lolgaxe wrote:
gbaji wrote:
Why can't we just agree on it without fighting?
It isn't a fight.
When one side supports one thing, and the other supports something else, and they can't agree, it's a fight. At least politically.
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A ban on bump stocks is a token gesture that won't happen,..
If it doesn't happen, it will be because the anti-gun folks refuse to propose a clean bill on the matter. The sad fact is that the left is more interested in using such things as a means to get other things they want, than to just do what's needed. So yeah, they'll propose a ban on bump stocks, which will include bans on other things unrelated to allowing for full auto rates of fire. Conservative gun rights advocates will oppose it. They'll get labeled as "not caring if people die", and a bunch of other nasty stuff. Left will get as much political mileage out of the
fight as possible, and then.... nothing will get done.
For the Left, the political value of proposing a bad law to get conservatives to oppose it so they can attack conservatives for doing so, far far outweighs the value of proposing a good law in the first place. That's why it wont happen. And it will be 100% on the gun control side. They
could pass a clean bill. In all likelihood, they wont.
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...purposely ignores the real issue,...
Lol. It's zeroed in on the real issue. The problem is that for gun control advocates, the "real issue" isn't about saving lives, it's about passing restrictions on guns. They've put their solution ahead of the problem and lost sight of things.
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...and isn't any more a step in the right direction towards a solution than passing out heavy boots is to finding landmines.
That's because the "right direction" for the gun control side is... wait for it...
gun control. A bump stock ban doesn't actually affect gun ownership at all, so it's not seen as valuable. You do get that they direction they want to go in is to lead to a place where the 2nd amendment is either repealed, or made meaningless because no one will choose to own a private firearm any more (if they can make it expensive or difficult enough, or eliminate the manufacturing capabilities enough).
Banning bump stocks is counter productive for the gun control people because it removes a scary thing about guns which they can use now to frighten people into passing "real gun control". They need people to have the ability to modify otherwise legal semi-automatic rifles to perform like full auto rifles, so that there will be more shootings like this, more death, and thus more support for banning the rifles themselves. If they ban the bump stocks, they will decrease the likelihood of more shootings like this, and make their job of banning the rifles themselves more difficult down the line.
That may seem cynical of me, but I've seen enough of this tactic to see which direction the wind is blowing. If a bump stock ban is passed, it will be done by the political right and with opposition from the political left. And if that doesn't turn your brain around on the issue, I'm not sure what will.