(09-11-2019 01:24 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(09-11-2019 01:12 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  

(09-11-2019 11:20 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  In what world it it a red herring to say that the current law requiring background checks be completed by gun dealers worked, when, in fact, a gun dealer did not sell to the Midland shooter because he failed a background check???

Sorry, couldn't really get past that astonishing statement at the start.

The guy still bought a gun, right? Would you not admit that MOST convicted felons wouldn't even TRY and buy a gun from someone requiring a background check? Yet they still get them

It's a red-herring for the very obvious and demonstrable FACT that as I said, it is a solution in search of a problem. You believe this will curtail illegal purchases, and you found a situation where it delayed one... and you then jumped to the conclusion that if we just did it more often, we would do even better... despite the FACT that the method for people like this ISN'T to keep trying until they pass, but to either KNOW they will fail and not go that route, or fail and then go another route.

I feel I pretty accurately described why I called it a red-herring. Perhaps you are merely unfamiliar with the reference. A red herring is something intended to distract, and that is what this is. It is intended to 'prove' something that it can't possibly prove... That background checks keep people from getting guns. They very clearly did NOT do so here... and only would (your distraction) if you could have somehow made an illegal manufacturer and illegal seller of illegal guns, decide to participate in background checks and decline to sell the gun.

Since you can't do that, the point, even if true, is meaningless to the discussion.

It's like saying the solution to illegal drug use is more restrictions on pharmacies and taxes on prescription medication. Yes, it COULD stop them from getting them from pharmacies, but it doesn't do a thing about the already significant and established illegal drug trade and it places a big financial burden on 100+mm legal purchasers of prescription medication.

(09-11-2019 11:26 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  And Ham, I bring up Warren because I actually looked up her policy positions as part of this debate, when I was being told that no Dem wants to propose any position but ones that would curb one's ability to own a gun.

and yet you then went on to demonstrate that this is precisely what her position is.

Illegal purchasers of guns and their suppliers won't comply with her proposal. Legal gun purchasers already comply with them... and you'd be restricting their ability (or increasing their liability) for owning one, legally. I'd note that there is more to ownership of something than the ability to hold it. There is also the ability to sell it.

Ham, I can't tell if you're misinterpreting what I said, or you're really hankering for an argument.

Once Tanq clarified the issue surrounding how the Midland gun was procured, and that the seller was not a private seller, but an illegal manufacturer/seller, my assessment of the situation changed. That comment I made about the effectiveness of background checks was with respect to licensed gun dealers, not on the effect/effectiveness of expanding background checks to cover private sellers.

That comment is not meaningless to the discussion, as you suggest it is, because the discussion was about what current/proposed laws could have stopped this mass shooting, and the current law kept a gun out of the shooter's hands for years. So it seems completely germane to comment on whether the current background law does keep guns out of people who are flagged in the system...

And to your final comment about Warren, are you arguing that increasing the enforcement of current laws about illegal sellers/manufacturers is actually a position the equates to increasing gun control? I can't tell, because you say they won't comply with her proposal, but the whole point of that policy proposal is that authorities have more support to go after people breaking the law.