Do you really think they care about your "gun rights", suckers?

The right wants to use gun rights as a wedge issue to get you to vote against your self interests, yet

their shut down could prevent people from exercising their "Second Amendment Rights":

One of the more controversial effects of a government shutdown is a halt on concealed carry permits for gun owners. The clerk of court issues these permits in each locality, but the software they use to perform background checks on applicants goes through the federal government.

OK, maybe the government will see things your way and this is covered under the "law enforcement exception". 

Then again, maybe not!

Of course, part of the reason the US is in this mess is because politicians have been courting the fringe elements of US politics:  The people who are single issue voters (e.g., "right to life", "gun rights", taxes).

Unfortunately, one lesson any democracy should know is choose good leaders, or you will be stuck with bad ones.

And the US has picked some really bad ones.

The Background Check System Needs to be Fixed

 The Denver Post reports

More than 2 million qualifying mental-illness records are missing from the NICS index, according to the National Center for State Courts and SEARCH, the National Consortium for Justice Information and Statistics.

Judges who find a defendant mentally defective under the law are required to add that person's name to the index.

"Part of the reason they don't report is lack of funding, and part is they just don't make this system a priority," said Dan Gross, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.

This is disgraceful and something should be done.

What do you think?  Please leave a comment.

State Reporting to the NICS Database

The Dayton Daily News reports

Ohio has identified 26,876 mental health cases and forwarded those since the state passed a law in 2004. But 23 states and the District of Columbia have submitted fewer than 100 mental health records to the federal database.

Seventeen states submitted fewer than 10 mental health records, and four states haven’t submitted any records.

The article goes on to describe the slipshod methods that allow drug abusers and even criminals to end up not making the NICS database.

The whole system needs to be revamped. Then we need background checks on all gun sales, licensing of all gun owners and registration of every gun sold.

The irony about all the arguments against this is that the ones making the arguments would be little affected. Law-abiding mentally-sound individuals would continue to have their precious guns under the most stringent of gun control systems.

But, if those regulations about background checks, registration and licensing were in effect, can you imagine how many unfit prople would be prevented from getting guns? Common sense and honesty is all it takes to see this is the right way to go. Opposition is immoral.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.