I have a novel idea on this whole “Safe Gun” argument.
The antis are always talking about “Safe Gun” technology, be it crazy mandatory safeties, microstamping, and unproven biometrics or RFID technology that only allows the gun to be fired by authorized users.
Here’s a simple solution. Pass a law enforcing whatever technology they hold dear, but have it be for law enforcement only. Demand it to be 100% at the state or federal level where it is passed and force ALL police weapons, from sidearms, to shotguns, to patrol rifles, SWAT equipment, and even TASERs and pepper spray.
Cops are mandated to carry weapons in their jobs. Most departments have provisions to allow officers to take the weapons home at the end of their shift where their families live and neighbors are nearby. Further due to the nature of law enforcement police are more likely to be involved in shootings, and more likely to have their weapons grabbed or stolen by criminals.
If these technologies are so good, Police have the greatest benefit to gain. After say a 5 year trial period, Anti-rights lawmakers could open up the discussion to civilian arms!
Common Sense!
Tough luck on that one. We can’t even get them to write the laws so that police have to follow the same laws that we do. Getting them to pass law that only effects police. Not likely.
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Kinda the whole point of the post! 😉
It’s worse than that. Look at the history of the whole “Safe Gun” concept: a law written to address the problem of police officers being shot with their own guns (grabbed from their holsters by criminals), but couldn’t pass through the legislature until police were exempted from it. Only non-police – i.e. the people NOT affected by the initial problem – are subject to the law.
That’s like drafting a law to prevent drunk driving by installing breathalyzers into the ignition switches of cars owned by convicted drunk drivers (they have to blow 0.00% for the car to start), then specifically exempting those cars and forcing everyone else to blow into the breathalyzer. Makes about equal sense, doesn’t it?
Oh wow! I didn’t know that history. Makes sense given that all I said above is true about cops getting their guns snatched away.
Yea, that was one of the big justifications for introducing “Safe Gun” bills in the first place, but the realities of politics mean the police unions cried foul and wouldn’t support “untested, unreliable” technologies being applied to officers’ self-defense sidearms that might cause the gun to not go “BANG!” when needed. But by then the bills were already in the works and the politicians were invested in them, so rather than let it die they exempted the very people the bill aimed to protect. And the antis, sensing the blood in the water and the chance to infringe on law-abiding citizens’ rights, happily jumped on board.
The original “why” of the whole thing got lost somewhere, and now private citizens (and not police, as originally intended) in places like Soviet Kaliforniya and New Jersey are stuck with it.
It’s also a rock-solid example of what happens when politicians’ priorities shift away from “serving their constituents” to “getting bills passed.” Or, put another way, seeing themselves not as “representatives,” but as “law-makers” (because if laws aren’t being made, they’re not doing their “job,” right?).
In an ideal world, any bill would serve a specific purpose, and if it can’t serve that purpose it should and would be withdrawn, allowed to die, or outright killed. Sadly, we don’t live in that world anymore.
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