Lots of “red flag” talk after the latest shooting panics, but Borepatch would like to remind us that such laws are stupid and useless.
The Parkland shooter was known to be a nutcase, having been reported to the local police some four dozen times (and twice to the FBI). Nobody took action, because the local (and likely national) government agencies thought that doing so would screw up the crime statistical goals that they were trying to achieve. While it’s very early after the event, it appears that lots of people knew that the Dayton shooter was a nutcase. Nobody did anything. The Air Force dishonorably discharged a guy because he was, well, a nutcase – but forgot to update the NCIC database with this information. The nutcase was able to buy a gun and kill a bunch of people in a church.
These are just the examples that come to mind; presumably a thorough analysis my the media or by social scientists would turn up many more examples. Of course, the media and social scientists don’t want to look into this because it would hurt their push for more gun control.
Left unsaid: Red flag laws are not only a Second Amendment violation, but a Fifth Amendment violation as well, violating due process of law. Legal expert Alan Dershowitz argues that we don’t have the tools to make such laws work:
Research shows that any group of people identified as future violent criminals will contain many more who will not be violent (false positives) than they will (true positives). More true positives mean more false ones. Such groups also fail to identify many future violent criminals (false negatives).
We do not currently have the predictive tools needed to increase the number of true positives while reducing false positives. We may one day develop such tools, but how many false positives are we willing to tolerate until then to reduce the number of false negatives? Put another way: How many law-abiding people are we prepared to steal weapons to prevent another mass shooting?
For those who favor strict gun control, the answer may seem obvious. They believe it is worth it for 100 or 1,000 non-violent people to lose their weapons to prevent mass shootings. But those who view gun possession as a fundamental right under the Second Amendment – as the Supreme Court ruled in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) – frame the problem differently. They ask: Can the government deprive a citizen of a constitutional right based on a prediction?
Red Flag laws run the risk of setting a dangerous precedent. If the government can take your weapons based on a prediction today, what will prevent it from taking your freedom based on a prediction tomorrow?
Indeed, everywhere on Twitter this week, the left have been saying two things:
1. We need to remove guns from the hands of racists, and
2. Everyone who voted for Trump is a racist.
49% of Democrats Think #Trump Voters Are #Racist… https://t.co/noY1Jd56MM #BreakingPoll pic.twitter.com/jQh8hathCh
— Rasmussen Reports (@Rasmussen_Poll) July 31, 2019
You are “the depraved evil” we need to eradicate. https://t.co/zPJhVS1hkn
— Reza Aslan (@rezaaslan) August 4, 2019
So hell no, we’re not disarming now or in the future, especially not when Democratic Party partisans are in the grip of mass hysteria.
Tags: "red flag" laws, Alan Dershowitz, Borepatch, Crime, Democrats, Guns
Of course, gun banners don’t see a downside in people losing their guns. It doesn’t inconvenience them at all, so after the next shooting they will agitate for even stricter red flag restrictions.
I like what you did here.
… therefore, “we need to remove guns from everyone who voted for Trump.
In the words of a sincerely amused Lucius Fox, “Good luck.”