As we discussed earlier, the Justice Department issued a statement after the passage of state laws legalizing marijuana that they would not affected federal enforcement. Obama officials also stated after the election (after being silent during the campaign) that marijuana policy would not change. Now, President Obama has given an interview that the federal government will not make enforcement a “priority” against recreational users. This is being billed as a major scope on “Obama’s pot problem.” However, there may be less than meets the eye here. He does not address the organizations and distributors of legal marijuana, which his Administration has cracked down on for the last four years. It also raises an interesting contradiction with other fields where Obama had insisted that matters are left to the Justice Department on questions of enforcement.
Obama told ABC “We’ve got bigger fish to fry . . . It would not make sense for us to see a top priority as going after recreational users in states that have determined that it’s legal.” His use of “recreational users” is telling. The state police generally goes after recreational users. The controversy for the last four years has been the Administration’s crackdown on distributors and growers who supply legal marijuana for medical use etc.
The statement also contradicts the statements of officials in the Administration. The U.S. Attorney’s office in Seattle (the highest Justice official in the state) issued a public warning after the election that “[r]egardless of any changes in state law, including the change that will go into effect on Dec. 6 in Washington state, growing, selling or possessing any amount of marijuana remains illegal under federal law. … Neither states nor the executive branch can nullify a statute passed by Congress.”
As I noted earlier that the Justice Department statement is a curious statement since the Obama Administration recently did precisely that in the immigration area — it declared that it would no longer enforce the express law with regard to certain illegal aliens. It also refused to defend such laws as the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Moreover, the Justice Department routinely makes decisions on the allocation of resources and priorities. Likewise, soon after taking office, Obama notoriously went to the CIA and assured CIA employees that they would not be prosecuted for torture, even though he admitted that water boarding used is torture. The President’s statement would reflect that he is going that route, but only for recreational users.
He remains uncertain, however, on how he can refuse to enforce this federal law despite his promise not to prosecute torture at the CIA or refusal to enforce immigration rules: “This is a tough problem, because Congress has not yet changed the law,” Obama said. “I head up the executive branch; we’re supposed to be carrying out laws. And so what we’re going to need to have is a conversation about, How do you reconcile a federal law that still says marijuana is a federal offense and state laws that say that it’s legal?”
He can clearly make marijuana enforcement a non-priority and I agree with that move. Yet, such statements on “users” avoids the primary question. Will he continue his controversial policy of cracking down on distributors and growers in these states?
Source: ABC
And what OS said.
I would be surprised if the long gun of choice for gun violence isn’t the shotgun. Easy to use. Hard (almost impossible) to trace.
300 million firearms of which zero fired themselves.
And let me get this straight, raff: you propose to do away with semi-automatic hand guns. Correct? Have you watched none of the marksmen videos OS has posted in the past? A revolver with speed loaders is just as deadly and fast in the right hands. Do you want to ban speed loaders? Do you have any idea how much resistance that would create in police departments who have been using semi-automatics and speed loaders for decades? In people who prefer semi-automatics for self-defense? It would not only create huge pushback, but as OS has pointed out before, would you like the job of going around and collecting people’s guns? I think not. And let’s say you do ban their sale, theirs a huge secondary market for guns right now. The prices would triple and the deals would be made in back alleys and other nefarious places. I knew a guy in Dallas 15 year ago (and still do if he isn’t dead and he might be) that I could go buy literally almost anything I wanted from – civilian or military – if I had the cash. Or drugs. Or stolen cars. Special orders.
Not a nice guy. In fact, one of the few people I know I consider outright evil. Is this the guy you want controlling the flow of semi-automatic hand guns? Because if you outlaw them, he and his ilk will.
The genie is out of the bottle.
“You show me a swordsman who can defeat someone with a .223 semi-automatic Bushmaster thaen maybe we can agree.”
If he’s within blade range? Not a problem. It’s all about range.
raff,
The shooter never used the .223 rifle that was found in his car. Actually, long guns are only used in about 3% of homicides every year in the US, and only a small percentage of that 3% are military type weapons. Most long guns used in murder are either hunting rifles or shotguns. I have not looked up the statistics, but I would wager that most long gun murders are with shotguns.
A semi-auto is simply a gun that reloads itself after each shot, but only fires one shot with each trigger pull.
A full-auto weapon is either a machine gun or submachine gun. A submachine gun is one designed to shoot pistol bullets rather than rifle bullets. They fire repeatedly with one pull of the trigger. Full-auto weapons have been heavily regulated ever since 1934, and you need to almost be independently wealthy to own one legally. A true assault weapon is one that has a “select fire” switch. It can be switched between semi and full auto. They come under the control of the Firearms Act of 1934.
A revolver is a form of semi-auto weapon, in that it shoots every time you pull the trigger. It is just the mechanism for carrying the rounds that is different.
You can shoot a revolver really fast if you practice a lot. Like 12 shots with one reload in 2.99 seconds.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/09/mass-shootings-investigation America now has 300 million firearms, a barage of NRA backed gun laws and a record number of mass shootings.
No, Gene. We have to stop killers and the semi-automatic guns that make it easier for people to massacre six year olds. You show me a swordsman who can defeat someone with a .223 semi-automatic Bushmaster thaen maybe we can agree. Gun violence in our country is out of control, but the answer from the Right is religion in public schools and in Michigan, guns in school!!
Charles M. Blow @CharlesMBlow
…There are millions of ppl suffering with/dealing with mental illness who never behave violently…
Elaine,
Leave it to Huckleberry. Is he suggesting that mentally ill people shoot people because they couldn’t pray in school? What an idiot!
Charles M. Blow @CharlesMBlow
Ppl put too much emphasis on mental illness in these shootings and not enough on the guns in my opinion…
raff,
“The choice of weapon does matter. When someone who may have had mental health issues is able to get guns of this magnitude, it endangers everyone that comes into his path. Knives and swords are no equivalent or anywhere near as dangerous as a semi-automatic weapon.”
Our primary difference is what do we each consider reasonable. Outlawing semi-automatic handguns is only going to create a black market in semi-automatic handguns. As for design? Let’s be honest about design. Handguns are made for killing people be they revolver or semi-automatic. And the chances of getting people to agree to ban handguns is slim to non-existent. High capacity clips? Certain kinds of bullets? Weapons that are easily convertible to full auto? Those are all up for discussion, but in the end, we need to stop killers, not guns. OS’s hammer/carpenter analogy is apt. A tool is not a user.
However, I’m going to have to disagree on the lethality of an edged weapon the in hands of a trained user. They are harder to use than a gun, true, but they are every bit as lethal. Guns make it easy to kill – point and click – but as a species we’ve been killing each other with variations on pointed sticks, knives, club and axes (and other variations on levers) for hundreds of thousands of years before gunpowder was even invented. The earliest known missile weapon other than a spear is an atl, nothing more than a simple lever to throw arrows. A determined attacker will find a way to hurt someone. Did you see the story about the guy who attacked four people in Arkansas (?) this week by setting them on fire? Or the bow and arrow attack a couple of weeks ago? Surely you’ve seen stories where someone was simply beat to death. You can kill someone with your thumb and forefinger if you know what you are doing.
OS,
The vest comment was an aside to the general theme that semi-automatic weapons don’t belong in civilain hands, let alone mentally ill hands.
yankeefarer,
We have suffered through Thirty plus school shootings in a decade or two so a discussion to curb dangerous weapons is not being rushed into. How many years since Columbie in 1999 do we have to wait?
“To all the gun defenders out there, can the government regulate (or ban) civilian possession of RPGs? What about depleted uranium rounds?” David Corn, Mother Jones
Obama….. A man you can trust…… Roflmao…… Sure…. And when we find the blue dress with the stain….. We will ll feel better…..
Obey Propaganda…… The nazis demanded….expected you to do the same……
Mike Huckabee: Newtown Shooting No Surprise, We’ve ‘Systematically Removed God’ From Schools
The Huffington Post
By Nick Wing & Paige Lavender
Posted: 12/14/2012
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/14/mike-huckabee-school-shooting_n_2303792.html
Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee (R) weighed in on the massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn. on Friday, saying the crime was no surprise because we have “systematically removed God” from public schools.
“We ask why there is violence in our schools, but we have systematically removed God from our schools,” Huckabee said on Fox News. “Should we be so surprised that schools would become a place of carnage?”
This line of reasoning isn’t new for Huckabee.
Speaking about a mass shooting in Aurora, Colo. over the summer, the former GOP presidential candidate claimed that such violent episodes were a function of a nation suffering from the removal of religion from the public sphere.
“We don’t have a crime problem, a gun problem or even a violence problem. What we have is a sin problem,” Huckabee said on Fox News. “And since we’ve ordered God out of our schools, and communities, the military and public conversations, you know we really shouldn’t act so surprised … when all hell breaks loose.”
I have no issue with keeping guns from the mentally ill, however, if science isn’t going to be your guide, what do you propose, LK? The Courts decide without medical input? Voodoo? Maybe an Ecclesiastical Court to determine who is evil and who isn’t? Teachers, as early interactors, are not a bad place to start for referrals, however, that leads to problems I’ll address in a minute.
Psychology and psychiatry are not perfect tools, but they are the best we have. Like all science, it is a work in progress and tomorrow’s knowledge will supplant today’s.
Health care, including mental health care, is voluntary except in extreme circumstances. Mandating mental health will not work. It violates free will, it infringes on privacy and your right to self and it would infringe upon religious choice in some cases. Mandating mental health care is a non-starter without Constitutional amendment and that would be an amendment not only difficult in the extreme to gain enough popular support for, but it wouldn’t withstand Constitutional challenge on a 1st and/or 14th Amendment basis. As such, universal free voluntary mental health care would reduce, not eliminate these kinds of events. Involuntary commitment proceedings add another layer of protection from people who are manifest dangers to others and/or themselves. Combine traditional methods with emergent sciences like using fMRI to detect psychopaths and sociopaths for those in therapy and you have yet another layer of protection. However, if you want a perfect solution, one does not exist. It can’t exist mathematically. The system is too complex and complexity breeds error. There is no way around that. Randomness is built in to the universe. Rejecting a solution with the greatest possibility of mitigation because it is imperfect is the Nirvana fallacy. Someone determined to kill another is difficult to impossible to stop without foreknowledge of their intent and capacity for violence. Add to that that insanity often skirts genius in unconventional thinking. You cannot protect against a harm you cannot predict. However, your protestation that a mental health screening violates rights can be systemically minimized. For everyone in voluntary therapy, make a “blind” end-user database based on psychiatric records. It could run just like a background check or NCIC except it simply lists if the person is under treatment (not for what) and whether their diagnosis indicates they are a possible firearms danger. If a person is denied a purchase, they should have a right to appeal – before a triumvirate or some other kind of board (possibly with one judge on the board to cover ancillary legal issues) – to see if the block on sales is medically justified or not. Again, this would not be perfect. People would slip through the net. But it can be done in a way that minimally infringes upon rights. And that is the whole trick of good governance: to maximize societal benefits while minimizing the rational infringement of rights. It’s the fulcrum in the scale of the social compact. Government is a machine. It is designed. And like all machines, it only functions as well as its innate design allows it to function.
However, if you want to see one picture of a world with mandated mental health care, I suggest reading any of Greg Bear’s Mary Choi novels. They are effectively police procedurals/mysteries set in the near future. Even in that world, crime still happens. Even murder. And they are a fun read to boot. Based on your other taste in S/F literature, I think you’d like them.
http://gawker.com/5968679/the-second-most-powerful-gun-lobby-in-the-country-is-located-in-newtown-conn
The tipping point for a different guy was a woman saying: “No, we’re done.”
http://articles.nydailynews.com/2010-03-25/local/27059890_1_happy-land-social-club-hondurans-elias-colon
No license, no permit, no waiting period, no insurance, no mandatory training. Just 87 dead.
Swarthmore Mom: David Corn has a simplistic view, as in that same era you could buy a keg of gunpowder with only the money required to do so.
Blackpowder was used as a blasting agent for mining, quarrying, removal of stumps, destruction of ledge, and in time of conflict, filling and launching explosive artillery shells, blowing up ships, buildings, and breaching defenses.
At 7:40 pm, on different boards, Gene and I had the same fear: another media frenzied rush towards a PATRIOT Act look-alike.
If the amnesty and gun buy-back doesn’t work… then what? Use DHS to kick doors and search town-by-town, house-by-house, room-by-room, and gun-down anyone who might – or does – resist?
Will we then elect as President-for-Life our own Uncle Joe?
Khrushchev forecasted the demise of our country would be our own undoing, not that of a foreign force or power.
I see gun control something like car a car license. There is testing to pass, safety issue to learn & practice. When you get caught with a violation you can take a driving safety course to refresh your memory.
How did the mother allow her son access to these guns? They should have been locked up in a secure gun safe. maybe one day we can get fingerprint technology on guns- they will not fire unless they get the right scan.
We should and could require gun evaluation safety courses, like a dog license, every 5 years or so. Gun enthusiasts should be happy to show their skills. Have the instructors evaluate knowledge, skills and at home storage and rate people on a scale.
If someone is not able to control a weapon properly they should not own that weapon.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/15/nyregion/adam-lanza-an-enigma-who-is-now-identified-as-a-mass-killer.html?pagewanted=2&_r=0&smid=tw-share Said to have had Aspergers.
Raff, I have now posted a reply twice and this is my third try. The internet gremlins are out tonight.
Body armor is available for civilian purchase. It is available at many police supply stores as well. As for regulating it, it might be hard to justify on the grounds that many people outside of law enforcement have personal reasons for wanting it. Just because less than a half dozen or so criminals a year might use it for nefarious purposes, makes stringent regulation hard to justify.
Google “bulletproof vests” and “body armor.” There are a lot of suppliers out there.
Gene, I don’t consider my logic any more facile than calling for early identification of mentally unstable or ill citizens and intervening in some fashion to render them less of a threat to themselves or others. In fact, it’s probably a lot less facile regarding the lethality of edged weapons; not every spree killer and casual thug is going to have knife skills at a level needed to insure lethality anymore than every spree killer and casual thug has the gun skills to insure lethality. The difference is though the range required for damage to be done and the amount of damage inherent in the type of weapon used. Knife wounds do not carry the same level of lethality of gun wounds. Obviously, a well planned fire trumps both.
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/1997/02/24/knives-00006/
Involuntary commitment, civil commitment and involuntary treatment are currently available to states and the federal government for sex offenders.
Currently, Sex offenders that have been convicted of crimes, can, after having served their sentences still be retained in custody because they are determined to still mentally ill/dangerous. This is reflected in state and federal laws.
Expanding that to a more general population is IMO a much more dangerous and complicated process, subject to political and cultural influences, that make it a great threat to fundamental civil liberties.
While it is easy to agree that “Early detection of pathology and early intervention are the only thing that would have avoided this.” and it is easy to point at the glaring failures in the system that is currently in place that have contributed to such spree killings what is actually being proposed?
What mechanisms would be put in place to monitor behavior and assess behaviors (as well as attitudes and thoughts that might be or lead to) what(ever) is considered a danger to oneself or society at large? How early would that assessment start? Would it be mandatory or voluntary? Who would perform it? Where would the criteria come from? The DSM which listed homosexuality as a mental illness until 20 years ago but just recently downgraded beast-f***ing (Srsly?). Perhaps it can be rolled into a teachers duties for children, after some sort of training of course. Perhaps regular mental health screenings could be made a condition of employment for everyone employed or receiving unemployment insurance or other ‘safety net’ payments?
Here’s the problem with the calls for better detection/identification and intervention, once you get too far past a mechanism for making mental health services dirt cheap/free and flooding every city with practioners you start impinging on civil rights in a big way and/or talking about an infrastructure that is more appropriate for a scifi novel than a free society. To just say that we want our guns but need a better mental health infrastructure (without a plan) is pretty facile as well. How would a better mental health infrastructure work that wouldn’t destroy civil liberties but would prevent this kind of tragedy?
***
“Then, in 1990, Washington state became the first to pass an innovative civil commitment law specifically for violent sex offenders. California, Wisconsin and New York, among others, later followed. Such “predator laws” focused on risk assessment and prevention of re-offending. It is a concept that the general public may not be aware exists.
The Supreme Court has upheld the use of such laws when the individual goal is rehabilitation, not further “punishment.” But it has another, broader purpose.
“The primary goal is incapacitation, that is, protecting society from people who are predicted to be dangerous in the future,” said Eric Janus, author of “Failure to Protect” and dean at William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, Minnesota. “The second goal is to provide treatment to these individuals.””
http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/01/12/scotus.sex.offender.law/index.html