Red Flag Laws:...

American Thinker

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/09/red_flag_laws_too_good_to_be_true.html

Red Flag Laws:

Too Good to Be True

By Rich Logis

September 20, 2019

We all know that if something looks too good to be true, it is.

Reasonable Americans can agree that no one who shouldn't have a gun should have one.  Red flag laws, though, are peaceful slavery disguised as bipartisan utopianism, with even President Trump publicly supporting them.

Bipartisanship is often sold as doing what's right, but warm and fuzzy bipartisan agreements don't necessarily mean something good for the American people.  Doing what's constitutional is what's right and correct, irrespective of whether it's bipartisan.  It's almost the equivalent of legislating based on polls.

In my home state of Florida, both our U.S. senators, Marco Rubio and Rick Scott, support red flag laws.  Rubio may be the most vocal cheerleader among Republican senators.  That's why I named him my most recent Tessio Republican for my weekly video series.  Inspired by Sal Tessio, from The Godfather, who betrays the Corleone family, a Tessio Republican is one who betrays America First voters and his constituents.

When Scott was governor of Florida, in a haste to "do something" after the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting last year, he signed red flag law legislation, which created "risk protection orders."  The prevailing narrative has been, if red flag laws had existed, Nikolas Cruz, the alleged shooter, wouldn't have been in a position to carry out his massacre.

This is simply untrue.  Florida has had, since 1971, laws that allow for involuntary institutionalization of an individual, which also requires due process and right to counsel.  The abject failures of the Broward County Public Schools; its Obama-sycophantic superintendent, Robert Runcie; the FBI; and local law enforcement are all well documented.

Cruz was singularly perhaps the most obvious red flag–type case in American history, and authorities and administrators couldn't get it right.  Those same people now expect you and me to live under guilty-until-proven-innocent red flag laws?

Actually, it's worse than that — it's just guilty.  Period.

Red flag laws are in place, to varying degrees, in 17 states and the District of Columbia.  They allow police or family members to petition a state court to order the temporary removal of guns from an individual who may present a danger to himself or others.  In some cases, ex parte hearings are held, which allow judges to make rulings without all plaintiff and defendant parties present.  In some cases, the defendant isn't even aware that someone has filed a petition against him until he receives a notice in the mail, or hand-delivered by a law enforcement officer.  In Florida, judges, after an initial hearing, can arbitrarily act as judge, jury, and executioner and prohibit a Floridian from firearm possession for a year.  How does this pass constitutional muster?  When James Madison wrote the Tenth Amendment, are we to believe that this is what he had in mind?  Highly unlikely.  Let's also not forget that our right to due process was begotten by John Adams's defense of British soldiers accused of shooting and murdering colonists.

Red flag laws don't solely violate our Fifth Amendment rights; they also potentially infringe upon our First, Second, Fourth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendment guaranteed liberties.  After only 18 months since Scott signed risk protection orders into law, Floridians have already had to endure the confiscation of their private firearm property due to mistaken identity and First Amendment speech abridgement.  An injustice against one is an injustice against all. 

Fallacy of "If It Saves Just One Life"

Advocates of red flag laws tout their alleged life-saving benefits.  "If it saves just one life," however, is not a constitutionally sufficient standard.  If peanuts were banned, the lives of hundreds would be saved.  If the internet were banned, Islamic supremacist and other Democrat-inspired terrorists (there's no such thing as "right-wing terrorism") couldn't be radicalized online.  If all babies were aborted, there'd be a 0-percent rate of child cancer.

Though I'm loath to speak for the man, I suspect that when Thomas Jefferson said he preferred dangerous freedom to peaceful slavery, "if it saves just one life" isn't what he had in mind.  Red flag laws are perhaps even more terroristic than the Mueller/Russia scam; as Lavrentiy Beria, the head of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics police state under Stalin, once remarked: show me the man, and I'll show you his crime.  What is particularly unnerving is that many Republican lawmakers nationwide are hopping aboard the bandwagon; we elected Republicans not so that they could give Nancy Pelosi what she wants.

There are other laws already in place that prohibit those who shouldn't have guns from purchasing them, such as an adjudicated mentally ill background check disqualifier as well as an active restraining order.

If state or federal government fails in enforcing existing laws, then that is all the more reason why the state should nothave additional power via more laws.  The bigger the government, the more the freedoms of law-abiding Americans contract — the antithesis of our Constitution.

Red flag laws are the precursors to the desired Democrat outcome: the criminalization of all firearm ownership.  Trump needs to be very, very careful on this; he's walking into bear traps on a field of landmines.  Red flag laws are the Democrats' game, on their rules, on their home field.

Democrats and the DMIC (Democrat Media Industrial Complex) regurgitate the problems ("climate change," "gun violence," etc.) ad nauseam, but they never offer intelligently designed solutions that don't take our children, money, or freedoms.

As a side note: Even though red flag laws and "universal background checks" (which apparently also cover private firearm sales on Uranus) are wholly unrelated to each other, I'm happy to listen to ideas to strengthen background checks, but with these upfront requirements, in no order of priority:

1. That the proposer knows what ATF Form 4473 is and can list two or more of its disqualifiers.

2. He acknowledges that it's never been more difficult to purchase firearms from federally licensed gun-dealers.

3. He recognizes that the burden of proof is on the proposer, not the proposee.

4. He knows that two thirds of all gun-related deaths are due to suicide.  While undoubtedly a public health crisis, others' suicidal tendencies are constitutionally irrelevant to the exercising of our Second Amendment right.

5. He knows that the vast majority of gun-related crime occurs, and has occurred, in cities run by only Democrat mayors, and super-majority Democrat city councils and boards of aldermen, for tens of thousands of consecutive days.

When anyone meets a Democrat or gun-confiscating Republican who meets all five, let me know.

Until then, molon labe.

Rich Logis is host of The Rich Logis Show, at TheRichLogisShow.com, and author of the upcoming book 10 Warning Signs Your Child Is Becoming a Democrat.  He can be found on Twitter at @RichLogis.