The bill purports to give people a chance to have their names removed from the no-buy list, but only at great personal expense... with no guarantee of success.

If the past is any indication, purchasing a firearm is about to become a lot more complicated.

Keep in mind that for years the ATF has been forbidden from doing any investigations to expunge records and return people's gun rights.

Now, with the help of the NRA, even more restrictions are being created.  (Click here for the E-mail NRA lobbyists sent Members of Congress lobbying for this gun control)

Of course, unlike a "crime," "mental illness" is a very subjective evaluation.

As Corey Graff from Wisconsin Gun Owners writes;

"Since 1952, the American Psychiatry Association (APA) has utilized the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) as its standard for defining, diagnosing and treating mental health disorders.

Since its first printing, the manual has undergone five revisions, the most recent being the DSM-IV, which was finalized in 1994. Currently a fifth version is being prepared and is due out by 2012.

Each new version contradicts the previous version; new authors with new perspectives and agendas write each new release. The standard keeps changing, shifting, sometimes radically so -- the result is that mental illness is never clearly or objectively defined. It is a moving target shaped by political and social pressures.

Following controversy and protests from gay activists at APA annual conferences from 1970 to 1973, the seventh printing of the DSM-II, in 1974, no longer listed homosexuality as a category of disorder. After talks led by the psychiatrist Robert Spitzer, who had been involved in the DSM-II development committee, a vote by the APA trustees in 1973, confirmed by the wider APA membership in 1974, replaced the diagnosis with a milder category of "sexual orientation disturbance."

In today's politically correct climate, the most recent version of the DSM-IV contains "no reference to homosexuality."

Which DSM was correct or were both wrong? One can easily see the danger this contradiction raises if these diagnoses were synced up with a gun owner database that acts as an automated judge, jury and executioner for the gun buyer.

Such variance also calls into question the credibility of those who define mental illness.

Psychiatrists can't even agree amongst themselves over a relatively short period of time on how to precisely define mental illness on any given issue. Thirty years ago no one heard the term "attention deficit disorder" or "post-traumatic stress disorder" -- today diagnoses for these new mental illnesses are commonplace.

We believe the next step -- if you don't think there's a "next step" you undoubtedly fit the description of mentally deranged -- is to require information and deny firearms purchases for anyone who has ever taken an anti-depressant (the estimates for the number of young adults in America who have, at one time, taken these anti-depressant drugs is staggering). If that happens, a large portion of a number of generations in America will be stripped of their Second Amendment rights.

The bottom line: If NICS is expanded, expect entire groups to be denied their right to purchase a firearm.

Legislation like this paints with a broad brush and will disarm many good people who should be able to buy handguns. One such group is veterans.

"[NICS Expansion] could have a significant impact on American servicemen," wrote Gun Owners of America recently, "especially those returning from combat situations and who seek some type of psychiatric care.

Often, veterans who have suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder have been deemed as mentally 'incompetent' and are prohibited from owning guns under 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(4). Records of those instances certainly exist, and, in 1999, the Department of Veterans Administration turned over 90,000 names of veterans to the FBI for inclusion into the NICS background check system."

Once again, the NRA has colluded with anti-gunners to pass new gun control and tell gun owners it's good for them.

They did so when the Brady Insta-Check Registration system was passed into law, and now they're attempting to strengthen that gun control... and weaken our rights.