How is the State Rights thing working out for you Tea Party...... and here you thought it would only be used to discriminate against gays and pregnant women.

State_College_Arsonist: By defining the Second Amendment as essentially worthless, of course the new bans and regulations won't infringe upon the right to bear arms. What a surprise.

Well that's the problem when you're talking about a document written when "bearing arms" was limited by the very fastest guns firing at a rate of 2-3 shots per minute... and that was in the hands of a quality soldier who drilled on the loading and firing of the guns as part of his job.

Also, even a casual reading of the 2nd amendment clearly suggests that the intent wasn't for everyone to go around with two shootin' irons at their side. It's about protecting the citizenry from a tyrannical government... not about protecting your one bedroom apartment from someone coming in through the fire escape. The idea seems to be that citizens would run and arm an organized militia that would serve to defend the town or city or state or whatever from corrupt men exercising the unilateral and self-serving power of say... a monarch.

This is not to say that people shouldn't be able to own guns under controlled circumstances with a decent reason (like hunters or target shooters). It's simply that the 2nd Amendment doesn't seem to suggest that the constitution protects any right of an individual to buy a gun just in case some crook tries to "make his day".

Can someone bottom line this for me - will I still be able to kill my friends and neighbors when I've decided they're tyrannical?

Skeptos: queezyweezel: Skeptos: God bless Andrew Cuomo.

Fark the NRA and the gun nuts.

/NYer

Hopefully they ban fatty food next.

When will they close the "Just buy 2 sodas" large soda loophole?

MetaCarpal: Wait, wait -- We're allowed to own guns?

/NYC resident



"I'm not saying you can't own a gun. Hell, I'm not even saying you can't carry a gun. You just can't carry a gun in town."

God bless Andrew Cuomo.

Fark the NRA and the gun nuts.

/NYer

So the take away from this thread is that when the anti-gun control folks said "do something about mental health and keep the guns away from the crazy people instead" after Sandy Hook, they were just completely full of shiat.

So would all the defenders of states rights please step up and defend the right of NYS to make its own laws?

flux: Philip Francis Queeg: And what harm does banning flash suppressors do? Is there a reason you desire to be able to shoot at night without the flash being seen?

Well, looking at it practically as an owner of an about-to-be-illegal weapon, let's say you're trying to modify it so that it's legal. You could get a new, non-adjustable stock without a pistol grip, and remove or disable the bayonet mount, but because this new law is "one-feature", your weapon is still illegal, because of the flash suppressor. If it's threaded, that's ok -- remove it. If it's fixed, you either have to have some kind of shroud welded around it or have it chopped off, which might make your barrel too short to be legal. Or, I guess you could spend a couple hundred bucks on a new barrel.

It also makes a lot of target handguns illegal. I dunno, overall, I don't have a lot of problems with this law, I guess. But I think the mag cap is the only really effective part -- the rest just severely inconveniences gun owners without changing the effectiveness of the weapon. I guess I think if you want legislation to pass, it should be simple and not overly-inconvenient for owners, like a flat-out mag limit, rather than "now you have to spend eight hundred dollars re-building your no-longer-legal rifle to make it into a legal rifle that shoots the same bullets at the same rate of fire, but has to be held slightly differently."

The mag capacity just seems so... arbitrary... though.

10 was the old limit in NY state. Is there anything stating what kind of magazines the Sandy Hook shooter used? I'm willing to bet it's higher than 10, or 15 (what New Jersey uses, IIRC). If you're already on the low end, and no real shootings occurred under the old law... then why bother with changing? Furthermore, I can't think of a good source for 7 round magazines for any rifle, "assault weapon" or not. Five-rounders aren't easy to find, either.

It's just so... hackneyed. It's feel-good legislation, at least with the "assault weapon" provisions.

Marine1: Philip Francis Queeg: queezyweezel: wee: (VI) A FLASH SUPPRESSOR, MUZZLE BREAK, MUZZLE COMPENSATOR, OR THREADED BARREL DESIGNED TO ACCOMMODATE A FLASH SUPPRESSOR, MUZZLE BREAK, OR MUZZLE COMPENSATOR; Those retards don't even know what the fark a muzzle brake is...

I like the banning of flash suppressors....When in the history of EVER have civilian casualties been limited because the shooter was shooting at night, and people didn't know where the shots were coming from because they couldn't see the muzzle flash?  These kinds of feel-good gun control measures make me spit.

And what harm does banning flash suppressors do? Is there a reason you desire to be able to shoot at night without the flash being seen?

Flash suppressors don't just hide the flash from other people, they hide it from you. If you're waking up to someone in your house at 3:00 AM, and end up firing on that person, you can be temporarily blinded by muzzle flash. This is a problem when you're trying to control a threat.
Overall, it's not really a big deal to have one on a firearm, and they don't make a weapon any more or less lethal in the situations this legislation is meant to prevent. It's another example of people not knowing what they're dealing with when it comes to firearms.

If it's dark enough that you are worried about being blinded by the muzzle flash, how are you identifying the target as worthy of being killed by you? Do you randomly fire at shadows on a regular basis?

Went through the New York Post article for this. Here's my take for each provision mentioned in the article. If my understandings of each provision are inaccurate, please find me the accurate source. NYP article

"The legislation, called the New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement Act, or NYSAFE, now defines an assault weapon as any having detachable magazines and one military-style feature, instead of two."

-Not particularly meaningful, as "military-style features" are more often than not effective measures of a weapon's "lethality".

"It also includes a ban on all magazines that hold more than seven rounds, and bans direct Internet ammunition sales. "

-Seven round magazines are very difficult to find for any weapon, "military style" or not. Most Internet ammunition suppliers did not ship to New York state before this law, so the effect of this legislation remains to be seen.

"The bill calls for universal background checks for all gun sales, as well as real-time background checks of ammunition purchases in order to alert State Police to high-volume buyers. "

-This would be a change, albeit a minor one. Federal law already maintains a background check system, which must be filled out in-store at a gun shop with a Federal Firearms License (FFL). Falsification of said form is prosecutable as perjury.

I have yet to see the specific number that would indicate "high-volume" ammunition purchases, which could be an editorial omission. If not, it leaves open the possibility of arbitrary decisions by the government as to what constitutes such a purchase, which is never a good thing. Furthermore, many marksmen and hunters make large purchases before hunting seasons in order to practice. The State Police in New York would probably be catching more false alarms with this technique than actual problems.

"Individuals who already own assault weapons will be required to register them within a year and be recertified every five years."

This is not yet mandated by Federal law. In my opinion, it makes the rather tacky assumption that people who own such firearms are, by their very nature, mentally ill. If evaluations are to be made, they should be on the scale of the entire population.

"There is also a "Webster provision," which calls for a life-without-parole sentence for killers of first responders. The measure was inspired by the Christmas Eve shooting in upstate Webster that killed two firefighters responding to a blaze."

- Fair enough.

"If the bill passes, mental-health professionals would be required to report potentially dangerous patients - who could then have their guns yanked - and mentally ill inmates would have to undergo review before being released from prison. Mandatory treatment for potentially dangerous mentally ill individuals would be broadened to a year, up from the current six months. "

-Arguably the most useful provision of this bill. It's already illegal to sell a weapon to a dangerously unstable person, but there was no real way to report this.

"Also under the bill, the state would develop an electronic gun- permit database to identify individuals disqualified from owning guns. Private gun transfers would require background checks, except for immediate family. "

The electronic database would be useful, but people who are criminals usually ignore sources that would require background checks. This won't change with the immediate family provision.

"Sen. Martin Golden (R-Brooklyn) said the bill also strengthens penalties for guns used in gang activities and allows prosecution of each gang member who uses a so-called "community gun.""

-Again, fair enough.

"The legislation included provisions pushed for by Republicans, including making it a felony to possess a firearm on school grounds or a school bus and allowing pistol-permit holders to request their personal information not be made public. "

-It's already a felony to possess a firearm on school grounds or a school bus, and has been for quite a while at the national level. Such laws have had little effect in blocking people who intend to use weapons to harm those on school grounds.

The removal of pistol-permit owner information from the public record is a good thing. A New York newspaper recently published the addresses of many such permit holders in Manhattan, making these individuals targets for burglaries and discrimination.

"Politicians from both sides of the aisle noted that Cuomo, who was planning to waive a three-day aging period for bills and allow lawmakers to vote on the gun legislation immediately, would beat the White House with the nation's first gun-control package."

-Forcing legislation is never a good thing, Governor.
The bill is a mixture of some measures that could have some chance of working and pure superstitious garbage, shoved through by a legislature that is made of people who know little or nothing about what they care to legislate.