Precisely, there is no gun show loophole, that's just another lie. They are selling it that way (along with the lie about an online sales loophole) but what they are really after is all private sales. If the gun-control mayors and congressmen and senators and governors and TV pundits were honest this is what they would say: [*]We want all firearm sales, whether from a licensed gun dealer or a private party, to have a background check. [*]We realize these background checks are extremely faulty and will probably do little to catch a large portion of the mental-illness cases because they never get entered into the NICS system in the first place. [*]And we also realize that the overwhelming majority of criminals buy their guns on the street and would never submit to a background check (if you were a felon would you?). [*] At present we don't intend to use these background checks to develop a gun registry of law-abiding citizens (please excuse the "emergency" during Katrina when we confiscated all guns and left the weakest members of society defenseless)[*]And truth be told we really don't want to address the mental-health issue (even though it's obvious all the mass-shooters are crazy, duh).[*]Nor are we interested in actually protecting children even though we've got no problem with using armed guards for all of us gov't officials... and celebrities... and corporations... and gated housing developments... and jewelry exchanges... and amusement parks... and banks... and... (geez, is there anything we don't use armed guards to protect except for children?)[*]So we know it's just a symbolic move that will have little effect but at least it shows we are doing something, right?
Only commercial entities are required to perform a background check at gunshows, but these gatherings are an expanded opportunity for non-commercial entities to buy and sell, sometimes illegally. That's the loophole. No, closing it does not mean that people can't buy and sell privately at home, but it would have been a meaningful statement made at a time when massacres are front and center on the national consciousness. As gwb pointed out earlier, tossing this bone to the public would have gone a long way to depressurizing the gun control push.