Thread by @CamEdwards

I was on the air while today's school safety presentation was taking place. Having now caught up, here's my stance:

Not giving up my due process rights.

Adults can and should be able to exercise their constitutional rights.

1/

Gun bans don't work. In fact, I believe in general that supply side gun controls (laws restricting legal access in hopes of stopping criminals) are not nearly as effective as efforts to reduce demand among criminals.

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I believe imposing an age limit of 18 to use social media would be far more useful for helping kids grow up mentally healthy than an age limit of 21 to purchase a firearm.

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I believe that the vast majority of us want safer neighborhoods, less violence, and a more peaceful society. Our disagreements are in how best to get there. And disagreeing doesn't make you a monster. 4/

I am truly worried about where we go from here as a shared society. It seems like we're in a national version of one of those arguments where something is said that can't be taken back. Even after the dust settles, a rift remains. Things aren't the same. 5/

I'm not one of those chest-thumpers on both sides who are eagerly rooting for a civil war. I live in Virginia. I drive through battlefields all the time where thousands of Americans were slaughtered at the hands of their countrymen. 6/

We are ignorant children playing with fire, blissfully unaware of the lasting damage we could do to ourselves and our home. We need to find some common ground, even if it's pina coladas or walks in the rain.

We should not be afraid to talk to each other. I've invited several people who want to de-platform @NRATV to have a live, unedited conversation on @CamAndCompany, but they don't want to talk. They want to silence. Looking at you @GeorgeTakei. 8/

We interrupt this Twitter rant to walk the dogs. Back momentarily. 9/

I've also noticed that the gun control movement seems far more interested (for now anyway) in putting new laws on the books than they are in seeing them enforced. NY's SAFE Act, for example, put in place five years ago, is a legislative mess. 10/

The SAFE Act's 7-round magazine limit was quietly dropped from enforcement, they can't figure out how to implement the requirement for background checks on ammo purchases, and that's not the worst of it. 11/

There are currently tens of thousands of New Yorkers who are now illegally possessing guns because they didn't re-register the handguns they had already registered with the state by 1/31/18.

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NY State Police say they won't enforce that part of the law for a year. Most sheriffs say they won't enforce it at all. And gun control activists in NY aren't complaining about this. They're trying to get a Friends of @NRA dinner kicked out of a restaurant instead. #priorities

I also think the Left in general is more interested in passing new gun control laws than enforcing them. After all, if you think the system is inherently biased, then those new laws are going to disproportionally impact people of color, particularly young men.

In Baltimore last year the City Council proposed a bill mandating a year behind bars for illegal possession of a firearm. There was a near riot in the council chambers from opponents. They weren't NRA members, but progressive community activists.

They were angry because, in part, not everybody illegally carrying a gun in Baltimore is out to commit a crime. They worried it would be another tool used against their sons, brothers, and fathers. And the City Council backed down.

The new bill actually mandated NO jail time upon a first offense. But neither side (different factions of the Left) floated the idea of making it possible for people to LEGALLY carry. The result is a "desperately needed" law that has no teeth and fails to address the real issue.

Let's talk Universal Background Checks. Johns Hopkins recently released a study on the effectiveness of background check laws in WA, CO, and DE. The results? Not so great. Like Howard the Duck. theguardian.com/us-news/2017/o…

Washington State and Colorado had no real increase in the number of background checks after Universal Background Checks went into effect, but the news was even worse for gun control advocates when it came to Delaware.

In Delaware, background checks did increase significantly. And while the study didn't look at the effectiveness of the laws on crime, a look at the FBI Uniform Crime Statistics shows the homicide rate has gone up, not down, since Universal Background Checks became law in 2013.

Michael is correct, but what is doesn't note is that sheriffs in WA & CO warned that these laws aren't enforceable at point of transfer. When a Universal Background Checks was introduced in NM last year, every sheriff in the state opposed it. It died in committee.

Many of those sheriffs are NRA members, not because they're pawns of the "gun lobby", but because they believe in their oath to protect the Constitution as well as their community.

I have broadened my perspectives and my viewpoints thanks to my NRA membership. I've met so many NRA members who are so different from me in so many ways, but on the #2A we speak as one.

If you're an NRA member (including one of the many new ones), I hope to meet you in Dallas. And if you made it this far in the thread, I thank you for reading. This concludes our rant, and here are some frolicking baby goats as a thanks for reading til the end.