May 21, 2013
DK:
My bill will " ... minimize the damage" the magazines can cause. ... the legislation a "perfect blend" of gun rights and public safety. When a gunman uses a high-capacity magazine, "you have real-life, dead bodies," Thank you to all my colleagues who voted to pass it out of Executive Committee.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-illinois-legislature-0521-20130521,0,5605012.story
— Grieving parents of children killed at a Connecticut elementary school gave haunting testimony about their lost sons Monday as they tried to persuade the Illinois Senate to approve a ban on the sale of high-capacity gun magazines in Illinois.www.chicagotribune.com
ME: I strongly disagree!
“ " ... minimize the damage" the
magazines can cause”? Magazines and firearms don’t cause damage. People
do. Sometimes they use firearms – just like the myriad of other ‘tools’ they
can and do use. I hate resorting to this because it rarely advances the debate,
but the comparison is sound – how will we deal with pressure cookers? Ban them
outright or limit them in capacity (volume) so when they’re used to make bombs
they won’t be as large? Pressure cookers aren’t designed to kill people?
Neither are magazines. Magazines are designed to feed ammunition into firearms.
Firearms are designed to shoot targets. A person determines if that target is a
person, an animal, an object or a piece of paper.
“ "perfect blend" of gun rights and
public safety”? The opposite, actually. This is an assault on 2nd
Amendment “gun” rights and is harmful to public safety.
Murder is already a crime and it’s done anyway – with
firearms and other tools. Conspiring to murder is a crime and mass murderers
plan and prepare their activities for months – sometimes singly but sometimes
in groups, as with Columbine and the Boston Marathon Bombing.
Our US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) has ruled the 2nd
Amendment extends to individuals and includes an individual’s right to defend
himself. By further extension that includes family, property and others. It’s
also been ruled that law enforcement does not have the responsibility to protect
citizens. They cannot be everywhere they are needed and cannot be held liable
for not being there in time to protect or save anyone nor can they be held
liable for not risking their own lives in defense of others’. That leaves a
person’s self-defense as their personal responsibility. Some people accept this
responsibility for themselves, their families, their communities and their
property through firearms ownership and carrying of firearms. Others hope for
the best and put blind faith in organizations that, again, cannot be everywhere
they’re needed and are not responsible for protecting them. “Protect and Serve”
is window dressing and an idealistic view that does not exist in reality. More
than 500 people killed by people (using firearms) in Chicago alone were not
“protected” in 2012.
The average number of rounds fired in a crime is 4,
therefore a 10-round magazine capacity limit will have no effect on normal,
violent crime where guns are used.
Magazine capacity limits will not affect mass murder because
somewhere between 10s and 100s of millions of them are already in circulation
and cannot be tracked. You cannot prevent purchasing magazines exceeding
10-rounds of capacity from other jurisdictions. You cannot prevent their
manufacture in basements or garages with basic metalworking skills – their
designs are simple. You cannot prevent “printing” them with 3D printers. These
magazines have already been “printed” and demonstrated as being functional.
They exist today. (This predates and is a different issue than the recently
publicized “Liberator” printed plastic handgun.)
Magazine capacity makes virtually no difference to someone
who is practiced at changing magazines. Mass murderers plan their activities
for months. They’re the ones prepared for the event. Everyone else is taken by
surprise and is reacting. Criminals can obtain or manufacture the magazines
they want and practice magazine changes. Here are 2 videos showing how quickly
magazines can be changed and why capacity limits are ineffective for a determined
killer. Note the 2nd one was produced by a law enforcement officer
for the purpose of demonstrating this. Also note, at the beginning of the 2nd
video, when we discuss magazines with capacities up to 30 rounds, we’re NOT
talking about so-called “high capacity” magazines. These are “standard
capacity” magazines – designed for use with their corresponding firearms by the
manufacturer. When talking about 50-200 round magazines then we’re in the “high
capacity” range. From the 30-range and downward is a political invention and
intentionally misleading propaganda.
Magazine capacity limits only affect and endanger law
abiding people. Military servicemen and law enforcement officers will always
carry more than 10 rounds in their pistol magazines. Pistols are used primarily
for defensive purposes in the military (excluding special operations).
Officers’ pistols are not for “assault” – they’re for defending the lives of
the officers and others. They carry more than 10 because the criminal is only
limited by their planning and preparation – not by ridiculous laws in addition
to the ones they’re already breaking. Citizens need the same rights,
capabilities and lack of restrictions that law enforcement officers do simply
for defense of self, others and property.
There have been many statistics published about the “hit
rate” of bullets fired. One statistic is that New York City police officers
have a 17% hit rate. Politicians and people want to put faith in the training
and professionalism of law enforcement officers – who are not responsible for
protecting us and have a 17% hit rate in spite of their training. Many things
affect shooting accuracy in an emergency situation – training, proficiency,
surprise, mental preparedness, shock, adrenaline, body perspiration, increased
heart rate, moving targets, one’s own movement, fear, cover or concealment,
shooting positions, etc. We can’t expect better performance from an armed
citizen. Even in a short engagement we cannot expect high, target shooting
accuracy because many of those complicating factors exist. Armed citizens
therefore need the same ammunition supply available to them as does a law
enforcement officer. The criminal has all the ammunition they want.
It sometimes takes more than 10 rounds to end an engagement
or turn away a determined attack. Earlier this year a woman in Georgia defended
herself and children in their home. She emptied her 6-shot revolver at
point-blank range at a single intruder. Five of the 6 hit the intruder in the
face and neck and he still walked out and drove away. http://www.ajc.com/news/news/local/mother-of-two-surprises-burglar-with-five-gunshots/nTnGR/
That’s 6 shots for a single intruder and he still wasn’t killed! What if there
were multiple attackers? Here’s a recent story where there were 3: http://www.khou.com/home/Resident-shoots-robber-during-gunbattle-in-southwest-Houston-207431391.html
Here’s a dramatization showing a realistic home invasion scenario: http://www.wnd.com/2013/05/shock-video-makes-case-for-high-capacity-magazines/
It’s an empty argument to say this shows 7 (New York) and Illinois (and other
states) are considering 10 or 15 (Colorado). The scenario shows 2 attackers,
not 3 or more. It shows that not every round will hit its intended target; a
round-limit will endanger the law abiding person defending themselves without
the luxury of planning, preparation and magazine changes; that multiple
attackers dramatically increases the need for more rounds for defensive
purposes; etc. Here’s an article about a police officer shot 12 times who was
still alive, conscious and functioning: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57584049/obama-honors-cops-renews-push-for-stronger-gun-laws/
Do you think criminals are not capable of the same resolve? Obviously the
criminal here had more than 10 rounds and it’s extremely unlikely he was
limited to 12 and 100% of them hit the officer. I can’t answer how many were
fired by the criminal. How many could the criminal have fired? As many as he
had – unlimited by any arbitrary magazine capacity limit.
There are some well-intending politicians who think they’re
benefiting public safety. They’re misguided and fail to realize the real
implications of their actions. Others are exploiting tragic events to continue
their decades-long assault on 2nd Amendment rights because they
don’t like or are afraid of guns or are driven by emotions rather than logic,
data, statistics and real world events showing the folly of their proposals.
Some of these politicians and gun control advocates actually do want guns
confiscated and banned, as shown here: http://us2ndamendment.blogspot.com/2013/05/no-one-wants-to-take-your-guns-except.html
Some think they’ll save lives through magazine capacity limits and eagerly
point to Tucson and Newtown (magazine changes). They also ignore the realities
of Columbine, Virginia Tech and Fort Hood where magazine changes didn’t
interrupt the killing. But they’ll never be able to name the specific person
who was definitively saved by such legislation because too many other factors
will prevent that specific knowledge. Here’s my question for them. Will they
take personal responsibility for the person who can be named, who dies with an
empty 10-round magazine they were trying to defend themselves with? Will they
lose sleep and openly embrace that person’s family survivors, fully accepting
that that person’s innocent blood is on their hands? If they can attempt to
claim credit for saving a life through legislation then they must accept that
their legislation will cause loss of life. If they blame guns and magazines for
killing people instead of the person behind the gun then they must equally
blame their arbitrary magazine capacity limit for loss of life.
Emotions need to be taken out of the decision making
process. What do psychologists tell patients about making major decisions after
suffering a traumatic event? Don’t do it. What do friends and colleagues tell
people about acting while in a state of emotional anxiety? Don’t do it. Don’t
send the email, tell off the boss or co-worker, or “drunk-dial” the ex-lover.
That’s what gun control advocating politicians are doing – drunk-legislating.
That and exploiting victims to forward their anti-gun agenda. The testimony of
victims and their families is little but emotional exploitation. I don’t blame
them for their deep feelings of grief or anger. But for many of them it’s
misplaced. These people should NOT have a ‘seat at the table’ when discussing 2nd
Amendment rights – as was granted by Vice President Biden and the legislatures
of Colorado, Illinois and others. Their loss is severe, but their grief does
NOT give them expertise at anything – not lawmaking, crime, violence, firearms
knowledge or functionality or use, training, tactics, psychology, the economics
of supply and demand – in short, nothing pertinent. It’s shameful when they’re
invited by gun control politicians to testify. There are plenty of people,
including victims and family members of Columbine and other violent crime, who
feel and believe exactly the opposite of gun control advocating victims. Where’s
their equal consideration? Some of them have testified at various hearings. But
are they given equal consideration? Not just equal time, but equal
consideration? How many gun rights supporting victims were invited by
politicians to attend the State of the Union, or aboard Air Force One and then
given personal escorts through the halls of Congress to advocate for their
positions or to stand behind President Obama and show their dissent when he
signed 23 executive orders? How many gun rights victims did the Illinois
legislature invite to testify in committee hearings? I’ve seen various
estimates of 600,000 to 2.5 million uses of firearms annually for self-defense
and to prevent crime. There are lots to choose from.
Incidentally, the statement in this article about this
Illinois bill, “ "learned the brutal truth" of what
happens when a killer chooses a high-capacity magazine to achieve the
"best kill rate as possible." ” has evidence to the contrary. In
the case of Newtown the shooter had multiple 30-round magazines, 6 I believe.
In the physical evidence it was found that some of the magazines still had
several rounds in them. The killer changed magazines without exhausting each
one’s supply, suggesting he didn’t attempt or achieve the “best kill rate” because
he chose to pause his shooting for those changes instead of getting the most
from his supply. Also, in the Aurora shooting the killer used a high capacity
drum that jammed. Those actual “high capacity” ammunition feeding devices, like
drums, are notorious for jamming. The reality in Aurora is that injury and
death were probably REDUCED because he chose to use a “high capacity” drum.
DK: Gentlemen, thanks for writing and expressing your point of view but I completely disagree with you. The reason criminals get access to high capacity ammunition magazines is because of the gun industry that makes and sells them. These high capacity magazines did not appear out of nowhere. Children are dying and we need to start worrying about their right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Best, Dan
ME: I'm not familiar with a pistol version of the AR-15 but it
neither surprises nor alarms me. Firearms are not inherently evil. They are
used for life-saving and providing safety and security and other lawful
purposes exponentially more often than they're used to take lives.
"High-powered rifle-caliber ammunition" is more
misleading propaganda. AR-15s in particular come in 2-3 different rifle
calibers that I'm aware of. Other so-called "assault weapons" add a
few more calibers. Sticking to the AR-15, the most talked about of them and the
most popularly sold sporting and self defense rifle, the calibers are mostly
.22 long rifle and .223 (a.k.a. 5.56 mm). These are among the LOWEST power
rifle calibers.
("Assault weapon" is a politically invented term
that does NOT equate to a military "assault rifle", a fully-automatic
rifle or machine gun, or even a rifle in use by the military - more false
propaganda.)
Gun control advocates commonly state that AR-15s are not
used for hunting. That's both untrue and misleading. They are used for hunting
- small game, like wolves, coyotes and smaller. The reason they're not used for
big game, like deer and heavier, is that they're NOT POWERFUL enough and have
been outlawed by many states for that use. They can certainly kill a deer but
they're more likely to wound them. AR-15s are also used in self defense,
contrary to what gun control advocates would have people believe. There have
been 2 incidents just this year that I'm aware of and there's the well-known
incident during the post-Rodney King Los Angeles riots.
While "scissors control" does sound silly, it's
not as far from reality as one might think. The United Kingdom (England and
Wales only) banned firearms and murder by use of guns did go down but overall
violent crime dramatically increased (because citizens no longer had the means
to defend themselves). Some of that crime is still by use of guns but knife
crime is particularly high. Now the UK has "knife control". A British
citizen is not allowed to walk the streets with a lock-blade Buck knife that we
all take for granted and consider a tool more than a weapon. In England it's
considered a dangerous and illegal weapon. Incidentally, when Australia banned
and confiscated firearms their gun murders actually increased (because citizens
no longer had the means to defend themselves).
You blame the gun industry for the creation and
proliferation of semi-automatic firearms and their "standard
capacity" magazines of more than 10 rounds? Let's put things in
perspective. Semi-automatic firearms technology, including in pistols, has been
around for 100 years. A popular handgun is the M1911 style. It's been around
since ~1911. So the technology and basic design have been long established and
sought after by military forces, law enforcement agencies and for consumer use.
The larger magazine capacities were likely not driven by gun industry
profiteering, as you imply, but by demand from military and police forces
because they needed the additional capacity for their own defensive purposes.
As I've already stated, citizens need the same capability that law enforcement
does - we face the same threats.
Not everything needs to be regulated. Not even every death
or means of death needs to be regulated. You cannot save or protect everyone
and it's insane to even try. The answer to every problem cannot be more laws,
more regulations and more money. Freedom is a pretty valuable thing but it
comes with a tolerance and acceptance of risk. As for as overall regulation
goes, I'm not sure the gun industry qualifies as the last consumer industry
that's unregulated and it's certainly the case that some of the regulation that
does exist regulates the wrong things or in the wrong way. There's plenty of
low hanging fruit in other needed areas without infringing on our rights.
===
Just hours after posting the last message I checked back on Illinois Senator DK's Facebook page and found that all 3 of my posts (labeled "ME", above and now in italics) had been deleted and that I had been prohibited from making any more comments on his page. (The first, long post here was broken into 2 on his Facebook page because FB wouldn't accept it in a single post.) I guess, like all outspoken gun control advocates, he was uncomfortable with being faced with a strong dissenting opinion and with facts that don't support his "infringing" intent and legislation - and that he wasn't really being honest, above, when he wrote "
thanks for writing and expressing your point of view". Perhaps more importantly, it appears he was uncomfortable with the idea that anyone else could read opposing ideas. It's so much easier to push illogical, ineffective, ideological legislation when it's only your (misleading, inaccurate, lying) propaganda that gets heard, isn't it? I think he was being completely honest when he wrote "
I completely disagree with you".
So far my comment on his page for a previous post remains, although I asked 3 specific questions of how citizens' rights will be protected in the context of proposed gun control legislation that still remain unanswered and unacknowledged.
This Senator is someone I have a shared background with. We went to high school together.
===
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