Jul 13 2008
Guns, Knifes, and Spies, Oh My!
BY VIRGINIA H. SHANAHAN
The United Kingdom banned handguns in 1997, yet crimes committed with handguns continue to rise. This is another failed knee jerk, feel good, policy invoked after a tragic shooting.
Now the UK is dealing with a rash of stabbings, six in just a few days. How does the UK propose to deal with this? Home Secretary Jacqui Smith plans on making every young person caught carrying a knife visit hospitals and prisons. They will expect these kids to speak with stab victims, victims families, and those that committed the crime.
This should be fun. No doubt everyone caught carrying a knife does so with criminal intent. And no doubt those with criminal intent, that could look another person in the eye as they stab them repeatedly, for fun or profit, is going to be impacted in a positive way by these visits. However, should it by some chance fail, what next, ban all sharp edges?
And hey, have any military secrets you want to sell? You can do so without fear of execution. It seems now the going rate for espionage is 57 months in prison, and 3 years supervised probation - at least in the state of Virginia. What’s a few months? It’s like a vacation without the sunscreen.
Gregg Bergersen, a former pentagon analyst, knowingly, and willfully, passed military secrets to Chinese spy Tai Shen Kuo, who was posing as a New Orleans business man. Bergersen admitted accepting cash, gifts, and money for trips to Vegas. I guess not everything stays in Vegas.
Just look at D.C. Banning weapons keeps them out of criminals’ hands just as well as banning drugs does with junkies.