Latest Topics

[Neo]

This is a prime example as to why we don't trust the government. We're constantly being called "paranoid" and the like. With bills like this being proposed, then we're not so paranoid after all.....



Misstep in gun bill could defeat the effort

One of the major gun-control efforts in Olympia this session calls for the sheriff to inspect the homes of assault-weapon owners. The bill’s backers say that was a mistake.


By Danny Westneat
Seattle Times staff columnist


Forget police drones flying over your house. How about police coming inside, once a year, to have a look around?
As Orwellian as that sounds, it isn’t hypothetical. The notion of police home inspections was introduced in a bill last week in Olympia.
That it’s part of one of the major gun-control efforts pains me. It seemed in recent weeks lawmakers might be headed toward some common-sense regulationof gun sales. But then last week they went too far. By mistake, they claim. But still too far.

“They always say, we’ll never go house to house to take your guns away. But then you see this, and you have to wonder.”
That’s no gun-rights absolutist talking, but Lance Palmer, a Seattle trial lawyer and self-described liberal who brought the troubling Senate Bill 5737 to my attention. It’s the long-awaited assault-weapons ban, introduced last week by three Seattle Democrats.
Responding to the Newtown school massacre, the bill would ban the sale of semi-automatic weapons that use detachable ammunition magazines. Clips that contain more than 10 rounds would be illegal.

But then, with respect to the thousands of weapons like that already owned by Washington residents, the bill says this:

“In order to continue to possess an assault weapon that was legally possessed on the effective date of this section, the person possessing shall ... safely and securely store the assault weapon. The sheriff of the county may, no more than once per year, conduct an inspection to ensure compliance with this subsection.”

In other words, come into homes without a warrant to poke around. Failure to comply could get you up to a year in jail.
“I’m a liberal Democrat — I’ve voted for only one Republican in my life,” Palmer told me. “But now I understand why my right-wing opponents worry about having to fight a government takeover.”

He added: “It’s exactly this sort of thing that drives people into the arms of the NRA.”

I have been blasting the NRAfor its paranoia in the gun-control debate. But Palmer is right — you can’t fully blame them, when cops going door-to-door shows up in legislation.

I spoke to two of the sponsors. One, Sen. Adam Kline, D-Seattle, a lawyer who typically is hyper-attuned to civil-liberties issues, said he did not know the bill authorized police searches because he had not read it closely before signing on.
“I made a mistake,” Kline said. “I frankly should have vetted this more closely.”

That lawmakers sponsor bills they haven’t read is common. Still, it’s disappointing on one of this political magnitude. Not counting a long table, it’s only an eight-page bill.

The prime sponsor, Sen. Ed Murray, D-Seattle, also condemned the search provision in his own bill, after I asked him about it. He said Palmer is right that it’s probably unconstitutional. “I have to admit that shouldn’t be in there,” Murray said.

He said he came to realize that an assault-weapons ban has little chance of passing this year anyway. So he put in this bill more as “a general statement, as a guiding light of where we need to go.” Without sweating all the details.

Later, a Senate Democratic spokesman blamed unnamed staff and said a new bill will be introduced.
Murray had alluded at a gun-control rally in Januarythat progress on guns could take years.

“We will only win if we reach out and continue to change the hearts and minds of Washingtonians,” Murray said. “We can attack them, or start a dialogue.”

Good plan, very bad start. What’s worse, the case for the perfectly reasonable gun-control bills in Olympia just got tougher.
Danny Westneat’s column appears Wednesday and Sunday. Reach him at 206-464-2086 or dwestneat@seattletimes.com

http://seattletimes....gbndv1.facebook

[Neo]

Confiscation......  Missouri


Missouri Dems Introduce Alarming Gun Confiscation Bill Giving Law-Abiding Gun Owners 90 Days to Turn in Certain Firearms or Become Felons


Jason Howerton


Democrats in Missouri introduced startling anti-gun legislation that would require gun owners to hand over their legally purchased so-called “assault weapons”  to “the appropriate law enforcement agency for destruction” within 90 days.
Under the proposed bill, “Any person who, prior to the effective date of this law, was legally in possession of an assault weapon or large capacity magazine shall have ninety days from such effective date to do any of the following without being subject to prosecution.”
Here are some additional provisions found in the gun control bill:

(1) Remove the assault weapon or large capacity magazine from the state of Missouri;
(2) Render the assault weapon permanently inoperable; or
(3) Surrender the assault weapon or large capacity magazine to the appropriate law enforcement agency for destruction, subject to specific agency regulations.
[..]
5. Unlawful manufacture, import, possession, purchase, sale, or transfer of an assault weapon or a large capacity magazine is a class C felony.

So essentially the law would turn a law-abiding gun owner today, into a felon tomorrow.
State Reps. Rory Ellinger (D-86) and Jill Schupp (D-88) reportedly introduced the anti-gun legislation, House Bill 545, this week.
Gun confiscation is being talked about more and more by lawmakers as a means to get so-called “assault weapons,” which are really semi-automatic rifles, off the streets. Democrats in California last week also proposed legislation that called for the potential confiscation of the state’s 166,000 legally purchased semi-automatic rifles.
California Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) defended the massive gun control package, saying “we can save lives.”


http://www.theblaze....-become-felons/

[Neo]

Confiscation..... Minnesota


Minnesota Democrats pushing gun confiscation bill similar to Missouri's



By: Joe Newby


Democrats in Minnesota are pushing a gun confiscation proposal that looks eerily similar to one recently proposed by Democrats in Missouri, Jim Hoft reported at the Gateway Pundit on Thursday.
The measure uses language that is almost identical to the Missouri proposal, including a requirement that law-abiding gun owners relinquish their so-called "assault" weapons before Sept.1, 2013.
According to the bill, anyone who, on February 1, 2013, legally owns or is in possession of an assault weapon has until September 1, 2013, to do any of the following without being subject to prosecution under Minnesota Statutes, section 624.7133:

• remove the weapon from the state;
  
• surrender the weapon to a law enforcement agency for destruction;
  
• render the weapon permanently inoperable; or
  
• if eligible, register the weapon as provided in Minnesota Statutes, section 624.7133, subdivision 5.

The rule would also apply to anyone who receives the weapon as an inheritance.
Anyone who owns a gun classified as an "assault weapon" prior to the Feb. 1, 2013 cutoff may keep the weapon provided that the owner registers it, submits to a background check, keeps the weapon locked up and submits to an inspection by authorities. Owners of such weapons would be required to renew the registration annually.
On Friday, Bob Owens wrote at PJ Media that Democrats walked out of a hearing when two firearms experts appeared to explain that the proposal "would outlaw only a gun’s cosmetic features while not affecting the functionality of the firearms in any measurable way in terms of rate of fire and accuracy."
"It certainly does appear that elected officials left the room to avoid expert testimony that would have better educated them about the issues they intended to legislate on," Owens added.

http://www.examiner....r-to-missouri-s

[nova]

Its not paranoia when it's happening.

[smokeyone]

I was under the impression we had already established reasonable gun control in this country. Was that what the NFA act of 1934 was? or the less reasonable act of 1968? or the big brother brady bill of 1993? Or the state level controls set by every state in the land? Un freaking real.  How about we just go back to the 2nd amendment and just enforce the criminal code? If I dont use a firearm to commit a non fire arm only crime you leave my guns alone and trust my judgement on what I think I need? If people are crazy or evil lock them up. Crazy to mental hospitals evil to jail. Regulate both of them.

[smokeyone]

I have never understood why people with no exposure to fireamrs, good or bad, feel the need to ban and confiscate them. I also dont understand why these same people want only the police to have them while at the same time shouting that its common knowledge the police are all racist corrupt terrorist organizations. How can you reconcile these two very opposing ideas? Please help me think this through in such a way it makes sense. No one but the police should have guns and the police are a corrupt racist terroist organization. How can that make sense to a thinking person?