Goodness grief: GOP lawmaker to introduce more gun legislation

Knee-jerk reaction from the anti-Second Amendment crowd. Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) will introduce legislation to create a gun-free zone encompassing one-tenth of a mile around federal officeholders and judges as they move from place to place. If you are carrying a firearm, you won’t be able to get within 1000′ of these federal employees.

From the Daily Caller with a hat tip to Ed Morrissey at Hot Air.

Rep. Peter King, a Republican from New York, is planning to introduce legislation that would make it illegal to bring a gun within 1,000 feet of a government official, according to a person familiar with the congressman’s intentions.

King is chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. The proposed law follows the Saturday shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and a federal judge that left six dead, including the judge, and 14 wounded.

Not a bad idea, so why not just create gun free zones around all residents in the United States? For those of you who think that idea to be absurd, why are you suggesting these federal employees get special treatment? Are they more important than you or me?

This legislation would of course be completely worthless, since we all know that gun free zones don’t work. If you are a criminal or intend to commit a criminal act, no law will stop you.

Do the congress-critters and pundits understand that concept at all? Really, we need to ask the question. Do they really think they can just create a law – without of course creating a police state – and somehow cure the evil within criminals? Are they nuts themselves?

By the way … there are already quite a few laws on the books, including one that makes it a federal crime to murder or attempt to assassinate a federal employee. But Rep. King and many others think more laws will solve the problem.

More stupid comments? King mentioned the following at a news conference

“From a conservative perspective, we have to have a stable society, we have to keep crime down,” King said. “You cannot do that if the police cannot be assured that illegal guns are not on the street.”

“To have a stable society and a safe society, we have to remove illegal guns,” he continued.

Illegal guns? Ahh yes … the jump from keeping guns 1,000 feet away from congress-critters to keeping “illegal guns” – whatever they are – off the street. That makes all sorts of sense.

Michelle Malkin also writing.

If they could only come up with the right law …

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7pGt_O1uM8

Posted in

Steve McGough

Steve's a part-time conservative blogger. Steve grew up in Connecticut and has lived in Washington, D.C. and the Bahamas. He resides in Connecticut, where he’s comfortable six months of the year.

10 Comments

  1. pauldow on January 11, 2011 at 1:43 pm

    I haven't made a nit pick comment on the internet today yet, so I guess I'll post here.

    Since a mile is 5280', then 1000' is almost 19% of a mile.

    We already have 30 mile security zones around the president, and three mile zones around the vice president. All those have accomplished is trapping innocent people. I guess that make a vice president about 1/100 the value of a president, and a representative is worth 1/252 the value of a vice president. This is measured by area the government confiscates when they're around.



  2. Dimsdale on January 11, 2011 at 1:53 pm

    Wow!  That is worse than my suggestion that congresscritters be counted as 3/5ths of a real person!!

     

    Once again, Congressional actuality is worse than fiction!



  3. Steve M on January 11, 2011 at 2:06 pm

    @pauldow – I was actually trying to figure out how many miles (area) equaled '1,000 feet' away. Figured the radius was 1,000 feet and Area=[PIE]r[squared] and somehow came up with one-tenth of a mile. So the president gets a 30 mile security zone and the congress-critters would get a one-tenth of a mile security zone… or somethin' like that.



  4. pauldow on January 11, 2011 at 2:17 pm

    Sounds right then Steve. I had read your post as 1/10 mile distance.

    President gets 30^2 * 3.14 = 2826 sq. mi.

    Vice President gets 3^2 * 3.14 = 28.26 sq. mi.

    Representatives would get (1000/5280)^2 * 3.14 = 0.11 sq. mi.

    I should apply to go on Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?



  5. JollyRoger on January 11, 2011 at 2:51 pm

    How can you positively identify and thus maintain proper distance from a congressman unless he is doing something conspicuous like attacking college students or trying to initiate a sexual liaison with you in a public restroom? And of course my congressman who sends campaign literature addressed to my dog… We need to build a fence around Washington DC- keeping ourselves, our kids, and our dogs safe from these miscreants!



  6. johnboy111 on January 11, 2011 at 3:22 pm

    WOW….they all need to just shut up..



  7. PatRiot on January 11, 2011 at 6:03 pm

    Do postmen count as federal officials?

    Hey Rep. King !!  (R) – Really?  Tell you what – Seeing as illegal drugs cause way more deaths than guns, clean that mess up first as a trial run.  Then, MAYBE, we can talk about illegal guns.

    Food for thought:  2 neighborhoods: one with possible legal gun owners, the other is a gun free zone.  Where will the criminals go and why?  How much peace of mind does that lawful gun owner bring to his/her neighborhood?  And at no cost to the taxpayers and no burden on the Federal, state and local governments?        

    Careful what you ask for, or try to ram down our throats.



  8. beekeeper925 on January 12, 2011 at 1:41 am

    Remember all the school shootings in the 1500' "gun free zones" around schools set up during the Clinton administration. King's idea will just set up some more "target rich" safe zones for nut jobs like the one in Arizona. Unless you set up TSA type check points, what is going to keep out someone who totally disregards the law?



  9. Lynn on January 12, 2011 at 3:45 am

    Love you guys…. Humor the best defense!



  10. Tracy on January 12, 2011 at 10:12 am

    Steve,

    In light of recent events I wonder how long it will be before the following will show up again:

     

    H.R. 45:

    Blair Holt's Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009

    http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.45:

    If I recall correctly, this was proposed on the FIRST day of the 111th congress.

    Also, your math is correct; a circle of radius 1000 feet is approximately 0.11 square miles OR 70.4 acres……………..so, what happens if you live next to a congressman/senator?



frontpg-gun-free-zone

The website's content and articles were migrated to a new framework in October 2023. You may see [shortcodes in brackets] that do not make any sense. Please ignore that stuff. We may fix it at some point, but we do not have the time now.

You'll also note comments migrated over may have misplaced question marks and missing spaces. All comments were migrated, but trackbacks may not show.

The site is not broken.