It does make sense, in a peculiar way. A private seller can’t access the NICS system, even if he wants to. A type 1 or 2 FFL must run the NICS check before making a transfer. A “straw man” purchase from an FFL basically uses Person A’s licensing, criminal record (or lack thereof), etc. to satisfy the NICS check, because the real buyer, Person B, can’t get past NICS (for whatever reason). But if there’s no NICS check, no deceit is needed to complete the transaction.

There are some requirements on the private seller but they’re minimal. For instance, the seller is not supposed to sell to a buyer who’s obviously underaged – but he’s not required to go to any extraordinary lengths to verify the buyer’s age if the buyer lies about it.

One could make a decent legal and practical argument that even minimal requirements could be dodged, in which case the Straw Man concept would apply to private sales as well. But that argument has apparently not yet been made. ATF doesn’t seem to interpret the situation that way. However, ATF interpretation are capricious. There are several known contradictory written opinions from ATF on legal interpretations of the federal laws. These questions seem to be answered by whoever at AFT happens to open the letter asking the question, and they don’t always answer them the same way. There are more formal processes for ATF “findings” but they’re not always used. And of course a court need not follow ATF’s reasoning.

Uncle: I agree that the press is no better than you or me; however, they shouldn’t be treated any worse, either. My guess (and it is a guess) is that the ATF has better things to do than to give more than a stern warning to purchasers who did not know about the law, and whose only crime was buying the right gun in the wrong state.

As to the pun, I appreciate the nod but can’t claim originality. Someone, I forget who, coined it during the Eason Jordan scandal.

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