New York State Passes New Gun Legislation

There was a bipartisan vote approving new restrictions last night in the state senate, and there was a rather hotly debated session about it today in the state assembly, but the New York Governor's "7-Point Plan" to restrict the sale and use of assault weapons and ammunition has passed.

Here's Governor Cuomo's plan as he outlined it -
1. Enact toughest assault weapon ban in nation
2. Close private sale loophole
3. Ban high capacity magazines
4. Enact tougher penalties for gun crimes (school zone violations, felons possessing, etc)
5. Keep guns from the mentally ill
6. Ban direct internet sales of ammo
7. Create state NICS check on all ammo purchase.

And here's a more detailed description of it by the Huffington Post -
[url=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/howard-glaser/cuomo-gun-safety-legislation_b_2476419.html]http://www.huffingtonpost.com/howard-glaser/cuomo-gun-safety-legislation_b_2476419.html[/url]

While there are new requirements included for therapists to report patients who threaten to hurt themselves or others, I'm hoping much more will be done in the very near future to address the needs of the mentally ill and their families - in gun-related ways and otherwise.

What do y'all think? Too much? Not enough?

Does this mean that therapists and or doctors now must violate the code of confidentiality?


Ohhh man, they ALWAYS sneak something into legislation. ...assholes

There are exceptions to the doctor-patient confidentiality laws - like when child abuse is suspected. I would think, though I don't know for sure, that public safety might be an exception as well.

[QUOTE] [b]matt z wrote:[/b]

Does this mean that therapists and or doctors now must violate the code of confidentiality?


Ohhh man, they ALWAYS sneak something into legislation. ...assholes[/QUOTE]

If the therapist or doctor believes that based on the information the patient has provided, that the patient is a danger to him/herself or others, then confidentiality can and must be broken to ensure safety

[QUOTE] [b]greaserkat wrote:[/b] [QUOTE] [b]matt z wrote:[/b] Does this mean that therapists and or doctors now must violate the code of confidentiality? Ohhh man, they ALWAYS sneak something into legislation. ...assholes[/QUOTE] If the therapist or doctor believes that based on the information the patient has provided, that the patient is a danger to him/herself or others, then confidentiality can and must be broken to ensure safety[/QUOTE] Agreed. As long as well that steps are also taken to ensure there is a boundary kept on publicizing names or protecting the identity of the patient, as determined on a case by case basis, to keep certain stigmas and mob mentalities as low as possible. I have a question for you Matt: Is it not also invasive in your view then for a doctor to yank a patient's driver's license when it's determined that due to poor health conditions they are not fit to drive? Surely that's also breaking confidentiality when the doctor is just doing their job to help protect the public from high risk drivers, then?

Look it up. *hypocrite that he was, Jefferson authored a document stating that in the event of government corruption it is the DUTY of the governed to overthrow it.


This suggested further legislation is a step towards more STALINISTIC action....


Last step of containing people is to completely disarm them

[QUOTE]

[b]matt z wrote: [/b] Look it up. *hypocrite that he was, Jefferson authored a document stating that in the event of government corruption it is the DUTY of the governed to overthrow it.

This suggested further legislation is a step towards more STALINISTIC action....

Last step of containing people is to completely disarm them[/QUOTE]

ffs grow up. I'll bet if you were made to walk throught that school looking at the dead bodies of those little kids you'd change your fucking tune very quickly.

Phew, thank goodness someone said it.

USA - the place where people want no gun regulation, but insist on marriage and vagina regulation

[QUOTE] [b]matt z wrote:[/b]

Look it up. *hypocrite that he was, Jefferson authored a document stating that in the event of government corruption it is the DUTY of the governed to overthrow it.


This suggested further legislation is a step towards more STALINISTIC action....


Last step of containing people is to completely disarm them[/QUOTE]

1) don't give me fake Jefferson-quotes (or in this case, fake Jefferson paraphrasings). Monticello.org has a full-time job debunking fraudulent quotes nowadays, and nearly all of them originate from gun-fanatics.

http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/strongest-reason-people-to-retain-right-to-keep-and-bear-arms-quotation

2) Look up the word "stalinist" before you throw it around like some McCarthyist foaming at the mouth. Have you been rounded up and tortured/"interrogated" by the secret service, and denied the writ of habeas corpus yet? No? Then Stalinism is probably not involved.

3) The entire march of civilization from the early middle ages to the present has been a steady movement towards disarming the populace. An armed populace is not a means to guarantee freedom, it's a means towards feudal society, where the best armed and most ruthless citizens oppress the others.

On topic:

I think New York has made a great first step here. I eagerly await federal legislation!

I tried using the search mechanism on the Monticello website and it did not work for me. So I don't see how a person can access their collection at this point. They do list a bunch of the most famous quotes, but Thomas Jefferson was writing all the time and the database of his writings must be pretty large. I read portions of it some time ago. Anyway, I am surprised by your comments, TQ. Because there are plenty of real quotes from the thinking of the time (various opinions among those who worked to ratify the Constitution). I realize the writing is not easy to understand because they wrote in a different style than we are used to today. Some of the expressions are antiquated and there is also symbolism in some of the writing (i.e. citizens being "armed" with certain abilities such as juries and representative government). So any person trying to understand any particular quote might need assistance. However, some quotes are pretty easy to understand: Jefferson's idea that walking with a gun was the best form of exercise in his opinion. But your point number 3, I would say is completely off the mark with respect to the history of the United States.

I think that gun control does not mean taking guns away from the populace. In the United States gun owners are protected by the Constitution, which is a federal document. However, modifying the ability to get a gun quickly or to buy certain types of guns, is more additional regulation than a major change of gun rights. It is quite a process to get a license to drive a car here and this is not a way to deny the use of cars, but just to promote greater levels of safety. The new gun laws will also help to promote safety. But they will not disarm the citizens in the United States. To do that, we would need to amend the Constitution.

[QUOTE] [b]matt z wrote:[/b]
Last step of containing people is to completely disarm them [/QUOTE]

Unless the 2nd amendment is overturned, which is not going to happen, US citizens will never lose the right to own a weapon, so this isn’t about completely disarming anyone. It’s about the type of weapon and ammunition the average citizen should be allowed to own. It’s about registering weapons and about background checks that will, hopefully, keep some of these weapons out of the hands of criminals or the mentally ill. It’s about public safety, not about taking away individual rights.

However, buying up all the assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition in a store – and there has been a run on these things of late – seems to be about pushing a ‘right’ well past its intent.


[QUOTE] [b]The Real Wizard wrote:[/b]
Phew, thank goodness someone said it.
USA - the place where people want no gun regulation, but insist on marriage and vagina regulation. [/QUOTE]

Correction – USA – the place where HALF the people want no gun regulation, but insist on marriage and vagina regulation.
And, btw, those last two issues could each be their own full-length thread. How disturbing is that?!


[QUOTE] [b]Donna13 wrote:[/b]
It is quite a process to get a license to drive a car here and this is not a way to deny the use of cars, but just to promote greater levels of safety. The new gun laws will also help to promote safety. But they will not disarm the citizens in the United States. To do that, we would need to amend the Constitution. [/QUOTE]

Exactly, Donna. The panic gripping gun enthusiasts is unnecessary since a Constitutional amendment is not even a consideration.

Though, just as an aside - and possibly in direct opposition to my comment above to matt - I know ‘abortion’ isn’t granted by constitutional amendment, but many US states regularly chip away at the ability of women to access them – like in Mississippi where the last clinic is about to have its doors closed and locked by new state regulations. They haven’t outlawed abortion because the Supreme Court says it’s illegal to do so. However, they can make laws so impossible to follow, that providers cannot function in the state, which, by extension, strips Mississippi citizens of the ability to access that perfectly legal procedure. It can be the 'slippery slope' so many fear.

[QUOTE] [b]Donna13 wrote:[/b]

I tried using the search mechanism on the Monticello website and it did not work for me. So I don't see how a person can access their collection at this point. They do list a bunch of the most famous quotes, but Thomas Jefferson was writing all the time and the database of his writings must be pretty large. I read portions of it some time ago. Anyway, I am surprised by your comments, TQ. Because there are plenty of real quotes from the thinking of the time (various opinions among those who worked to ratify the Constitution). I realize the writing is not easy to understand because they wrote in a different style than we are used to today. Some of the expressions are antiquated and there is also symbolism in some of the writing (i.e. citizens being "armed" with certain abilities such as juries and representative government). So any person trying to understand any particular quote might need assistance. However, some quotes are pretty easy to understand: Jefferson's idea that walking with a gun was the best form of exercise in his opinion. But your point number 3, I would say is completely off the mark with respect to the history of the United States.

I think that gun control does not mean taking guns away from the populace. In the United States gun owners are protected by the Constitution, which is a federal document. However, modifying the ability to get a gun quickly or to buy certain types of guns, is more additional regulation than a major change of gun rights. It is quite a process to get a license to drive a car here and this is not a way to deny the use of cars, but just to promote greater levels of safety. The new gun laws will also help to promote safety. But they will not disarm the citizens in the United States. To do that, we would need to amend the Constitution.[/QUOTE]

http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/spurious-quotations

What annoys me is that people read the opinions of the people who drew up the constitution with modern eyes, not with 18th century ones. When they thought of citizens being armed, they had in mind the weapons of the day - smoothbore muskets. These weapons are practically useless unless they are used in large quantities, and so the founding fathers naturally combined the concept of gun ownership with the concept of an organized citizen militia. These militias were superseded by the National Guard, which means the Second Amendment as it now stands only represents half of what the founding fathers intended: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.".

The Second Amendment is a rump law, the remnant of a complete law that has been superseded by later legislation, and as it stands, it is being abused for purposes it was not intended to serve, e.g. the private ownership of assault weapons, (sub) machine guns, etc.

If we could magically have them visit us today (these founding fathers), I think they would be most shocked that we let the situation get so bad without doing anything about it.

That we can agree on.