3 hours ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

I can readily acknowledge that our culture (or that is to say, varied cultures across large sometimes disparate geographic regions) plays a big part in gun violence.

I can also acknowledge that lack of access to asylums that mentally unstable individuals might have been thrown into in previous generations has a big effect specifically on the mass shootings that make the news. (regardless of whatever other problems these asylums caused, they did serve the public in this one regard)

yet you cannot acknowledge that 4-5x as many guns in circulation per capita, and the ability to purchase 3-5x as many guns with the same buying power as 50-100 years ago, also contributes. 

who's the one being lazy?

Still you

you said it yourself the number of homes with guns stayed consistent. So to present the argument that per capita matters is lazy or outright dishonest/stupid

the mental institutions are the first valid correlation you are making. So should we go back to locking people up?

1 minute ago, ToastJenkins said:

So should we go back to locking people up?

Yes. We can start with all the Trump voters.

1 hour ago, we_gotta_believe said:

Hey look at that, you're starting to get it. 

I do, but you’re not there yet.

 

Why would they make them available but prohibitively expensive for the average person of the time. 

9 minutes ago, Bill said:

I do, but you’re not there yet.

 

Why would they make them available but prohibitively expensive for the average person of the time. 

Oh I get it now, you don't know what the word prohibitively means.

2 hours ago, we_gotta_believe said:

Oh I get it now, you don't know what the word prohibitively means.

It’s a simple question. Just answer it. 

31 minutes ago, Bill said:

It’s a simple question. Just answer it. 

To own the libs obviously.

Who wants to start a two-man EMB podcast with me?

Love Boat themed, of course, but general banter about American football, darjeeling tea, and vector spaces

who's in?

6 hours ago, we_gotta_believe said:

To own the libs obviously.

Why didn’t the NFA of 1934 just outright ban those guns? Why did they make it prohibitively expensive for the poors to own the guns in question but not for the bourgeoisie?

6 hours ago, Bill said:

Why didn’t the NFA of 1934 just outright ban those guns? Why did they make it prohibitively expensive for the poors to own the guns in question but not for the bourgeoisie?

Whatever point you think you're making, it's bad and continues to make you look really dumb the longer you keep at it.

16 hours ago, ToastJenkins said:

Still you

you said it yourself the number of homes with guns stayed consistent. So to present the argument that per capita matters is lazy or outright dishonest/stupid

the mental institutions are the first valid correlation you are making. So should we go back to locking people up?

You're being willfully obtuse. 

17 hours ago, Bill said:

I do, but you’re not there yet.

 

Why would they make them available but prohibitively expensive for the average person of the time. 

De facto ban

5 hours ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

You're being willfully obtuse. 

7 hours ago, we_gotta_believe said:

Whatever point you think you're making, it's bad and continues to make you look really dumb the longer you keep at it.

I’m not the one refusing to answer a simple question. 

6 hours ago, ToastJenkins said:

De facto ban

For who?  And for why?

33 minutes ago, Bill said:

For who?  And for why?

Ban meaning everyone.

by making price abusurd and supply very scarce (and fading over time).

why? Thats obvious. Its the objective 

1 hour ago, Bill said:

I’m not the one refusing to answer a simple question. 

JFC, Bill. It was one of first pieces of federal legislation that was in direct opposition to the 2A. Presumably they figured a challenge was inevitable so instead of an outright ban, they used a tax and registration policy under the interstate commerce clause because I'm guessing they determined that would be more viable and more likely to withstand legal scrutiny. Just so happens that it did go before the SCOTUS a few years later and was upheld, so turns out they kinda had the right idea.

Not that any of this is even remotely relevant since you've already conceded the main point I made, which was that the stamp cost was prohibitively expensive. And since you are using words you clearly don't understand the meaning of, it means it was expensive enough to prohibit the possession of these weapons, which is exactly what they were ultimately trying to achieve. So now maybe it's time you answer a question for me, have you always been this stupid and I just never realized it, or is this more of a recent thing with you?

2 hours ago, we_gotta_believe said:

JFC, Bill. It was one of first pieces of federal legislation that was in direct opposition to the 2A. Presumably they figured a challenge was inevitable so instead of an outright ban, they used a tax and registration policy under the interstate commerce clause because I'm guessing they determined that would be more viable and more likely to withstand legal scrutiny. Just so happens that it did go before the SCOTUS a few years later and was upheld, so turns out they kinda had the right idea.

Not that any of this is even remotely relevant since you've already conceded the main point I made, which was that the stamp cost was prohibitively expensive. And since you are using words you clearly don't understand the meaning of, it means it was expensive enough to prohibit the possession of these weapons, which is exactly what they were ultimately trying to achieve. So now maybe it's time you answer a question for me, have you always been this stupid and I just never realized it, or is this more of a recent thing with you?

US v Miller was about the transporting of restricted arms across state lines by two defendants, not as a broad appeal by an organization. But anyway. 
 

 

If you make a widget prohibitively expensive for the middle and lower class, is that widget effectively prohibited for all? If no, then who is not prohibited in the purchase of said widget?

6 minutes ago, Bill said:

US v Miller was about the transporting of restricted arms across state lines by two defendants, not as a broad appeal by an organization. But anyway. 
 

 

If you make a widget prohibitively expensive for the middle and lower class, is that widget effectively prohibited for all? If no, then who is not prohibited in the purchase of said widget?

Yeah you might have had even a semblance of a point if I had ever said it was prohibited for literally everyone. But of course I didn't, and of course you come out of this looking like an absolute moron for going in circles for two days straight pretending I ever did. I take back what I said about you being kinda dumb, turns out you're far dumber.

4 hours ago, we_gotta_believe said:

Yeah you might have had even a semblance of a point if I had ever said it was prohibited for literally everyone. But of course I didn't, and of course you come out of this looking like an absolute moron for going in circles for two days straight pretending I ever did. I take back what I said about you being kinda dumb, turns out you're far dumber.

Argumentum ad hominem. 
 

If a widget is prohibitively expensive for the lower and middle class, which class is it not prohibitively expensive for?

12 minutes ago, Bill said:

Argumentum ad hominem. 
 

If a widget is prohibitively expensive for the lower and middle class, which class is it not prohibitively expensive for?

Me. 
 

You all need to be less poor already. 

5 hours ago, vikas83 said:

Me. 
 

You all need to be less poor already. 

Bingo. 
 

So why is it that a law that was to "combat organized crime” had a cut out so that those in the upper echelon of society could afford them? Let’s discuss. 
 

Looking at the text of the law, you need to purchase a $200 tax stamp in order to purchase a machine gun, short barreled rifle or shotgun, a suppressor, or any other weapon (essentially anything not a pistol/revolver that could be concealed), and that a person has to notify the government when they’re taking those things across state lines and explicitly state where you’re taking them to.  (Why did I emphasize that? I’ll circle back later.)

So what’s with the provisions for the short barrels or the AOW? Well, those were to close loopholes that ended up not existing, for the lawmakers also originally intended to include pistols, but at the end of the process pistols were dropped from restrictions, but the loopholes remained. I suspect because they probably wanted to come back around and attempt restrictions on pistols at a later date. 
 

So the law was enacted to make firearms prohibitively expensive to "combat organized crime” that rose up as a result of prohibition. Except that prohibition ended the year before. So why would you need to combat prohibition related organized crime when prohibition ended. Sure, the mob didn’t suddenly fizzle away, instead turning to loan sharking and gambling, but those criminal industries don’t rely on the trafficking of items, and as such there’s less violence associated with them than there is with moving contraband. Then you get to the weapons themselves, which the gangsters of the time usually acquired, not by purchasing them in stores, but by stealing them. Well, I mean, hey, if people didn’t have the opportunity to buy them, then they couldn’t be stolen by gangsters? Well, as it turns out, and as I’ve previously stated, the gangsters stole them… from the government. You had the relatively newly created National Guard, with armories across the nation, that were unmanned most of the time. Criminals, much like electricity, follow the path of least resistance. Why steal a few of something lots of times when you can steal lots of something a few times. So the law wasn’t exactly needed.  Prohibition was over and it didn’t curtail the actual way that gangsters were getting their weapons. But they did it anyway. Hey, why not, right? Might as well get those dangerous weapons off of the streets. Now, that being said, isn’t it odd to have a requirement to report when you’re taking them out of state? It’s not like gangsters had any significant weight to move across state lines anymore. And what’s with not banning them across the board? Why make them available, but only for the rich?  And why did they wait 14 years since the start and 1 year after the end of prohibition to deal with prohibition related crime.

Enter the Bonus Army. What started as a small movement in Oregon quickly grew over the nation. In its famous march, over forty thousand Great War veterans and their families descended on the Capital, demanding early payment of their bonus.  Hoover ordered them gone, they said no. 800 cops, 1,000 soldiers, and six tanks later, the Bonus Army was pushed out, with the police initially firing shots into the crowd and killing two of the marchers, injuring tens more.  
 

So you have a large movement of poor veterans and their families, coming from all over the nation, and marching on the capital, only getting dislodged by brute force. What did this do? It terrified the elites. So what’s was a good way for them to guard against the poors from wielding any significant power? Make guns too expensive for them, and make it so that if they had them and were going to, gee I dunno, march anywhere and demand stuff, that notifications had to be made before hand so that they would be dissuaded from bringing weapons, or if they did, then the powers that be would know about it ahead of time. So Congress suddenly started submitting a ton of gun control bills, with one in 1934 finally being passed out of the house, which we know today as the National Firearms Act of 1934.

The National Firearms Act of 1934. Keep any discernible power away from the poors. 

I'm pretty sure the main reason they constructed the NFA as a tax/fee on purchasing guns, and made it illegal to cross state lines without notifying the government, was because they could only pass such a law as a tax and as a regulation of interstate traffic under the commerce clause without being swiftly struck down as unconstitutional.

I really don't think it was some scheme to allow the rich to have Tommy guns to lord over the poor. 

The rich have plenty of other ways to lord over the poors. Polos, Taycans, free strawberry slushies.

Stealing weapons from police and armories is certainly a source of weapons for criminals, but straw purchases and before 1934 just straight up buying them were and still are the most common and easiest way to procure weapons for illegal use. 

1 hour ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

Stealing weapons from police and armories is certainly a source of weapons for criminals, but straw purchases and before 1934 just straight up buying them were and still are the most common and easiest way to procure weapons for illegal use. 

Not to mention that mere possession without registration was also illegal after the NFA so a simple shake down was all it would take to land a few goons in hot water as their guns were confiscated. Didn't even matter how they acquired them, without the stamp, they were coming off the streets.

Bill knows this, but he already stepped in it by referring to an era where gun control actually worked and now he's forced to pretend it didn't because of classism or whatever insane point he thinks he's making. That's why he's completely ignoring the legal viability aspect despite it having been spoon-fed to him like a toddler. Or maybe he actually is that stupid and has been this whole time but we never noticed because he's been largely silent outside the Russia thread.