sjfcontrol wrote:VMI77 wrote:
Sorry, but I think you're wrong. They may not know for a certainty who has what, but, for example, they pretty much know for a certainty someone with a CHL is going to have at least one gun...and likely more. The Feds have also been monitoring the internet for years now, so everything anyone has purchased over the internet can be compiled for a pretty good picture of what you own. Even if they don't know specifically what you own, they may know you've got an MP 15-22 (because you bought a mag for it and have bought .22 ammo), a Springfield XD in .45 (cause you bought a Crimson Trace laser sight for it and have purchased .45 ammo), and .243 (bought a scope and ammo and hunting license), a .410 and and 12 ga (bought ammo, bought a hunting license), and a 1911 (because you bought a pack of new springs from Brownells). Places like Walmart, and the credit card companies, will probably turn over their records too, so they'll also have access to transactions made in person if you didn't pay cash. They may also require all dealers to turn in their 4473s.
Doing that kind of research on an individual may be possible, even likely if you commit a crime (such as shooting up a movie theater or school), but I believe it unlikely to be performed wide-scale on a few hundred million citizens. There simply aren't enough investigators to do something like that in a timely manner.
Maybe, and you'd be right if there was no centralized data collection, but I think you underestimate their ingenuity and the current software, and the database creation that has been occuring. For one thing, they don't have to do it on a few hundred million citizens. They can flag certain transactions, set a simple score index, then burrow in. There aren't 300 million people buying guns and gun accessories. The scoring could be a simple flag count, to which they could apply a threshold: name-flag. I'm just making up numbers here, but say, a certain name-flag comes up once (where a flag is a purchase of any gun, accessory, or ammo) --it gets tallied and ignored, but if it keeps getting flagged, at some point it breaks a threshold....say 1,000 name-flags....then that person gets a deep search using the collation software and has his purchase history constructed. Maybe they've determined that it takes at least 1,000 name flags, or 5,000, for enough data to construct a reasonably accurate estimate of guns owned. They may know enough to know that certain purchases don't matter....that say, they only need to track ammo and magazine purchases, or ammo and sighting devices, etc, which further reduces the effort --depending on how well matches are correlated to construction of ownership.
And they can also use multi-flag tests. For example, they start with the database of CHL holders, then look for purchase flags, sorting out only those that cross the threshold. Or they could start with CHL holders with (or without) prior military service --depending on the political point they want to make. They could narrow it down further to CHL holders, prior military Special Operations experience, enlisted, NRA member --and just count flags on that group. Or they could start with that group and pick out certain states that haven't been "nice" to the administration. Texas, say, passes legislation that Texas LEO's won't enforce the Federal Gun law....so it becomes: CHL holders, prior mil spec ops, enlisted (or officer instead), NRA member, Texas resident. There are numerous way to cut down the effort....I do similar kinds of sorting in my own work to eliminate unmanageable results.
"Journalism, n. A job for people who flunked out of STEM courses, enjoy making up stories, and have no detectable integrity or morals."
From the WeaponsMan blog, weaponsman.com
