U.S. police chiefs call for background checks for all gun purchases

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

US | Mon Oct 26, 2015 6:49pm EDT

U.S. police chiefs call for background checks for all gun purchases

CHICAGO | BY FIONA ORTIZ

Police chiefs from across the United States called on Monday for universal background checks for firearms purchases, saying opinion polls consistently show that most Americans support such restrictions.

The proliferation of firearms is one of the factors behind a rise in homicide rates in many U.S. cities this year, according to senior law enforcement officials at the International Association of Chiefs of Police conference in Chicago.

Acknowledging the power of the gun lobby and the reluctance of Congress to enact stricter gun laws, the police chiefs told a news conference they were not anti-gun but wanted to keep weapons out of the hands of people with criminal backgrounds.

Current rules on background checks apply to licensed dealers, but up to 40 percent of firearms sales involve private parties or gun shows and do not require checks, the chiefs said.

[font size=1]-snip-[/font]

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/26/us-usa-guns-police-idUSKCN0SK2RR20151026

[randys1]

1. I say how about some background checks on cops who shoot people

Or fire them or put them in jail, at least once in a while anyway

[gejohnston]

2. they came a long way since the 1970s

back then, they were screaming for complete bans.

[beevul]

3. Ahh yes, the "up to 40 percent" myth...BUSTED

They could have at least dusted it off and given it a fresh coat of paint before dragging that ugly thing out in public:

In other words, rather than being 30 to 40 percent (the original estimate of the range) or “up to 40 percent” (Obama’s words), gun purchases without background checks amounted to 14 to 22 percent. And since the survey sample is so small, that means the results have a survey caveat: plus or minus six percentage points.

Moreover, as we noted before, the survey was taken in late 1994, eight months after the Brady law went into effect, and the questions were asked about gun purchases in the previous two years. So some of the answers concerned gun purchases that took place in a pre-Brady environment.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/update-obama-claim-on-background-checks-moved-from-verdict-pending-to-2-pinocchios/2013/01/25/59caeca6-672f-11e2-85f5-a8a9228e55e7_blog.html

?

[Eleanors38]

5. Datum from 1994? Back when cathode ray tubes walked the earth?

[jimmy the one]

7. what 2 pinocchios means

One Pinocchio Some shading of the facts. Selective telling of the truth. Some omissions and exaggerations, but no outright falsehoods. (You could view this as “mostly true.”)

Two Pinocchios Significant omissions and/or exaggerations. Some factual error may be involved but not necessarily. A politician can create a false, misleading impression by playing with words and using legalistic language that means little to ordinary people. (Similar to “half true.”)

Three Pinocchios Significant factual error and/or obvious contradictions. This gets into the realm of “mostly false.”

A 'half true' in this realm does not (necessarily) mean a deceptive 'half truth', it means about half is true, half is false - partly true or partly false.

FC:.. rather than being 30 to 40% (the original estimate of the range) or “up to 40%” (Obama’s words), gun purchases without background checks amounted to 14 to 22%. And since the survey sample is so small, that means the results have a survey caveat: plus or minus six percentage points.

Which means possibly as low as 8% or as high as 28%, and 28% is nearly 30%.
Fifteen to 20 percent is actually bad enough, anyone disagree?

[beevul]

8. We weren't discussing how "bad" it is...

Which means possibly as low as 8% or as high as 28%, and 28% is nearly 30%.
Fifteen to 20 percent is actually bad enough, anyone disagree?

We weren't discussing how "bad" it is in this subthread, of which I am the originator. We were discussing how far from the truth "40 percent" which is the universally cited number here on DU, actually is.

The clue you seem to have missed, was:

The "up to 40 percent" myth...BUSTED

[virginia mountainman]

4. Thats odd..

An awful lot of local law enforcement nationwide are suing to stop gun control...

[Nuclear Unicorn]

6. "across the US" = 1 LA + 1 NY + 1 Chicago