
This from a country
that has mail order guns ...
The DoJ is looking to hold eBay liable for the buying and selling of products on its platform that it alleges include emissions cheat components known as "defeat devices." eBay said in a statement yesterday positioning itself as a "commerce leader that connects millions of buyers and sellers around the world," that it intends …
“Not our fault the rest of you gave up your rights without a fight”
Excellent point! I shall write to my MP right away to demand the right to randomly shoot people (in self defence - obviously) who knock on my front door, or turn around in my driveway, or who’re the wrong colour. Only then will i become a truly emancipated moron.
Care to provide evidence of this?
Do you mean that you can order a firearm through a dealer? Are you an American and have you ever actually looked at what is required for this? To do this requires a Federal Firearm License and that means that you have to have a FFL (generally this is a licensed dealer) and, if you are in different states, that means the person selling/shipping has to do it via a FFL dealer and to get it in your state you have to get it from a local FFL dealer.
Stop spouting disinformation.
Since the Gun Control Act of 1968 all mail order firearms sales must go through a federally licensed firearms dealer (FFL). In practice this means that while you can order a gun online (or via mail order if anyone still has paper catalogues), it can only be shipped to an FFL. The buyer then goes to the shop to fill out the form and go through the FBI background check - see https://www.fbi.gov/how-we-can-help-you/more-fbi-services-and-information/nics for more info.
There is one way to get guns via mail order. "Firearms" is a defined category that specifically excludes black powder muzzle loaders of any age and guns made before 1898 that use obsolete ammunition "not readily available in the ordinary channels of commercial trade." So primitive hunting enthusiasts and US Civil War reenactors can still buy their kit without a trip to an FFL. However, these folks are not normally considered to be a significant threat to the public, at least when armed with their mail order weapons.
"Since the Gun Control Act of 1968 all mail order firearms sales must go through a federally licensed firearms dealer (FFL)."
True, but becoming a FFL basically means you fill out a form, pay a fee, and pass a background check. It's pretty easy for individuals to do (based on a couple of FFL holders I am acquainted with).
How long ago did they get their FFL? The requirements to get or maintain a dealer FFL were greatly tightened in the early-90s. The current application process essentially requires an FFL licensee to be an operating business that complies with local zoning laws. The agency that grants the licenses (the ATF) will first do a site visit to interview the applicant and check that all local laws have been complied with, that the applicant meets the safe storage requirements and that the applicant has processes in place for completing and saving the paperwork that is required for gun sales. I worked at a gun shop that opened a new location and went through one of those inspections and the agent was very thorough.
Because of this, the number of dealer FFL license holders peaked at 248,155 in 1992. In the next 5 years as the new regulations took effect and existing FFL holders came up for renewal it had dropped to 79,285. There are currently 50,540 dealer licenses.
Note that these numbers are for dealer FFLs. There is also an FFL for Collectors of Curious and Relics which is essentially limited to the purchase of guns that are more than 50 years old and that are not otherwise restricted such as selective fire weapons. This license still requires an FBI background check and a site visit/interview to check on safe storage, but does not require an operating business. Some of the people who didn't renew their dealer licenses did switch to a collector license, so those numbers have grown from 15,820 in 1992 to 50,995 today.
You can read about the process and see the application here: https://www.atf.gov/firearms/apply-license
All very well, but US gun deaths have grown steadily since about 2000, and whilst down on say 2021, were still 37,000 in most recent stats. The only logical conclusion is that the US is awash with guns in the hands of people happy to use them, and official measures to implement controls have failed to make an appreciable difference to the appalling international comparisons.
But, the US is a soveriegn nation, if its people are comfortable with 37k deaths every year, that's their call, even if that is 30,000 deaths each year more than if the US had the same gun death rate as Canada. Or perhaps they need to reflect that the US is still emotionally scarred by combat losses in Vietnam sixty years ago, yet in terms of order of magnitude the US has almost as many gun deaths each year as it suffered in total across the peak five years of the Vietnam war. Is that what the people of the US are really wanting?
Was addressed to me? My responses were what the rules are, not what I believe they should be.
As to the what the people of the US want. Poll after poll show that a sizeable majority of Americans want greater regulation of firearms. But it's not a primary interest for most and the specific measures they would like to see undertaken vary widely, so the desires of the majority get steamrolled by a focused and very active minority.
Ah, statistics. My favorite.
~37,000 firearms deaths (not accidents?) annually in the USA.
~393,000,000 firearms in the USA as of 2017.
in contrast
~43,000 deaths attributed to automobiles (accidents?) in the USA (2022).
~291,000,000 automobiles in the USA as of 2022.
According to most, firearms are intended to kill. Also, according to most, automobiles are not. Seems like we may need to consider putting significant restrictions on automobiles as well.
You made great points though.
The black powder work around is crazy, I live in the US of A (and own several guns) and I was entirely astounded that I got, through the post, a .44 caliber 1851 black powder revolver. It takes a minute to load it (you have to load in the black powder pellet, wadding and bullet into each chamber then cap the nipple* with a blasting cap) but once it is loaded I can get 6 shots off in a couple of seconds easily as accurate as my 9mm at anything out to 25 yards and it makes a much bigger hole in the target....(in addition to which, once it is empty it is so big and heavy you could beat someone to death with the blunt end). This thing barely counts as a 'gun' for most applicable laws over here (although as I live in the communist hell-hole that is Maryland, I still need a license to concealed carry it - but not to buy it).
*Fnarr.
Black powder is lightly regulated because there is essentially zero crime committed with black powder firearms. Repeating black powder handguns are not readily concealable and, while the first 6 shots from your Colt 1851 Navy replica can be fired almost as fast as a 9mm automatic, reloading for 7-12 require two hands and a couple of minutes for concerned citizens to deal with the threat.
No doubt the modern version of highwaymen would return to their cap and ball gonnes if cartridge firearms were to somehow disappear, but that seems rather unlikely.
"I still need a license to concealed carry it"
I've often wondered about the, me not being in the USA, exactly what it means. I'm assuming that means you are not allowed to carry a firearm in you pocket or backpack, or in a shoulder holster under a jacket without the correct licence, but are able to carry it in full view, eg on a belt holster like the cowboys of the old West?
It varies by state whether openly carrying would be legal or not, but that is indeed the distinction. A concealed firearm, or indeed any concealed weapon, is one "not in plain view, and readily accessible by the possessor"; this means that having it in a container which you can immediately reach, rather than strictly on your person, is also concealment. Many states have a specific authorization for firearms in vehicles (where they are usually in the 'glove box' or 'centre console') for this reason.
"order a gun online (or via mail order if anyone still has paper catalogues)"
That's a strange distinction. Surely "mail order" is simply "distance selling", whether you have a paper catalogue or do it via a website. Either way, you order something and it gets mailed to you :-)
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Europe as a whole does burn more coal than the U.S., around 60% more (if you consider Russia and Turkey as wholly European countries, and they are the 2nd and 4th worst offenders in Europe), but Europe's population is more than twice that of the U.S. (742 million vs. 340 million)
The U.S. consume a lot more than Europe, per capita - but not as much as Germany, though.
https://www.worldometers.info/coal/coal-consumption-by-country/
https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/
Something that has never made any sense to me is tackling pollution on cars/trucks before power plants, trains, ships. Powerplants, stationary, number in the 100s, release tons of CO2, soot, and radioactivity. Nope. Lets find a solution for millions of cars instead. I know why that happens in America, it's because coal lobbyists have deeper pockets than the average consumer.
Electric cars in urban use have a particular efficiency advantage over ICE engines, as well as using a fuel that is high cost to the buyer. This makes them unexpectedly economic to electrify.
Put another way, every kWh of energy delivered to the wheels of a city car costs (very roughly) $2 where I live. Retail electricity is much cheaper.
>I know why that happens ... it's because coal lobbyists have deeper pockets than the average consumer
Don't under-estimate individuals, who are happier the govt subsidises something they personally can own themselves, like a car, than someone else's power plant.
Generally speaking, "we should do X before doing Y" is a trap. What we should do is both X and Y at the same time. Failing that, next best is doing either while at the same time debating how to do the other. Not doing either because we're still working out the best way to do X, but Y has strictly lower priority and therefore must wait, is a very poor strategy.
"This from a country
that has mail order guns ..."
Yes, you can order a gun by mail. The seller has to ship that gun to a local Federally licensed dealer near to you where you still have to fill out all of the paperwork and pass a background check before you can pick it up. It's not shipped to a parcel locker where you can pick it up under the cover of night.
That doesn't mean that the action is wrong.
It actually means that the government is reacting to new elements in the world. In a democratic country, that is supposed to be a good thing, no ? Besides, the action is hardly unprecedented. I do believe the government has never been friends with defeat devices of any kind.
In a future where Meta actually becomes a thing, if we find out that kiddie porn is on that platform, I'd think that everyone would be okay with the government stepping in to quash that particularly horrible thing, right ?
The action would still be unprecedented, as far as Meta is concerned.
Not an argument.
I think you're perpendicular to the question. It's not whether it's inherently good or bad but, rather, whether it deserves our scrutiny. As you pointed out, the country in question is "democratic" so I believe it's important that voters are aware of when the government does something novel so they can decide whether the current government is still fit for purpose.
In this case, the allegedly novel part is holding an online marketplace liable for individuals selling items which may be used illegally, may be illegal to sell or may be illegal to own. There's a multitude of underlying questions which, depending on the outcome of the legal action, might impact individual rights down the road.
Regarding your hypothetical about Meta, what if a government demanded that, in order to catch offenders, all data from Meta-interacting devices were automatically made available, without probable cause, to authorities? That would be pretty unprecedented and, while the stated aim might be to catch child abusers, I think the average voter would like to know that their government was surreptitiously collecting a huge stream of private information about them, even before knowing it might form the basis of a legal charge.
In this case, the allegedly novel part is holding an online marketplace liable for individuals selling items which may be used illegally, may be illegal to sell or may be illegal to own. There's a multitude of underlying questions which, depending on the outcome of the legal action, might impact individual rights down the road.
When it comes to 'defeat' devices, they aren't illegal to own. At least not currently. It's questionable that they are illegal to sell, and that is why there is such controversy in the heavy handedness of the EPA. It most definitely comes down to 'they may be used illegally', and often are, but there are still legal uses for the devices. Both catalytic converters (gas) and Diesel Particular Filters (DPF)(diesel) can be dangerous under certain farm uses. The heat of a catalytic converter and the regen on a DPF can catch fields on fire. And IMO, EGRs are just a horrible tech that manufacturers don't care to find a better solution because they reduce the life of engines while helping EPA compliance. The costs on both ends gets passed to the consumer and the manufacturers can blame governments.
I'm reminded both of the anti consumer rights advocates telling us that right to repair would have individuals making their engines damage the planet and of e scooter sellers in the UK.
If this case, it sounds very much like the agencies trying to create virtual legislation without oversight.
But there is oversight. There is congressional (senate and house investigations), executive (Department of Justice investigations), and judicial (federal courts,
lawsuits and actions brought by the other two branches) oversight. Any of these agencies can and regularly do have investigations when a regulatory agency
is thought to have overstepped it's bounds. There is an upcoming Supreme court decision about this very subject that could have far reaching effects that
seeks to severely limit the ability of the regulatory agencies to set the policies they need to do their jobs. This has actually gone to court before and it was
wisely decided that an agency with experts in the fields needed to make such decisions where more qualified than the courts. It was also noted that if every
policy/change had to go through the courts that the burden would create a huge back log in the court dockets. I would add that the record of court cases where
competing interests, usually big corporations vs. anybody/everybody else complete with dueling scientists rarely end well with big money having a distinct
advantage. Tobacco companies vs. smokers lungs being one of the most obvious example. A more recent one would be newly leaked evidence that big oil
scientists' models of the effects of massive carbon dioxide emissions by post industrial age humans have echoed what climate scientists models have shown
and been covered up for decades.
And finally. When congress created/creates these agencies they have no intention of making decisions on every policy/change they make and relegated to them,
which they can do, some authority to do so when needed knowing full well that they and the other two branches will always have the final say.
There is an upcoming Supreme court decision about this very subject that could have far reaching effects that seeks to severely limit the ability of the regulatory agencies to set the policies they need to do their jobs.
I think there are a few. But it also seems like a complicated problem, ie are the EPA overreaching by 'setting policies' that are effectively indistinguishable from laws? Especially when the agencies may become politicised, ie the ATF and EPA.
It's also strange when the agencies are tasked to enforce arguably bad legislation, ie the US NFA. So situations like pistol braces. Personally, I kinda side with the ATF on that one. Legislation defines firearms, and as wiki puts it-
Short-barreled rifle broadly refers to any rifle with an unusually short barrel
Err.. what does 'unusually short' mean? But it was an attempt to make a distinction between rifles and pistols. Especially when pistols could be fitted with shoulder stocks.. But then some of those were very old designs, so could carve out an exception as a 'relic'. But then it also defined SBRs as rifles with barrels less than 16", and there's additional paperwork & payment if you want one of those. And then there's disability legislation that disallows discrimination, so people made pistol braces that allowed disabled Americans to enjoy their Constitutionally protected rights and freedoms.. But then people started making not-a-stocks that can turn a 7.62mm, 12" barrelled 'pistol' into something functionally identical to an SBR.
It could just be easier to re-legislate what firearms are and remove some of the distinctions. You need X to own a gun and have a simpler definition of what a gun is. Pull trigger, it goes bang. Instead, legislators seem intent on complicating the matter even further with calls to ban 'assault weapons'. First, define an assault weapon. There's plenty of other legislation that defines improper use of firearms, ie drug addicts aren't (normally) allowed to buy them, or toss them in trash cans when they want to get rid of them. Seperate the object from the action and call it good.
And it's much the same with the EPA. The whole 'delete' thing was a great example of regulatory capture. Create problem, develop solution and sell millions of litres of DEF.. Which is a pollutant in it's own right, and makes diesels more expensive, inefficient and unreliable.
I understand that, and legally I'm sure you're correct (in the UK) , but no one says "....yeah, I bought it from seller0985123", do they? Whatever the legal position, people "buy stuff from ebay" and if it walks like a duck........
The concept that eBay (and other sites) is just a marketplace and no different from the newsagent's noticeboard or the farmer who rents his field for Sunday morning boot sales might have been OK when they first started as an any-old-tat auction site, but they've moved on a bit since those days and, as others have posted here, maybe it's time that the law caught up with the changes.
"I know it when I see it" can be prickly when it comes to legal rights. It's reasonable to use it as the impetus for drafting new laws but broadening the scope of existing laws based on changing general expectations risks creating effectively ex post facto laws without legislative assent and could violate some forms of nulla poena sine lege (apologies for the lack of italics).
"In the UK at least they can be charged with aiding and abetting.
They are assisting the illegal sellers and should be prosecuted for doing so."
You are getting into the same thing as an ISP being held liable for people pirating movies and music. How about people that post albums to YouTube without permission. There's just way too much traffic to individually vet everything so the best that can be done is to have a good reporting system to weed out improper items. That's also going to vary quite a bit from locale to locale so it requires people trained on what can and can't be sold in their patch as well as universally.
If somebody hosts a car boot sale in their vacant field on a weekend, do you hold them responsible if one of the vendors is selling ivory carvings? There's just no way for an organizer to do anything more than have everybody sign an agreement that everything they sell is legit and holds the organizer harmless for any actions against them. Oh, and no refunds.
> How about people that post albums to YouTube without permission. There's just way too much traffic to individually vet everything so the best that can be done is to have a good reporting system...
Even 12 years ago, YouTube was doing some better. They had a music-match algorithm. (Apple? already had a Name That Tune app.) I had posted a clip with "Marshmallow World" as background music. Within 2 hours of posting I got a copyright note. I Googled the concept (this was before Google bought YouTube) and it was a real thing even then. False hits etc but this robo-report was valid. Googled what I had to do to mangle the audio to avoid detection, and it would have detracted from the video. (Short snips or gross pitch change.)
Two more: a demo of a tube radio, out of cabinet (bassless), playing AM radio, was tagged for 'Summer Samba by Walter Wanderley'; and a friend in a singing class tagged for "In My Life" 'Video uses this song's melody'. Dang, it is good.
"Does eBay actually sell anything? I'd expect their argument to be that they're merely a marketplace which puts buyers in contact with sellers, and any accusations of wrongdoing should be directed to them"
eBay does regulate the sorts of things that can be sold on the platform. Some things are regulated by law (prescription meds, weapons) and other things are due to the milquetoast view of the BoD. They cancelled a listing I had for an ice bucket claiming it required a doctor's prescription which was ludicrous but they wouldn't budge. I also had some other things they cancelled yet there are sellers in China selling gobs of the same thing and have been for ages. It's worth having a dig through the selling requirements since the really weird prohibitions will get you scratching your head in no time.
eBay does need to watch its advertising and branding or it should be held liable. I've been noticing a lot more eBay advertising slanted towards eBay being the seller rather than the individuals that are listing products. Amazon works to make people think they are buying from Amazon rather than a marketplace seller. Fine if they want to do that, but it should mean they have to take more responsibility. Amazon allows lots of things that are banned in the US. Perhaps not banned from selling, but something like an electrically actuated exhaust bypass that is not legal to install on a car in the US that's driven on public roads (at least in many states).
"I'd expect their argument to be that they're merely a marketplace which puts buyers in contact with sellers, and any accusations of wrongdoing should be directed to them."
Go into certain bars in seedy parts of town where the owner turns a blind eye to drug dealers and said owner can be up on charges too or, at the very least, lose their liquor license. With greats rights comes great responsibilities :-)
The government created an issue where modern diesel vehicles will not run without the required emissions fluid. I believe this puts lives at risk.
Imagine an emergency situation, for example a natural disaster, Diesel fuel is available. The people in the vehicle could drive to safety. However, they are out of the government required DEF. As designed for compliance, the vehicle will not operate. Lives are lost.
This is completely irresponsible for the government. Flag a non-compliance, turn on a service engine light, fail an emissions test....but don't intentionally put people in a dangerous situation for an emissions issue.
There's even worse examples, like denatured alcohol (methylated spirits). The powers that be would rather people are blinded and killed than get drunk without paying tax. I could even understand adding something that induces vomiting but deliberately introducing an unnecessary fatal poison seems pointlessly cruel.
You raise an interesting point. Except that pretty much every engine requires multiple different fluids for them to work properly, clutch fluid, radiator coolant (ok, maybe not that, water will do in pinch), brake fluid, engine oil, any of which may be low and need topping up or replacing at any time and needs to be checked regularly by the owner/driver. I dunno about you, but I don't risk any of those fluids getting anywhere near down to a level where the vehicle might not be ready for a trip without a top up. Why would DEF be any different? Just keep it topped up as with all the other "fluids" a car or truck uses.
Depending what and how you drive, a DEF tank should need filling every 3000-10000 miles, way less often than the fuel tank, and it's a pretty small tank in general and not hard to stick a pint or two in every time you fill up if you're really worried the apocalypse is due.
"What IS it with American companies"
If you are talking about eBay, most likely it's a Chinese company. Plenty of sellers on eBay represent their items as shipping from the US but a quick scan of feedback shows they are shipping from outside and the company isn't US based.
A company in the US has to be more careful as they are an easier target. Facilities can be raided and bank accounts frozen with very little fuss.