not really, the way its worded at least allows obama to say it prevents a registry without technically lying, but when you look at some of t he details and wording, all it looks like is they are taking steps to get close to a national registry rather than protecting against one.
for one, the bill would allow selling of guns privately and through gun shows it would cover pretty much all of those purchases, but, you would be required to have a 4473 (the background check you fill out) which dealers are required to keep, and ATF can have access to all of those records if they choose. so in that way, it pretty much creates a national registry.
we've already had to do this when purchasing guns through a gun store, so in a way there is an incomplete national registry already. this would be a huge step towards completing it.
the bill would also allow undercover sting operations at gun shows and private sales, so people who had no intention of breaking the law or committing a crime, can now be arrested. say you go to a gun sho, you want to purchase a gun, and the undercover guy "allows" you to purchase a gun without completing a background check. it doesnt matter if you knew or intended to break the law, you can now be arrested. the bill eliminates "any need for a federal prosecutor to prove beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury that the individual who allegedly broke the law had any kind of criminal intent"
and current law DIRECTLY prohibits any kind of federal gun registry, all this bill does is turn that into a grey area.
it does state that nothing in the legislation shall be construed to allow the establishment of a federal firearms registry, it takes away that protection by this key little statement..
"notwithstanding any other provision of this chapter, the Attorney General may implement this subsection with regulations"
"notwithstanding" basically takes away any barrier that was in place, and makes it a grey area.
that and the only thing they propose banning is to "consolidate" or "centralize" records, and only the Attorney General is restricted, it doesnt even mention the FBI or BATFE.
this whole thing looks like a substantial step towards a registry, it wound complete the little bit of a registry we already have, and takes away the direct restriction of establishing a more detailed registry.
not to mention creating even more completely pointless ways to charge gun owners of crime's they would unknowingly commit if this bill were passed.
