Barack Obama once said that we need to have a national conversation about firearms.  It is impossible to have any kind of constructive conversation with somebody who lies routinely, and this is the standard operating procedure of the anti-Second Amendment camp.  It is particularly important to convey this to their rank and file, because the best way to get people to walk away from a cause is to prove to them, or even better, let them prove to themselves, that their own leaders are abusing their trust.

I reported previously how Katie Couric and Stephanie Soechtig's "documentary," Under the Gun, claimed that their producer from Colorado bought firearms in an Arizona parking lot without undergoing a background check.  Somebody who claims to have proven some kind of point by committing a felony such as hacking into a computer; embezzling money; buying or selling illegal drugs; or, in this case, violating federal gun laws has almost certainly fabricated the story in question – professional misconduct among journalists.  It is legally impossible for a resident of one state to buy any kind of firearm in another state unless the transaction goes through a licensed dealer, who must then perform a background check.  This is prima facie evidence that these "journalists" fabricated a story out of whole cloth.

The Million Mom March, meanwhile, defrauded its donors and volunteers with its claim that firearm violence kills 12 children a day.  Very few of the "children" in question were toddlers who found their parents' guns and shot themselves or playmates.  Most were teenagers in a high-crime age group who knew exactly what they were doing, as well as legal adults (18-19) whom the MMM redefined as children to inflate its figures.  "That depends on what you mean by children" is to the gun control controversy what "that depends on what you mean by sex" is to Bill Clinton.  Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) made themselves parties to this fraudulent statement, as did many other left-wing Democrats.

Harry Reid's press release of June 15 includes a flat-out lie that, along with the Under the Gun scandal, should expose the blatant and routine dishonesty of the enemies of the Second Amendment.

Washington, D.C. – Nevada Senator Harry Reid spoke on the Senator floor today calling on Republicans to join with Democrats to pass legislation preventing suspected terrorists from buying guns and explosives. Below are his remarks:

Here is a frightening quote from an Al Qaeda spokesman urging would-be terrorists to buy weapons here in the United States.

"America is absolutely awash with easily obtainable firearms. You can go down to a gun show at the local convention center and come away with a fully automatic assault rifle, without a background check, and most likely without having to show an identification card. So what are you waiting for?"

Somebody who repeats a lie without qualification, and with the obvious intention to deceive his listeners or readers, is himself a liar.  Senator Harry Reid is telling us that our gun laws allow somebody to buy a fully automatic weapon without undergoing a background check.  Just as it was legally impossible for Stephanie Soechtig's producer to buy a firearm across state lines without a background check, it is legally impossible to acquire any kind of automatic weapon without a background check.

Transferring a machine gun: With certain limited exceptions, the NFA requires anyone transferring a machine gun to register it with ATF. (The NFA put this responsibility, along with the $200 tax discussed below, on the transferor, rather than the transferee, in an effort to deter all transfers of machine guns.) In order to register a machine gun, a transferor must obtain authorization from ATF prior to the transfer in accordance with ATF regulations[.]

Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), meanwhile, subordinated his past honorable service as a Marine officer to party politics with the following statement.  "I carried guns every day in Iraq, guns very similar to the ones used to perpetrate the Orlando murders and many other mass shootings in America."  As shown above, it is absolutely illegal for a private citizen to acquire fully automatic firearms like the ones Moulton carried in Iraq without a background check and a federal permit.  No legally owned machine gun has ever been used in a mass shooting, and a grand total of two have apparently been used in homicides between 1934 and 1995.

Reid's and Moulton's deliberate obfuscation of semiautomatic rifles and assault rifles is entirely consistent with the Violence Policy Center's openly stated agenda to deceive the American public, and with 501(c)(3) tax-exempt money in the bargain.

Assault weapons – just like armor-piercing bullets, machine guns, and plastic firearms – are a new topic. The weapons' menacing looks, coupled with the public's confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons – anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun – can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons.

Honesty is a prerequisite for any kind of constructive conversation, and that quality has been universally lacking among the advocates of so-called commonsense gun laws.  This needs to become a front and center issue in the upcoming national elections.

William A. Levinson, P.E., is the author of several books on business management including content on organizational psychology, as well as manufacturing productivity and quality.