Can't pass up a chance for a Thurber reference

I don't know what's worse -- the fact that they treat us like idiots or the way it so often works!

A few days ago, while having dinner with a young lady who works for a government agency. She was telling me about people who call her office to express their fear that "Obama is going to cut off my disability (or other benefit) if I don't turn in my guns or if I even keep a gun in my house."

When she said she wasn't sure if "Obama" had signed the law yet or not, I mentally reviewed pending legislation, and assured her I hadn't heard of anything approximating such a bill, and was reasonably certain nothing like that had made it through either the House or the Senate, much less both.

Since there are any number of resolutions floating through the system, I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge, so the next day, I ran a search. A week's worth of delay due to the wonderful bandwidth limitations of my wireless service, then back to the search.

No luck, but then I considered the journalistic standards of the so-called Mainstream Media.

You remember them, right? Massive corporations owned by some of the farthest-right Conservatives on the planet, owing their existence to the NEVER even so far as center-right FCC? The corporations that somehow keep getting called "Liberal Press or Liberal Media" when they let a day go by without suggesting that the President of the United States should be dragged out of the White House, horsewhipped, and lynched in Lincoln Park?

So, like any good research wonk, I checked draft bills that predate the current administration. Yes, there is a bill, currently without co-signers, still in committee in the House, on its third try since it was first drafted in 2007.

Interesting story to it, and since you're already reading this, I'll tell it to you. I will warn you: it doesn't sound much like the bill that the Coulters, O'Reillys, and Limbaughs have described, but that is about par for the course when we're talking about a group that can look at a standard, boilerplate lesson/activity plan for "what do we do now that we've heard our guest speaker?"and see a mind-control plot to turn millions of children into something approaching informed citizens.

Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.

Our story starts in Chicago, Illinois, in May of 2007. Blair Holt, a high school Honor Student in his junior year, is riding a public bus when a 17-year-old gets on the bus, pulls out a gun, and starts firing. Blair, without hesitation puts himself between a girl sitting in the next seat and the shooter. Blair died, four other people were severely wounded, and the shooter just walked off the bus, having dropped the gun.

Even though it would later turn out that the shooter, not any older than his victim had purchased the gun for the express purpose of killing "the guy who stole my girlfriend", there was no way to trace the gun, since the 90-day limit on record keeping had passed. Some weeks later, the shooter was captured when he bragged to his friends about his brave, manly act.

At Blair Holt's funeral, U. S. Representative Bobby Rush promised the family of this slain hero that he would draft and fight for a bill making these tragedies less likely.

Rep. Rush drafted H.R. 2666 and saw it presented to the House Judiciary Committee. There were 15 co-signers, each of whom received death threats and each of whom faced vitriolic comments from the Right Wing and the Christian Right. The bill was called everything but legal by the Right. A multi-million infusion of bribes from the gun lobby did what you might expect. The bill died in Committee.

In 2008, Rush tried again. No real results until it became possible that his bill (now renamed H. R. 45) might get through to committee. The bill was submitted on 6 January, 2009. It is still in the Judiciary Committee, doesn't have a lot of hope, but it makes a wonderful rallying point for the more vicious elements of the Right Wing.

So is it, "an Obama Bill to seize all our guns"? No. Our President at that time was George W. Bush.

President Obama is said to think the theory of the bill is good, but the practicality may be doubtful, given the emotional pull of firearms upon certain segments of the American people.

Is it Unconstitutional? Probably not, but that depends on how it is challenged. It does not violate the Second Amendment, unless we disregard the positions of the NRA and similar organizations. For years, they have insisted the "right to keep and bear arms" is an individual right, not associated with membership in a Militia.

Digressive mutter: It should have made President Obama popular with the Right when he agreed with the "individual right" position when he was a candidate. It should have helped when he asserted the same position a few months ago. It should have helped that he took that position when he was teaching Constitutional Law.

To be very obvious, the first genuine Constitutional scholar to be President since we ran out of Presidents who were there at the writing AGREES WITH THE NRA on this point.

Here's the problem. With individual rights come individual obligations.

Examples:

We have Freedom of Speech as an individual right, but if I want to set up a TV or radio station to exercise that right, I have the responsibility to meet a number of requirements, obtain a number of licenses, and generally provide evidence that I will neither disrupt the communication of my neighbors nor use my station to "advocate the overthrow of the Government by force and violence."

We have freedom to assemble peaceably to petition for redress of grievances. Since these gatherings tend to happen in populated areas these days, there are a whole batch of requirements that must be met to ensure that our peaceable assembly doesn't destroy the neighborhood.

We have a right to travel freely, but we need a license to drive a car, you must pass written/practical tests that vary from state to state,you can't buy a car without a background check to convince a dealer will give you credit to buy one. You need to pass certain criteria to use a Commercial aircraft. If you buy a boat, whether skiff or schooner, you must take written and practical tests, get licenses from local authorities and the U. S. Coast Guard, and agree to periodic inspections.

We have a right to be secure in our homes, which is generally regarded to extend to "you can make your home anywhere you want," but the banks have credit and background checks that make getting a security clearance look like a walk in the park. If there is a Neighborhood Association, you may have a list of things you can and cannot do with your home. In many states you cannot keep certain animals within the city limits. Cross the invisible line, and it all changes.

We have freedom of religion. But when a pastor (in 2004) told his flock "I won't make any political endorsements. All I will do is to tell you to look at the facts and examine your consciences before you vote." The Bush Administration took it personally, moved to revoke his congregation's tax-exempt status, and directed the IRS to audit the pastor's financial records for the past 5 years.

That equine is not likely resurrect, so back to the points of H.R. 45.

It revives the NRA suggestion of testing gun owners from back in the 1950's (actually, they wanted training and testing).

It overcomes the "not within our capability" problems with local registration systems.

It gets around the frequent situation where person A, who has no criminal record buys five guns, gifts them to people B through F, and magically finds the purchase price (plus a small percentage) in his pocket.

It treats handguns and guns with removable magazines with the same regard for "trackability" given to pickup trucks and bass boats.

OK, H.R. 45 is not likely to get out of committee. Emotion and ignorance will just about always beat reason and fact in the American political system. why the big hoo-hah? The Becks, Limbaughs, O'Reillys etc. have gone through so many insane charges and innuendo that some of their followers are starting to notice. So this hopeless exercise in dealing with the fact that this is not the Wild West of John Wayne (and it never was!) at least has the unique quality of being something real.

So, to paraphrase Thurber, the whole fuss has no factual pedigree, and less substance, but one can at least be amused by its presumption.