Hand Over Your Weapons

I’ve read the Boston Globe Article “Hand over your weapons” at least 3 times.   Sometimes making it all the way through, sometimes stopping to ponder how a particular aspect of the article might look in America.   Summarizing, the writer of the piece writes about the “epidemic” of firearms deaths in the US, trotting out the tired statistic of 30,000 people being killed (without mention of the suicides), followed by how gutless politicians are for not being  willing to oppose the 2^nd amendment, though a brave Obama had hinted at it.   An example of how a mass shooting in Australia lead to the country’s mandatory ban on most firearms, and how the more civilized Aussies endorsed that national feeling of guilt.    Lastly, the gun grabbers here are willing to endorse confiscation, but the NRA is too powerful and well organized (woos me), and those yahoos own too many guns, and a one sentence acknowledgement of mental illness.   I’ve attached a link to the article so you can see if I accurately surmised the article.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2017/11/10/hand-over-your-weapons/6IxJLanMKGak7RvCLipwbN/story.html

I’ve read articles like this for years, but with this article, my mind keeps circling back to “What would gun confiscation look like in the US”?   A compulsory buy back followed by using illegally kept records from database searches, to surprise seizures of paper records from your local gun store?  The next paragraphs are fiction, it’s how my mind sees a possible unraveling of events.

The compulsory buyback component would be the same lame format that some of the big cities have used, and  failed at getting guns out of the hands of criminals.   The money they offer won’t match the value of the guns, because states like NY and CA can’t afford to pay a fair value of the gun.   However, the state will use the threat of prison time, and fines  to attempt compliance.   The resulting inventory of turned in guns will likely mirror the inventories retrieve in Chicago, and Phoenix-old relics, broken 22s,  PVC and wood zip guns, etc…   Look at NY and CA to lead this charge on “buy back” and when that fails, look to them to jump head long into confiscation.

In my imagination confiscation has a couple of different looks, one looks like this.   State politicians would order police to confiscate local gun shop records, some records would be lost in mysterious fires, others would be turned over, computer records, that by law should have been destroyed, will mysteriously be available to cull names, addresses, serial numbers etc.…  Names are regionalized and organized for local enforcement if the agency leadership mirrors the views of the state leaders, else look for state agencies to enforce the state mandate.    Some cases of Blue flu are reported.

The state initiates limited targeting based on the intelligence gathered from gun store records, or family turn coats, or electronic records.  Based on the numbers of teams available for the searches and seizure, CA and NY announce a huge success in the number of illegal firearms seized, increasing numbers of raids are planned.  Illinois polls the questions and contemplates following suit.   The Governors and allies pose for the photo-op that is used as the front cover of every paper in the country.  The Feds remain mum, wanting to see how this plays out.  Republican leadership wants to be able to claim “me too” if the raids are well received by the public.    The state realizes that it confiscated about 8% of the firearms it expected, the press provides cover, gun owners are jailed, jail populations expand, people that had been law abiding have now become criminal because they believe in freedom that the state no longer supports.    The state plans a 2^nd round of raids.  Three days later, a second round of raids is met by limited resistance.   In one instance, a 36 year retired policeman knows they’re coming to his house.    He sits behind the door with his Rock River AR-15, 30 round mags loaded with XM855.   Knowing the tactics, he anticipates the proper arrival time, partially barricades the doors, he doesn't expect to live through the ordeal.   The flash bang is ineffectual because the retired patriot anticipates and the partially blocked door allows him to recover in time to head shoot the first 2 men in the stack before being shot and killed by the third.   In his death the older man becomes a rallying cry, “Remember Bob!”   A call goes out for a suspension of the raids but is largely ignored by the gun grabbing media and politicians.   After all, it’s the gun nuts that are being killed by the gun, they brought this on themselves.

Serious push back occurs during the third raid, about 2 weeks later.   Now those people that have been following the reports are banding together and  actually creating defensive plans.   Blue flu attacks 50% of the LE ranks, and teams of “gun free believers” are combined from the remaining operators.  Some gun owners are targeted and caught in the open by changing tactics employed by the state – targeted traffic stops to catch them unarmed, or less armed,   But the raids are still the darlings of the media and the planning is still going strong.   As long as the politicians can get a photo op beside piles of menacing looking guns, they vow to press on.       The third set of raids are embarrassing for the state.   Armed resistance is up, patriots surveilling the police watch the Bearcats rollout and put out the call -1 if by land.  A full 1/3 of the raids are met with resistance, and in some cases are counter attacked.    Casualties are high among the police and the civilian/patriot populace.  Horded tannerite was used to make IEDs  and the homes of politicians, their families and of senor police staff seen on TV are set on fire.   The Governors mansions are fired upon in retaliation and many “suspicious” packages are found through out the parking garages that service the State’s Congressional buildings.   Fire trucks are impeded in route.  The third raid will be the last.  Politicians have no stomach for being involved in the confrontation they endorse.

No politician will be held accountable for the breach in constitutional rights, no guns returned, no apologies are issued.   A week later, a Kardashian is killed in a freak accident.   The body is not found for a couple of days, and a small pack of Chihuahuas partially devour the body, the image is leaked to TMZ, and the country has already forgotten.

Eight months later a young man in Texas, recently off his psych drugs, kills 6 in a failed attempt to become the greatest killer of all time.   The state confiscates all property and razes the house, sues the estate and confiscates all insurance money, all proceeds are used to reimburse the families of the dead for all funeral costs as far as the money goes.   The body is publicly burned in front of the court house and the ashes and remains are left for the crows and the wind.   Texas tells their citizens, that the surviving family members will be punished for the attempted mass murders of their family members.   Keep your family in line, or we come for you.

Do the people that believe in gun confiscation think further out than the act of confiscation?  If it started tomorrow, would they fear a backlash?  It’s High School science people, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.    Do they not acknowledge the violence perpetrated in England and Australia by people with knives?  While maybe the “gun” violence went down, did the numbers of violence, murder and assault go down, or was the tool being used just changed to a knife?    What do they think will happen?  Or do they think we’ll all take the public transportation  down to the park link hands and sing Kumbaya ( ok, Boulder might)?