Gun control bill to be introduced in the Senate next month will cover some handguns

In the new Congress Diane Nanny State Feinstein will introduce sweeping gun control legislation which, among other things, will ban handguns “that can accept a detachable magazine and have one military characteristic,” and handguns “with a fixed magazine that can accept more than 10 rounds.”

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Terry Morris writes:

And all in direct violation of the second amendment’s prohibition against federal regulation of gun ownership. But who really cares anymore about the original intent of the Bill of Rights, or of the only legitimate change to the Constitution written therein by which the federal authority could possibly restrict private gun ownership in any way legitimately?

I own a handgun that would fall under Feinstein’s limitations. I won’t give it up voluntarily. As ominus as that may sound.

Karl D. writes:

I find this one sentence to be confusing.

“that can accept a detachable magazine and have one military characteristic,”

In my mind this would put a ban on virtually every modern handgun as they all use magazines. Unless they specifically mean magazines that are over ten rounds? Otherwise we will all be back to revolvers. I don’t know what “Military characteristic” means? Maybe someone more knowledgeable knows what this means.

Thomas O. writes:

Diane Feinstein has long been a hypocrite in that while she operates powerfully on the side of gun control (apparently this legislation she proposes to introduce has been waiting in the wings for just this kind of moment), she, herself, has a permit to carry a hidden handgun. Of course, I imagine that she is more of a target than the average citizen, but one would think that a person in her position, with her own need for protection, would appreciate the need of others (but since when does the government think of the need of the populace?). She, of all people, ought to know that one can not expect protection from the police, armed guards in a building, a security perimeter, and so on, since she was the very one who came into fame when a deranged San Francisco Supervisor broke into City Hall and murdered Mayor George Moscone and fellow Supervisor Harvey Milk. Feinstein was sworn in as the replacement mayor.

This latest legislation comes very, very close to home, as it circles around a ban on semi-automatic hand-guns with detachable magazines. This is a very normal handgun for a person to have, either that or a revolver, and as far as I know, most, if not all, semi-automatic pistols have magazines. I am not sure of the ratio of semi-automatic pistols to revolvers among the American populace, but I imagine that they are pretty close—somewhere around 50/50. To be technical, one could actually refer to a revolver as a “semi-automatic.”

Of course, this legislation offers two “saving graces,” in that the semi-automatic handguns to be banned must have “one military characteristic” and cannot have magazines with a capacity beyond ten rounds. I have no idea what “one military characteristic” means, it could mean anything, as I believe almost all guns have some kind of a military background (such as the 1911 semi-automatic, one of the most popular styles of handguns out there). In California, where I live, to my knowledge, semi-automatic handguns already cannot have a magazine capacity greater than eight, so that limitation of ten rounds proviso is perhaps to increase the limitations nationally. California is already one of the strictest gun control states. In high-crime Los Angeles County, it is impossible for a citizen to obtain a hidden carry permit, whereas in neighboring Ventura County, one of the safest counties in the United States, such permits are there for the asking.

Do you, or anybody else reading this exemplary forum, have any idea what “banning” actually means? For if it means “the forced relinquishment” of such handguns, I don’t even know that would be possible. I found one website that listed the ratio of gun ownership in various countries around the world, and in the United States, the ratio is 88 guns for every 100 people. That is such an immense majority that any attempt to collect handguns from all those people would be bound to result in failure (and it is a very dangerous precedent to turn a majority of your citizens into criminals by default). Additionally, I would think that such an effort would be political suicide. All those people screaming for gun control are in a small minority, if that statistic is, indeed correct.

Paul M. writes:

According to Feinstein’s website, the bill she plans to introduce in 2013, “Requires that grandfathered weapons be registered under the National Firearms Act.”

This is far, far more onerous than the last so-called “assault weapon” ban. NFA registration requires fingerprints, photo, letter from your local law enforcement that you are someone who should be trusted with an NFA firearm, and paying a $200 tax. Not to mention the government now knows the exact make and serial number of your firearm, and exactly where to find you if they want it.

The ATF can barely keep the NFA Registry up-to-date now, with long wait times to register a firearm. If I recall correctly, the number of firearms on the NFA registry right now (machine guns, short barreled rifles and shotguns, silencers, etc., ) is several hundred thousands. There are 10 times that many AR’s alone in the U.S.

This part of her bill, at least, is a complete non-starter—even in the United States of Obama.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at December 27, 2012 02:02 PM | Send