Back in the Saddle

After a hiatus and proper period of mourning the election results, the Truthacher has returned. The ache remains.

The National Rifle Association's Institute for Legislative Action has a great article exposing one of the great lie-tellers in America, that being the anti-gun rights lobby (reproduced in part here):

It is a simple matter of fact, beyond dispute, that for years prior to passage of the Brady Act, the organization now known as the Brady Campaign called for a waiting period on handgun sales and vigorously opposed the establishment of the National Instant Check System (NICS). The anti-gun group, when known as Handgun Control Inc., ranted and raved against instant check legislation ...

While NRA strongly opposed the Brady Act because of its five-day waiting period, when Congress passed the Brady Act in 1993, it contained a provision authorizing its waiting period on dealer handgun sales only until a NICS could be established. ... The final bill required that the NICS become operational within five years. As it turned out, Brady’s prized waiting period, which Brady claimed could reduce so-called “crimes of passion” (though by the group’s own admission no data existed to support such a theory) was abolished after only four years and nine months ... having been replaced by the NICS in November 1998.

President Bill Clinton signed the Brady Act in November 1993, however, so in November 2008 the Brady Campaign released a 15-year anniversary propaganda paper praising itself and – you guessed it – calling for a federal law prohibiting private sales of firearms, not just those at gun shows, but all private sales. ...

The title of Brady’s anniversary propaganda? Get this: “Brady Background Checks: 15 Years of Saving Lives.” Brady checks? These are the same instant checks that Brady has opposed for 20 years, and which have been conducted for the last 10 years, instead of the waiting period that was in place for less than five years before! ...

Adding to (the) lie, Brady claims “the National Rifle Association (NRA) fought long and hard to block Brady background checks.” While NRA opposes waiting periods, it supported NICS, and Brady worked hard to block it. ...

Adding further to the lie, is Brady’s pretense that the Brady Act is the reason that violent crime has declined in recent years. The Act “has been a resounding success by stopping more than 1.6 million potentially dangerous people from purchasing a gun from a licensed gun dealer,” the group claims.

The reality is something much different. First of all, as the FBI states in its annual national crime report , a variety of factors determine the type and volume of crime, and none of these factors is guns, gun ownership, or gun laws. And the Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service, National Academy of Sciences, National Institutes of Justice, and others have studied gun control and found no evidence that it reduces crime at home or abroad. (emphasis added)

Secondly, the nation’s violent crime rate began declining in 1991, three years before the Brady Act took effect. And violent crime committed with weapons other than guns has declined, as well as violent crime with guns – the only weapons requiring a background check. This is largely due to tougher criminal justice policies imposed in the states during the 1990s, such as mandatory sentencing and reduction of probation and parole of violent criminals – precisely what NRA has advocated for years.

Thirdly, Brady incorrectly assumes that denying gun sales must necessarily decrease crime. ... However, since 1991, the number of new guns sold to private citizens has increased by 70 million, and total violent crime has decreased 38 percent, including a 43 percent decrease in murder. Let’s not forget also the deterrent factor posed against criminals by the Right-to-Carry laws now in effect in 40 states. (emphasis added)

Brady also claims that before the Brady Act, “gun traffickers had it easy” with “new handguns bought easily over-the-counter in states with weak gun laws.” The fact is, however, that prior to the Brady Act, the 18 states and the District of Columbia that already had Brady-like laws delaying the acquisition of firearms – including waiting periods, purchase permit requirements, and license requirements – accounted for 63 percent of the nation’s violent crimes. Therefore, the Brady Act – particularly during the waiting period phase favored by the Brady Campaign –never had an effect on jurisdictions where most violent crimes occur.

Naturally, the media have reported Brady’s claims as gospel. But otherwise, the anniversary propaganda is little more than a pathetic attempt by a decreasingly significant group whose agenda has been rejected time and again.