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George III did mishandle relations with the American colonies -- most modern historians, American and British, agree on that point -- but he actually did try the tact suggested in the question, to no avail. It showed, however, his mindset, which was really the root of the problem.To begin with, despite an assertion elsewhere here, George III was very firmly in control of the Lord North government, and had taken a keen interest in American affairs and managed them in great detail personally. Some background:In 1686, King James II revoked the colonial charters of several American colonies -- New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York and New Jersey -- and forced them into a mega-colony called the Dominion of New England. He filled the new colony's political positions with his personal political hacks, causing extreme agitation. When news of the 1688 "Glorious Revolution" reached the Americas (overthrowing James II in favor of William and Mary), the American colonists immediately rose in revolt and overthrew James' governors and administrations, and re-established the pre-1686 colonies. They arrested James' governors and then waited on instructions from London, hoping that William would accept and legitimize their rebellion. In effect he did, freeing the prisoners but allowing the old charters to be re-established. James II (a converted Catholic) was exiled to France but then landed in Ireland in 1689 to foment rebellion and form a Catholic army that would eventually land in England. That ended in defeat with the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, but France came to his aid nonetheless and this started a series of wars between England and France that would last through the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. In fact, this kicked off a serious Anglo-French rivalry that led to almost constant wars between the two throughout much of the 18th century. The point of all this is that after James II's ouster in 1688, London was largely focused on the rivalry with France, and essentially left the American colonies alone.In one regard, this was positive as it allowed the colonies to develop their own fairly democratic and self-sufficient political institutions - colonial legislatures and administrations that learned how to function for decades with minimal input (or interference) from London. The downside was that London also largely abandoned the American colonies in terms of security. Every war between England (after 1711, Britain) and France also played out in the Americas as France sent professional soldiers, colonial militias and Indian allies to raid American colonial towns and ports, with Britain doing nothing to help the colonists defend themselves other than to advise them to form their own militias. From 1690-1697 was the war over James II's ouster - called King William's War in the Americas - and then came the War of the Spanish Succession (1700-1713) known as Queen Anne's War to Americans, then Father Rale's War (1722-1725) when New Englanders and Quebecers fought over Maine, then came the almost simultaneous War of Jenkin's Ear (1739-1748) and the War of the Austrian Succession (1740-1748) which was known as King George's War in the Americas. These all led to a near-constant state of intermittent warfare in New England, New York, Pennsylvania and to a lesser extent the border towns of other colonies, and not just in the border areas; professional French forces, militias and Algonquin Indian allies continuously raided deeply into the English colonies, most infamously with the Deerfield Raid of 1704 during which a sizable town in western Massachusetts was burned down and more than a hundred captives taken to Quebec. (In the last war, King George's War, fed-up New Englanders united their militias to form an army that attacked and successfully captured France's Fort Louisbourg fortress at the mouth of the St. Lawrence River in 1745, but because of reverses in the European war, London gave the fortress back to France in 1748 in the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle.)While he wasn't king yet, George III was instrumental in 1754 in changing all this. When Virginia Colonel Washington's mission to oust the French from the confluence of the Ohio, Allegheny and Monongahela rivers went disastrously wrong and war once again loomed between Britain and France (the Seven Years War), London convened a conference in Albany, NY (1754) with most of the American colonies to settle some lingering relationship issues with border region Indians, especially the Iroquois - but this conference was also a notice to the American colonists: America had too long been neglected, and Mother Britain was going to be more involved from now on. The Americans reacted with jubilation as the first manifestation of this renewed British involvement came in the form of armies - actual British regular forces were defending Americans, for the first time since the 1680s! Though relations between regular British forces and American militias were often strained (in what Americans and Anglophone Canadians call the French and Indian War; 1756-1763), nevertheless Americans were thrilled as after a few years of setbacks, General Amherst gradually overcame French colonial defenses, culminating in General Wolf's legendary conquest of Quebec. Victory in 1763 sent the American colonies into utter euphoria -- the French threat was removed, and London had finally proven that it actually gave a crap about Americans, sending armies to defeat the French and end the years of constant raids and suffering. What they didn't understand (yet) was that George III -- king since 1760 -- was going to be taking a much more detailed interest in American affairs, in ways that the Americans hadn't anticipated.As we all know, the Stamp Act was passed in 1765, as an add-on to another bill in Parliament, almost as an after-thought. The British thinking was simple: the Mother Country had sent several armies to defend the colonies - at considerable expense - and so why shouldn't the colonies pitch in to pay off the large debt the war cost Britain? And hey, it had technically started in the colonies themselves anyway. The American reaction to the Stamp Act fell into three basic categories of Americans, however:The Intellectuals, who resented being treated like conquered colonials. By not being allowed to send representatives to the British Parliament, they felt as if a key British right was being denied them, and indeed that was their argument: they or their forefathers had emigrated to the Americas freely, and could move back to England if they wanted -- many did so -- so didn't they continue to have the rights of free Englishmen in the Americas? At which point in the Atlantic did they lose those rights? These colonists invoked the famous Parliamentary charge against England's Stuart King Charles I in the 1630s when he tried to illegally raise taxes for a war against the Presbyterian Scots without Parliamentary approval: "No taxation without representation!" By using that slogan, they consciously were invoking the rights of Englishmen - an argument lost on George III. For these Americans, the issue was less the tax than the legal process behind it. William Pitt the Younger recognized this argument, however, in his famous speech in Parliament arguing for the repeal of the Stamp Act:Upon the whole, I will beg leave to tell the House what is really my opinion. It is, that the Stamp Act be repealed absolutely, totally, and immediately; that the reason for the repeal should be assigned, because it was founded on an erroneous principle. At the same time, let the sovereign authority of this country over the colonies be asserted in as strong terms as can be devised, and be made to extend every point of legislation whatsoever: that we may bind their trade, confine their manufactures, and exercise every power whatsoever - except that of taking money out of their pockets without their consent.Merchants: America was then and still is today a nation primarily of traders, and this tax hit them hard. In small transactions it amounted to little but in larger volumes it accumulated. Coupled with mercantilism -- the British practice of forcing American merchants to trade only with Britain -- this tax put a dent in the living standard of many coastal Americans dependent on trade. This in turn helped fuel an already rampant wave of smuggling, as American merchants sought to circumvent not only the tax but rules banning them from trading with other countries or even other British colonies without going through British ports first.Commoners: The stamp tax reached down to the lowest levels of colonial society, forcing colonists to pay a tax for any paper products from books, newspapers, receipts, letters; anything paper-based. Because doing so required a signed receipt - a form of public notary - paying the stamp tax required paying a tax. For these people, the tax was a real burden. This is why anger with London quickly spread like wild fire and to all levels of colonial society. Throughout much of the war Lord North and George III were convinced that the entire revolution was the work of a few bad apples like Sam Adams, despite constant reports from their military commanders of having to confront entire countrysides filled with enraged farmers.This was a very poorly-conceived tax, and revealed George III's thinking, which is that he failed to distinguish between freely-settled colonies -- most of the American colonies -- and conquered colonies. His thought process in this regard did not change throughout the entire American crisis, from 1765 to 1783. Infuriated that someone would challenge his government's prerogative, he stumbled from punitive measure to punitive measure until finally militarily occupying Boston in 1768 and putting it under martial law. In 1782, a year after the defeat of Cornwallis' army at Yorktown, George III granted the local parliament in Ireland broad autonomy for his Irish subjects ("Grattan's Parliament") but his ultimate motive was to show his rebellious American subjects just how magnanimous he could be, if only they'd lay down their arms and just resubmit to his rule. It took the collapse of his government in Parliament for the king to realize that the war was over. Incidentally, the Americans largely believed that George III did not know what was happening, and the Continental Congress sent him two petitions, in 1774 and again in 1775, trying to explain to the king that they were loyal to him but that an evil government was causing the troubles -- but both petitions were dismissed.So the problem wasn't that the taxes were too high -- though many farmers, fishermen and laborers saw it that way -- but that the taxes were imposed from London without either the local colonial legislatures being able to approve them, or the colonies being able to send elected representatives to Parliament in London. When the Stamp Act was repealed, George III thought that he was accommodating the Americans, and so thought nothing of imposing other taxes instead -- completely missing the American argument against the first taxes.In 1839, a year after a series of revolts had broken out across both Lower Canada (i.e., Quebec) and Upper Canada (i.e., Ontario), London sent Lord Durham on a fact-finding mission to understand why the Canadians had rebelled and he filed a famous report (The Durham Report). Over 142 pages, he came to two basic conclusions. The first was that the French were a bunch of medieval frog-eaters who were incapable of modern civilization, and that Quebec should be stripped of all autonomy and Anglicized as soon as possible. (Well, he was an Englishman, and we all have our prejudices.) His second was that the rebellion in Upper Canada (Ontario), however, was legitimate and caused by poor governance, and he suggested a series of democratic reforms to allow Canadians more say in the running of their colony. Local authorities had tried to blame the United States for the rebellion but Durham rejected this and even went so far as to admire American democracy and government. Moreover, several times he implied that if London had paid due respect to these American political institutions in 1776, then the United States might still be a part of the British Empire.By creating high prizes in a general and responsible Government, we shall immediately afford the means of pacifying the turbulent ambitions, and of employing in worthy and noble occupations the talents which now are only exerted to foment disorder. We must remove from these Colonies the cause to which the sagacity of Adam Smith traced the alienation of the Provinces which now form the United States: we must provide some scope for what he calls 'the importance' of the leading men in the Colony, beyond what he forcibly terms the present 'petty prizes of the paltry raffle of colonial faction'. A general Legislative Union would elevate and gratify the hopes of able and aspiring men. They would no longer look with envy and wonder at the great arena of the bordering federation, but see the means of satisfying every legitimate ambition in the high offices of the Judicature and Executive Government of their own Union.

You’ve asked a great question. However, it seems to assume that all international students are evaluated equally when it comes to admission to highly selective colleges and universities. For a number of reasons I will try to list (and I am sure I am missing some), schools treat students from some countries and different regions quite differently than others.China:The flood of students coming to the US is a recent phenomenon. From a trickle a decade ago there are now over 100,000 undergraduates from China studying in the US. The number of these students who start their college search in China with top schools in mind is he since they are the schools they have heard of. At this very moment on Quora I am trying to get information on the number of applications from China the number of those accepted at Harvard and Stanford. The schools themselves will not release this information. And not just to me. There is a reporter at Harvard trying to get the information but they won’t release the data to her either. I do, however, have the number of students accepted fromChina last year by the most selective schools. The information may not 100% accurate but it’s likely pretty close. What follows are the number of Chinese students accepted followed by the overall acceptance rates at these schools:Stanford 13 5.6%Harvard 9 5.79Yale 13 6.72Columbia 14 6.89Princeton 14 7.29MIT 5 8.2Chicago 25 8.89Brown 27 9.16Dartmouth 4 10.05Caltech 6 10.55Duke 26 11.58Vanderbilt 27 11.97UPenn 16 12.1Pomona 16 12.89Amherst 5 13.67TOTAL 220Only 220 students from all of China have been offered places at these top tier schools. This seems at the least very odd, since a study released last year showed that China ranked number 1 in the world on the Pisa test, a global test that is as good or better than any standardized test at measuring academic success. The acceptance rate for students from China to top schools is, I am almost sure, far lower than even the percentages of students offered admission overall. Jessica Su already posted about how international students at Cal Tech have a harder time of it, but I think this is in part due to the students applying from China I think if they were subtracted out the acceptance rate for international student would be close to if not a little higher than domestic students. Top schools have said there are no quotas when it comes to China. A quota is an exact number and is different than a goal. Schools do have goals and schools do have limited spaces so it appears from the outside that is much, much harder to get accepted to top schools from China.Why would schools make it harder for some students from certain countries? Schools have goals for the number of international students they wish to enroll. Given the number and quality of students from China they would take up a disproportionate number of the slots. Rather than having ‘too many’ from one country schools have simply made it harder to get in from China (they will not say this but I have been told this in private conversations with admission officers at some schools).KoreaKorea used to be the one that had lower acceptance rates than virtually anyplace else. It has slipped because of the influx of students applying from China and it now appears that the number of students applying from Korea has peaked. Nevertheless, there are still exceptional students applying from the top high schools in Korea who cannot get in to top 15 schools. For example, one of the best schools in the world, Korean Minjook Leadership Academy only gets a couple of students in to most top 10 schools. Here is one of the paradoxes about highly selective admission. Students who go to the top schools in the world not only face competition fro the others from their country, but from their schoolmates as well. Colleges and Universities do not want to accept too many students from any given school be it in China or Korea or in the US. KMLA has the highest SAT average of any school in the world and I have met any students from there and they are more than high scoring machines. They do amazing things outside of class too. The have the full package to be a huge addition to any of the top schools but because of the policies about spreading offers (something schools would ever admit to in public), only a select few will end up getting into the top 15 or so schools. Schools would ever use the word quota about the number of students from a country and they would never use the word when talking about schools either. I have written about this policy about the selection of students from top high schools beforeSingapore:Singapore is a small country with a great system for pushing up the top students into a few schools. One of them Raffles JC, may be the best school I the world. I say this as they have hundreds of students each year who score the equivalent of 4 A’s on A levels. This makes them all eligible for Oxbridge but those schools don’t enroll hundreds but they do enroll more than the top schools in the US. The school has well over 1000 students and they are the best, along with Hwa Chong, in Singapore. In addition, the Singapore government offers scholarships to student from around Asia to attend their top schools in hopes that many will stay for university ad add to the brainpower and economy (other countries should follow this model). But like KMLA and other great schools, many top colleges and universities will not take more than a handful.India:There is a huge surge in applications to the US from India. However, most of these are from students applying to graduate programs. However, if the trends in education hold true, then there will be many more undergraduates applying to top schools in the US in the coming years. They will find, I would predict that thee will not be many who can get in at the very to schools.Thailand:The government of Thailand has a wonderful program—the Thai Scholars. In a given year the top 40-50 students (based on a national exam) get funding from the Thai government to study in the US, any all the way through the PhD. The catch is that for every year in the US they must return to Thailand and work for 2 in a field chosen for them for every year they are in the US. The students come to the US for a year at top boarding schools then apply to US colleges and Universities. Once again top schools rarely offer to more than a handful of these students. I find this perplexing as some that I know are medal winners in international science Olympiads and most spend their summers in secondary schools preparing for these competitions. They are incredibly bright and driven but stats show that only a few get into the top 20 schoolsVirtually all the toughest places to get into selective schools from outside the US are in Asia. The vast majority of international students applying to schools come from there. The stats are dramatic and are available here: Page on ice.gov2011-2013 | All Places of Origin | International Students | Open Doors DataThe graph above gives some idea how much China specifically and Asia as a whole dwarfs all other places in the world. The stats include graduate students, but the overall trend, even for undergraduates, reflects these percentages.The Rest of the StoryHere is where the news gets better. If you are not from one of the places above the demographics begin to shift in your favor. US colleges and universities want to promote their global profile and this means they try to enroll students from all around the world. Given that there are small numbers of students coming from most countries across the rest of the world, the chances of being admitted go up at highly selective schools. I do not, however, wish to convey that it is easy to get into top schools but it is simply not as hard if you have the academic profile the schools are looking for. For example, if you are a student in France who has very high marks so far in the French Bac, and, in addition, have high SATS and Toefl scores, then you are in a very small cohort of people. To put this in perspective there are probably more students at Raffles with 2250 SATS and all A’s applying to US schools than the entire group of applicants from France.So too with most other locations around the world. It does, however, usually mean that student from outside the US who have done very well on standardized tests and within their national or intentional school typically attend elite secondary schools: Eton, Robert College, Henry IV, Nuevo Granada, Le Rosey, or The Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy, for example, almost always get at least a few into top schools in the US. A student has to have strong stats and a compelling set of recommendations and essays but if they do then they stand as good or better a chance at getting in than a student from New York or New Jersey who is a US citizen. Diversity means many things in the US but one is the number of countries students come from. Schools like to report that they have students from many places, as it looks good on the profile that goes out to the public and the media. But it’s more than a cynical ploy by a long shot. There are significant benefits from having students on campus who come from many different places. Their experiences and backgrounds will add to the overall education of other students, both in and out of class. The perspectives they give can often teach a professor or thing or two in addition to the students. Global perspectives widen the scope and views and approaches to issues. I have certainly had international students change my views.International first year undergraduates in the US2010/11: 84,5432011/12: 90, 9032012/13: 102, 069And here’s where the news gets even better. Last year the percentage of international undergraduates coming to the US increased by almost 13%. Colleges and Universities are looking to increase the numbers of students who will add a diverse point of view to their campuses. The increase, however, at the top 10 or 15 schools, however, is negligible. They are not in creasing their percentages much at all. But if a student begins to look just a little further down the list things change dramatically. For example, last year alone, Berkeley increase its offers of admission to international students by about 45%. Berkeley is rated as the best public university in the US and there are many other schools with great rankings and reputations that are also increasing their international numbers.Berkeley international numbersAnd this too is great new even for those whose sights are set on Ivies. Although those schools may still be out of reach, the great students not accepted there will get into wonderful schools and given their academic credentials they will likely do exceptionally well. For example, when I oversaw the selection of honors students to the university I worked for, a significant number of the international students in the group did not have my school as their first choice. They did not get into to the Ivies or other top 10 schools. However, once they got there the loved it and also did exceptionally well academically. The data is clear: a student that does very well at a top 50 school will have better opportunities after graduation than any student who does not do particularly well at a top 10 school. Malcolm Gladwell and many others write about this and provide good data to back it up.International students, from anywhere, should understand that the acceptance rates at top schools are so small that it is almost impossible to predict who will get in. But even if a great student does not get I they will still have many what could be ultimately better choices instead.Another significant factor that comes into play when strong international students apply to highly selective schools: money. While colleges and universities are interested in creating a diverse class, they also have their eyes on the bottom line. Most schools, no matter the size of the endowment, expect most or almost all of their international students to be able to pay some if not all the fees (there are a tiny number of exceptions to this). Most schools in the US do not provide any financial aid for international students. Those that do give need-based aid then get deluged with star students from around the world whose only chance of attending a school depends on money. What many schools do (but will not say) is to give preference to those needy students who come from countries not often represented. A needy star from Paraguay or Sudan has a much better chance of being admitted than needy students from China. Again, this should not come as a surprise. Schools have limited dollars and they put their institutional needs ahead of those of individual students. Students who say they are applying for need-based aid will, in most instances, be held to the highest possible academic standards. There are, however a number of very good universities and colleges that offer merit scholarships for students. Some of these cover all the fees; others cover just some, but there is money out there for very strong students.There is one set of international schools that often sends a healthy number of students to top universities. The United World Colleges are actually a set of secondary schools around the world. Through private generosity and government support (and especially one individual, Shelby Davis), students from all over the world receive scholarships to attend these wonderful schools. The schools are more international than any I know of. The students follow the IB curriculum and many of the teachers are US citizens so the students are well prepared for success at selective schools. Mr. Davis has put a billion dollars into providing support for students to attend a range of great schools in the US. Most of the student can receive up to 10,000 a year but in the case of a select few, Princeton and Middlebury among them, he provides up to 40,000 for each student who shows need and is offered admission. These students often have compelling stories in addition to academic strengths and so every year these schools get a number of students into top schools in the US.DiversityI have already mentioned diversity before but there is one more factor that comes into play for students applying to schools in the US. Most schools care a great deal about trying to bring in students from different races and ethnicities. Schools who do not enroll enough of certain groups are often critiqued for not enrolling a mix of students that reflects the racial composition of the US. The two groups that get favored status in affirmative action are Blacks (I use this term because some of the students who count in statistics for African American are recent immigrants from Africa or the Caribbean) and Hispanics. Because students in these groups tend not to score as high on tests or attend any of the top magnet schools across in the US in significant numbers, schools try to supplement their racial and ethnic diversity with international students. The number of students who come from Latin America, Mexico and Africa is quite small relative to those coming from Europe, the Middle East (especially Saudi Arabia) and of course Asia. Therefore a student in one of the under-represented groups often gets a push in the admission process. This is especially true of student in these categories who do not need financial support. On the other hand, Asian Americans perform better than anyone in the US on tests; in addition they are already disproportionately represented at top colleges and universities. Bringing in more Asians from outside the US increases the percentage of Asians overall and for some schools this may be perceived as a negative.In some cases, then, an international student with a certain background may be admitted to a top tier school with lower test scores and a less impressive program than a domestic student. Conversely, for those from certain countries, the acceptance rate often falls below the overall acceptance rate of virtually any other measurable group.

The question, as asked by Nathan Jones, at the time of answering is:“Why are people against common sense gun control? I'm not trying to start a fight, but I genuinely don't understand why like background checks and a waiting period is too much to ask for.”Well Mr. Jones, there are a few issues with this.When you say “common sense” you are implying that there is:Consensus on what “common sense” isPeople actually have someI would dare to say what a citizen of Montana views as “common sense” with regards to guns is going to be amazingly different than the view of a citizen of New York City. That is just a fact of life that must be considered.I use Montana as a specific example because their State Government has ‘thumbed their nose’ at the Federal Government by stating you can buy a machine gun in the state of Montana without the requisite federal background check if two criteria (I believe) are met:The machine gun must be manufactured in the State of MontanaThe machine gun can never leave MontanaYou see, the Federal prohibitions on machine gun ownership are based on interstate commerce meaning if the gun never crosses state lines then it never becomes subject to the NFA. I’m willing to bet that this would incense no small number of New Yorkers that a state is flaunting the law…To the state of Montana this IS common sense.To my way of thinking, it is inherently counter to the American principles as well as the principles of a civilized society, to limit the rights of the law-abiding due to the actions of the law-breaking.A good analogy of this would be:In the interest of public safety we will begin requiring speed limiting governors on every car sold limiting the car to 85 MPH. That is 5 MPH over the maximum legal speed limit anywhere in the country now. Since we ‘know speed kills’ it would be incumbent on society as a whole to mandate a limit on the capabilities of cars to reduce the risk of death due to excessive speed.We are also going to restrict sales of “sports cars” because those serve no useful purpose other than to speed and since we know ‘speed kills’ we have to make sure we restrict the sales of vehicles such as Ford Mustangs and Chevrolet Camaros and Corvettes. Each and EVERY existing vehicle of this type will require registration with a new sub agency of the NHTSA that will govern the transfers of said vehicles.We know some people will want to be able to go faster than 85 MPH, and we are willing to allow that; provided these individuals pay for a special permit, that will be reasonably priced at $15,000 per vehicle. We are also going to implement background checks for these permits to ensure those obtaining them are not intent on performing illegal acts such as “street racing” and they have nothing in their driving record that would serve as a disqualifier (such as even 1 DUII) to the ownership of such a vehicle.We know that some people will want to be able to put performance enhancing modifications on their vehicles. Some of these will be allowed without permit, others such as NOS systems will be subject to the above listed permit fee (in addition to the vehicle fee, transfers of vehicles of this class and with a NOS already installed require TWO permit applications AND associated fees) and incumbent background check.We promise the backlog for these background checks will never exceed the backlog for NFA checks which currently stands at just past 250 days.NFA Transfer Time Tracking NFA Reviews Form 1 Form 4 TrackingOh, and in about 10 to 15 years, we are going to come in and say “no new vehicles can be added to the registry of sports cars.” The current ones are OK, but new ones aren’t.That seems like a REASONABLE and COMMON SENSE approach to dealing with vehicle violence deaths. Wouldn’t you agree? And while you and I may agree, I personally know a LOT of folks for whom this would NEVER fly.Now, as to your two points about background checks and waiting periods.POUND SAND.You see, in Oregon we have ‘universal’ background checks on what should be all transfers (with a very well defined list of close relative and gun-smith exceptions).And then an amazing thing happened.The news carried the story of a pastor who decided to spend $3000 in a raffle for the hopes to win the grand prize of an AR pattern rifle, and turn it into a piece of art through destructive means that would eliminate a weapon of destruction from the streets. That’s all well and good, I don’t have a problem with that since the transfer to the pastor (he did win) was completed at a dealer where a background check was performed.The pastor, wanting to properly store the rifle, transferred possession of said firearm to a parishioner with whom he had no exempting relationship. This transfer of possession occurred without the requisite background check. Law violation #1.A few days later the pastor returns to pick up the rifle to take it to the artist who will destroy the firearm to create art. LEGALLY this transfer of possession requires yet another background check through NICS. Law violation #2.At this point I don’t know if the pastor stayed at the artist’s studio long enough for the firearm to be declared “de-milled” (ATFE description of a firearm that has been rendered inoperable and is no longer subject to ATFE laws and regulations) or if the pastor left before this occurred. If the former is the case then there is no additional violation of the law, if the pastor left before the firearm was destroyed then this is law violation #3.The lame government decided they weren’t going to prosecute these very clearly documented violations of the law. I’m sorry, they don’t get to decide whether they want to selectively prosecute people or not. Well, I guess they do get to since the pastor is as liberal as the government of Oregon.Lake Oswego pastor won't be charged after AR-15 transfer allegationsHere is a money quote from the State Police of Oregon: “ "The suspect's statement to the media that he gave it to someone for safe keeping is insufficient to prove that it did happen." ”(from the linked article.Normally everything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law…All animals are equal, some are more equal than others…Background checks:Sorry, I don’t buy into that; well at least not more than the three day wait when there is not an instant clear to proceed on the NICS.Other than that there are times when you absolutely positively need to buy a gun TODAY. Just ask the folks in LA during the riots when they found out there was a mandatory waiting period, there was much consternation in the land in those days.There are also states that are only recently changing laws allowing victims of domestic violence to obtain firearms fasterChristie Executive Order Shortens Gun Wait for Victims of Violence | Video | NJTV NewsNew Jersey shortened the wait from 30 days to (hopefully) just 14, but in some cases even that could be too long.Given that there are NUMEROUS SCOTUS decisions stating the police are under ZERO obligation to come to the assistance of a given individual, even one who has a stalker or someone who has threatened their life, it is incumbent upon the individual to be ready to defend their own life if necessary.Waiting periods deny that ability to protect self. In my opinion that is unconscionable in a (mostly) civilized society.It is my heartfelt belief that when a law-abiding citizen who is a victim of domestic violence, to the point of requiring an order of protection, applies for a Carry Permit a check of NICS should be performed and a provisional permit MUST BE (not may, not shall, but MUST be) issued within 8 working hours of submission of the request.Failure to issue the permit within that window will result in a civil penalty against the police chief of the jurisdiction of not less than a $25,000 fine. A second violation within a two year period would result in a fine of the civilian police commissioner of not less than $250,000 and the chief in question being fired with a national “black-ball” for law enforcement jobs for the chief in question. Any jurisdiction with three violations of this law in a two year rolling period would be subject to some a heinous penalty that I’m not sure of yet, but would likely involve 15 years imprisonment for the police commissioner and in excess of a million dollars in fines for the jurisdiction.Either we are serious about domestic violence protection or we are not.And yes, I am a bit draconian when it comes to protecting innocent life.With regard to domestic violence, I would say that failure to enter disqualifying information into the NICS update system within 10 to 20 working days of a conviction should be grounds for insanely stiff penalties to the top ranking officials of a department and their civilian oversight (chief, commissioner).Unfortunately the lowest possible link on the chain gets to be the scapegoat in too many cases, leading me to want to punish those at the top with penalties that will ‘inspire’ their leadership to ensure things don’t fall through the cracks. There would be no statue of limitations on failure to enter the data, you can still be subject to penalties for as long as you are alive if failures to report occur.Like I said, I can get draconian; especially when it comes to those who are supposed to protect and serve.So, what did you have in mind with regard to acceptable waiting periods and background checks.