Oklahoma Episcopal Bishop Edward J. Konieczny, who once strongly opposed stricter gun control laws, is changing his views.
Konieczny will participate Sunday at Trinity Episcopal Church in an adult forum on gun control titled “The Thin Line Between God and Guns.”
A former police officer, Konieczny discussed his changing views on gun control in a recent CNN Belief Blog that drew national attention.
As per the article, as a former police officer he has a concealed carry permit. He can decide if he wants to protect himself of not. As a resident of Maryland I am never offered that choice. Until I can make a similar decision, his opinions and comments are irrelevant.
No one should be able to buy or own a gun without passing a criminal background check. To the extent that is not the case, it needs to be fixed. And yes, the NRA is on the wrong side of this issue. Beyond that singular concession, 99% of current and proposed gun laws are pointless. Any law that doesn’t amount to outright confiscation or prohibition, both of which would run afoul of the 2nd amendment, is going to have no appreciable effect.
More and more churches have security teams – off-duty LE who are parishioners, and private citizens, who quietly and discreetly exercise the right to keep and bear arms, at church.
A good idea.
I completely support gun control.
I’ve noted elsewhere that for me, gun control is 1) a good stance, 2) a good grip, 3) good sight alignment, 4) good breath control, and 5) a good trigger squeeze.
Outright confiscation would not run afoul of the 2nd amendment. It would run afoul of millions of owners who would refuse to turn them over. The mere threat of such an outcome has already made ammo almost impossible to find as average folks are buying out stores just in case. I read somewhere that Wisconsin and Pennsylvania put more people in the woods during deer season with rifles than the entire US military. And likely many of those hunters are better shots.
Brian, regarding who may be the better shot: it’s easier to take careful aim when the target isn’t trying to kill you, too.
[i]it’s easier to take careful aim when the target isn’t trying to kill you, too[/i]
But practice does make better, and the average recreational shooter or hunter will go through more ammo at the range in a year than the average soldier or DHS agent goes through during a year of duty.
Psychological research by Lt. Col Dave Grossman has demonstrated that those few soldiers in infantry have to receive special operant training in order to make them effective killers. The great bulk of soldiers and casually trained agents and LEO’s have great difficulty in using their weapons to actually kill in close encounter combat operations.
[i]No one should be able to buy or own a gun without passing a criminal background check[/i]
A common opinion among liberals and progressives. Fortunately nothing in the 2nd Amendment supports that position. We already have laws on the books which places the onus on a gun seller in a private sale to make sure to the best of their ability that they are selling their gun to someone who can legally own a gun, per all the conditions of a 4473 Form sale. Screw up on that and the blow back to the seller is potentially very very serious.
Until places like Chicago enforce gun laws already on the books, adding more laws just amounts to adhering to the progressive political agenda and does nothing to make people or the country safer. In fact, disarming law abiding citizens is the best known path of history to make sure we end up with a totalitarian government.
“No one should be able to buy or own a gun without passing a criminal background check.”
How about,
“No one should be able to buy or own or operate an automobile or a pick up truck or an SUV without passing a criminal background check and having a medical examination to check on their use of illegal narcotics and a medical verification that they are not using any form of psycho-tropic medication and a psychiatric verification that they are not (at times) mentally incompetent or prone to “road rage” or a medical evaluation of whether or not they are prone to ‘loss of control’ due to diabetes or other non-psychiatric ailments.
The misuse and abusive use of motor vehicles cause much more tragedy and take many more lives annually than incidents with firearms.
And many more lives might be saved by applying the same extremely severe standards to motor vehicles that are being so offhandedly being proposed for guns.
If Newtowne CT is making him reconsider gun control, I wonder if the Boston Marathon bombing is prompting him to reconsider immigration or welfare reform.
I have always believed that strict enforcement of the gun laws already in force is the best way to prevent [i]at least some[/i] gun violence, but the problem as I see it is that there isn’t enough [i]enforcement[/i], which is at best uneven from state to state or from one jurisdiction to another. Some have called for Federal law enforcement to step in and enforce a Federal law aimed at preventing gun violence, but as a gun owner myself, I don’t think that would be a good idea. Personally, I have nothing against background checks, but in order for these to be effective, they have to be thorough, and therein lies a problem: How to run such a check and ensure that the person being investigated isn’t a mental patient or a potential terrorist, or who may or may not have a criminal record. The last is easy enough to do, but what about the first two?
If a father wants to ‘gift’ his son or daughter with a firearm, should there be a background check?
If I want to sell a firearm to my brother or to my neighbor, persons whom I know far far far better than any federal agency could know, should there be a background check?
And the list of of potential firearm transfer scenarios goes on and on and on.
At what point must I surrender the rights that I was ‘born into’ be surrendered to the’state’ which after all in the USA is merely a ‘construct’ based upon the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
And finally, doesn’t the abrogation of a Constitutional right require that we follow the process for the Amendment of the Constitution?
Where does the authority of the Congress or the Supreme Court come from when either body decides to abrogate a Constitutional Right?
Are we going to become a country where our Constitutional Rights are decided by a ‘de facto’ act of either the Congress or the Supreme Court or possibly an Executive Order of the President?
When such a ‘de facto’ act occurs, where do our ACTUAL rights come from?, the Constitution ?, a simple majority (i.e. a dictatorship of a simple majority) of the Congress?, or a decison of nine human beings on the Supreme Court bench?
[blockquote] If a father wants to ‘gift’ his son or daughter with a firearm, should there be a background check?
If I want to sell a firearm to my brother or to my neighbor, persons whom I know far far far better than any federal agency could know, should there be a background check?[/blockquote]
Yes and yes. No right is absolute. And it is ridiculous to presume you would know if your neighbor had a serious criminal record. And I say this as someone who is generally libertarian and highly suspicious of most gun laws.
[blockquote] And finally, doesn’t the abrogation of a Constitutional right require that we follow the process for the Amendment of the Constitution?
Where does the authority of the Congress or the Supreme Court come from when either body decides to abrogate a Constitutional Right?
Are we going to become a country where our Constitutional Rights are decided by a ‘de facto’ act of either the Congress or the Supreme Court or possibly an Executive Order of the President?
When such a ‘de facto’ act occurs, where do our ACTUAL rights come from?, the Constitution ?, a simple majority (i.e. a dictatorship of a simple majority) of the Congress?, or a decison of nine human beings on the Supreme Court bench? [/blockquote]
I am not sure what you are driving at here. It sounds like you are denying the authority of the courts to resolve constitutional issues. We may not agree with what the courts do. I frequently disagree. But in an orderly society there has to be some final arbiter. The alternative is anarchy.
In the Heller case I thought Justice Scalia’s opinion was well written and reasoned. Clearly you disagree. I think this falls under the heading of ‘we are free to disagree with the law, but not to disobey it.’ I would suggest lobbying for an amendment that would make gun ownership an absolute right with zero restrictions if that is what you think should be the case.
I think that would be nuts. But that’s the great thing about a mostly free country. We can disagree with each other civilly.
[i]And it is ridiculous to presume you would know if your neighbor had a serious criminal record[/i]
Not at all. If you are getting ready to sell him/her a $1500 AR15 you might want to spend $75 on a background check so that you know to the best of your ability he/she can legally own the gun.
Of course, one can speculate most people won’t go to these lengths. After all, VP Biden admitted “we don’t have time to investigate folks who lie on their 4473 forms”. No, we won’t enforce CURRENT gun laws, but trust us, piling up new laws will solve “the problem”. Just trust us.
I think opponents of background checks are creating a straw man argument by saying it won’t stop violent crime or it would not have prevented the massacre at Newtown. But no law will guarantee any such thing. However it does seem highly likely that it will make it much more difficult for criminals to get their hands on firearms.
[blockquote] If you are getting ready to sell him/her a $1500 AR15 you might want to spend $75 on a background check so that you know to the best of your ability he/she can legally own the gun. [/blockquote]
My only disagreement is that I don’t think people should have a choice here. Background checks are not gun confiscation and can not be reasonably described as infringing on the right to own a gun given that they can be conducted almost instantly at most police stations. If I were selling the gun I would make the buyer cover the cost of the background check upfront.
[i]However it does seem highly likely that it will make it much more difficult for criminals to get their hands on firearms[/i]
I don’t know if you are a libertarian or a wild-eyed progressive, but you are using a patented Progressive argument. Which flies in the face of one very commonly known fact: criminals do not obey the law. Thus, all the new laws that Progressives want to put on the books only serve to disarm the law abiding.
Several studies have tracked how criminals get guns; for example,
http://dailycaller.com/2013/02/11/where-criminals-get-their-guns/
As stated earlier there are already laws on the books governing private sales and the burden on the buyer to not sell a gun to someone they have reason to believe cannot legally own a gun. But we don’t enforce the CURRENT laws on the books. As VP Biden said, “we don’t have time for that.”
But faith springs eternal: just pass more laws and that fill “fix” the problem.
No. Pass more laws, disarm the law abiding, and that will usher in the path to a totalitarian government. Just read history.
“Ad Orientum,
I do not agree with your answers as given so far.
They are just your point of view.
You still haven’t answered my comments regarding the “abrogation” of a Constitutionally given individual right by unConstitutional means.
The “boil the frog” technique that has been used to disregard the legitimate path to modifying Constitutional rights and is now being used regarding the 2nd Amendment, is a Progressive method of ‘getting one’s way regardless of the Constitution.’
Are you aware of how President Jackson did this in the case of the Cherokee and Creek native Americans?
Are you aware of how FDR tried to “pack” the Supreme Court with his appointees in order to do this?
These are but a few examples of dishonest unConstitutrional chicanery.