In the U.S. there are approximately 22,000 gun laws already enacted and in effect while Maryland and Washington D.C. have some of the strictest gun laws already in place yet these areas have some of the highest gun-related murder rates in the USA and most of these crimes are committed with hand guns.
If all commercial airline pilots had a gun or stun guns in the cockpit that crashed into the World Trade Center in New York could terrorists still get away with taking over and crashing airplanes?
Stricter gun laws may do too little to control gun violence unless you control the manufacture and possession of ammunition with strict laws and harsh penalties like mandatory 25 years to life for the importation and/or manufacture of ammunition because too often guns used to commit crimes are obtained illegally. Nothing short of the control of ammunition is realistically going to deter gun-related crime.
Fingerprinting gun buyers and background checks may be relatively ineffective because it does nothing to stop the illegal sale and possession of firearms. Moreover, firearms can be changed or altered with something as simple as a nail file.
Critics charge that, unfortunately, gun laws are used to garner votes in irrational, emotionally charged political campaigns by “do-gooder” politicians elected by a reactionary, clueless voting public.
However, law enforcement officers may end up taking advantage of the stricter control of ammunition. A slow and gradual erosion of the citizenry’s rights to bear arms makes it so much easier for the citizenry to accept and swallow.
Today, the police can stop you and search you for drugs all under the guise of drug enforcement and interdiction. This is a windfall opportunity for profit taking by the few who happen to be “crooked” cops. Furthermore, even more problems arise when the police are allowed to keep large portions of the “booty” they sometimes questionably seize. Is this how they coined the phrase, “license to steal?”
Too often money and drugs interdicted by law enforcement from citizens has been stolen and used to fund and pay for exotic trips complete with shopping sprees for some police officers and law enforcement officials all disguised as law enforcement “training” seminars. Police departments caught in the act are reluctant to “open up the books” to public scrutiny to determine if these type expenditures are legitimately going toward these so-called training missions.
SUPPLEMENTAL SOURCES: NBC-TV DATELINE 1/3/97
and FT. LAUDERDALE SUN SENTINEL NEWSPAPER 10/20/02