H.R. 2159, or the “Denying Firearms and Explosives to Dangerous Terrorists Act of 2009,” is a major party foul sponsored by Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y.
Its purpose, as stated in the legislative text, is to allow the attorney general to deny transfer and sale of firearms to suspected terrorists.
First, the U.S. Department of Justice’s current watchlist of suspected terrorists is estimated to hold the names of 1.5 million people, and nearly every audit has shown the watchlist to be riddled with errors.
One such error includes the placement of Mikey Hicks on the list, which still has not been corrected. Hicks is an 8-year-old Boy Scout from New Jersey and is most likely not trying to wage terrorism against the United States. He cried while being patted down for the first time, but it’s OK because he was only 2 years old.
What can a Boy Scout possibly do to pose a threat to the country, you ask? I don’t know. The government must be afraid of him making awesome loop knots.
The department clearly has no way of regulating this list in the first place.
Second, Attorney General Eric Holder’s interpretation of the Second Amendment is, in essence, that it does not exist. He opposes the individual right to keep and bear arms under the false hope that such a belief will create peace, yet denies the vast evidence that demonstrates gun control promotes crime.
Our current administration somehow has the idea in its mind that guns can kill without people but that somehow people cannot kill without guns.
Studies have shown gun bans simply do not work. FBI statistics showed that the murder rates in Washington, D.C., increased after its gun ban while the rest of the United States’ murder rates did just the opposite.
In England, handguns were banned in 1997 after a pedophile, who was the subject of several molestation complaints to the police, ran into a classroom and killed 16 children. Two years later, the use of handguns in crime rose by 40 percent. After Australia’s 1996 gun ban reform, armed robberies rose by 51 percent and kidnappings rose by 43 percent.
Nothing spells “victim” like a helpless person. Neither criminals nor terrorists stop by the local Wal-Mart to pick up their AK-47s. If that’s what our government thinks, it needs to get its head out of the clouds.
Gun control does not determine how many bad guys obtain guns. It only determines how many innocent people are not allowed to protect themselves and their families from the evil in our world.
The citizens of the United States of America are never going to give up their guns without a fight. If the gun control legislation keeps getting stricter, the government is surely going to feel the blowback, as will our nation against its enemies.
Reach Brian at brian.p.anderson@asu.edu
