http://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/ ... g.comments
My reply in the comments section:
The problem with so called "universal" background checks... Is that such a scheme is 100% impossible to implement. I do not mean impossible to pass, it could pass and in fact it is already the law in some states such as CA and NY. Fat lot of good that does for crime in those states...
But the bigger problem is two fold...
First it would be impossible to implement because there simply is not the funding or manpower to enforce it. There are somewhere above 350m guns in private hands in the US (I suspect the actual number is at least double that but 350m is the most research backed number) which means that to enforce such a scheme, you have to know where every single one of them is. Which means registration...
Which brings us to the second problem with the scheme, registration not only does not work but is acitvely resisted EVERY single time it has been tried throughout history.
Not only here in the US on a state by state level in places such as CA, NY, MA, etc...
But in Australia, The United Kingdom, Austria, Belgum, Denmark, France, Germany, etc... And non-compliance in places like that often exceeds 80%. Source: (http://reason.com/archives/2012/12/22/g ... red-defian)
If countries such as those, that are traditionally viewd as being ones where the people are generally subservient and obedient to the government, have resistance in such high percentages, what makes anyone think that the numbers would not be drastically higher here in a nation that has a long and proud history of telling the government to mind its own business.
That very scenario has played out in recent years in places like NY, CO and CT... All three places passed laws that were, by all appearances, not only not complied with, but outright ignored by the vast majority of the population. With some estimates of non-compliance being above 90%.
So what do you do if you pass a law that no one will follow?
Do you start rounding people up and tossing them in jail?
There are roughly 1m sworn law enforcement officers in the United States... That number includes federal, state and local levels as well as part time officers. And there are somewhere above 100m firearms owners in the US. If even 1% of legal gun owners (the ones owning illegally will not comply anyways) tell you "I will not comply, come make me" and then actively resist your new law... You do not have enough sworn law enforcement personnel or jail cells to enforce your new law.
And that is assuming that all you are doing is having them knock on doors and politely asking people to comply... Which is far from reality. In reality, such enforcement would be at on the recieving end of so called no-knock raids by SWAT teams, because guns... And such actions tend to lead to "incidents".
So now, you are kicking in doors with full on tactical teams to enforce your new law that no one wanted to comply with in the first place...
How many "incidents" will happen before the public turns against you?
How many times will officer Fumblefingers and Deputy Stumblebutt "trip" and "accidentally" kill a kid before entire neighborhoods become no-go zones for police?
How many times do you think that the police department will get a pass from the public for putting a stray round through a toddler's crib 3 houses away from their raid on Old Man Smith while looking for his unregistered .22 derringer before such actions are met with return fire?
To put it bluntly, how many bodies are acceptible to implement your plans?
How deep are you willing to stack up the bodies on both sides of the issue to get your utopia?
Because that is what you are asking for... You are asking for the government to use its police power to enforce a law. And such enforcement is always backed by the full force of government which necessairly includes lethal force to ensure compliance. In short, you declare war on the public... And wars are messy things for everyone involved.
Either that or you sit back and complain because your newly implemented utopian law is not being followed... And you use that as a push to pass more laws that wont be followed. Which is exactly what has been happening for a couple of decades in California and New York.
