NRA's Blatant Lie About The Mental Illness Registry

[kpete]

the NRA blatantly lied about the mental illness registry issue:

In his Friday morning news conference, National Rifle Association chief executive Wayne LaPierre floated the idea of a national registry of the mentally ill as one way to stem gun violence.

“How can we possibly even guess how many, given our nation’s refusal to create an active national database of the mentally ill?” he asked.

The NRA lied to all of us. In fact, weapons salespeople actively and successfully fought attempts to create a national list of those who were too unstable or mentally ill to handle weapons. In fact, the NRA lobbied hard in 2007 to gut a law that was intended to do what LaPierre told us he wants to do.

After a Virginia Tech student killed 32 students and faculty in April 2007, the Bush administration proposed legislation that would require all states to share the names of residents involuntarily committed to mental health facilities. The information would be provided to a Federal Bureau of Investigation database.

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The NRA wanted the government to change the way it deemed someone “mentally defective,” excluding people, for example, who were no longer under any psychiatric supervision or monitoring. The group also pushed for a way for the mentally ill to regain gun rights if they could prove in court that they’d been rehabilitated.

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MUCH MORE:
http://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-nra-gained-the-last-time-congress-strengthened-gun-laws
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2013/01/29/nra-gutted-2007-mental-health-registry-law/

[Animal Chin]

1. The NRA is interested in one thing and it's not the 2nd Amendment...

...it's selling more guns.

That's it. Gun manufacturers (whidh is really who the NRA represents) have a problem that clothiers, electronics makers, auto makers and just about every other manufacturer doesn't have...their products don't wear out. With minimal maintenence, a rifle or handgun will last 100 years or more. Once you have your pistol and/or your rifle, you're really all set for firearms hardware for the rest of your life...you just need to buy ammo.

So the manufacturers have two choices: (1) differentiate new guns with new technology or new features, or (2) find new customers. Why do you think the NRA pushes so hard on promoting guns to kids? They've tried to make going to the range to do some shooting a "pasttime for the whole family." They need these kids to grow up to be gun-lovers because they're out of customers.

I think the only difference between now and 2007 is that becase of the pure horror of Sandy Hook and the national response, the NRA cound't just stick its head in the sand...it needed some solution to propose or cling to, so they had to cut bait on the menatally ill, in order to have some appearance of a rational solution (of course ymmv as to whether they achieved that).