Friday, January 19, 2007

We're the Only Ones Rangy Enough

City officials could face a debate over gun rights after the police chief suspended the licenses of a shooting range at which a woman killed herself in October.

The issue is headed for the City Council, and possibly the courts, with the police chief asking for new regulations that would ban customers who don’t have a firearm identification card from entering the shooting range. A lawyer representing the range said yesterday that such a measure could force the business to close.
So if it's up to the "Only Ones" chief, novices, who don't have enough interest to procure a permit just to try something new, will never be introduced to the shooting sports, and importantly, to the safety training and familiarity with firearm handling they afford. That way, if they ever do come across a gun, they'll be completely untrained. Plus, there will be fewer in the general population "legally permitted" to keep and bear arms (talk about an oxymoron!)

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Americans flap their jaws about freedom and put their faith in restriction.
Hypocrites that we are, we don't deserve a Bill of Rights. We should have a Bill of Restrictions that specifies restrictions the government can impose on us.

1st Amendment: Restriction of Speech: the government shall have the power to restrict all speech, especially political speech. (As in McCain-Feingold -- upheld by SCOTUS)

2nd Amendment: Restriction of Arms: the government shall restrict the keeping and bearing of arms. (We have 20,000 gun laws, any one of which can send you to prison - take your pick)

3rd Amendment: Restriction of Life and Property: The government shall kill people with impunity and take from them as it pleases. (Examples too numerous to mention)

When will we end the hypocrisy and change the BOR to be more in line with what Americans actually believe?

Anonymous said...

Lovely--the Chief "who enacted one of the toughest gun licensing policies in the state" (and remember, the state we're discussing is Massachusetts, where competition for that "honor" must be fierce) now wants to make possession of one of those nearly unobtainable licenses mandatory for anyone who wants to shoot at the range.

I suppose a suicide every eight years constitutes enough of an "epidemic of gun violence" to justify using the Bill of Rights as toilet paper.

E. David Quammen said...

One of the whole purposes for forming the federal government was to "secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity". If every little piss-ant small town usurper is allowed to infringe. Doesn't that make the fed. pretty much useless? If we have no "liberty" left to "secure". Why the hell are We the People paying taxes in support of this useless behemoth?

We are being systematically reduced to being subjects of the state. Ruled by their arbitrary and unconstitutional edicts.

"...That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, -That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it...."

Anonymous said...

Is this policy in MA:

"The chief has said that anyone who shows a lack of restraint in anger shouldn’t hold a license... "

Applied to the only ones?

http://www.officer.com/article/article.jsp?siteSection=5&id=31234

me said...

Yikes, both the original story and the link 1894c posted.

I've been out with cops drinking, buddy's a cop. VERY unsettling, especially given they were armed, much like these two in Boston. Seen the way things operate "inside" and it's sickening.

As for the main article here...can we sneak in funding for about 400 miles of fencing to wall that state off and keep the some of sickness contained?