Why is common sense gun safety legislation so hard
by digby
David Frum thinks it’s odd that this isn’t already a requirement all over the country. So do I:
[New York Rep. Carolyn] Maloney’s “Firearm Risk Protection Act” requires gun buyers to have “a qualified liability insurance policy” before they are able to legally purchase a firearm.
It also calls for the federal government to impose a fine as much as $10,000 if a gun owner doesn’t have insurance on a firearm purchased after the bill goes into effect. “It shall be unlawful for a person who owns a firearm purchased on or after the effective date of this subsection not to be covered by a qualified liability insurance policy,” the bill text reads.
The bill would also make it a federal crime to sell a firearm to anyone without insurance. “For too long, gun victims and society at large have borne the brunt of the costs of gun violence,” Maloney said as she introduced the legislation. “My bill would change that by shifting some of that cost back onto those who own the weapons.”
Sounds reasonable. Needless to say, the NRA disagrees:
Chris Cox, the executive director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action, told The Daily Caller that the bill is “ridiculous on its face, as it presumes law-abiding gun owners are guilty for merely exercising a fundamental, constitutional right.”
Yeah, well as a woman, that argument doesn’t carry a lot of weight with me. Fundamental, constitutional rights are in the eye of the beholder as is the “presumed guilt” of anyone who exercises them. (Of course, in the case of reproductive rights, these same people want to prohibit women from buying insurance, so we lose coming and going …)
But as a practical matter, this gun insurance seems like a winning proposition to me and I wonder why nobody’s proposed it before. After all:
I don’t drive as much now that I don’t commute every day, but I have a car and I’m required to carry liability insurance anyway. It’s not cheap. Now, the founders didn’t explicitly write that we have a constitution right to drive a car, to be sure. I think they can be forgiven for being unable to see into the future and know that the automobile would be invented. But we have established over the years that people must register their vehicles, meet certain licensing requirement and carry insurance because it’s a useful tool but it’s also dangerous and society has an interest in regulating them.
I’m afraid I cannot see why guns should not at least be subject to that much regulation. It’s common sense.And I think the NRA should jump on this idea. There’s money to be made. And I’m quite sure that if this ever gets passed they’ll be the first ones making it.
Unfortunately, this is a long shot, as is all gun safety legislation. This pollster explains:
So why is Congress struggling to find common ground on an issue where nearly all Americans agree? One key reason is the potential for electoral retribution from the NRA. The group has instilled fear among some key senators that voting for background checks would have political consequences, the Post’s Philip Rucker and Ed O’Keefe report.
Another factor, argues political scientist Jonathan Bernstein, is that few Americans are taking to the streets to demand universal background checks. Ninety percent of people answering a phone survey the same way is not the same as hordes of voters protesting in the streets or badgering their congressmen.
The lopsided level of activism was clear in a January Pew Research poll, where respondents who prioritized gun rights were more than four times as likely as those backing gun control to donate money to an organization that takes a position on gun policy. More than four in 10 gun rights supporters (42 percent) reported participating in at least one type of political activism on the issue, compared with 25 percent of those prioritizing gun control. Activist groups supporting gun restrictions — notably the Michael Bloomberg-led Mayors’ Against Illegal Guns — have tried to change this dynamic. They promise to bring the fight over gun laws to the electoral battlefield, supporting candidates who agree with them and opposing those who don’t. But the fact that Congress is struggling to pass a law with near unprecedented support — and that popular proposals such as bans on assault weapons and high-capacity clips have been essentially taken off the table — indicates they are still
I’m going to take a wild guess that most people aren’t going to take to the streets to protest in favor of gun safety regulation as long as the gun rights leadership continues to sound like a bunch of lunatics (see: LaPierre, Wayne) and their followers show up to protest armed with loaded guns. They aren’t suicidal.
And neither are the politicians:
Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) says she received death threats at her Manhattan office Tuesday over a piece of proposed gun control legislation.
According to Maloney, three phone calls were made to her Upper East Side office about an hour apart from each other, ABC reports. Disturbed by the phone calls, the congresswoman decided to skip an event where she was scheduled to present an award that night.
“They said they were going to kill me,” Maloney told The Daily News. “I couldn’t go. Who knows what could happen? I think any member of Congress would be scared after what happened to my good friend Gabby Giffords.”
Can we see what’s happening here?
I don’t know the answer, but when you have an armed movement that fetishizes the potential necessity of revolution against the government you can certainly understand why politicians and citizens alike might not be eager to put themselves in the metaphorical — and literal — line of fire. In this case, many people, including pols, probably feel that their best insurance policy is “don’t make trouble.”
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