Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Starver]

Now, *clears throat*, as a currently-certified NYC Board of Elections Official, I'd like to answer a few points here

I think "KEEEWWLLL!!!11oneoneone" is the appropriate response to this information. And I'll break the subset of response-points out of the spoiler, being now fewer and shorter. Slightly.

Now, your system seems to have (...)

This varies by state. Actually, every part of the primary process varies by state; even for national elections. It's a huge mess, but it means that any general statements about US primaries must be worded very carefully.

This is what I gather. No wonder they switched from E Pluribus Unum to In God We Trust in relatively recent times... 

(...) but might like the opportunity to foul up or otherwise swing the result for another party.

I'm not sure what you mean. Do you mean, "What stops someone from voting in the other primary?" because the answer is you can't vote in two primaries anyway, and in states with closed or semi-closed primaries being registered with a party means you cannot vote in the primary of a different party.

Thus you register (or re-register) for the other party. Give up your (meagre, inconsequential) influence you would have for your ideologically-matching party (doesn't need your help to go where you happily see they are going already) and instead leverage your influence (slightly less meagre and inconsequential, you might think, especially if they're vote-wise the minority party where you are) to sour the opposition's ranks.

I believe also that it depends on state whether or not you need to register with the party in order to vote in the primary, so depending on location your party registration can be totally cosmetic.

Yes. Open Primaries allow you to vote in any one parties primary, closed primaries force you to vote in your own parties primary and no other (and if you're an independent you cannot vote in any primary at all), and in semi-open primaries registering for a particular party means you can only vote in the primary of that party, but independents may vote in any one party's primary.

I had understood the semi-opens as being "cannot vote for a party other than any that you registered for, if you did", which is functionally equivalent in the "choose only one" environment.

I must look up the relative rates of unallied registrations between the various varieties of Primary operation. Keeping options open would seem useful in Semi-Open, Making a choice best in Closed. In an Open situation, there'd be no advantage either way (w.r.t. the Primaries, anyway - there might be other things a registration activates or otherwise).

[bloop_bleep]

I read an article on the actual gun registry place where they store and look up the data. Its like a building containing a bunch of old women and millions of pieces of paper.

....What happens if there's a fire? Has there ever been a fire there in the past? Just curious.

[redwallzyl]

I read an article on the actual gun registry place where they store and look up the data. Its like a building containing a bunch of old women and millions of pieces of paper.

....What happens if there's a fire? Has there ever been a fire there in the past? Just curious.

You lose everything.

https://www.npr.org/2013/05/20/185530763/the-low-tech-way-guns-get-traced

It's really bad. Some of the files are on LITERAL toilet paper! Its a miracle they manage to do as well as they do. The guy who runs it is a math genius or something and he figured out how to do the impossible.

[birdy51]

I almost think it wouldn't be bad if the place somehow started a minor blaze. At least that would hopefully catch the eye of anyone smart enough to realize that this is a terrible, terrible idea to have that much paper.

[sluissa]

Well, considering they ran out of room and some of the records are stored in shipping containers in the parking lot... I doubt they'd lose EVERYTHING.

[scriver]

This is actually my favourite part of the US government. Not because I think that is how it should be done, but because it is a monument to humanity's relentless drive and diligence.

[RedKing]

The ATF registration center in Martinsburg, WV is like that warehouse at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark, but filled with shitty old gun sales documents, some of which could be mistaken for the Dead Sea Scrolls.

When a local law enforcement agency wants to trace a firearm, they have to submit the details into a web-based application (which as of four years ago, when I stopped supporting it, still used fucking Visual Basic in the GUI). That app then generates an email to a group of those old women that were mentioned, who then have to look through a paper filing system to find where the corresponding document box is housed, then a collection of the boxes needed goes to a couple of guys who literally just go back and forth all day fetching file boxes. Then the ladies have to look up the registration info (sometimes paper, sometimes on microfilm) and type it back into an email, which gets sent back to the requesting agency. If everything works perfectly, it takes about a week to get a result. If something goes wrong at any of the myriad failure points in the process, it can take months to get a result.

It's also a major drain on the Bureau's budget because it takes a small army to run this place, plus upkeep of the facility. Martinsburg has more people employed at it than any other ATF facility other than HQ. It's a no-brainer for people interested in "more efficient government" to modernize this, but thanks to the NRA's lobbying, they're prohibited from digitizing the records or making a better search system.

[JoshuaFH]

I saw a clip of a student asking Senator Rubio "Will you stop taking donations from the NRA" during a live debate, and that kid just earned massive kudos everywhere for everything. That was a fucking slam dunk kid, you roasted that asshole with one question, especially with the Senator almost doing an Ace Attorney style flinch reaction before giving a wishy-washy answer that I'm sure satisfied noone. That's the most satisfaction I've gotten out of anything political in quite a long time.

[deathpunch578]

I saw a clip of a student asking Senator Rubio "Will you stop taking donations from the NRA" during a live debate, and that kid just earned massive kudos everywhere for everything. That was a fucking slam dunk kid, you roasted that asshole with one question, especially with the Senator almost doing an Ace Attorney style flinch reaction before giving a wishy-washy answer that I'm sure satisfied noone. That's the most satisfaction I've gotten out of anything political in quite a long time.

Got a link? Would love to see this

[JoshuaFH]

I saw a clip of a student asking Senator Rubio "Will you stop taking donations from the NRA" during a live debate, and that kid just earned massive kudos everywhere for everything. That was a fucking slam dunk kid, you roasted that asshole with one question, especially with the Senator almost doing an Ace Attorney style flinch reaction before giving a wishy-washy answer that I'm sure satisfied noone. That's the most satisfaction I've gotten out of anything political in quite a long time.

Got a link? Would love to see this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo52BObqCds

[McTraveller]

So what do people really want to happen at a practical level here?  I mean I guess I can understand token gestures like refusing donations from certain organizations, but that's not going to actually do anything (in the short term anyway).

Even passing more strict gun registration laws (anywhere from more strict background checks to bans on certain sales) is only going to discourage new acquisition, it's not going to do much for the existing stock of weapons in the field.

[Harry Baldman]

New acquisition is a pretty big problem in its own right, since newer weapons like the AR-15 are also a lot more dangerous to be shot with than your average handgun owing to high velocity rounds and such, and unless you limit that now it's only gonna get worse in the near future as progressively more dangerous shit trickles out into the civilian market. You gotta start somewhere rather than throw your hands up and say there's no ideal solution. Making the NRA politically poisonous would be pretty great too since it'd feasibly weaken the gun lobby that's been keeping nightmarish gun policies in place all these years.

[Jopax]

Yup, gotta plug the holes before you start pumping out the water that's sinking the ship. Stop their sales first, then after a while you make their registrationg mandatory with hefty fines if you fail to say, check in with the status of your weapon once a year. Maybe offer to buy them off of folks, trade ins for less dangerous shit are an option too.
Anything can be worked out once that first step of stemming the tide is made.

[sluissa]

I saw a clip of a student asking Senator Rubio "Will you stop taking donations from the NRA" during a live debate, and that kid just earned massive kudos everywhere for everything. That was a fucking slam dunk kid, you roasted that asshole with one question, especially with the Senator almost doing an Ace Attorney style flinch reaction before giving a wishy-washy answer that I'm sure satisfied noone. That's the most satisfaction I've gotten out of anything political in quite a long time.

Got a link? Would love to see this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo52BObqCds

That whole thing was painful to watch. So many scripted questions with planted actors. God damn it CNN, if you're going to load the dice, at least try to hide it a little. It's just insulting.

New acquisition is a pretty big problem in its own right, since newer weapons like the AR-15 are also a lot more dangerous to be shot with than your average handgun owing to high velocity rounds and such, and unless you limit that now it's only gonna get worse in the near future as progressively more dangerous shit trickles out into the civilian market. You gotta start somewhere rather than throw your hands up and say there's no ideal solution. Making the NRA politically poisonous would be pretty great too since it'd feasibly weaken the gun lobby that's been keeping nightmarish gun policies in place all these years.

The AR-15 is not a newer weapon. AR-15 was the Armalite/Colt company designation for what eventually became the military M16. It's been around since the 50s in some form and advertisements in civilian gun magazines can be found back to 1963.


Look, I love guns, but I hate the NRA, I specifically refuse to do business with gun ranges that are affiliated with them. I do think we need more restrictions on guns. (Notably a magazine size restriction to start with.) However, the people arguing for increased gun control seem to come up with arguments that make no sense, measures that do nothing to help, and are perfectly willing to let gun manufacturers slip in loopholes so they can continue to do business as they wish.

"AR-15"s in particular do nothing special that hundreds of other models of 'hunting' and 'sport' rifles don't also do, yet they don't get any attention.

The Mini-14 in particular is a popular one, but because it's got wood on it and no pistol grip, it's basically ignored, yet it has the exact same function as the AR-15 style rifles including caliber and 30+ round magazines and origin in military rifles. Also notably used in a number of high profile criminal instances including a few mass shootings.

The M1A is another popular rifle. Also has wood, also lacks the pistol grip. Uses the even larger and more powerful .308 bullet and also based off of a military design.

So fine. You want gun control, go for it, I'll listen to your proposals. But give me something better than "This gun looks scarier than the others." That is the direction this ALWAYS leads to because it ALWAYS happens in an emotional moment where doing SOMETHING (Think of the children!) is more important than doing something smart. And that is exactly what the NRA wants you to do. They know where they stand and they'll let people propose stupid things knowing they'll never pass or they'll be able to whittle it down to something as toothless as the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban.

[Harry Baldman]

I mean, I do come from a background where firearm ownership in general is heavily restricted so I might have a slightly different perspective, and I'm certainly not a lawyer. But as for legislation you could apply here, maybe something like the progression of the Firearms Act of 1968, amended several times in the UK after particularly affecting mass shootings and expanding the number of prohibited and controlled firearms each time, specifically in 1988 and 1997, eventually effectively banning even handguns. Seems to have fixed the problem somewhat. Just ban the whole fucking lot over a longer period of time for everyone's general safety.