Florida, NRA, and Grover Norquist[ he who brought you Starve the Beast Deficit spending by Republicans and then flipped flopped and now wants No Deficits now that GOP Presidents have added 60% to the national debt] are up to national mischief again. Sales of concealed handuns in the US have suddenly spiked since 2006.
Map of Concealed Handgun Laws in US
In a classicly well researched report, Bloomberg’s John Crewdson was able to obtain a Florida concealed handgun license by mail no trainin and no experience with a handgun required or possessed [but Florida insists that the background checks on John were done]. Here is how John describes the situation:
I’ve never touched a handgun and I haven’t been to Florida in decades, yet this month Florida officials mailed me a permit to carry a concealed gun.
If Congress adopts a bill that the National Rifle Association is pushing, Florida’s licenses would apply to 49 states in all — allowing their holders to carry hidden guns in places such as midtown Manhattan, where the New York Police Department rejects most such applications for “concealed- carry” permits.
Now this is MADness – Mutually Assured Destruction, a concept in game theory and warfare in which two sides arm themselves to the hilt to ensure a standoff. The problems are twofold: 1)some criminal players are simply not interested in a stand off [witness the thousands of killings at the US-Mexican border and the killing rampages of the mentally unstable] or 2) accidents or 3) suicides. But so far 243 of 435 [55%] in the House are willing to pass a bill that allows state gun licenses to be valid in any other state that licenses guns [49 of 50]. This all goes to prove that voters better pay attention on election issuesfor the next 10 years because they will get imposed on themselves things they did not necessarily expect or wish for.