The Washington Post reports
A new study by Third Way , a centrist think tank with close ties to the Obama administration, found that thousands of guns, including so-called assault weapons, are for sale online and that many prospective buyers were shopping online specifically to avoid background checks.
(Yes it has 'ties' to Obama and yes Obama is in favor of stricter gun control. Thanks WaPo).
Advocates for gun control consider this a more significant problem than the gun show loophole. The study focused on
Armslist.com, a gun version of Craigslist, and analyzed listings in the 10 states where Senators voted against background checks. They found that there were 15,000 guns for sale in those states, 5,000 of them semi-automatic weapons and 2,000 wanted ads from people seeking to buy a weapon from a private seller (which would avoid a background check).
But online, [Lanae Erickson Hatalsky] said, “nobody’s monitoring this. Nobody has any ability to stop these people who are looking for private sellers — and the only reason to do that is to evade the background check system.”
The Brady Law of 1993 enacted the background check system, but exempts private sales of guns. Writers of that law could not have foreseen the explosion of online gun sales.
The compromise struck this spring between Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) would have required background checks for online sales, but the legislation fell short of passage.
Third Way hopes its study will illustrate to senators who voted no the magnitude of online gun sales in their states and help convince them to change their positions if the legislation comes up for a second vote.
Opponents of gun control fought fiercely against background checks of any kind, but it seems nothing but requiring online background checks can have any possible effect in preventing those with criminal records from getting a gun.
During the deliberations there was a lot of pushback from conservative media that such a loophole did not exist, but now it has been documented by Third Way (not that studies ever meant anything to conservatives).
Prior investigations have found that this loophole for private sales is frequently exploited by gun traffickers and used to supply firearms to criminals, and that many Internet sellers are willing to complete sales even after being informed that would-be buyers couldn't pass a criminal background check. Nonetheless, conservative media have insisted that no such Internet or private sales loophole exists.
Of course, if there is no such loophole, then they couldn't possibly care if this (non-existent) loophole is closed, could they? In typical Conservative fashion: "the loophole does not exist but we'll be damned if we let you close it"! This study proves it does exist. And needs to be closed. Unfortunately, the waste of America's time that is the budget battle will consume Congress till the end of the year and gun control
has been shelved by Harry Reid until next year.