An Act creating a global positioning system locators in firearms study commission.
SECTION 1. A special commission after this referred to as the Global Positioning System Locators in Firearms Study Commission, is hereby established for the purpose of making an investigation and study relative to the feasibility of placing Global Positioning System (“GPS”) locators in firearms.
Y'know, I take it back. This cannot possibly be ignorance - if someone's really stupid enough to believe that putting a GPS device in a firearm would do *anything* to reduce crimes committed with firearms, they're too stupid to avoid drinking out of a bottle with a skull and crossbones on it to reach adulthood. How does Petruccelli suppose this is going to work? Sure, if your gun is stolen, it *might* aid in getting it back. Given that MA has "safe storage" laws, where guns are required to be locked up anyways, getting a law-abiding gun owner their property back is a flimsy pretense for this naked attempt to run gun manufacturers out of MA entirely.
They've done a pretty damn good job with the "Approved Firearms Roster" {spit}. Manufacturers who want to sell firearms in MA have to submit a certain number of guns for "testing", with a number of idiotic and useless features (loaded chamber indicators, 10 pound triggers, etc.). Requiring gun makers to somehow cram a GPS device inside a handgun will end the sale in MA of all new handguns - quite simply, no manufacturer is going to add the expense and bulk for a tiny market like MA.
And that is exactly what State Senator Anthony Petruccelli is aiming for.
That is all.
Thanks to reader Seth in Massachusetts for e-mailing me this idiotic bill.
14 comments:
This is too funny. It's not just a case of ignorance; it's a case of watching too many James Bond movies.
GPS devices are just receivers, not transmitters. By themselves, they don't tell anyone but the person possessing them where they are at any given moment. Now, I gotta admit a certain geeky thrill to the thought of owning a pistol that can give me directions to the nearest shootin' range..... but unless you couple it to some sort of transmitter with a magical perpetual battery powering it the JBTs are not going to be able to track it. At the very best the GPS could store a tracklog of where it's *been*. Maybe record the it's position into memory every time it's fired. Of course, any such James Bond system would be fairly simple to defeat in real life. Thanks for the Sunday morning chuckle!
Cellphones can transmit GPS location. But in that case, the GPS transmitter is the cellphone transmitter.
Where in the frame of a gun is there room to fit in a transmitter, a power source, _and_ the shockproofing it would need? I suppose you could fit it into the grip of a revolver, but a semiauto...?
OO! OO! I know! To power it you could have some sort of coil around the barrel, so when the gun is fired the bullet (it would have to be a magnetic bullet) would cause a current in the coil, and you could charge up a battery! Wow! That makes it sound even more feasible!
Flee.
Mopar - I was thinking along your lines. We all know the best Red Ryder BB guns had a compass in the stock. Let's get up to speed with new technology :-)
http://www.thegunzone.com/gagpix/g-nokia.jpg
Even better, GPS units that haven't had a signal for even a day or so can take several minutes to get a satellite fix and calculate a position. With MA's "safe" storage laws, you have a unit that won't pick up a signal for weeks or even months at a time before it's stolen.
The GPS signal is pretty weak. If the thief keeps it in a metal box - or even just under the seat of a car - until he's ready to use it, it won't have an accurate position to send. Cover the part with the antenna with lead foil, and it will never pick up a signal.
Gotta go shoot somebody...guess I'll have to take the battery out of my gun.
Do people even stop for a microsecond to think anymore?
Theoretically, slide movement on semi-autos could be used to charge the battery - same way as a handle on hand-crank radios. No magnetic bullet required. There are three problems with this:
1) This will add mechanical resistance to slide motion, potentially preventing it from cycling on lighter loads,
2) This charger won't be sufficient, unless the slide is operated on pretty much daily basis, and
3) Anybody with half a brain would be able to make this system inoperable
Designing a "crank" that would be either as reliable as the gun itself, or at least won't render the gun inoperative when it breaks, is an interesting problem. Wish I had more time to think about this, I have a feeling there might be material for a few patents in it. And there could be actual uses for this, better ones than this idiotic GPS+cell phone idea. For example, keeping the laser and/or the flashlight charged. Oh, and just for you, Jay, I'd add the ability to deliver a small electric shock through the bayonet ;)
HorseThief: People do stop to think.
It's liberals that don't.
I could see this being a great addition to police patrol rifles and stuff like that.
As for personally owned guns, I'd carve mine out of the gun and attach it to State Senator Anthony Petruccelli's vehicle and call in an anonymous stolen gun report.
We know the goal is to make guns too expensive to manufacture/buy but why do they chose such stupid methods? It's as if they had no knowledge of physics, chemistry, metallurgy, history ... oh, wait! That's why they've gone into politics. They can't make it in the real world.
w/v expermin: there's a joke there but I'm damned if I can find it.
bluesun almost had it. The problem isn't where the firearms are its where the bullets go.
We obviously need GPS in the bullets.
PS- I'm also sure this would solve global warming.
Obviously rep. Petrucelli got the idea from his father, the Mass Highway electrician who amassed something like 300K$ in OT working 21 hours a day.
"Say dad, you'se are an electrician, you knows about satellites and outer space and stuff right?"
You would not need a high school shop or physics class to disable that GPS. Which would probably work about 40% of the time. Hence it would be 200% more price and hassle, and 0% affect on crime. Brilliant, I feel so much confidence in my elected officials, federal and state level.
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