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Feinstein Goes For Broke With New Gun-Ban Bill
NRA ^ | 12/27/2012 | NRA/ILA Staff

Posted on 12/29/2012 7:32:08 AM PST by IbJensen

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.)—author of the federal “assault weapon” and “large” ammunition magazine ban of 1994-2004—has announced that on the first day of the new Congress—January 3rd— she will introduce a bill to which her 1994 ban will pale by comparison. On Dec. 17th, Feinstein said, “I have been working with my staff for over a year on this legislation” and “It will be carefully focused.” Indicating the depth of her research on the issue, she said on Dec. 21st that she had personally looked at pictures of guns in 1993, and again in 2012.

According to a Dec. 27th posting on Sen. Feinstein’s website and a draft of the bill obtained by NRA-ILA, the new ban would, among other things, adopt new definitions of “assault weapon” that would affect a much larger variety of firearms, require current owners of such firearms to register them with the federal government under the National Firearms Act, and require forfeiture of the firearms upon the deaths of their current owners. Some of the changes in Feinstein’s new bill are as follows: •Reduces, from two to one, the number of permitted external features on various firearms. The 1994 ban permitted various firearms to be manufactured only if they were assembled with no more than one feature listed in the law. Feinstein’s new bill would prohibit the manufacture of the same firearms with even one of the features.

•Adopts new lists of prohibited external features. For example, whereas the 1994 ban applied to a rifle or shotgun the “pistol grip” of which “protrudes conspicuously beneath the action of the weapon,” the new bill would drastically expand the definition to include any “grip . . . or any other characteristic that can function as a grip.” Also, the new bill adds “forward grip” to the list of prohibiting features for rifles, defining it as “a grip located forward of the trigger that functions as a pistol grip.” Read literally and in conjunction with the reduction from two features to one, the new language would apply to every detachable-magazine semi-automatic rifle. At a minimum, it would, for example, ban all models of the AR-15, even those developed for compliance with California’s highly restrictive ban.

• Carries hyperbole further than the 1994 ban. Feinstein’s 1994 ban listed “grenade launcher” as one of the prohibiting features for rifles. Her 2013 bill carries goes even further into the ridiculous, by also listing “rocket launcher.” Such devices are restricted under the National Firearms Act and, obviously, are not standard components of the firearms Feinstein wants to ban. Perhaps a subsequent Feinstein bill will add “nuclear bomb,” “particle beam weapon,” or something else equally far-fetched to the features list. •Expands the definition of “assault weapon” by including:

•Three very popular rifles: The M1 Carbine (introduced in 1944 and for many years sold by the federal government to individuals involved in marksmanship competition), a model of the Ruger Mini-14, and most or all models of the SKS.

•Any “semiautomatic, centerfire, or rimfire rifle that has a fixed magazine with the capacity to accept more than 10 rounds,” except for tubular-magazine .22s.

•Any “semiautomatic, centerfire, or rimfire rifle that has an overall length of less than 30 inches,” any “semiautomatic handgun with a fixed magazine that has the capacity to accept more than 10 rounds,” and any semi-automatic handgun that has a threaded barrel.

•Requires owners of existing “assault weapons” to register them with the federal government under the National Firearms Act (NFA). The NFA imposes a $200 tax per firearm, and requires an owner to submit photographs and fingerprints to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE), to inform the BATFE of the address where the firearm will be kept, and to obtain the BATFE’s permission to transport the firearm across state lines.

•Prohibits the transfer of “assault weapons.” Owners of other firearms, including those covered by the NFA, are permitted to sell them or pass them to heirs. However, under Feinstein’s new bill, “assault weapons” would remain with their current owners until their deaths, at which point they would be forfeited to the government.

•Prohibits the domestic manufacture and the importation of magazines that hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition. The 1994 ban allowed the importation of such magazines that were manufactured before the ban took effect. Whereas the 1994 ban protected gun owners from errant prosecution by making the government prove when a magazine was made, the new ban includes no such protection. The new ban also requires firearm dealers to certify the date of manufacture of any >10-round magazine sold, a virtually impossible task, given that virtually no magazines are stamped with their date of manufacture.

•Targets handguns in defiance of the Supreme Court. The Court ruled in District of Columbia v. Heller that the Second Amendment protects the right to have handguns for self-defense, in large part on the basis of the fact handguns are the type of firearm “overwhelmingly chosen by American society for that lawful purpose.” Semi-automatic pistols, which are the most popular handguns today, are designed to use detachable magazines, and the magazines “overwhelmingly chosen” by Americans for self-defense are those that hold more than 10 rounds. Additionally, Feinstein’s list of nearly 1,000 firearms exempted by name (see next paragraph) contains not a single handgun. Sen. Feinstein advocated banning handguns before being elected to the Senate, though she carried a handgun for her own personal protection.

•Contains a larger piece of window dressing than the 1994 ban. Whereas the 1994 ban included a list of approximately 600 rifles and shotguns exempted from the ban by name, the new bill’s list is increased to nearly 1,000 rifles and shotguns. Other than for the 11 detachable-magazine semi-automatic rifles and one other semi-automatic rifle included in the list, however, the list appears to be pointless, because a separate provision of the bill exempts “any firearm that is manually operated by bolt, pump, lever, or slide action.”

The Department of Justice study. On her website, Feinstein claims that a study for the DOJ found that the 1994 ban resulted in a 6.7 percent decrease in murders. To the contrary, this is what the study said: “At best, the assault weapons ban can have only a limited effect on total gun murders, because the banned weapons and magazines were never involved in more than a modest fraction of all gun murders. Our best estimate is that the ban contributed to a 6.7 percent decrease in total gun murders between 1994 and 1995. . . . However, with only one year of post-ban data, we cannot rule out the possibility that this decrease reflects chance year-to-year variation rather than a true effect of the ban. Nor can we rule out effects of other features of the 1994 Crime Act or a host of state and local initiatives that took place simultaneously.”

“Assault weapon” numbers and murder trends. From the imposition of Feinstein's “assault weapon” ban (Sept. 13, 1994) through the present, the number of “assault weapons” has risen dramatically. For example, the most common firearm that Feinstein considers an “assault weapon” is the AR-15 rifle, the manufacturing numbers of which can be gleaned from the BATFE’s firearm manufacturer reports, availablehere. From 1995 through 2011, the number of AR-15s—all models of which Feinstein’s new bill defines as “assault weapons”—rose by over 2.5 million. During the same period, the nation's murder rate fell 48 percent, to a 48-year low. According to the FBI, 8.5 times as many people are murdered with knives, blunt objects and bare hands, as with rifles of any type.

Traces: Feinstein makes several claims, premised on firearm traces, hoping to convince people that her 1994 ban reduced the (relatively infrequent) use of “assault weapons” in crime. However, traces do not indicate how often any type of gun is used in crime. As the Congressional Research Service and the BATFE have explained, not all firearms that are traced have been used in crime, and not all firearms used in crime are traced. Whether a trace occurs depends on whether a law enforcement agency requests that a trace be conducted. Given that existing “assault weapons” were exempted from the 1994 ban and new “assault weapons” continued to be made while the ban was in effect, any reduction in the percentage of traces accounted for by “assault weapons” during the ban, would be attributable to law enforcement agencies losing interest in tracing the firearms, or law enforcement agencies increasing their requests for traces on other types of firearms, as urged by the BATFE for more than a decade.

Call Your U.S. Senators and Representative: As noted, Feinstein intends to introduce her bill on January 3rd. President Obama has said that gun control will be a “central issue” of his final term in office, and he has vowed to move quickly on it.

Contact your members of Congress at 202-224-3121 to urge them to oppose Sen. Feinstein’s 2013 gun and magazine ban. Our elected representatives in Congress must hear from you if we are going to defeat this gun ban proposal. You can write your Representatives and Senators by using our Write Your Representatives tool here: http://www.nraila.org/get-involved-locally/grassroots/write-your-reps.aspx

Millions of Americans own so-called “assault weapons” and tens of millions own “large” magazines, for self-defense, target shooting, and hunting. For more information about thehistory of the “assault weapon” issue, please visit www.GunBanFacts.com.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Government; News/Current Events; US: California
KEYWORDS: 112th; 2ndamendment; awb; banglist; california; diannefeinstein; fineswine; gungrabbinwitch; landoffruitsnuts; nra; richardcblum; sanfrancisco; secondamendment
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Feinstein wants to be the one who pens another piece of convoluted legislation designed to enslave Americans. We will be put at the mercy of an evil central socialist government that first comes for our guns and then comes for us. We, according to these imbeciles, are the true nut cases that must be committed to a asylum in order that we be brain washed (shock and cold treatments). Our troops and CIA aren't permitted to do that to our enemies, but its perfectly okay for torture to be administered to us.

Don't sit around waiting for it to start!

1 posted on 12/29/2012 7:32:27 AM PST by IbJensen
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To: IbJensen

Unreal.


2 posted on 12/29/2012 7:36:26 AM PST by vladimir998
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To: IbJensen

The ditz and her “staff” have really gone over the top with this “bill”. It must be stopped.


3 posted on 12/29/2012 7:39:10 AM PST by FlingWingFlyer (U.S. elections have become nothing but another cheap ripoff of American Idol.)
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To: IbJensen

i wonder if this is legacy legislation for her.


4 posted on 12/29/2012 7:39:31 AM PST by longtermmemmory (VOTE! http://www.senate.gov and http://www.house.gov)
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To: IbJensen
Feinstein is bat-shit crazy to expect any movement on this.
More likely she's looking to make the first step in "compromise" - kind of like asking $5 million for my 2000 Nissan, expecting (and willing) to get beat down to only $500,000.
The only response she warrants is a laugh.
5 posted on 12/29/2012 7:43:46 AM PST by grobdriver
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To: IbJensen
every breath that wretched POS takes is proof of what a law abiding gun owning citizenry we are...
6 posted on 12/29/2012 7:48:36 AM PST by Chode (American Hedonist - *DTOM* -ww- NO Pity for the LAZY)
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To: IbJensen

Can we print wanted posters for the old hag?


7 posted on 12/29/2012 7:50:49 AM PST by bmwcyle (We have gone over the cliff and we are about to hit the bottom)
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To: FlingWingFlyer
She's kinda sicko, She had this written up sitting in a file cabinet waiting for a tragedy like this to happen an out she pops it on American gun owners.
8 posted on 12/29/2012 7:54:24 AM PST by reefdiver
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To: IbJensen

This bill has zero chance to pass as written. Pelosi and company, however, will introduce a stand-alone hi-cap mag ban in the house early in January. Don’t think it will pass, but has much better chances than the Di-Fi bill.


9 posted on 12/29/2012 7:55:32 AM PST by umgud (No Rats, No Rino's)
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To: FlingWingFlyer
Guys, Dianne Frankenstein knows full well this bill has no chance of passing as written.

Here is an angle I'm not seeing out on the blogs. The submission of this bill is nothing more than a precursor to an executive order/action.

Consider this. Obozo announcing an executive order banning this or that, taxing this or that based off of the fact that congress is gridlocked and he is forced to protect the American public from gun crimes.

Classic bait and switch if you will. They will not stop throwing stuff against the wall to see what sticks, but this will allow the executive branch to move.

10 posted on 12/29/2012 7:56:42 AM PST by servantboy777
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To: AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Berosus; bigheadfred; Bockscar; ColdOne; Convert from ECUSA; ...

Thanks IbJensen.
“I have been working with my staff for over a year on this legislation” and “It will be carefully focused.” Indicating the depth of her research on the issue, she said on Dec. 21st that she had personally looked at pictures of guns in 1993, and again in 2012.



11 posted on 12/29/2012 8:03:27 AM PST by SunkenCiv (Romney would have been worse, if you're a dumb ass.)
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To: servantboy777

“The submission of this bill is nothing more than a precursor to an executive order/action.”

When Hussein first made the speech about guns, I thought, “He’s going to do it by executive order.”


12 posted on 12/29/2012 8:05:22 AM PST by Marcella (Prepping can save your life today. Going Galt is freedom.)
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To: Marcella
Yep, caught that too.

When it comes, it will be a series of moves.

Continued attempts by the EPA to regulate lead ammo as an environmental hazard.

HHS regulation deeming firearms a human health hazard.

Commerce dept./TSA/DHS regulation on transportation of firearms across state lines.

IRS databases for the purposes of registration.

U.N. small arms ban.

Legislation through congress. Republicans will bow down to the liberals reinstating a FFB.

The gun grabbers now have momentum on their side and for the global elite, this is now the time to go for the gold.

In order for their agenda to advance, they must disarm Americans.

13 posted on 12/29/2012 8:21:53 AM PST by servantboy777
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To: IbJensen
Indicating the depth of her research on the issue, she said on Dec. 21st that she had personally looked at pictures of guns in 1993, and again in 2012.

We are "led" by these morons!? I'll wager she didn't even ask her security detail for their input.

5.56mm

14 posted on 12/29/2012 8:24:15 AM PST by M Kehoe
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To: IbJensen

FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS BITCH!

LLS


15 posted on 12/29/2012 8:31:58 AM PST by LibLieSlayer (FROM MY COLD, DEAD HANDS!)
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To: IbJensen

I can envision the drug cartels branching out into guns and ammo. They supply where there is a demand.


16 posted on 12/29/2012 8:33:05 AM PST by jimbobfoster
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To: umgud; FlingWingFlyer
My prediction:

I don't Swinestein's bill will pass as written; however, I expect the socialist bastards will put some type of grab in an addendum onto any "fiscal cliff" bill.

When the spineless jellyfish in Stupid Party (R) attempt to say anything, the (D)s will hem and haw and say the (R) want children to die, the middle class to face tax increases, the country to go 'off the cliff,' and to gut the military.

They will point to DiFi's ask for the moon bill and say that was what they really wanted, but "compromised." Then they will reference Boner's remarks on reasoned discussion about guns. Expect to see more "evil gun" stories in the "news" and of course more and more idiot celebrities to be paraded in front of the microphone - I'm sure sitcom scripts are being altered as we speak. Not sure if "Law and Order" is still on, but look for new episode in which the fearless Jack McCoy takes on the evil within the gun industry/lobby.

Boner will cry for a bit and then bite his pillow, limber up, and expose his posterior......but is the citizenry that will feel the pain.

If DiFi's bill did somehow get passed....I see a very funny list of things I will not comply with.

17 posted on 12/29/2012 8:54:36 AM PST by Repeat Offender (What good are conservative principles if we don't stand by them?)
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To: IbJensen

***and most or all models of the SKS. ***

Proof this is a gun grab. This has a 10 round magazine filled with a stripper clip.


18 posted on 12/29/2012 9:04:40 AM PST by Ruy Dias de Bivar (REOPEN THE CLOSED MENTAL INSTITUTIONS! Damn the ACLU!)
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To: servantboy777; JRandomFreeper
“In order for their agenda to advance, they must disarm Americans.”

My handgun does not fit into her bill so the gun is safe, for now. However, I just in the last day, installed a red laser on the gun to exactly pinpoint my target. Next, I guess she will go after lasers. She's not getting my gun.

Another thing that ticks me off is the provision for a grandfathered gun not to be allowed to be willed to another person. When the owner dies, the gun has to be given to the government. That's a provision to finally get all the grandfathered guns out of the population.

We are under siege and I wonder what Texas will do about whatever law passes. Sure, it's federal law but this state is full of “Bubbas”. If Texas govn. can't do anything to avoid these laws, the Bubbas “ain't” giving in to a “damn guberment gun grab”.

19 posted on 12/29/2012 9:22:25 AM PST by Marcella (Prepping can save your life today. Going Galt is freedom.)
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To: Ruy Dias de Bivar
filled with a stripper clip.

Only if you have strong thumbs and know the trick. ;)

I don't care what law they pass, I'm not giving up my firearms.

/johnny

20 posted on 12/29/2012 9:25:02 AM PST by JRandomFreeper (Gone Galt)
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