Other than the exceptions outlined below, arms should not be regulated

OBV 1 I offer the observation that my opponent, while trying to specify what regulations should apply, is still arguing for getting rid of some regulation in the status quo. He defines regulation as “preventing the use or purchase of arms” with some specific regulations that are left over and would continue working. However, realize that existing gun laws would be struck down. Framework We need to view today’s debate through the understanding that lives come first. This is the foremost principle of the US government, and any just democracy for that matter, which needs to be protected. This idea was planted in the heads of the founding fathers to the point that the preamble of the constitution states the following: “We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” (9) The founding fathers wanted the people to be protected and made sure to include the idea that the general welfare, aka the people of the US, is the entire reason that the constitution was made to begin with. This is exactly what government’s main function is. In fact, looking at the Social Contract Theory proves this. The theory suggests that people have a contract with their government where certain rights are given up, for example being tethered by laws and paying taxes, for protection and for their welfare to be respected (10). This was clearly important as John Locke’s specific Social Contract Theory was a huge inspiration for how our government works today. Thus, weigh every single impact to that metric. C1: Straw gun purchases First, we need to realize how this resolution prevents any progress forward to prevent gun crime. First though, we need to understand exactly what a straw gun purchase is in relation to firearms. Dan Noyes of PBS News explains that straw gun purchases are instances where an individual who is unable to purchase a gun by law uses a companion who purchases the gun, usually in a suggestive manner in the actual gun store by pointing or gesturing toward a preferred weapon, and gives it to the person who could not buy it on their own (1). While this behavior seems only minor and not important to begin with, by looking closer we can see the disastrous effects that these straw gun purchases have on the crime rate. In fact, well-informed individuals may already know a case where this tactic has been abused to commit a crime. The San-Bernardino shooters used this tactic to kill over a dozen people in a tragic shooting. Olivia Li of The Trace reports that one of the gunmen, Syed Rizwan Farook, asked his friend Enrique Marquez to buy 2 AR-15 rifles that were used in the shooting. This was not even used because he couldn’t pass a background check, as he already owned two pistols that he purchased legally. He just did not want these weapons traced back to him (2). However, we can see more evidence pointing toward the large impact that straw gun purchases have not just on homicides, but on the entirety of black market guns. Everytown in April of 2008 shows that 47% of gun trafficking cases involved a straw gun purchase, representing the largest source of how guns are trafficked. Not only this, but nearly all the crime guns trace back to a select few legal gun dealers, with 1% of these licensed dealers accounting for 57% of these traces (3). These dealers and those who buy these guns are technically breaking the law as interpreted by the Supreme Court. The SCOTUS Blog retells the Supreme Court Case of Abramski v. The United States where in November of 2009 a police officer by the name of Bruce Abramski purchased a Glock 19 pistol for his uncle in Pennsylvania for saving some money on the gun. However, a year later he was indicted for lying on his background track by indicating that he was the buyer of the gun. He challenged this ruling which made it all the way up to the Supreme Court where, in a 5-4 decision they determined this practice to be a straw purchase and illegal (4). This widened the interpretation for what a straw purchase is. Unfortunately, this did not respond in more jurisdictions taking straw gun purchases more seriously. Hansi Lo Wang of NPR in December of 2015 explains that while the penalties for straw gun purchases at a maximum of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, many gun experts, including Daniel Webster, head of the John Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research and retired Assistant Director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, say that the reason many don’t get convicted is because prosecutors have to show a direct link between the straw purchaser and the person who received the gun through the other person as a proxy, which is hard (5). Because of this, many criminals will never face penalty and will put someone’s life at risk because of their negligent actions. The black market is prospering and criminals now have a steady supply of weapons. However, with federal action to scrutinize gun shops across America that are shown to sell to straw purchasers, we can stop this cycle of madness. Remember, most trafficked guns, including crime guns and straw gun purchased guns, are attributed to 1% of licensed dealers. This would mean that increased scrutiny for who can sell and increased regulations by scrutinizing straw-gun purchases will be the best possible solution to the problem at hand. But this resolution makes sure that any restriction on use of firearms would have to be stopped. This would include the laws governing straw gun purchases and future attempts at stopping the problem of straw gun purchases. Since we value the people in this debate, we have an obligation to negate to address the large bulk of murders in the status quo and to protect the general welfare of the people. Not only this, we can’t remove current laws that address this issue as it indirectly will lead to an increase in the crime rate. C2: Black market sales Due to the vague definition of regulate in this resolution, we would do more than abolish legal statutes to curtail gun crime. More specifically, we will be limiting any access that police should have to prevent black market sales. Remember the definition for regulate is to “prevent the use or sale of firearms.” The definition of firearms would be “any weapon that could be used by the military.” This is problematic as it does not specify that police and federal agencies could still prevent black market operations, as it would technically still prevent the use and sale of said weapon on the black market. This problem becomes even worse when you realize that theoretically, you would be able to own any weapon that the military has access to. Any regular person could acquire a tank legally from the black market with no repercussion. This is exactly what the US government has been trying to stymie for the past decade. For this, turn toward the Council on Foreign Relations in July of 2013 where it describes the Merida Initiative which tried to form a legal framework for shared responsibility to stop the illegal trafficking of ammo and guns into Mexico. However, due to lax gun laws, (see my previous contention,) there are huge opportunities for illegal drug cartels and other such criminals in Mexico to receive these weapons. Not only this, but the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) used software to trace back illegal weapons that were confiscated by law enforcement in other countries and the results were shocking. Over 70% of guns recovered by law enforcement came from the US in 2007. In the Caribbean, 90% of crime guns recovered were traced back to the US, and in Jamaica over 80% came from the US. This lead to Central America’s gun crime rate being 30% higher than the average rate in 2010 and cost Central America nearly 8% of its GDP due to health, law enforcement, and security costs (6). Realize that we now have no way to stop the fueling of other criminal powers in other countries and these impacts will get worse with even more lax regulations on what type of weapon is available to the public, that being all weapons that the military can own. This will lead to more dangerous weapons getting into the hands of criminals, worsening the effects on Central America even more as more and more spending is driven toward health, security etc. However, we also need to look at the effect on domestic government. The FBI has been cracking down on illegal gun trade for a while with moderate success. If we look toward data from the FBI, we can see that they have targeted over 400 “onion” sites from the notorious deep web as of November 2014, (7). In case you are unaware, the deep web is a hidden part of the internet that can only be accessed using specific software that doubles as also a cesspool for illegal sales of guns, drugs, and even child pornography. We can look at one of these websites known as the Silk Road, a large store for drugs and weapons. The FBI recently put an end to this website, but not before it racked up millions of dollars. Specifically, Donna Leinwand Leger of USA Today in May of 2014 reports that $1.2 billion in illegal sales occurred from millions of customers (8). This will not be stopped, and will instead increase in the status quo as we prevent any agency from stopping the use or sale of any weapons. Sources 1. (http://tinyurl.com...) 2. (http://tinyurl.com...) 3. (http://tinyurl.com...) 4. (http://tinyurl.com...) 5. (http://tinyurl.com...) 6. (http://tinyurl.com...) 7. (http://tinyurl.com...) 8. (http://tinyurl.com...) 9. (http://tinyurl.com...) 10. (http://tinyurl.com...)