Gun restrictions come to the forefront each time there is a tragedy, such as the Aurora, Colo. incident. However, there is plenty of legislation looming in the background year-round, that tries to beat up on the law-abiding gun owner. The granddaddy of all these bad restrictions has been the UN Small Arms Treaty. While one would think of "small arms" as rifles and handguns, this treaty was written to include everything from tanks on down, and was so far reaching that it included firearms technology, not just the guns themselves. The treaty was in theory, a registration scheme of ALL guns, worldwide. While you might think this a good idea, it included all personally owned firearms, not just military issued weapons.

One thing that this would allow would be all U.S. citizen gun information to be shared with every country, regardless of if they signed the treaty or not. Not a good idea in my eyes. The second major bugaboo with the treaty is that it would give other countries control to usurp our Second Amendment rights guaranteed by our Constitution. I personally don't want China or Syria or Pakistan to be changing the freedoms that we have fought for for over 236 years, do you?

On July 27 of this year, the treaty came to an impasse and the conference broke down, thus a draft treaty would not be reported to member nations. The NRA and National Shooting Sports Foundation were recognized Non-Governmental Organization at the UN and spoke out against the treaty. NRA worked with our allies in the U.S. Congress and Senate and successfully assembled strong bipartisan opposition to any treaty that adversely impacts the Second Amendment. This is a big victory for American gun owners, but the treaty is not dead, just postponed for another year.

In the wake of the Aurora tragedy, dozens of new gun laws are being proposed both on the Federal front and here at home in Albany.

Sens. Chuck Schumer and Frank Lautenberg have proposed an amendment to the "Cybersecurity Act" to ban standard capacity magazines. The amendment would ban import, possession, and transfer of magazines that accept (or could be readily converted to accept) more than ten rounds and that are manufactured after the enactment of the amendment. Pre-ban magazines could be possessed by the current owner, but not transferred or imported. The ban only excludes tubular magazines designed to accept .22-caliber ammunition.

In our state, the "assault weapon ban" already limits higher capacity magazines to 10 rounds or less for every gun, not just the defined "assault weapons.” Has this had any effect on lowering crime? Read on for some of this year’s statistics down in New York City.

Also Lautenberg and Rep. Carolyn McCarthy have introduced legislation further restricting ammunition purchases. The bill, they say, would prevent criminals (and you and I) from stockpiling ammunition by limiting the ability of people to order ammunition over the Internet. The bill would require anyone selling ammunition to become a licensed dealer, and would require dealers to maintain records about the sale of ammunition, and require dealers to report to the police anyone who buys more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition. Lots of feel-good, useless restrictions put on law-abiding gun owners, once again.

Here in New Yorl, state senator José R. Peralta, Democrat of Queens, would limit ammunition sales to 500 rounds per customer each month. Also one measure introduced by Peralta last week would require background checks of anyone buying ammunition. Another, being drafted this week, would limit the purchase of firearms to one per person per month. Mr. Peralta is also seeking to require courts to strip people of their guns or gun permits if they are committed to psychiatric hospitals, and to require that all handgun licenses across the state be renewed at least once every five years.

“Shouldn’t the amount of ammunition being purchased bring up a red flag?” Mr. Peralta said. “It’s just common sense: Why would one individual stockpile all that ammunition, and what’s he or she going to do with it?” Hmmmm...obviously Mr. Peralta has never gone down to the range to shoot a few rounds of trap, or plink away at targets. As all of us who have know, it doesn't take long to run through several boxes of shells in just one afternoon of shooting. Wanna bet Peralta does not even own a gun?

Sen. Gianaris, the lawmaker seeking to limit firearm purchases to one per month, said the measure would cut down on gun trafficking, in which a person buys a large cache of guns legally and then resells them.