By Rob Morse
Southern California –-(Ammoland.com)- Every law and every election is useful. We were promised that criminals would stop using firearms in Washington State.
In theory, criminals would stop using guns because they could not pass the new mandatory background check. In practice the new law didn’t stop crime at all.
Armed robberies continue in Seattle. I’m sure you’re stunned, but armed bank robberies continue in Tacoma too. Crime didn’t even slow down after the initiative went into effect. Who would have imagined that violent criminals wouldn’t obey the next gun law!? I’m sure the naive Washington voter is shocked.
To the rest of us, it was obvious that criminals would continue to use guns and break the law the way they always had. The new gun law was simply another un-necessary burden aimed at honest gun owners. That was the plan all along.
The new law makes it illegal to let your girlfriend touch your gun and learn how to safely unload it. That is because it is now illegal to hold a firearm that hasn’t been legally transferred to you. Now you can’t teach your neighbor or her child about gun safety. We even outlawed many of the safety practices we were taught in hunter safety classes. That makes us less safe in Washington State, not safer.
How did we become less safe when we were promised the end of gun violence? All it took was ten million dollars of advertising to persuade the drive-by voter. They voted for a sweet sounding headline. The Sheriff’s association in Washington told us the law wouldn’t work, but the Washington voters didn’t want to listen. I’m going to make a prediction. The superstitious gun-bigots will claim the latest law failed to work because we didn’t pass enough anti-gun laws. The next law is sure to work! Sure it is.
The sad news is the gun-bigots can probably sell that superstitious idea too. All it takes is another donation from the billionaires’ anti-gun club. With enough money for advertising, the next bigoted gun initiative will pass as easily as the last one. The naive Washington voter certainly is no wiser.
Seattle voters think the criminals simply didn’t get the news about the new gun law. That is why we need a special tax for a new 10 million dollar publicity campaign telling armed robbers in Washington that it is now doubly illegal to use a gun in an armed robbery. That is sure to work!
Who owns a radio or TV station near Seattle? I bet we can sell that publicity campaign to the next batch of headline surfing voters. With enough money, you can fool the stupid voters enough of the time.
About Rob Morse: By day, Rob Morse works as a mild mannered engineer for a Southern California defense contractor. By night he writes about gun rights at Ammoland, Clash Daily and on his SlowFacts blog. He is a combat handgun competitor and NRA basic pistol instructor.