Las night on FOX news' Hanity and Comes (spelling?) there was someone from the Brady Campaigne talking about the lawsuit against Bushmaster and the Bullseye Gun Store.  He was crying negligence by the store for allowing the Rifle to be stolen, (as well as 230 other firearms reported lost within the last 2 years), and for Bushmaster for selling to a dealer with such an irresponsible record.  He Kept referring to the weapon as a "High firepower assult weapon"  Notice he didn't say a "high-power" assult weapon.  Those words were very carefully constructed to not be entirely un accurate, but emotionally misleading b/c though 5.56 is not a high power cartrige, an ar15 can rightly be called alot of firepower, especially with the "40 round magazines and accessories called the "ultimate sniper grip""  Now I will say that grossly missing from the debate was someone from the NRA or whatever.  The conservative woman sitting for Sean Hannity was criticizing the group for suing lawful companies and products, and infact so was Comes who has some strains of belief in personal responsability, but neither of them quite had enough knowledge of firearms or how firearms commerce operates to really shut this guy down.  Now, this Brady guy stated that the store was responsible for allowing the gun to be supposedly shoplifted from the premises and then not reported as having been stolen.  I think that that litagation may have some merit b/c every gun store I have been in has the weapons behind a couter on a rack.  I can't imagine how one could grab one and run off w/o the store knowing it.  I also have difficulty understanding how they could not know for months that the Rifle was missing until the ATF traced it back to them.  Now the grounds for the trial against BM is not at all valid.  He said that BM has a responsibility to be aware of whether or not any dealer that they dare sell "high firepower assult rifles" has any history of fishy buisness.  He says that since this buisness has reported 230 firarms missing to the ATF in the last two years, BM should have somehow found out about it and refused to sell anything to the dealer.  This is stupid for several reasons.  First of all, everytime BM recieves a copy of an FFL liscence from a dealer, they verify that the FFL is real and non-expired or revoked with the ATF b4 they ship to the dealer, and I'm not even sure they are legally required to do this.  Secondly, the whole reason we have the ATF is so that they can be the watchdog of the industry and can investigate and penalize people who don't follow the law.  If this crap about 230 firearms being reported missing to the ATF in the last two years all within the reqired 48 hour period is true, and these were all somehow seperate incidences that would be like a phone call to the ATF every third day saying something like "uhh, I lost another firearm ATF, so now you can note that in your records so that when you do a firearms trace, you will not be able to locate a purchaser..."  I have a hard time that the ATF would allow a dealer to maintain his FFL who would do something like that.  But if that was the way it was, they should be suing the ATF, not BM for negligenece.  If the ATF thought that the dealer was trustworthy to have his FFL, then BM doesn't have any reason, and maybe any right, to deny sales to the dealer.  Sue the ATF  Still, I imagine that there was somesort of break in or something, or a shipment that was stolen where several firearms were stolen at once to make up for the bulk of that 230 number.  Conclusion: Sue the ATF and the snipers, and investigate the store more.

Not only that, but BM has no way to know that the dealer is under investigation, and if they did, they couldn't find out why. The ATF will not release confidential/priveleged information. It is the ATF's job to police the industry, not the manufacturer.

I thought the same thing when the info first came out.  The ATF knew beforehand about missing guns (stolen or sold "off the books" is anyone's guess).  The ATF should have shut that dealer down long before any of this happened so they were negligent and are much more responsible than Bushmaster.

Has anyone ever even asked the ATF why that dealer was still in business?

There is no excuse for having 'missing' firearms, but in another story, many of those guns were sold legally but not logged in properly.  I would think that the gun store would track guns better just from a profit standpoint!  IMO, Bushmaster is NOT responsible for anything.  The gun store should find a better way to track their guns, but BATF is supposed to check FFL holders once a year, at least.  

I recently read somewhere (I can't remember where and I hate not being able to point to a reference because it weakens my point) that the BATF has told firearms manufactureres NOT to investigate dealers on their own.  The BATF's reasoning is that the manufacturers might inadvertently interfere with a BATF investigation and muck it up badly.

I agree that the negligence, if any, was on the part of the BATF and not Bushmaster.  After all, would you sue Boeing if an airline company kept a pilot with a history of irresponsible bahavior that resulted in a tragedy?  It is the FAA's purvue to issue/revoke flying licenses.  Similarly, it is the BATF's charter to issue/revoke FFL's.

I swear that if that Sniper asshole had shot one of my family or something, I would sue the ATF if after having looked closely at their handling of the dealer I concluded that they were irresponsible.  Do you think that any of the victims of the sniper were pro-gun?  I don't know though, I wouldn't necessarily want to make the ATF any more prone to pull FFL than they probably already are.  

let's see the FBI lost 386 firearms over a four year period.  Think they'll lose their ability to purchase firearms?

The web page:
http://www.house.gov/judiciary/news063003.htm

The actual report:
http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d03688.pdf

It is the responsibility of the ATF alone, by their own words, to investigate FFL dealers.  This hasn't stopped the lawyers from suing like crazy for the last 5 or so years stipulating that manufacturers are to blame.  All with the intention to financially stress/put out of business, lawful gun manufacturers.I also saw that FBI story, and am totally outraged by it.  These weren't just issued pistols, some of them were fully automatic sub-machine guns as well that are missing and weren't reported, or were reported months later.  I wonder how many weapons the ATF itself has misplaced.  It shows another layer of hypocracy that these agencies possess.  

In a country that was founded on the  individuals rights we sure got away from assigning individual responsibility for ones actions.  I am baffled, to say the least, how it could be in any way the manufacturers (Bushmaster in this case) responsibility how the consumer chooses to use or misuse a product.  To me that would be the same thing as suing "budweiser" if I got a DUI and the "7-11" where I bought it.  It's insane.  That's what I think.  

The ATF was actually one of the best at keeping track of their weapons.  (maybe they were smart enough to understand the utter irony of them losing  weapons themselves).  The report contains a chart with each Federal agency and the number of firearms they lost.

Bullseye is a shitty store anyway, and everyone I had dealt with there was an ass. They have always been very irritating whenever I ask them about anything.

Finally hitting the nail on the head.

I don't believe how simple minded and sheep like attitudes people have become. When things happen people want assurances that safeguards are put in place to "help" reduce futur occurances, this I think we can all agree on. What get's me &&%^$# is when current safeguards are not implemented and shit happens, people want more safeguards without the understanding of what already exists.

Now, groups like the Brady bunch want less violence with guns "read no guns, period". I agree with the proper use of firearms concept (meaning: you get privileges but also have responsabilities), but please explain to me why they do not go after the government for failure to implement what safeguards already exists. That is hypocritical in the worst way, and of course do not inform the public that the ATF has let them down, but rather point the finger at manufacturers.

I do not believe in "immunity" for manufacturers, in the sense that if the product causes harm due to design and quality issues then sue their 'pants' off.

My point being; the government of the US of A has given the ATF a mandate to audit applicants and users of permits in order to ensure proper use of the privileges given by such permits. Under these rules, the manufacturer is not a "policing" agency, when ATF grants a permit to XYZ then that means it's good to go.

People wake-up, you, I and whomever are not to be used to cover the shortcommings of the governement. Bushmaster followed the rules setup by the same governement that ignored it's own "raison d'etre", the ATF failed, end of frigen story. As far as Mr. sniper, well step-up to the plate and face responsability.

I am sadened by the fact that the sheep are not here to read this topic.

"NRA was grossly missing"
NRA is conspiciously missing from a lot of gun debates.  I'm a life member of NRA, but I don't believe they really care about so called "Assault Weapons", like the M-4orgery.  Double barreld shotguns and highly shined deer rifles are their pets.  I've lost a lot of faith in NRA over the years.  I hope they make a come back!

buddy, I know the NRA doesn't rant come out with all the "jack booted thug..." retoric anymore, eventhough we feel that way and would like to hear it in the public forum, but their job is to basically convert the minds of the uninitiated with reasonable arguments about the natural law, the right to self defense, and following right to bear amrs.  When they get that across, the self defense concept is easily extended from unjust aggression by street crimanals to unjust agression by invading forces (however unlikely) and unjust agression by a corrupt government that does not respect the inviolable rights of it's citizenry.  They can't let the style of their arguments get in the way of their content, so that's why they make an effort not to come across as the demonic irate fat white men in their 40's walking around in camo carrying AK's and SKS's that the media has largly in part invented.  The NRA stands for our natural rights.  Havn't you read the magazines lately, especially AFF?  Don't give up on them, send in extra donations, and if you can also, join some other, perhaps more local, groups.