Gun Violence Victims Suggest Tax To Support Research

[billbuckhead]

"Gun Violence Victims Suggest Tax To Support Research"

Here’s an interesting idea about how to make sure the cost of gun violence is covered: a few advocates in Boston are trying to push a handgun surcharge. Just as cigarettes are taxed now, these activists would like handguns to be taxed at purchase, with the proceeds going directly to fund research against gun violence.

MacArthur Williams was shot in Roxbury as he changed a tire on his Hyundai so he could go to work the next day. The man who shot him on that September night in 1989 was looking for revenge in a gang dispute, Williams said.

The gunshot paralyzed Williams, now a father of four living in Dorchester. Yesterday, he was among advocates and paralysis patients who urged state legislators to impose a $25 surcharge on all handgun purchases in Massachusetts to fund spinal cord injury research, so that one day he might walk again.

“It’s a privilege to own a gun,” Williams said in an interview yesterday. “The surcharge, if you know it’s going toward research for a problem caused by gun violence, most people wouldn’t have a problem.”
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<http://www.gunguys.com/?p=1998>

Guns owners should pay for the 100's of billions in damages guns cause, instead of the majority of Americans who don't own guns and want stronger regulations on these deadly menaces. It's only fair. Gun owners should volunteer for this instead of mooching off the rest of us.

[bluestateguy]

1. What garbage

How about special new taxes on junk food to pay for all of the health problems caused by obesity and heart disease?

:eyes:






:sarcasm:
(for those of you who don't get the joke)

[billbuckhead]

2. They should tax high fructose corn syrup and other harmful foods

Corporations should pay for the problems their marketing of harmful products cause.

[Selatius]

3. We could do it without new taxes.

If anything, this could be handled at the federal level. If Congress can spend 600+ billion on blowing up third world countries, then it stands to reason it could cut some of that to regulate guns in a competent manner like Switzerland.

[Mojorabbit]

4. The only thing I have ever hurt with any of my guns

are paper targets. For this I am supposed to pay for what gangbanging lawbreaker's do? Please.

[spoony]

5. And it isn't like THEY'LL be paying the tax

As I don't think their particular channels of getting weapons tend to tax them.

Ultimately this comes from the idea expressed in the article, that it is a "privilege" to buy a gun, meaning that they can make people jump through whatever hoops and pay whatever fee officials deem fit.

[ComerPerro]

6. I think this is a bad idea, not for the same reasons gun nuts probably do though

honestly, I think such a tax wouldn't really generate much revenue at all. Hell, I'm not so sure even guns sold at gun shows would be subject to this tax (I've always thought those dealings were probably very shady).

Plus, most rational people don't buy guns as often as they would buy a pack of smokes. So, to offset that, and to show any real revenue, the tax would have to be very high.

So it just doesn't sound very well thought out.

Now, if you wanna tax bullets... might be something there...

[NewHere]

7. I would tax

free speech. There is a lot of that going around and most of it is not very useful. You could charge around $0.01 per forum post, $0.05 per newspaper, $0.10 per day per blog. Any thing that doesn't use electricity could be free, that way it would help with global warming and people wouldn't have to pay for traditional speech.

[aikoaiko]

8. I'd rather confiscate money and property from gangbangers to pay for it.

[billbuckhead]

9. What's a "gangbanger" ?

A non white gun nut wearing colors? I say treat all the gangs the same, whether NRA neoCONS or whatever "gangbangers" are.

[aikoaiko]

10. gangbanger = member of a gang

In other words, I'd be more interested in confiscating money and assets from those who criminally use guns to fund the programs in the article than taxing law-abiding folks.

[billbuckhead]

11. Why not call them a "member of a gang"

Sounds like it has racial connotations.

[bonito]

12. Or bangergangs

Yep.

[FyurFly]

13. The term "gang banger" is common

and not racist. You can be of any color and in a street gang and be a gang banger. Also gang bangers often refer to themselves as "bangers" as well.

[billbuckhead]

18. White gangbangers and black Republicans. Sounds like Jeopardy!

Maybe with the meth epidemic, you'll get your wish and there finally will be a resurgence of white gangs.

[aikoaiko]

14. It sounds like it has race connotations to you because you are a race baiter. nt

[billbuckhead]

17. Gangbangers has racial connotations. you stepped in it

Can't admit reality so you call the whole rest of the civilized world racists because they believe in enlightened gun regulation?

Hey, I'm just another racist on the NRA hate list along with Maya Angelou, Oprah Winfrey and the NAACP.

<http://www.nrablacklist.com/>

[aikoaiko]

19. nra's list? you should be on DU's enemy list.

Your post is a good example of the race baiting I accused you of. You claimed not to know what a gangbanger is but just from the sound of the word you think it had racial connotations. What kind of twisted racist attitudes do you hold that equates being a a gang member (i.e., gangbanger) with racial connotations.

Is it your secret desire to start a race war, Bill? I now know you secretly wish you were on the NRA's enemy list because it would at least make you relevant.

I feel sorry for you Bill. And with this post, I bow out.

[billbuckhead]

22. No answer to the NRA enemies list so you whine and slander me

Pray, tell how "gangbangers" are any different than NRA honcho and Leninist Grover Norquist?

A lot of what you want to classify as gangbangers are just misguided kids surrounded by too many guns and too much gun worship.

[benEzra]

15. Gee, a press release from the ban-more-guns lobby...

that argues for more hassling of lawful gun buyers. What a surprise. I am SHOCKED, I tell you...

[derby378]

16. All we have to do is de-fund the occupation of Iraq...

...and legitimate researchers will have all the money they need to study ways to reduce gun-related violence in America.

[scrinmaster]

20. “It’s a privilege to own a gun,”

Williams said in an interview yesterday. “The surcharge, if you know it’s going toward research for a problem caused by gun violence, most people wouldn’t have a problem.”


I guess this guy thinks the constitution is just a goddamn piece of paper too. Don't complain about your First Amendment "priviledges" when someone comes to take those away.

[Paladin]

21. A Couple Of Points

1. The next time somebody uses speech or the written word to turn a school campus or a shopping mall into a slaughterhouse, I'll take your First Amendment comparison seriously.

2. Until the Supreme Court renders some official notion of just what the Second Amendment means in this day and time, whether gun ownership is a "right" or a "privilege" remains an open question, regardless of what the Well Regulated Keyboard Militia say.....

[-..__...]

23. What a tool.

By his logic if his injury had occurred as the result of a drunk driver, consumers should pay a special tax/surcharge for every bottle of beer/wine they purchase.


“It’s a privilege to own a gun,” Williams said in an interview yesterday. “The surcharge, if you know it’s going toward research for a problem caused by gun violence, most people wouldn’t have a problem.”

:eyes:

Uhhhh... how'z that?

Bills filed in the MA legislator are subject to a public hearing/input... usually around May.

Mr. Williams can fully expect my input on this matter when the time comes. And I can guarantee him...
there will be a problem with it.