Writing for The Boston Globe, ex-Maryland governor and presidential hopeful Martin O’Malley reacted to the shooting in a LaFayette cinema with a call for more gun control. “We need comprehensive gun safety laws to save lives,” O’Malley opines, using the gun control-euphemism-of-the-moment. Come to think of it, considering his radical suggestions for combatting “gun violence,” I reckon we can substitute the words “90 degree slippery slope to a complete gun ban” for “comprehensive gun safety laws.” Check it . . .
This is where we should start: The federal government should limit the sale of firearms to tightly regulated, licensed dealers. That means closing the “gun show loophole” once and for all, and banning unlicensed private individuals from selling guns.
We should also impose greater restrictions on what, to whom, and where dealers can sell guns. That means banning the sale of assault weapons, increasing inspections, and establishing a national gun registry to help law enforcement track down dangerous criminals. It also means requiring gun owners to secure and safely store all firearms in their homes.
This is by far the most extreme anti-gun agenda this writer has encountered in over five years of gun blogging – short of the occasional call for an outright ban on civilian firearms ownership. Putting the government in charge of “licensing and regulating” the entire civilian firearms industry – banning any and all private sales – is a bald-faced move towards the Mexican model, where only the government sells firearms.
In case you don’t know where that leads, O’Malley spells it out: the government would decide “what [firearms], to whom, and where dealers can sell guns.” And then keep records on everyone who was allowed to buy one. And visit gun owners’ homes to check-up on anyone and everyone – probably at random and without a warrant – who bought one, to make sure they’re being stored safely (the UK model).
Clearly, O’Malley views the words “shall not be infringed” to mean “shall be infringed.” The bigger question: who’s with him? Which gun control group or politician will renounce O’Malley’s prescription for civilian disarmament? I’m thinking none. If they’d have their ‘druthers, every gun control advocate would be down with this plan. They won’t admit it, now, but it’s their collective vision of gun control paradise. Which is, of course, hell.
That said, I am delighted that Martin O’Malley wrote this Boston Globe article. It reveals the ex-Governor as nothing less than a proto-fascist, and nothing more than coward. As Thomas Jefferson said, “Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of Liberty.” Experience tells us that timid men can be far more dangerous than their courageous counterparts. Hence the Constitution. ‘Nuff said?