According to the editorial poo-bahs at newsok.com, Oklahomans frustrated by the state’s failure to meet its legal obligation to issue or deny a concealed carry permit within 60 days should STFU. They “should be the first to realize that with gun privileges, getting it right is more important than getting it quickly.” Really? Let’s say you’re not a “gun person.” Your soon-to-be ex-husband goes off the rails. You’ve taken out a restraining order but you want to exercise your right to keep and bear arms with a concealed firearm RIGHT NOW . . .
In Oklahoma, you have to take an eight-hour class, fill out the paperwork (including a passport photo taken within thirty days and a fingerprint card from your local sheriff) and pony-up $100. Oh, and if you’re getting therapy to deal with the sitch, you have to get your doc to submit a OSBI Mental Health Form. And then . . .
You have to wait for Sooner State bureaucrats to perform their statutory obligation. At the moment, that requires an average of 94 days. The legal requirement is 60.
Thanks to the surge in concealed carry permit applications, the situation is well out of control throughout the United States. One of our Rhode Island readers waited eight months for his Providence Concealed Carry Permit.
The Massachusetts Firearms Records Bureau is taking so long to process out-of-state renewals for a License to Carry (LTC) they’re telling applicants to reapply after six months; six months into a one-year license.
Under Maine law, the Maine Department of Public Safety must give a thumbs-up or thumbs-down to Pine State residents applying for a concealed weapons permit within 30 days. Current wait time? Three months.
A Nevada concealed carry permit holder had to wait 72 days for his renewal. Americans who want an NFA (National Firearms Act) tax stamp that allows them to own and use a suppressor (in those states where it’s legal) are looking at a seven-month delay.
And so on. I could rant about the inefficiency of our government. Or the hypocrisy of requiring citizens to dot every I and cross every T in their concealed carry permits when the people processing the forms are violating their legal obligation to process those forms within a specified time frame.
I could also point out the deterrent effect that all this snail-like paper-shuffling has on the most disadvantaged members of our society who seek to exercise their Second Amendment protected right, for whom the application process represents a significant financial and, let’s face it, intellectual burden.
Instead, I want to highlight a simple fact: people are being beat-up, raped and killed because of gun control measures which do nothing—NOTHING—to prevent criminals from acquiring firearms. In fact, the security theater that are our gun control laws leave law-abiding citizens who have the most pressing need to arm themselves for self-defense defenseless.
Do I really need to do the gun control anecdotal/emotional thing to “prove” the danger? Isn’t it just common sense? When someone needs a gun to protect themselves, time is of the essence. How many times do you think cops have advised victims of crime who (rightly) fear another attack to get a gun? Did they say “you know, three months from now” (and, in some states, wait seven days after purchase)?
Oh what the hell. Check these from gunwoners.org:
New York. In 1983, Igor Hutorsky was murdered by two burglars who broke into his Brooklyn furniture store. The tragedy is that some time before the murder his business partner had applied for permission to keep a handgun at the store. Even four months after the murder, the former partner had still not heard from the police about the status of his gun permit.
Colorado. Talk show host (Alan Berg) was gunned down in 1984 after being denied a concealed carry permit.
Wisconsin. In 1991, Bonnie Elmasri inquired about getting a gun to protect herself from a husband who had repeatedly threatened to kill her. She was told there was a 48 hour waiting period to buy a handgun. But unfortunately, Bonnie was never able to pick up a gun. She and her two sons were killed the next day by an abusive husband of whom the police were well aware.
Los Angeles. USA Today reported that many of the people rushing to gun stores during the 1992 riots were “lifelong gun-control advocates, running to buy an item they thought they’d never need.” Ironically, they were outraged to discover they had to wait 15 days to buy a gun for self-defense.
Gun control laws are nothing short of a farce. The government’s growing delay in granting concealed carry permits is nothing short of a scandal.
It’s bad enough that a law-abiding citizen can’t walk into a gun store, show his or her license, go through an instant background check and walk out the door with a firearm. But to make U.S. citizens jump through hoops to exercise their Constitutional right to armed self-defense is criminal.
Well it should be.