berettaprofessor
Member
I woke up this morning with a horrible thought. Everyone please hear me out and then tell me why it will never happen so I can sleep soundly again tonight.
Suppose, for a minute, that Feinstein and McCarthy and Schumer stopped worrying about shoulder things that go up and clip capacity? We talk a lot about the 300-odd million guns in circulation here and why they could never be confiscated. So what if they weren't confiscated, they were bought by the government in a completely voluntary sales system?
Here is my nightmare scenario:
a) In the wake of a shooting like Newton, government says"we're not going to ban anything, but Freedom Group, etc, you can't manufacture any more semiautomatic rifles of caliber bigger than 22LR." Make all the shotguns and bolt actions and lever guns and 22 plinking handguns you want, but no more AR's or AK47's or Glocks." And along the way, firearm imports to the US are eliminated by Presidential decree. The gun makers aren't automatically out of existence, they just have to retool.
b) Revoke all existing FFL's but offer a new form of FFL and background check where existing guns can be transferred upon more stringent checks including a mental stability note from a physician. Yeah, we'd scream, but they'd point out that you can still get firearms for protection and you can keep all you currently have, but for public protection we're imposing an additional test to buy them...similar to a driver's license." Neighborhood gun stores aren't out of business, they just have some extra paperwork.
c) Now, of those 300 million guns outstanding, let's say for the sake of argument, that there are roughly 50 million shotguns, 80 milliion bolt action or lever hunting rifles, and another 80 million 22 rifles and handguns. Feinstein et al don't care about those. They want the remaining 90 million semiautomatic weapons that include our Glocks and AR's and the CMP Garands. Say those 90 million guns are worth $1500 average apiece in current dollars. That, my friends, is only $135 billion dollars, chicken feed for the kind of money thrown by our government around the past few years. Heck, it hardly makes a dent in the deficit.
d) The coup de grace is a massive government VOLUNTARY buyback. The Feds buy every semiautomatic from every gun store in the US, every semiautomatic that goes up on Gunbroker and Auction Arms, every gun listed in a newspaper. The $135B doesn't even have to be spent all up front, maybe budget $100B the first year and then declining levels after that. Heck Bloomberg could almost fund it himself.
What's the average circulation time of a firearm? Ten years? Twenty years? In twenty years, most of the semiautomatics in civilian hands will be gone, except for the collections and the heirlooms passed to our certified mentally-stable heirs and the few back-room manufactured weapons that the diehards create a black market for and the smugglers. All done, as the historians like to point out, just like Lincoln should have done for the import-limited and regulated slave trade stead of fighting a war.
Yes, I'm aware that criminals will still have guns, but Bloomberg and Feinstein and their bodyguards don't care about that because even though the burglary and rape rates rise, the mass shooting's decrease. They'll allow you your 22 plinker for self defense and target practice and they'll allow (for now) your hog rifle and deer rifle and shotguns, so the 2nd Amendment is pretty moot unless we want to face its real intention.
Now, please tell me how Obama and Bloomberg can't get a large enough group of Democrats and Rhinos together to make this happen in the current political environment? Forget the NRA and it's power, it's DONE and over by the next election.....
Suppose, for a minute, that Feinstein and McCarthy and Schumer stopped worrying about shoulder things that go up and clip capacity? We talk a lot about the 300-odd million guns in circulation here and why they could never be confiscated. So what if they weren't confiscated, they were bought by the government in a completely voluntary sales system?
Here is my nightmare scenario:
a) In the wake of a shooting like Newton, government says"we're not going to ban anything, but Freedom Group, etc, you can't manufacture any more semiautomatic rifles of caliber bigger than 22LR." Make all the shotguns and bolt actions and lever guns and 22 plinking handguns you want, but no more AR's or AK47's or Glocks." And along the way, firearm imports to the US are eliminated by Presidential decree. The gun makers aren't automatically out of existence, they just have to retool.
b) Revoke all existing FFL's but offer a new form of FFL and background check where existing guns can be transferred upon more stringent checks including a mental stability note from a physician. Yeah, we'd scream, but they'd point out that you can still get firearms for protection and you can keep all you currently have, but for public protection we're imposing an additional test to buy them...similar to a driver's license." Neighborhood gun stores aren't out of business, they just have some extra paperwork.
c) Now, of those 300 million guns outstanding, let's say for the sake of argument, that there are roughly 50 million shotguns, 80 milliion bolt action or lever hunting rifles, and another 80 million 22 rifles and handguns. Feinstein et al don't care about those. They want the remaining 90 million semiautomatic weapons that include our Glocks and AR's and the CMP Garands. Say those 90 million guns are worth $1500 average apiece in current dollars. That, my friends, is only $135 billion dollars, chicken feed for the kind of money thrown by our government around the past few years. Heck, it hardly makes a dent in the deficit.
d) The coup de grace is a massive government VOLUNTARY buyback. The Feds buy every semiautomatic from every gun store in the US, every semiautomatic that goes up on Gunbroker and Auction Arms, every gun listed in a newspaper. The $135B doesn't even have to be spent all up front, maybe budget $100B the first year and then declining levels after that. Heck Bloomberg could almost fund it himself.
What's the average circulation time of a firearm? Ten years? Twenty years? In twenty years, most of the semiautomatics in civilian hands will be gone, except for the collections and the heirlooms passed to our certified mentally-stable heirs and the few back-room manufactured weapons that the diehards create a black market for and the smugglers. All done, as the historians like to point out, just like Lincoln should have done for the import-limited and regulated slave trade stead of fighting a war.
Yes, I'm aware that criminals will still have guns, but Bloomberg and Feinstein and their bodyguards don't care about that because even though the burglary and rape rates rise, the mass shooting's decrease. They'll allow you your 22 plinker for self defense and target practice and they'll allow (for now) your hog rifle and deer rifle and shotguns, so the 2nd Amendment is pretty moot unless we want to face its real intention.
Now, please tell me how Obama and Bloomberg can't get a large enough group of Democrats and Rhinos together to make this happen in the current political environment? Forget the NRA and it's power, it's DONE and over by the next election.....
