Bump stocks. Silly name, isn't it? Sort of makes you think of "bump and grind", if your thought processes are as weird as mine. But for those of you who own firerams, it is really important that you understand the issue of whether or not bump stocks should be legal _really doesn't matter_. The big issue isn't bump stocks themselves, but what the new rule (a rule with the force of law) means. Please bear with me here.
While bump stocks are just toys, owned by very few of us in the gun culture, the new ruling made by BATFE - the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (formerly just BATF or ATF) - changes a very important definition. Now, anything that can be used to make a gun fire more than one bullet from a single press of the trigger is no longer the definition of a "machine gun". That means not just the gun itself, but anything that can be attached, a gun part or an accessory that can increase the RATE of fire of any firearm. No longer is the number of bullets fired by a single pull of the trigger - a definition established back in 1934 in the National Firearms Act - the definition of "machine gun".
This is very, very important, people. The BATFE has changed their ruling - a ruling that was made and approved while Obama was the President - that bump stocks were not to be classed as "machine guns". After the Left, and President Trump, learned that (supposedly, although the FBI and Las Vegas Police Department have _not_ released all of the facts concerning the mass shooting of people attending a concert in that city) one or more rifles discovered in the room had bump stocks installed (no photos supporting such weapons in the room have been shown), the Democrats immediately jumped on that claim. They claimed those bump stocks made the rifles shoot just like a machine gun, a fully-automatic rifle. That isn't true, but is beside the point.
President Trump agreed. Not because he is against guns or the Second Amendment, but because he was misled to think that the bump stocks could do something that they cannot do. He was misled to believe they made a rifle equipped with one the same as a machine gun. That is not true.
BATFE _knew_ it wasn't true. They knew that if they made that claim, it could be proven wrong - because it _was_ wrong. So the Democrats and BATFE sat down and worked out what had to be done to make the bump stock the same as a machine gun. They CHANGED THE DEFINITION of what constitutes a machine gun. No longer was it a gun, or a part or accessory, that could cause more than one round to be fired with a single pull of a trigger. NOW they claim it is any part or accessory which can change the _rate of fire_ beyond what is possible without that part or accessory.
The way the new rule is phrased makes it sound like the bump stock can allow you to fire more than one round without using your finger more than once, but it is a lie. Your finger operated the trigger each and every time a round is fired, every time a bullet goes down the barrel. Pull your finger away, and the shooting stops - right now. Firing the gun again _requires_ another pull of the trigger. BATF claims your finger isn't "pulling" the trigger after the first pull, but that is a lie. Your finger pulls the trigger every time, but you don't have to "crook" your finger and move it backwards. The stock forces your finger against the trigger every time you want to fire a round. Just like with any semi-automatic rifle, the gun won't fire if you do not choose to make it fire, each and every time.
Strictly speaking, that could make your _finger_ a machine gun, since you can certainly pull the trigger faster if you wanted to (although it would make aiming a bit more difficult, just like with a bump stock). Suffice it to say that any part or accessory that could increase the rate of fire beyond what is possible without adding such a part or accessory is what they deem to be a machine gun.
Did you know that at one time in the recent past, the BATFE said a shoelace could be considered a machine gun? There is a way, on certain semi-automatic rifles, to get the gun to fire more than one round if a shoelace was attached in a certain way. It would then keep firing so long as you kept your finger on the trigger. That _did_ meet the original definition of a machine gun, but since it was pretty ridiculous (and unConstitutional) to put people in prison for years if they had a shoelace in their possession (like a kid on a football team who carried extra shoelaces in case one broke during a game), that idea was scrapped.
Now we have a new definition. Remember - this device, this bump stock - was completely legal during the Obama administration. NOW, however, it no longer will be legal. President Trump could have stopped this from happening, but he was misinformed into thinking that making it illegal would stop it from happening. Most of us understand that bad guys don't obey the law. That is part of what makes them bad guys. Bump stocks are easy to make by putting together a few items yourself. Any criminals wishing to do so can do it in a matter of minutes, once he has the right parts in hand, all of which are completely legal to buy or make yourself.
The Democrats/Left and the people at BATFE don't care about that. What they DO care about is that this new definition will make it easier to get semi-automatic rifles outlawed, made illegal, a little further down this road. That is why this rule is important to them, and that is why this rule is important to US. We do not want to lose the right to own any semi-automatic rifle we choose to own. Many of us have several of them, one for a husband and spouse, one for a father and one for his son or daughter (yes, a lot of women and girls like to shoot, too).
The bottom line here is this: the Second Amendment is at great risk if the government (especially the BATFE) is allowed to go changing definitions whenever it pleases them. Remember the "Assault Weapons Ban"? All of a sudden, firearms that had been legal for many years were ruled illegal. At the time, you could still keep it, but it had to be registered. Did you know that in every country that ever forced the registration of guns, they went on to confiscate them, to forcibly take them from their people? Did you know that in almost every country where guns were confiscated, ruled illegal to possess, the government went on to kill millions of their own people? Not in wars, just within their own country, by their own government.
A man named Rummel, if I remember correctly, is the author of a web site where he tracks and numbers this killing of people by their own government. He calls it "Democide". Turkey was one of the first, back in the early 1900s. They killed or starved to death well over a million Armenians. Germany was a big killer (over 20 million, 6 million of which were Jews), before and during WWII (none of those during WWII are counted from those actually fighting the war). Russia killed even more, over 70 million, 7 million or so intentionally starved to death, men women and children. China is the _big_ winner, having killed over 100 million of their own people through political killing of dissenters, starvation, and (it is believed) the use of actual biological agents. Pol Pot in Cambodia killed well over a million of his people, and millions have died in Africa in Rwanda, Darfur, and other parts of the continent.
So, during the 20th century, somewhere in the neighborhood of over 200 million people were killed by their own governments, not counting any war in which they might have been involved. None of those people were allowed to own firearms. Guns had been registered, then confiscated, and not long afterwards, they were killed - helpless to defend themselves and their loved ones, helpless to protect the innocent, their children.
https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM
