A legislative committee has rejected on a tie vote a bill by Governor Deval Patrick to limit the purchase of firearms, angering supporters who say the measure would be a crucial step in stemming gun violence in Boston.
The Joint Committee on the Judiciary’s 4-to-4 vote does not kill the bill. But the prospects for another vote in the near future seem far from certain.Representative Eugene O’Flaherty, House chairman of the panel and a Chelsea Democrat, said he would like to resurrect the measure but other bills, such as one to change the Criminal Offender Record Information law, known as CORI, take priority.
*Sigh*
Limiting the number of firearms a law-abiding gun owner can purchase - especially in MA - isn't going to do a damned thing to stop "gun violence" (gee, I recall a number of stories of kids getting stabbed - apparently we don't give a rat's ass about knife violence). Law abiding gun owners in MA are not going out, spending hundreds to thousands of dollars on training, gun club memberships, etc. to get the elusive MA LTC only to turn around and commit a Federal felony by making a straw purchase. If there were any proof that this were the case - say FBI statistics - this would be front page news.
Instead, they try to ram this bill through in the dead of night so that "Cadillac" Deval has something to hang his hat on. The man's tenure as governor has been an abysmal failure by pretty much any standard, watching the state revenues plummet even as he increases taxes. Crime remains a problem - mainly because criminals are coddled, receiving slaps on the wrist (like 3.5 years for molesting children) while the most law-abiding members of the public are repeatedly harassed and treated shabbily.
Let's face it: Saying that we need a law limiting law-abiding gun owners in MA to one gun a month is a slap in the face. To own a firearm in MA, you need to take a Basic Firearms Safety Course, spending several hundred dollars in the process, and still be at the whim of your Chief of Police. Every single lawful gun owner in MA has a permit - you cannot simply walk in off the street and purchase a firearm. Claiming - without a shred of proof - that criminals are getting their guns from (formerly) law-abiding gun owners is besmirching an entire class of honest citizens.
I, for one, resent the smear and reject the premise.
That is all.
UPDATE: Just wanted to reiterate my promise. When (not if) they do manage to enact some sort of "One Gun A Month" law in MA, I promise to make that a reality in the G. armory - I will actually go out and buy one gun every single damn month of the year.
4 comments:
Nice, a Spam bot!
Well Jay, first up, Remember England. Just like they can't ban the sale of guns entirely they'll start with one-a-month, then maybe 6-a-year, one-a-year, to none. Then they'll stop renewing expired permits, and using that handy registry to round up the guns.
THEN they'll start banning the knives.
Somewhere in that long list are 5 gallon buckets, and woman's pantyhoes. THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!!
Also the spin doctors and trolls keep attempting to make such foolish laws make sense, they will suggest that crooks aren't buying guns from FFLs, but that they're STEALING guns, and one-gun-a-month "limits the supply". Of course we already HAVE lots of guns...and throwing 12 more on top of the pile for the next year further smokes that argument.
Again they're just icing the slope so they can eventually ban your benchmade, your bucket, and your hosery.
Does anybody really NEED to buy more than one beer a month???
The bill is dead, at least for now. Sadly, in MA politics no bill is truly dead or truly passed until the end of the session. There are any number of sleazy tricks sleazy politicians can pull to try to resurrect this.
Which is a good reason to vote them all out and elect new legislators who will tear up the sleazy rule book and make the government work for the taxpayers and voters, not the special interests and leaches.
Not that I have any strong feelings on the subject.
I can add a personal anecdote to what TOTWTYTR said. I grew up wih Rep. O'Flaherty's brothers. His brothers and father fitted the tuxes for and attended my wedding. This is a guy who has a D behind his name because his ancestors would and will never vote for any other party. In our 20's we were all pretty much anti-crime, law and order, anti gun control, Yankee Division Nat'l Guard types, but no f'ing way that they would vote for Ronald Reagan, the anti Kennedy. This guy definiyely got infected by the state house, no other explanation than he sold his soul.
It makes me sad to say that Gene-O and Ed Markey graduated from the same high school that I did, talk about a pair of brainwashed automatrons.
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