Just in case you were wondering whether “instant background checks” really were about gun confiscation:
The proposal will allow a doctor to add a patient to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) without ever telling the patient he or she has been added.
There would be no due process requirement. Not all doctors will be able to do it with the same ease, but many will. Knowing a doctor could add him to a federal database as mentally ill without his knowledge could potentially dissuade a patient from going to the doctor in the first place to get help.
Worse, if the doctor does so and makes a mistake, the patient would have to actively work through the system to get himself removed — guilty before being proven innocent. In some states, should a doctor flag you as having mental illness without your knowledge, you may very well see the state come collect your previously purchased guns.
Activist mental health providers will probably be overly aggressive in adding people to the list. Give it five years in liberal areas and people who believe in the physical resurrection of Christ will probably get automatic entry onto the list.
Mental health is a serious issue and the Toomey-Manchin legislation could have negative consequences. Worse, it would still not stop a Columbine, a Newtown, or the daily massacres in Chicago.
Just out of curiosity — would you accept a background check before you could exercise your 1A rights? If not, why not? And why would you accept them before you exercise your 2A rights?
This is scary stuff, folks.
If we want to improve our mental health system, that’s fine… but this is scary, black helicopter, 1984-style nonsense.
I’m sure that will put me on a registry somewhere…
