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“The state of Hawaii did not issue any gun-carry permits to private citizens in 2016, the Washington Free Beacon reports. “Documents submitted by county police to the state’s Department of the Attorney General show that every application by a private citizen for a concealed-carry permit was denied in 2016. That makes Hawaii the only state in the country not to issue even a single concealed-carry permit last year.”

An unbroken record stretching back to 2000 — despite the fact that Hawaiian [non carry] gun permit applications rose by 298 percent between 2000 and 2014. And if you think the Aloha State is the only state where gun rights go to die . . .

“All other states have issued permits,” said Dr. John Lott Jr. of the Crime Prevention Research Center. “The next lowest state is New Jersey with about 1,200 permits, but half of those are issued to judges and retired police officers. Even D.C. last year had [just] 74 permits for civilians being able to carry.”

Clearly, it’s high time the Supreme Court struck down “may issue” permitting systems in states like Hawaii, New Jersey and Rhode Island. Or declare all firearms permitting processes an infringement on Americans’ natural, civil or Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms. Hey, I can dream can’t I?

Meanwhile — wouldn’t you know it? — Michael Bloomberg’s anti-gun agit-propagandists are in love. Here’s a taste of The Trace’s article Forget Australia’s Gun Laws. American Reform Advocates Have Their Own Island to Study:

[Hawaii’s 25 percent gun ownership rate] point to a conundrum. Research shows that higher rates of gun ownership lead to higher rates of violent crime. How has the Aloha State avoided the correlation?

The answer begins with one way in which Hawaii differs from many of its continental cohorts: As the number of guns in the state has increased, Hawaii’s legislators have enacted some of the strictest gun safety measures in the country.

State law, for starters, requires a universal background check for all firearm sales. Citizens are required to obtain a permit and sit through a two-week waiting period before making a purchase, and they must register any firearm they buy. Registration itself is a multi-step process that can lead prospective gun owners on as many as five separate trips to either a police station or gun retailer.

Permits for concealed-carry, meanwhile, are issued at the discretion of the state’s county police chiefs, who set a high bar (a recent decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals looks poised to bulldoze that hurdle, though the state’s lawyers are fighting the ruling). In short: Background checks, waiting periods, elaborate registration guidelines, and strict limits on concealed-carry permits combine to seriously vet prospective gun owners, and limit impulse and illegal purchases.

A high bar for concealed carry? Need I remind Trace scribe Kevin Mahnken that when it comes to concealed carry permits Hawaii issues exactly none? 

Guess so. I’m also thinking that Mr. Mahnken is cherry-picking variables — draconian, unconstitutional gun control laws all — to portray Hawaii as the Promised Land.

Manhken then makes the usual argument that all of America would be the same pastime paradise if only gun control was federal, somehow preventing illegal interstate gun traffic. Like this:

[Duke sociology professor Philip J.] Cook went on to suggest [that] Hawaii offers a kind of case study in what federal gun regulations might look like — a country in which firearms would be more difficult to acquire and carry in public, much harder to procure illegally, but still plentifully owned by law abiding citizens.

“If we start talking about a national strategy,” he says “that eliminates the ‘Chicago-Gary problem’”—i.e., the network of criminal actors funneling illegal guns into Chicago from nearby Gary, Indiana. “At the very least, it would cut into some of the flows we’re seeing right now, just as the Brady Act cut down on some interstate trafficking. Probably, it would tell us something about the potential effectiveness of national regulation as opposed to states going it alone, where they’re being undercut by their lax neighbors.”

Setting aside the Second Amendment, anyone who thinks that the federal gun control would stem the tide of “gun violence” in the continental U.S.’s urban centers should be exiled to an island in the Pacific. For their own safety.

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43 COMMENTS

      • I visited my parents on Maui a decade ago. We were walking through Lahaina Village (big money, big tourist area) and I had two guys try to sell me ice in 5 minutes. My dad says it’s because I didn’t look like a tourist. I tan very deeply, very quickly.

        Homeless people shitting on the beach – not even in the water, FFS. Hawaii is a hole. But Downtown Honolulu has a lot to offer a young, single man with disposable income, that’s for sure. Just don’t accept any drinks from the hostesses. Visit Pearl Harbor and go back to your room

  1. Not to bring up some stupid show but Dog the Bounty Hunter proves the fact that there is still tons of crime going on in Hawaii it’s not as safe as they like to make it for the tourist. Sure if you stay in one of the big hotels on the mainland you’re as safe as anybody else that is guarded by armed security. But if you go back into the some of the neighborhoods on the smaller Islands methamphetamine is everywhere they’ve got a major at the dimmick in Hawaii with this nasty narcotic. All sorts a crime that go with a major drug epidemic as well robbery assault rape you name it they got it. All you have to do is Google Hawaiian crime rates and look at how they’ve exploded over the last 10 years to 15 years.

    • Well, there is a lot of meth-related crime, but it seemed that last year, every other week there was a story on HawaiiNewsNow about some Honolulu cop being arrested for some damn thing or another. Kind of makes you see the draconian gun laws a bit more sharply.

  2. “In short: Background checks, waiting periods, elaborate registration guidelines, and strict limits on concealed-carry permits combine to seriously vet prospective gun owners, and limit impulse and illegal purchases.”

    In short Hawaii makes sure that “undesirables” cannot acquire and carry firearms.

    • By “undesirables”, do you mean the law-abiding citizens that consent to jump through the convoluted legal hoops to comply with the draconian rules and regulations? If that is in fact what you mean by “undesirables”, then your definition is a 100% match with that of the elected and bureaucratic officials of the state of Hawaii (as well as many other states).

  3. By the way, what firearm and caliber is McGarrett holding there? It almost looks like a .44 Special.

    And, it looks like it has an actual cartridge with an actual bullet loaded into at least one of the cylinders.

    • Click on the pic. It’s a .38 caliber 5-shot Model 36 S&W.

      When I worked in TV I knew one of the producers of Hawaii Five-O. He told me that Jack Lord lost it. Actually believed he was McGarrett. The network hired two men to accompany him and run interference. Sad

      • Somehow that almost doesn’t surprise me that an actor gave himself over to his fictional role.

        I have stated many times that Progressives operate on altruism, fantasy, and emotion. And it should be obvious that the overwhelming majority of writers, directors, actors, and actresses are Progressive. It would be exceedingly easy for such a person to totally reject reality and just play their role full time … since they pretty much do that already.

        • It’s altruism when you give of your own wealth, possessions, and time to benefit others. It isn’t altruism when you force others to give up their stuff. Then it’s more accurately called coercion, and it ought to be a crime in all circumstances.

        • See also “Robin” the boy blunder of the original BATMAN series. Ole Burt called me when I worked for a toy mfg in the early 90s. A total nutter.

          “Actor” defined as someone with not actual personality or substance who needs to assume that of another. So no surprise are easily manipulated by progtard left/commies.

  4. I am not surprised from my home state. It has been going down hill with liberties for a long time. The suck thing that idiots that are in power are constantly voted back in every elections. The funny thing is that a lot of people complain about how everything is run. Duh.

  5. I would imagine places like Hawaii and such are super good breeding grounds for tourist trap crime. Armed robbery, assaults, batteries, etc. people carrying high balance credit cards, lots of cash, jewelry, seems like an easy target for actual deplorables to get some quick money.

    I’ll consider going when I’m able to legally carry. Same goes for NYC, Chicago, and Disney Land.

    • Tourist crime is usually auto burglary. Tourists tend to leave cameras and laptops in the rental car while they go to the beach. Locals put a flower window decal on the rear window to let the tweakers know there’s nothing inside.

  6. Hawaii also has something the rest of the country doesn’t: It’s a set of islands. Small islands.

    The combination of being small and being islands naturally lends itself to policing the import of black market firearms.

    To me, what this study shows is evidence that, in a relatively controlled environment which is good for study, guns in public hands are safe because people who legally buy guns don’t have a significant tendency to use them for illicit purposes. Ergo, gun control isn’t the issue. Criminal control is the issue.

    • Criminals are a tad easier to catch on a series of smaller islands. Doesn’t eliminate crime but naturally reduces it.

      • As long as the cops are competent. The Dutch side of St. Maarten, where the cops are decidedly NOT competent, comes to mind.

        On the other hand it’s kind of a wash because most of the criminals aren’t competent either. Drug smugglers calling the Coasties to come rescue them and then trying to wave off the Coasties when the smugglers realized what they had done had me sitting on a dive boat laughing for about an hour. Best surface support day ever.

        Of course what the cops did with those three tons of pot later had me laughing even harder because I was stoned out of my mind along with the rest of Philipsburg.

    • If there are no guns because it’s an island…where does all the meth come from?

      There are no guns because there is no market. People get tired of the BS? A container labeled as Spam will be on it’s way from Chongqing in no time. Same place Mexican cartels get their weapons.

  7. Not passing the smell test to me. The thing about elected officials is that they GET OFF on the very things they like to deny the public. There is either a secret list of those Chosen Ones who get to carry or they carry without permits because they know the cops and the DA allow them to.

  8. I was stationed in Honolulu, Hawaii and their laws are really designed to deter gun ownership. First you go to the gun store pick out your gun, you pay but you can’t take it with you. You get all the gun info and you take it downtown to police station, which is the only, I say again only place on the island to request a purchase permit. There is limited parking and you could be waiting in line for hours. So you finally make to the window drop off your paper, it turns into a 2 week wait. Fast forward 2 weeks, you have to go back downtown, fight for parking and waiting in line. Once you make it to the window and secure your permit, you drive back to the gun store where you purchased your handgun to retrieve. Once you have your handgun in hand, you must got back downtown, fight for parking, wait in line and register your gun. Now your a proud gun owner!

  9. The number isn’t zero. Kauai issues 1 or 2 permits. 2aHawaii was discussing how one person had a permit issued for 9 days when they are valid by statute for 1 year.

    In 2006, Maui issued 1.

    The article says zero because the AG’s office reported zero being issued. The reason for this is that none of the 4 chiefs forward copies of the permits to the AG as required by HRS 134-9.

    That said, the number of permits since 2000 is less than 10…. which is pathetic… but it’s not zero.

  10. Actually the yearly AG’s report notes 6 permits issued since 2000, the year the AG was mandated to publish such a list. There are several years in which no permits for concealed carry were issued.
    Handgun purchases require that you obtain specified training (4 hours classroom, 2 hours range time) and submit your original, notarized affidavit of said training each and every time you make a handgun purchase. After the training it takes 3 separate trips to the only police station that processes permits. Long gun purchases do not have a training requirement and take 2 trips to the police station.
    Every year bills are submitted to the legislature to change to a “shall issue” permitting process. Each year those bills die without ever getting assigned to a committee hearing.
    Last year a bill was passed that every one who purchased a new gun be entered into the FBI “Rap Back” program.

  11. I still remember the Hawaii 5-0 episode where Steve was being shot a by a guy with a scoped rifle in a helicopter. Miss, miss, miss. McGarrett draws his revolver, grabs his wrist, “bang”, the chopper went down. Good shootin’, I’d say. 8>) Book ’em, Dano.

  12. Hawaii is afraid if the natives were armed they’d lose their little islands. They’re probably right. Hawaii gun laws are racist in nature.

  13. To add insult to injury… Effective this year, with the registration of ALL new firearms or for those bringing them into the state, the owner will be entered into the FBI Rapback database. It adds a $42 fee for firearm registration. Hawaii is the only state in the nation to require a firearm owner to be in the FBI database. Existing firearm owners are currently grandfathered from being placed into the database, but with our ALL DEMOCRAT state legislature, that may soon change. There are several bills going through the state House and Senate right now trying to amend firearm registration requirements. Where is the NRA?

    BEWARE!!! Rapback may be coming to a state near you soon.

    http://honolulupd.org/information/index.php?page=gunmain

    https://ag.hawaii.gov/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Rap-Back-Facts-Sheet-Final-12-7-16-002.pdf

  14. I was stationed when active duty Army in Hawaii for 3 years[90-93] and lived there later on for 8 more.[2001-2009] The guns I had registered nearly 10 years earlier were STILL in the government records of the Honolulu Police Dept. When I showed up in ’01, I had 2 or 3 NEW guns to register since last living there. Do it within 5 days of arrival in one trip to HPD HQ’s and you’re thru. Buy a new gun a few months later, OH, you need a “hunter safety class” or something similar. WHY? I have over a dozen guns ALREADY registered? It’s da law. OH, good thing I buried all my DANGEROUS “high capacity” magazines for my Glock 17/semi AK, etc. That way, I was STILL legal owning them once I unburied them to use again ! lol
    NO civilian has gotten a “carry permit” EXCEPT the civilian employee of the HPD who is the gun armorer. ZIP, NO one else as this article states.
    I carried under LEOSA when it passed while I lived there 2001-2009. NOT easy to carry a Kahr P45 in drawstring shorts ! LOL Had to buy shorts with belt loops.
    The laws are just put in place to make things difficult for the poor and to make you jump thru hoops. It has NOTHING to do with “safety” or any other lie.

    • Sorry, you’re incorrect. Review the AG’s reports from 2000 forward. There have been 6 permits issued in 16 years.
      The reports are available in the AG’s webpage if you’d like to verify.

  15. none of these articles take the actual truth into account.. There are THOUSANDS of unregistered firearms in Hawaii, because being an island, makes is very difficult to police every single thing coming into the island. When they decided that all of us who own guns are criminals, we decided we had enough, and just became criminals. When the government oversteps it authorities we have a duty to resist.

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