states have passed lost and stolen gun legislation to require people to report a stolen gun(s). We can see why from this: “The office also charged two people with buying up to 10 weapons for others in the group and later reporting the guns as stolen.”

And this, from the article, shows that many gun dealers are doing their jobs well:

At Bill’s Gun Shop & Range, owner John Monson is among the numerous Twin Cities sellers to occasionally find that a straw buyer passed through their doors. Monson said each of his five locations logs suspicious activity from any of the 100,000 customers who visit each year and passes along information to law enforcement agencies when necessary. Investigations can also evolve from mandatory reports to local police and the ATF whenever a customer buys two or more handguns in a week.

“We can’t stop all [straw purchasing],” Monson said. “But we can stop it in conversations in the process that happens before they do buy the gun.”

Prevention is what this is all about. If we can prevent guns from getting into the hands of those who intend harm, we can prevent some of the way too many shootings. Working with gun dealers is an important part of this process.

A new approach to preventing the proliferation of weapons onto our streets is needed given that many of our elected leaders are so beholden to the corporate gun lobby causing inaction in passing new laws or strengthening the ones we have. But we are seeing a new boldness amongst our politicians who are willing to speak out against the gun lobby publicly. One such statement was made by Democratic Vice Presidential candidate Tim Kaine on Saturday at his introductory speech. He spoke out and has spoken out before on the need for passing reasonable gun laws and has won all of his elections anyway.

The gun lobby is going to experience a stormy time now that their hypocrisy and rhetoric of fear are coming back to haunt them. Talk has turned to the nonsensical idea that citizens should openly carry assault rifles at public events and rallies such as the Dallas Black Lives Matter rally that turned violent. Others are wondering about conceal carry policies and how they work to protect people given that Philando Castile was armed with a legal gun when he was shot. There is some confusion over this confirmed by a local police officer at a meeting I attended about community safety. There are some interesting comments in the above linked article:

Thoughts on concealed carry: “If you’re a concealed-carry permit holder and you’re carrying, you assume some risk, you know? Things happen. Whether it’s on accident or intentional—you’re carrying a firearm. You’re assuming some risk in carrying a firearm. You have to assume some risk—it’s just like when you drive a car.”

How the Philando Castile situation will affect his work: “Will we change the way we do the training? No, because we believe we’re teaching it correctly. Will we emphasize this part of the training more? Yes. Will it come up for discussion? Guaranteed.”

It is undeniable that risk is involved when someone chooses to own and carry a gun. Guns are lethal weapons designed to kill others.

 

There is a perfect storm coming. More and more people are getting involved. This latest action to get in the way of Crossfit Reebok giving away Glock pistols to the winner of the  annual Crossfit games worked to call attention to the idea that gun giveaways are just not a good idea and obviously promote gun company profits. After the Orlando shooting, the GLBTQ community is not going to sit back and be silent. From the article:

“It is an outrage that an organization like CrossFit Reebok, who purport to be about health and fitness, are giving away a weapon of death and destruction as a prize,” said New Yorkers Against Gun Violence Executive Director Leah Gunn Barrett.

Why give guns away? Promotion of weapons of death just does not fit with exercising.

A new AP poll shows, again, consistent support from gun owners and non gun owners alike for universal background checks and stronger regulation of assault weapons.

From the above article:

Nearly two-thirds of respondents expressed support for stricter laws, with majorities favoring nationwide bans on the sale of semi-automatic assault weapons such as the AR-15 and on the sale of high-capacity magazines holding 10 or more bullets.

The percentage of Americans who want such laws is the highest since the AP-GfK poll started asking the question in 2013, a survey taken about 10 months after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, that killed 20 children and six educators.

High-profile shootings also appear to have taken a toll on Americans’ sense of safety. Strong majorities of those polled expressed some degree of concern that they or a relative will be a victim of gun violence or a mass shooting.

What I love about this poll is that it reveals that public opinion has not changed regarding support for doing something about the proliferation of guns in America. And when politicians and the public are in no mood for the increase in mass and every day shootings, things are going to change. The gun lobby may experience some stormy times and it would be past time for that to happen.

As my friend and writer, Sam Cook, wrote for the Duluth News Tribune, there is a hole in the sky left by the fallen trees.

But guns are not falling through that hole.

The public has shown over and over again over many years that they want our leaders to act to prevent at least some of the heinous shootings. More guns are clearly not making us safer.

I leave you with the latest mass shooting at another nightclub in Florida where teens were gathered for a pool party.  Two killed and 17 injured.

Teens should be able to attend a pool party without being shot and killed.  Guns make every situation more likely to end badly. They make for the perfect storm.

#Enough. We are better than this.

Terror- again- in America

commongunsense, , , , , , , , , , ,

assault rifleAn alleged act of domestic terror has taken the lives of what are reported to be 20 people with another 42 or so injured. One man with an assault rifle and a handgun was able to take hostages and inflict terror in a popular Orlando, Florida nightclub in just seconds.

CNN reports that for every person injured, 6 medical personnel are required to treat them. And now the nurses, physicians and others are also traumatized by this incident.

The country is traumatized collectively when we see news of shootings like this one.

In America, these things happen. We call these types of incidents terror. Early reports indicate that the shooter may have had a radical ideology or maybe even somehow ISIS related political leanings. We will learn more soon enough.

Meanwhile, there are many questions to be asked and answers will hopefully come. But one big question is where the guns came from? In America it is far too easy for just about anyone to access an assault rifle. Was this man a “law abiding” buyer? Was he on a terror watch list? Or was he just another angry person with guns ready to shoot people for whatever reason? It appears that he was a “lone wolf.”

Again.

These acts of terror take place all over the world. In Israel, 4 people were shot dead the other day. It was an act of terror. But in America they happen regularly and take the lives of innocent people. This could be an actual act of terror similar to the San Bernardino shooting. Or it could be “just” another mass shooting similar to Virginia Tech, Sandy Hook, Aurora or one of the many many acts of senseless gun violence and mass shootings that happen on a regular basis.

These shootings cause those of us who have been affected by gun violence to relive our own terror after learning the news of a loved one shot and killed or injured.

Just the other day a young woman singer who had competed on “The Voice” , Christina Grimmie, was gunned down by a lone gunman while Grimmie was signing autographs. He was armed with 2 guns and a knife. Who was he? Why? This bold act was one of many that happened on that day.

With a gun in hand, it’s easy to shoot someone you know or don’t know in an instant.

So the last big question is what are we going to do about the guns and the easy access to them in America? Common sense tells us that we must do something about our laws, our gun culture, hate, terror, anger or whatever turned out to the be the cause of this particular shooting.

But we can’t ignore the guns.

Remember that in America we not only do little to regulate the purchase of assault rifles, we encourage their sale and try to convince the public they are just “common sporting rifles”.

Profits.

And anyone can buy one without a background check at gun shows, flea markets, estate and garage sales, on line on Facebook or Armslist.com. 

Even known terrorists can buy guns in America and we can’t stop them.

Thank you corporate gun lobby.

What are we going to do?

We can’t shrug our shoulders and believe nothing is to be done. That would be negligence.

#Enough.

It’s a sad day in our country and also frightening, to say the least.

We are better than this.

 

UPDATE:

The Mayor of Orlando is reporting that 50 are dead in the horrific nightclub shooting with more likely to be added to the list of the dead. There are no words for this.

Guns and bullets odds and ends

commongunsense, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

odds and endsIt’s been another deadly few weeks in America and in my own state of Minnesota. Let’s review the carnage.

Two weeks ago a young man shot and killed his wife in front of their children and then killed himself in a domestic murder/suicide.

A few days ago another domestic murder/suicide took the lives of 2 more Minnesotans .

A mass shooting killed one and injured 6 in a Minneapolis neighborhood home to many of the awful shootings in Minnesota. From the article:

One person was dead and at least two others were in critical condition after seven people were shot Wednesday night in north Minneapolis, police said.

The carnage, which unfolded just before 9 p.m., added to the grim toll that a sharp escalation in shootings has taken on north Minneapolis this year.

30 shots fired. Are we at war? This may have been gang related. Please see my previous post for what is the truth about gang shootings. Lives lost are lives lost.

Further, until we start admitting that we have a gun problem, we won’t be able to prevent some of the guns from getting into the hands of gang members and other young people in affected communities so the shootings can stop. We have a lot of work to do.

Another shooting just a few days ago in a Minneapolis suburb ended with 2 injured.

The state Senate, however did take a common sense vote when the Public Safety  committee unanimously voted to ban pistols that look like cell phones. This kind of phone was developed by a Minnesotan who thought it would be a good idea. Whatever was he thinking? This idea was even too much for Republicans and gun rights supporters.

A gun carrying parent in South Carolina “accidentally” fired off his gun at his daughter’s swim class. Luckily for him, no one was injured.

“This man was sitting not 2 feet away, and his gun went off,” Kay said, recalling what her daughter told her. “She said he had a huge hole in his pocket.

“Everyone was upset. It could have been a terrible tragedy for many people.””

Sigh.

In Ohio, a man shot himself in the leg at a Chick-fil-A while pulling up his pants in the bathroom.

Oops. This is not the first time I have written about this kind of irresponsibility and stupidity.

A disgruntled and angry employee shot and killed someone at his former place of work in Texas, angry over being fired. Fired? Get a gun and kill your co-worker and yourself.  Only in America.

A Texas concealed carry permit holder decided to help out at a crime scene by trying to stop the first shooter with his own gun. The result? He was shot and killed. So much for defending oneself or someone else with a gun carried around in public.

In Texas again, a customer tried to stop a man who shot at an employee by getting out his own gun and shooting at the man. The result? He was shot in the head but will apparently survive.

A Facebook employee is helping private groups who buy and sell guns with each other get their groups back in spite of Facebook’s policy to remove the groups. Why not? Private sales of guns are such a good idea because the seller has no idea to whom he/she is selling a gun. Domestic abuser? No problem. Felon? No problem. Dangerously mentally ill? No problem.

An 11 year old Alabama boy decided to take matters into his own hands and shot and injured a burglar. He had no remorse and even mocked the burglar.

Sigh.

And then there are those kids shooting themselves and others. Several recent articles have been written about toddlers and guns. This one from the New York Times writes about one week in April. From the article:

Sha’Quille Kornegay, 2 years old, was buried in a pink coffin, her favorite doll by her side and a tiara strategically placed to hide the self-inflicted gunshot wound to her forehead.

She had been napping in bed with her father, Courtenay Block, late last month when she discovered the 9-millimeter handgun he often kept under his pillow in his Kansas City, Mo., home. It was equipped with a laser sight that lit up like the red lights on her cousins’ sneakers. Mr. Block told the police he woke to see Sha’Quille by his bed, bleeding and crying, the gun at her feet. A bullet had pierced her skull.

In a country with more than 30,000 annual gun deaths, the smallest fingers on the trigger belong to children like Sha’Quille.

During a single week in April, four toddlers — Holston, Kiyan, Za’veon and Sha’Quille — shot and killed themselves, and a mother driving through Milwaukee was killed after her 2-year-old apparently picked up a gun that had slid out from under the driver’s seat. It was a brutal stretch, even by the standards of researchers who track these shootings.

This is the American gun culture, like it or not. Most, of course, don’t like this but just are not willing to step up to work on solutions. What can we do about children getting their hands on guns? Not let them get their hands on guns. How can we do that?

  • Safely store guns away from small and curious hands.
  • Consider the risks of having guns in homes where children are present.
  • ASK if there are unsecured guns in the homes where children and teens play and hang out.
  • Pass laws to hold gun owners responsible when they are careless enough to leave guns around for small hands to access. The fact that we have not done this is shameful and negligent. Laws matter and will change behavior.

Not surprisingly the corporate gun lobby is opposed to laws that could prevent some of these brutal and tragic shootings of and by toddlers. It’s really beyond imagination to understand this kind of resistance to life saving legislation. But never mind…. rights.

From the article above:

Gun control advocates say these deaths illustrate lethal gaps in gun safety laws. Some states require locked storage of guns or trigger locks to be sold with handguns. Others leave safety decisions largely to gun owners.

Twenty-seven states have laws that hold adults responsible for letting children have unsupervised access to guns, according to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, though experts say such measures have, at best, a small effect on reducing gun deaths. Massachusetts is the only state that requires gun owners to store their guns in a locked place, though it has not stopped youngsters there from accidentally killing themselves or other children.

Gun rights groups have long opposed these kinds of laws. They argue that trigger locks can fail, that mandatory storage can put a gun out of reach in an emergency, and that such measures infringe on Second Amendment rights.

“It’s clearly a tragedy, but it’s not something that’s widespread,” said Larry Pratt, a spokesman and former executive director of Gun Owners of America. “To base public policy on occasional mishaps would be a grave mistake.”

“Occasional mishaps”? Seriously Larry Pratt?

Sigh.

Where is common sense?

These are our nation’s children we are talking about here. Anything we can do to stop senseless and avoidable deaths of children should be done. Hiding behind the second amendment and rights is just not cutting it any more. When even one child dies choking on a small toy part, we ban the toy and recall it. This is just plain nonsense and the public knows it. Too bad our legislators and Congress members don’t stand up in boldness and have the courage to challenge the gun culture that has left us with the carnage described above.

And speaking of protecting our children and youth, what about the ban on selling e-cigarettes to anyone under 18? Good news. Also, a warning label must accompany the product. If only guns were treated like all other dangerous public health and safety products, we could be on our way to saving lives.From the above article:

Federal health officials billed the new rules as critical to taming a “Wild West” atmosphere involving a multi-billion-dollar industry whose products have surged in popularity in recent years, especially among young people. They say there is little control over — or even basic information about — the manufacturing, distribution and marketing of the products, and that action is needed to protect young people from nicotine addictions and to inform adults about what exactly they are inhaling.

Hmmm. Insert guns for cigarettes and we would be on our way to doing something very good for our teens.

It is not odd for shootings like the ones above to happen every single day in America and my own state of Minnesota. It should be but it’s not. And when guns are in combination with anger and/or depression or a need for revenge, the ends can justify the means.

It’s time for this to stop and we can do something about this if we have the will and put our heads together to do the right thing. This is about saving lives. Period.

Let’s get to work. #Enough.

Snowplows, guns and other gun nonsense

commongunsense, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

snow_ploughIt’s been another interesting week in the world of guns and gun violence, as always. Several days ago I wrote about a New Jersey woman who asked some friends to shoot a neighbor who temporarily borrowed a shovel to help another neighbor. I wrote about it because you can’t make this stuff up. It’s happening in communities all over our country and soon to come to your own community if it has not already.

Apparently snow and cold are causing some gun owners to leave all common sense behind in their anger or while under the influence of alcohol. Neither of these goes together well with holding a loaded gun.

Take this one for example when a Massachusetts when a man driving while drunk and loaded, fired off shots at a snowplow that annoyed him:

A Massachusetts man apparently got frustrated while driving behind a snow plow and opened fire.

Bruce O’Brien was arrested after firing his gun three times while driving in Plymouth during a snowstorm about 7 p.m. Saturday, reported The Manomet Current.

Police said the 60-year-old O’Brien was driving drunk when he fired the shots.

None of the shots hit any cars or homes, and police aren’t sure whether the Whitman man was shooting at the snow plow.

I get the frustration of driving behind a snowplow since I live in Northern Minnesota. But I also get the “rules of engagement” when following a snowplow on a street or freeway. And one of them is not to get out a gun and start shooting bullets.

I think I posted about the good samaritan in North Carolina who was shot and killed by a drunk and loaded guy in the recent east coast snowstorm:

The Catawba County Sheriff’s Office says a 27-year-old Good Samaritan was shot and killed yesterday by a man he stopped to help.

The victim has been identified as 27-year-old Jefferson Heavner of Newton.

Investigators say the suspect, Marvin Jacob Lee, has been charged with first-degree murder and will appear in a Catawba County court on Monday. The sheriff’s office says Lee was drunk when he ran his vehicle off the side of Mathis Church Road during the snowstorm on Friday afternoon.

A group of people stopped to help Lee, including Heavner.

Investigators say that when Lee became aware that Heavner was going to call police for help, Lee got out of his vehicle and fired his gun, killing Heavner. Lee then got back in his vehicle and a standoff ensued until a SWAT team finally got Lee out of the truck and arrested him.

Making any more comments about these senseless shootings seems senseless. It’s what we’ve come to in America. When more people are armed, more people will be shot and more stupid and dangerous incidents will happen with guns. It’s just the way it is but it doesn’t have to be this way.

Steps are being taken to make us safer from people who shouldn’t have guns. President Obama has changed the conversation with his Executive Orders announced several weeks ago.  I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Facebook has announced that it will not allow guns to be sold peer to peer on its’ platform. Why? Most, if not all of these guns, go without Brady background checks. That’s simply a bad idea. The President’s new executive orders will beef up monitoring of on-line gun sales. A Kentucky teen purchased a gun through a Facebook gun sale meeting place was someone who could not legally purchase a gun from a licensed dealer. 

In 2014, several gun safety reform groups worked to get Facebook to change its’ policy regarding sales of guns. At that time some changes were made but they did not go far enough because private gun sales were still allowed with no background checks. But as of this past week, that has changed.

But never mind, the gun rights extremists are trying to claim this is against their second amendment rights. These guys are just plain confused and wrong. But the corporate gun lobby has convinced them that anything that makes common sense concerning gun policy and gun laws is violating their “God given” rights.  A simple explanation was offered for why they are wrong in this article written by a lawyer:

Predictably, after the announcement, the “Obummer is coming for my guns”/”Molon Labe”/”Come and Take it” crowd immediately started throwing a hissy fit about their 2nd Amendment rights (if you need proof, head over to any right wing Facebook page and you’ll find hundreds, if not thousands of comments regarding Facebook “violating people’s 2nd Amendment rights”). The problem however, is that these statement are entirely incorrect, because the 2nd Amendment doesn’t apply in this situation. So clearly, these people either skipped the day in civics class where they were taught about  the state action doctrine and therefore clearly (and laughably) don’t seem to realize the Bill of Rights doesn’t apply, or worse they simply just don’t seem to care that their understanding of the Constitution is flawed at best, and flat out incorrect at worst. Maybe it’s time for a remedial lesson?

Now, we seriously should not have to go over this concept every damn time something along these lines occurs, but unfortunately, here we go again. The reason the 2nd Amendment does not apply in this situation, is because Facebook is a private company; Facebook is not the government. Therefore, if Facebook decides to ban private gun sales on its social media platform, Facebook has every right to do so; and not only is Facebook not violating anyone’s 2nd Amendment rights, the 2nd Amendment isn’t implicated.

Stand down everyone. Obama is not coming for your guns and neither is the government. Facebook has sensibly decided on a policy that they have a right to decide given that they are a private company. I thought these were the guys who love individual liberty, less government and private industry. Go figure.

In other good news, the Brady Campaign has been working to repeal the PLCAA law that has allowed the gun industry protection from law suits that no other industry enjoys. There was a victory this week when repeal legislation was introduced in the U.S. Senate and several Brady activists walked into Sen. Bernie Sanders’ office to talk to staff about the repeal bill. Several hours after these folks visited with Sanders’ staff, the Brady Campaign got a call saying that Sen. Sanders would sign on to the legislation to repeal the law he voted in favor of in 2005. From the article:

According to a release from the Brady Campaign, Sanders will co-sponsor the repeal of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which protects gun manufacturers in lawsuits involving shootings. Sanders had voted in favor of the protections while in the Senate and has up to this point resisted reversing course on the issue.

The Brady Campaign says that Sanders decided to support the legislation “hours after meeting with Brady activists,” and that his staff also met with victims of gun violence.

For Sanders, it’s all an effort to undo the damage of a 2005 vote for a bill that protected gun manufacturers from lawsuits when their firearms are used in crimes. Then-New York Sen. Hillary Clinton opposed that bill, and has repeatedly pointed to Sanders’ vote as evidence he was aligned with the National Rifle Association.

This is what change and activism looks like. This is what happens when the majority of Americans are fed up with being snowed by the corporate gun lobby blizzard of #badideas and leaves us and victims and survivors out in the cold. This time around, the discussion about the causes and effects of gun violence is heating up in the Presidential election.

Change is in the air. We can shed the light of day on the politicians who have bowed down to the corporate gun lobby for fear of their mythical power. Gun rights extremists are a minority of Americans and even gun owners who have held sway for far too long. We have had #Enough. Let’s get to work.

Reactions to new gun executive orders

commongunsense, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

??????As could have been predicted, the reaction to the President’s announced executive orders have been fierce and wrong. The gun lobby and run rights extremists as well as certain politicians believe that these executive orders are meant for them personally apparently. For the reaction just doesn’t fit with what is actually in those orders. The fear in the statements from those who disagree is unfounded but it’s hard to convince them otherwise. This is going to be a tough job.

Christopher Ingraham of the Washington Post wrote this article about why the executive orders should be embraced by the gun rights enthusiasts.  He lists several, including the issue of mental health and guns, enforcing existing gun laws and supporting the second amendment. All 3 of these are what the corporate gun lobby and their supporters in Congress have been talking about for many years when they oppose any new common sense measures to reduce gun violence. From the article:

On Tuesday, the Obama administration announced a set of new gun rules that might amount to a big political statement but, technically, represent a clarification of already-existing laws. The biggest change — a provision that would require more gun sellers to be licensed as firearms dealers — does not qualify as new regulation, and hence is not dependent on either public comment or congressional review. The provisions are so modest that initially even the NRA initially shrugged off the changes by saying “they’re not really doing anything.”

Still, champions of gun rights in Congress and elsewhere wasted no time in lambasting the president and his proposal — even though it appears that many of the provisions are pretty much in line with what gun rights advocates have long demanded.

So what is this about then? Opposition to anything President Obama wants to do. That’s obvious. The fear mongering and paranoia about gun confiscation and government overreach has been screamed at us now by Wayne LaPierre and others as if it is true. And the worst of this is that too many people believe it. Captain Mark Kelly, husband to Gabby Giffords, had a really good question at the town hall meeting:

Mark Kelly, the astronaut and husband of former Arizona congresswoman and shooting victim Gabrielle Giffords, told Obama the two gun control advocates have encountered fears that expanding background checks “will lead to a (gun) registry, which will lead to confiscation, which will lead to a tyrannical government.”

“With 350 million guns in 65 million places, households … if the federal government wanted to confiscate those objects, how would they do that?” Kelly asked.

Cooper jumped in, asking: “Is fair to call it a conspiracy? I mean, a lot of people really believe this, deep down — that they just don’t trust you.”

“I’m sorry, but yes, it is fair to call it a conspiracy,” Obama said. “What are you saying? Are you suggesting that the notion that we are creating a plot to take everybody’s guns away so that we can enforce marshal law is a conspiracy? Yes, that is a conspiracy. I would hope you would agree with that. Is that controversial?”

He said if he truly desired to strip away Second Amendment rights, he’d have started much earlier in his presidency.

“Look, I mean, I’m only going to be here for another year. I don’t know — when would I have started on this enterprise, right?” Obama said.

It turns out that President Obama has made no attempt to confiscate the (about) 350 million guns in circulation in the U.S. And it also turns out that most gun owners agree with President Obama. Apparently they don’t subscribe to the conspiracy theory that any new gun regulation will automatically lead to their guns and rights being unceremoniously stripped from them. Most people already understand that that is going to be an impossible thing to do and just won’t happen.

I was on the Facebook page of a Minneapolis area TV station during the CNN town hall meeting on Thursday night making comments along with many gun rights advocates. The arguments were indicative of the above and based on hyperbole and often not fact based. There was some agreement here and there about the sentencing for gun crimes.

But I want to talk about one item in the Presidential executive orders that Christopher Ingraham did not address in the above linked article- on-line gun sales. For the last several years, I and others have argued that there are opportunities to obtain guns through on line sales with no background checks. The gun lobby argues that this is not possible. Their argument is that all on line sales must go through a federally licensed dealer. This is not true. Internet groups have made it possible for gun sellers to advertise their guns for sale on sites like Armslist.com.

I found something new and interesting on the Armslist site today while looking it up for this post.  It has been changed and one can no longer click on private sellers to see how many there are. Also many of even the private sellers are advertising that the gun needs to go to a licensed dealer or ( in my state of Minnesota) a Minnesota permit to purchase or conceal carry permit is required by the seller. Perhaps all of the attention paid to private on-line sales is already affecting this market place. And if so, this is good news for everyone.

Back to the site, though, buyers can go to this site and find a seller of a gun they want, connect with the seller and make arrangements to exchange money for a gun(s). Some of these sellers advertise that they are private sellers and actually have advertised that no background checks are required. I did not see this while looking this morning. I did notice that in other states with generally looser gun laws, like Florida, there were more “unregistered” or private sellers listed.

Armslist is where the shooter at the Wisconsin spa that killed 3, not including the shooter, got his gun through a private seller with no background check.  He was a prohibited purchaser because of his domestic abuse.

Mike the Gun Guy addressed on-line sales in a recent blog post. From his post:

The reason that I would check the listings in these other states is that if I drive to one of those states and buy a gun from a private seller, I give him the money, he gives me the gun, I drive back home and that’s the end of that. And that’s the end of that because those states do not regulate private gun transfers which, in the case of long guns, happens to be true in more than 40 states. Will the seller of an out-of-state gun ask me to prove that I am also a resident of his state?  He might, but then again he might not.  Remember, if he lives in a state that doesn’t regulate private sales, he’s not breaking any law by selling me that gun.  And since he’s not a licensed dealer, he is under no requirement to ascertain whether I am legally able to own that gun, or even keep a record of the sale.  I’m breaking the law because I can’t bring an unliensed gun back to my home state.  But I didn’t want to submit to a background check anyway, remember?

The situation gets a little trickier with handguns because such transfers tend to be more strictly regulated in many states and folks who sell handguns are generally aware that handguns have a funny way of winding up in the ‘wrong hands.’ So if I want to buy a handgun without submitting to a background check, I probably will stay within my own state, assuming that my state doesn’t regulate private handgun sales.  Which is the real impact of the internet as regards the flow of private guns, because I can drive from one end of my state to the other within 3 hours, but could I know of the desire of some seller in another town within my state to get rid of a gun without going online?  Of course not.

When the internet first started up, you could find gun listings on Craiglist, other online classifieds including eBay, and you could pay for guns if you had a Paypal account. Those sites quickly banned guns because they decided the liability far outweighed the returns.  But I can’t imagine that websites like Armslist or GunsAmerica would voluntarily ban private sales, since that’s their reason for being in business in the first place.  As long as the internet operates as a giant flea market and guns are legal commerce, guns are going to be sold online, it’s as simple as that.

So yes, there is reason to regulate this on-line market place that sells guns to potential prohibited individuals. Does anyone want them to have guns?

Facebook was involved in a bit of a tussle with gun safety reform advocates a few years ago about the site allowing the sales of guns. They made some minor changes to their position but did not outright ban the sale of guns as did Craigslist. ( I am editing this post to include this article that reveals that Craigslist did ban gun sales on its’ site but apparently people are still advertising guns and ammunition for sale. This is an insidious problem.

So here is just one example of an Arizona teen who got a gun through a Facebook group. He brought that gun to a school.

Facebook gun sales largely remain unregulated:

It’s hard to tell if these moves slowed down gun sales on Facebook generally or made a dent in unregulated or illegal deals in particular. The platform still hosts scores of members-only groups that exist solely to facilitate private sales, many with thousands of followers. While some of the groups operate instates with universal background check laws, 32 states don’t mandate such checks for private transfers. So even though members of those groups can’t boast that they won’t conduct checks, they’re under no obligation to actually make sure in-state gun transfers they’ve arranged on Facebook are legal. Facebook did not respond to a request for comment.

Facebook’s approach is similar to those taken by other popular social networking sites, such as Reddit. The self-proclaimed “front page of the internet” bans discussion of baldly illegal activity, but even after outside pressure it remains a pretty easy place to arrange a gun transfer free from background checks. One entire subreddit is dedicated to gun sales. It asks first time visitors if they’re over 18, but there’s no way to verify if a user is answering truthfully. Many sellers on the subreddit offer to meet “FtF,” or face-to-face, where they can make the exchange without running the background check that a licensed dealer would require.

Some newspapers allow sales of guns from private sellers who most likely will not require a background check from a buyer. My own local newspaper changed their policy some years ago with some pressure from our local Brady Campaign chapter as did other media outlets. But then the ownership of the paper changed hands and the sales are again allowed. How does a seller know to whom he/she is selling that gun(s)? There were no firearms for sale in my local newspaper today. Maybe this is a sign that things are changing for the good.

Public opinion is coalescing around President Obama’s executive orders and even further measures to make sure we are safe from people who should not have guns. National columnist and conservative Kathleen Parker wrote this opinion piece today:

This may well be true, but couldn’t we stand to tweak them a bit? Or, perhaps, enforce them? And, isn’t it possible to reduce the number of guns in the wrong hands without surrendering our Second Amendment rights or invoking the slippery slope of government confiscation?

Of course it is — and we can.

Obama made an artful and poignant counterargument to the usual objections Tuesday during a news conference from the White House. He reminded those gathered, including many who have lost family members to gun violence, that other people also have rights — the right to free assembly or the right to practice their religion without being shot.

In fairness to the gun lobby, which may not deserve such charity, one can understand reservations about limiting access to guns. What is less easily understood is the refusal of Republicans to take the reins of any given issue and do something constructive rather than invariably waiting to be forced into the ignoble position of “no.”

It is one thing to be in the pocket of the National Rifle Association. It is another to do nothing and then assume a superior posture of purposeful neglect, as though do-nothingness were a policy and smug intransigence a philosophy. (…) Obama’s actions won’t go unchallenged, needless to say. And much political hay will be threshed, bundled and sold to Republican primary voters in the meantime. But GOP voters should be as skeptical of those ringing the gong of doom as they have been of Obama. In a civilized society, more guns can’t be better than fewer.

Parker does reflect the truth of the matter. There are much in these executive orders to actually strengthen the second amendment and rights of law abiding gun owners as well as the right of the rest of us ( and even reasonable gun owners who agree) to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”.

Reasonable discussions can occur with reasonable people. At this point in time, during a Presidential election, I guess we can’t expect that to happen from the Republican candidates or members of Congress who are beholden to the corporate gun lobby. And more’s the pity. Lives will be lost in the daily carnage that results in 89 dead Americans a day. Children will get their hands on guns and shoot themselves or others. Domestic abusers, some who are prohibited purchasers, others not, will continue to shoot their spouses, girlfriends and/or partners. Gangs will continue to get guns through an illegal market that we can do something about if we put our mind to it. And young (mostly) men, teens and older (mostly) white men will continue to shoot themselves at alarming rates. Serving and ex military members will shoot themselves on almost a daily basis. And “accidental” gun discharges will continue to occur amongst those who are not responsible with their guns.

To say the President’s orders would no nothing to stop any of this is the height of hypocrisy. The gun lobby speaks out of both sides of its’ collective mouth. Which is it? That Obama is coming for your guns or that these measures will do nothing..

We are better than this. Let’s get to work.

“Good guy with a gun” myth

commongunsense, , , , , , , , , , , , , 10 Comments

frog_heartIt’s a myth propagated by the corporate gun lobby mostly in the figure of Wayne LaPierre of the NRA that a “good guy with a gun” can stop a “bad guy with a gun”. This presupposes that the only folks with guns who mean evil intent are the “bad guys”. Let’s look at this mythical thinking in the first linked article above:

That argument was put to the test last weekend in Las Vegas, Nevada, when two “bad guys” with guns, Jerad Miller and his wife, Amanda, shot and killed two police officers. To be clear, the Milers were, in the eyes of the NRA, “good guys” until that exact moment when they used those guns to do “bad” things.

After the cold-blooded shooting, the Millers headed to a Wallmart for a final confrontation with police. Inside, there was a good guy — Joseph Wilcox, a 31-year old Las Vegas resident with a concealed carry permit and a gun in hand. Rather than running away, he took out his weapon and approached Jerad Miller from behind. It was a heroic and selfless act and one for which Wilcox deserves nothing but praise.

But it was an act that cost Wilcox his life.

Unbeknownst to him, there was more than one shooter, and when Wilcox approached Jerad Miller, he was shot in the back and killed by Amanda Miller.

While the NRA claims that a more armed population can prevent these types of mass killings, we know this is not true — and a tragic death like Wilcox’s is a far more likely outcome.

How does the gun lobby respond to this recent shooting in a Grand Forks, North Dakota Walmart store? From the article:

The gunman in Tuesday’s shooting had two passengers in the car when he pulled up to the Wal-Mart in south Grand Forks, Grand Forks Police Department spokesman said Wednesday.

Police Lt. Derik Zimmel said the two people stayed in the car while Marcell Travon Willis, 21, entered the Wal-Mart around 1 a.m. Within seconds, Willis allegedly shot two Wal-Mart employees, including 70-year-old Gregory Weiland, who died as a result.

Lisa Braun, 47, was injured from a gunshot wound. She was still in “satisfactory condition” as of 8:15 a.m. Wednesday, according to an Altru Health System news release.

Willis then shot at a third, unidentified Wal-Mart employee and missed before turning the gun on himself and ending his own life.

The shooter was stationed at the nearby Grand Forks Air Force Base:

Sean Willis of Nashville, Tennessee, said only that his son had been in the military for about three years and was originally from Springfield, Tennessee.

Sgt. David Dobrydney, a base spokesman, said he couldn’t yet release any information about Willis due to Air Force regulations.

So far we don’t know why the shooter did this and then took his own life with the gun. Most likely we will learn more in the coming investigation. But I think it’s safe to say that the shooter was a “law abiding” gun owner and therefore one of those “good guys” with a gun that the gun lobby is talking about.

Mr. LaPierre?

The words uttered by Mr. LaPierre dropped like a thud on the American public. The inane response to a terrible national tragic shooting just seemed to puny and ridiculous and just plain incredulous. But this must be what the corporate gun lobby and its’ minions actually believe. They are wrong but they continue believing in myths. The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence took on this myth in an article about a poster boy for the “good guy” with a gun myth. They write about a case of an Alabama “good guy” with a gun who shot another in a presumed robbery but got away with the shooting. From the article:

Who Will Protect Us from the “Good Guys”?
Folks like Wayne LaPierre and Cam Edwards and “More Guns, Less Crime” Author John Lott might think our country is better off when criminals under indictment for rape are allowed to own guns and carry them in public.  Rational Americans might disagree, and ask, “If these are your ‘good guys,’ who are your ‘bad guys’?”  Perhaps then-NRA President Karl T. Frederick had this quandary in mind when he told Congress in 1934, “I do not believe in the general promiscuous toting of guns.  I think it should be sharply restricted and only under licenses.”

It also begs the question of how many other NRA “Armed Citizens” have criminal records and histories of violence, a topic which Media Matters recently explored.  As Timothy Johnson of Media Matters pointed out, the NRA’s glorification of individuals like Marlo Ellis “demonstrates how the show must scrape the bottom of the barrel to find actual cases of self-defense with a gun for its audience.”

The thing is, when all of those “good guys” with guns are walking around in public with their guns as they now are everywhere, how do we know what will happen? How will we know when one of them snaps or is suicidal and takes the lives of innocent people? How can we tell these “good guys” from the “bad guys”? And when we allow people with no permits or training to now carry guns as we have done in several states, we will open up our communities to more of these kind of shootings. It is inevitable.

And why wouldn’t the “bad guys”- and by that term I assume the gun lobby means criminals and domestic abusers and others who are otherwise prohibited from owning and carrying guns- also then carry their illegally or, actually, legally purchased guns in public? And what I mean by legally purchased is the policy of allowing private sellers to sell guns at gun shows, through Internet sites ( Armslist.com) on Facebook, in daily newspapers and/or flea markets and other venues. It’s legal because we have not passed laws to require those gun sales by private sellers to undergo background checks.

Which brings me to my point. We have no idea if someone obtained their gun with a background check or not. And in states that don’t require background checks before granting carry licenses, we surely can’t guarantee that the person with the gun is law abiding. Without background checks on all gun sales, the person carrying with a license that doesn’t require a background check and a gun purchased without a background check could be the next Jared Loughner or the next Radcliffe Haughton.

The public has common sense when it comes to background checks. 92% of Americans (and including gun owners) believe all gun sales should come with a background check. Of course. Why in the world did anyone believe it was a good idea in the first place to not require background checks for all gun sales? It slipped through the cracks of the Brady Law when it passed in 1993 in part because then there were only occasional private sellers. Now is different. Private sellers often have exhibits of guns similar to those being sold down the aisle by licensed dealers where background checks are required. And a whole new market has opened up on the internet at places like Armslist.com, even on Facebook and in ads in local newspapers for just a few. Yesterday there were 3 guns for sale by private sellers in my home town newspaper. How about yours? I assume they will be sold with no background check. In my state of Minnesota today there are multiple listings of guns for sale by private sellers- presumably with no background check. In fact, this website called gunlistings.com makes it very easy to find gun ads in papers all over the country. Interestingly enough, there is advice for the buyer and the seller here:

For ensured safety when buying or selling your guns you should meet at a FFL dealer and conduct the transaction through the gun dealer. (transfer fees vary by dealer)

It is up to the buyer and seller to determine if transfering the gun through an FFL is required by law.
If you choose to conduct a transaction privately always meet in a public place!

Always consult federal, state, and local laws before conducting firearms transactions.

At least that advice was given. We have no idea if it’s taken. And we can see how easy it is to find guns for sale from private sellers.

Consider the reason we need a national law. Some states require background checks on all or most gun sales and some don’t. Naturally those who don’t want to go through a background check know where to go to get their guns. And when they are allowed to buy as many as they want, it doesn’t take too much imagination to understand what happens with those guns.

We need to finish the job started in 1993 and require all gun sales to go through Brady background checks. The Brady Campaign’s Finish The Job campaign asks you to sign a petition to send to Congress to pass the background check law they refused to pass after the horrific Sandy Hook school shooting. If we don’t pass this law, we are not doing our job to protect our communities from devastating gun violence. We also know that even this will not stop all shootings or all “bad guys” from getting guns. There are straw purchases, stolen guns, bad apple gun dealers and lots of trafficking. But it is one way to make us safer. Saving lives is what this is all about and if we can save lives, why wouldn’t we? And the bigger question is why the corporate gun lobby is so opposed to keeping guns out of the hands of the “bad guys” instead of a laser focus on arming who they believe to be the “good guys”.

It’s time for a change of conversation and a change to our gun las. We need action and we need those who support background checks to speak out and bring others with them. Lives depend on it. We are better than this as a country.