“Libertarian” Gun Control? Not!

        
For someone who single-handedly brought about the landmark Heller decision, it is nearly incomprehensible Robert Levy penned the atrocity that appeared under his name in the New York Times . The Old Gray Lady used Levy’s stature to heap decidedly un-libertarian blessings on the re-submission of the defeated Manchin-Toomey “compromise” gun control legislation. That the Times so bastardized “libertarian” as an adjective to warn lawmakers is not surprising.

Levy recommends the Senate should pass the bill warts and all lest they and gun owners suffer “…accusations from President Obama and others that they are merely obstructionists, zealots who will not agree to common-sense gun legislation”. 

(ahem) What happened to principles vs. ad homonyms?

 Other errors of omission or commission:

<<It would allow Americans to buy handguns from out-of-state sellers, which is not allowed currently. >>

Wrong as written. A handgun seller in Peoria can sell to anyone in the USA providing it is shipped to the buyer’s FFL holder and said buyer successfully submit to the BATFE Form 4473 processing through the NICS System. Regardless of the local FFL participation, the buyer is purchasing the handgun from an out of state seller. The M-T compromise does not circumvent or eliminate the 4473 - NICS process.

<It would explicitly prohibit the creation of a national gun registry, and make it a felony, punishable by up to 15 years in prison, to misuse records from the national database used for background checks.>

Even the Most Tenuously Connected know this and previous administrations have wallowed in multiple violations of the Constitution, Bill of Rights, Rule of Law, Magna Carta, Ten Commandments, Ms. Manners and the Red Hat Society. Government’s collective (pun intended) record continues to grow poorly disguised as the US Revised Code, SCOTUS precedents and innumerable suffocating regulations. To wit: HHS Kathleen Sebelius' latest move conjoining HIPPA and NICS to "share" your personal health info in order to “insure” elusive “public safety” remarkably ignoring that sharing health info via HIPPA is illegal.

 “Extending background checks to unlicensed sellers shouldn’t be cause for alarm...”

One word: Infringe. Another word: Waco. Can anything originating within government have a positive relationship with advancing Freedom, Liberty, and Individual Responsibility? When has this President - or any politician - spoke out affirmatively for Life, Liberty, Private Property and then so much as proposed legislation enhancing any one of them or repealing just one of those that trespass those unalienable rights? How about some old-fashioned facts such legislation would advance safety one iota?

Cue the crickets…..                                                   

 “…the taxpayers - not just law-abiding gun owners - should foot some of the bill [to add] more F.B.I. staff members to manage the database [to]help expedite the process..The government needs to hire enough staff members to promptly conduct checks…”

This is hardly the libertarian notion of smaller government and less regulatory intrusion. It is confounding any genuine libertarian would place such faith in the efficiency and benevolence of federal agencies.

“Gun-rights supporters should not stand in the way of reasonable reform.”

Here’s real libertarian “reasonable”, courtesy of an Oregon jurist: Repeal of FOPA 86, GCA 68, NFA34. Enact a statute requiring that any local, county, state, or federal official who violates the 2^nd Amendment shall be subject to a 10 year minimum prison sentence at hard labor. Hand copying the Constitution. With quill and parchment. With a minimum of 5,000 error and smudge free copies required to be produced before he's unshackled. Copies to be sold to help defray the costs of his daily gruel.

All in favor………….?

What's missing in all “gun control” discussions is the inconvenient fact the Constitution, as written, does not grant the federal government any authority over firearms within the 50 united States irrespective of the Second Amendment.

“The Manchin-Toomey proposal, with the changes I’ve suggested, would offer substantial benefits while imposing tolerable restrictions...”

Who gets to define "tolerable"? As the quote worthy Tom Sowell notes: “The most basic question is not necessarily what’s “best”, but who shall decide what’s best.” (Emphasis mine).
“...none of which intrude on our core Second Amendment liberties.”

So incremental intrusion (see also: infringement) is OK? There is nothing “libertarian” about that!

  “Mancin-Toomey would offer substantial benefits while imposing tolerable restrictions”

The perfect epitaph for the Second Amendment.

As posted at Lew Rockwell.com