Found the following articles in the local newspaper and thought they were important enough to share with everyone. Please note both articles are from the newspaper, no text of my own.
Two different events take aim at gun violence
News item you may have missed this week: New Jersey's "smart gun" legislation was signed into law by Gov. James McGreevey. The Associated Press said it will "require new handguns to contain technology that allows only their owners to fire them."
Movie you may have missed this week: "Bowling for olumbine." "Bowling" is a documentary film that examines America's plague of gun violence, particularly the 1999 massacre by two nutcase students at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. Although I am distressed about gun violence, I hold that citizens have an absolute right to bear arms in their own defense. The Second Amendment was designed as a check on government power, as was the rest of the Bill of Rights. I believe that abrogation of any part of the Bill of Rights will set precedents far more harmful to America than the threat posed by other nutcases with guns, in or out of government. The AP made New Jersey's new law sound terrific, but I'd like to take a look at the entire measure before I take a stand on it, one way or the other. I did go see "Bowling" in its entirety, and it reflected the sentiments of the gun control movement. In other words, it was filled with hysterical anti-gun non sequiturs and treated the Bill of Rights as irrelevant. The film was produced by Michael Moore, who displays the intelligence, demeanor, and physique, of a septic hop toad. At one point, Moore and his camera crew stormed into the California home of actor Charlton Heston, president of the National Rifle Association, to demand an apology for NRA rallies held in support of the Second Amendment. Moore declared the rallies to be insensitive to the feelings of the Columbine victims. The befuddled Heston, who is pushing 80, totteringly retreated to his home's interior with-out apologizing, the cad. Moore's film did raise one crucial point. It grudgingly admitted that other countries, notably Canada, have at least as many guns in public hands, but have a tiny fraction of the violence that affects America. How does Moore, or anyone else, explain why Canadians do not shoot each other to pieces? How about Switzerland, where every adult is armed for self-defense? Is culture the reason? Do average Americans have a character flaw that makes us more violent? That seems unlikely to anyone who has watched pro hockey and the mayhem that Canadian players gleefully bring to games. Could it be that the reason for inordinate violence, especially mortal violence, lies elsewhere? Could it be that the popular cure for violence, more government intrusion has the opposite effect? Who nurtures conflict in our society? Is it the guy next door? Or is it politicians who reward greed while suppressing the work ethic, and who enact Big Brother controls approaching what George Orwell saw in his nightmares? Does government focus on crooks who harm other people, or does law enforcement focus almost entirely on consensual personal behavior? Do public schools fan hatred? Do social service juggernauts support individualism, or do I they say you are not responsible for, and have no authority over, yourself or your family? Who enacted the laws that created the colossal profits and turf wars of Prohibition and then the War on Drugs? Maybe someday Michael Moore will point his documentary cameras at government, and will ask someone there to apologize but don't hold your breath waiting for that.
Part 2
Law provides for guns so safe they don't work
What could be more reasonable than a state law to make handguns safer?
As I noted on Friday, New Jersey's new "smart gun" law requires that handguns be equipped with devices to keep them from being fired by marauding children, etc. "Smart gun technology prevents anyone, except the recognized user of the gun, from firing the weapon," gushed a statement from Gov. James McGreevey, as he signed the bill on Dec. 23. "Personalized handguns can include a sensor on the handle of the gun, fingerprint recognition, remote control, magnetic coding or radio transmitters," the governor's statement said. The fact that no such technology exists did not deter the Trenton crowd. They said the law will not take effect until after the technology is available, so skeptics should not get their noses out of joint. On Friday, I said I like to look at an actual law, in addition to reading what politicians say about it, before I make up my mind. Now that I have read the new measure, I'm afraid I am still a skeptic. The first thing I looked for was the part that said the law cannot take effect until after the technology is available. , "Personalized handguns shall be deemed to be available for retail purposes," it says, "if at least one manufacturer has delivered at least one production model of a personalized handgun to a registered or licensed whole-sale or retail dealer in New Jersey or any other state." There is nothing in the law that says the gun necessarily has to work. The Flybynite Corkscrew Co. of Cucamonga can make a gun with magnetic coding, or whatever, and sell it to the Hillary Clinton Gun Boutique in Po dunk. If one gun, anywhere, has a device to keep it from firing, the rule takes effect in New Jersey. Do you believe that is intended to make guns safer, or to make guns not work at all? Here is the law's most revealing part: "The provisions of this section," it says, "shall not apply to handguns to be sold, transferred, assigned and delivered for official use to" police or federal authorities. If the law's authors truly feel it will make guns safer while letting them function for legitimate purposes, why not also let it apply to the police? Don't we want their guns to be both safe and operational? Logic dictates there is only one reason for such a law. It is designed to disarm everyone except government. It is not a safety measure; it is a measure to give government ultimate power. Every tyranny in world history has done the same thing - disarm the public so that the public need not be feared by the power structure. Having been shot at three times in my life, I am all for genuine gun safety. When I was a boy, my parents let me hunt and target shoot by myself because they knew that I knew guns had to be taken seriously and handled properly. In those days, kids may have done many foolish things, but we were well educated about guns and I never saw any magnetic coding. Today, antigun hysteria has enabled government to enact one restriction after another, with just as much efficacy as the war on drugs. And now that the land east of the Delaware River has a new law to take functioning firearms out of the hands of everyone except the government, how long will it be before a similar proposal arises west of the Delaware? .
Two different events take aim at gun violence
News item you may have missed this week: New Jersey's "smart gun" legislation was signed into law by Gov. James McGreevey. The Associated Press said it will "require new handguns to contain technology that allows only their owners to fire them."
Movie you may have missed this week: "Bowling for olumbine." "Bowling" is a documentary film that examines America's plague of gun violence, particularly the 1999 massacre by two nutcase students at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. Although I am distressed about gun violence, I hold that citizens have an absolute right to bear arms in their own defense. The Second Amendment was designed as a check on government power, as was the rest of the Bill of Rights. I believe that abrogation of any part of the Bill of Rights will set precedents far more harmful to America than the threat posed by other nutcases with guns, in or out of government. The AP made New Jersey's new law sound terrific, but I'd like to take a look at the entire measure before I take a stand on it, one way or the other. I did go see "Bowling" in its entirety, and it reflected the sentiments of the gun control movement. In other words, it was filled with hysterical anti-gun non sequiturs and treated the Bill of Rights as irrelevant. The film was produced by Michael Moore, who displays the intelligence, demeanor, and physique, of a septic hop toad. At one point, Moore and his camera crew stormed into the California home of actor Charlton Heston, president of the National Rifle Association, to demand an apology for NRA rallies held in support of the Second Amendment. Moore declared the rallies to be insensitive to the feelings of the Columbine victims. The befuddled Heston, who is pushing 80, totteringly retreated to his home's interior with-out apologizing, the cad. Moore's film did raise one crucial point. It grudgingly admitted that other countries, notably Canada, have at least as many guns in public hands, but have a tiny fraction of the violence that affects America. How does Moore, or anyone else, explain why Canadians do not shoot each other to pieces? How about Switzerland, where every adult is armed for self-defense? Is culture the reason? Do average Americans have a character flaw that makes us more violent? That seems unlikely to anyone who has watched pro hockey and the mayhem that Canadian players gleefully bring to games. Could it be that the reason for inordinate violence, especially mortal violence, lies elsewhere? Could it be that the popular cure for violence, more government intrusion has the opposite effect? Who nurtures conflict in our society? Is it the guy next door? Or is it politicians who reward greed while suppressing the work ethic, and who enact Big Brother controls approaching what George Orwell saw in his nightmares? Does government focus on crooks who harm other people, or does law enforcement focus almost entirely on consensual personal behavior? Do public schools fan hatred? Do social service juggernauts support individualism, or do I they say you are not responsible for, and have no authority over, yourself or your family? Who enacted the laws that created the colossal profits and turf wars of Prohibition and then the War on Drugs? Maybe someday Michael Moore will point his documentary cameras at government, and will ask someone there to apologize but don't hold your breath waiting for that.
Part 2
Law provides for guns so safe they don't work
What could be more reasonable than a state law to make handguns safer?
As I noted on Friday, New Jersey's new "smart gun" law requires that handguns be equipped with devices to keep them from being fired by marauding children, etc. "Smart gun technology prevents anyone, except the recognized user of the gun, from firing the weapon," gushed a statement from Gov. James McGreevey, as he signed the bill on Dec. 23. "Personalized handguns can include a sensor on the handle of the gun, fingerprint recognition, remote control, magnetic coding or radio transmitters," the governor's statement said. The fact that no such technology exists did not deter the Trenton crowd. They said the law will not take effect until after the technology is available, so skeptics should not get their noses out of joint. On Friday, I said I like to look at an actual law, in addition to reading what politicians say about it, before I make up my mind. Now that I have read the new measure, I'm afraid I am still a skeptic. The first thing I looked for was the part that said the law cannot take effect until after the technology is available. , "Personalized handguns shall be deemed to be available for retail purposes," it says, "if at least one manufacturer has delivered at least one production model of a personalized handgun to a registered or licensed whole-sale or retail dealer in New Jersey or any other state." There is nothing in the law that says the gun necessarily has to work. The Flybynite Corkscrew Co. of Cucamonga can make a gun with magnetic coding, or whatever, and sell it to the Hillary Clinton Gun Boutique in Po dunk. If one gun, anywhere, has a device to keep it from firing, the rule takes effect in New Jersey. Do you believe that is intended to make guns safer, or to make guns not work at all? Here is the law's most revealing part: "The provisions of this section," it says, "shall not apply to handguns to be sold, transferred, assigned and delivered for official use to" police or federal authorities. If the law's authors truly feel it will make guns safer while letting them function for legitimate purposes, why not also let it apply to the police? Don't we want their guns to be both safe and operational? Logic dictates there is only one reason for such a law. It is designed to disarm everyone except government. It is not a safety measure; it is a measure to give government ultimate power. Every tyranny in world history has done the same thing - disarm the public so that the public need not be feared by the power structure. Having been shot at three times in my life, I am all for genuine gun safety. When I was a boy, my parents let me hunt and target shoot by myself because they knew that I knew guns had to be taken seriously and handled properly. In those days, kids may have done many foolish things, but we were well educated about guns and I never saw any magnetic coding. Today, antigun hysteria has enabled government to enact one restriction after another, with just as much efficacy as the war on drugs. And now that the land east of the Delaware River has a new law to take functioning firearms out of the hands of everyone except the government, how long will it be before a similar proposal arises west of the Delaware? .
