REPORTING FOR DUTY
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Dec
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Illinois Governor Singles Out Group For Special Gun Punishment
December 3, 2009 | 1 Comment
We are not fans of gangs, their members, or their guns, but it is hard to see how Illinois can constitutionally single out a specific group of people for specific punishment.
Gov. Pat Quinn signed a law today requiring prison time for street gang members convicted of possessing a loaded gun in a public area. [Read More]
We are not lawyers, so perhaps we are wrong, but doesn’t that violate the very premise of “equal treatment under the law?”
Shouldn’t that law apply to ALL individuals illegally carrying a loaded weapon in a public area, and not just gang members? All or none, yes?
Here’s a radical idea…Why not explore the root causes of gang empowerment? What mobilizes them? What funds them? What radicalizes them?
Admittedly without statistical proofs in our pockets, we would venture to guess that the overwhelming percentage of gang related gun violence in this country is directly related to the war on drugs.
End the war on drugs, and you will dis-empower the gangs. End the war on drugs and our society will immediately experience a dramatic decrease in the number of minorities killing each other in their neighborhoods. Their neighborhoods will cease to be war zones. That should be something only bigots would be against.
Sure, there will likely be an increase in drug use as a result, but could the social costs of that possibly be worse than the social costs of the “War on Drugs”, and its ugly cousin the “War on Guns?”
To that point, how is the war on drugs something that can be tolerated by a “conservative” platform? Turning law enforcement against the American population in such a violent and militaristic fashion would seem completely counter to our founding principals. And as the new Illinois law exhibits, the war is having unintended consequences for gun ownership rights.
Bottom Line: The War on Drugs has empowered a statist monster, whose warm embrace is not preferable to the potential negative effects of almost any level of drug use. Unless of course you can attach an acceptable value to the authoritarianism which spawns the militarized narco war zones minorities are forced to call home.
As long as it is just minorities killing each other, and just minorities the laws effect, the price for the wars on drugs and guns must not be too high for the average American to tolerate.
Comments
1 Comment so far
We target “Rich” people for higher taxation. Seems to me if that passes the “equal protections under the law” bar then so do laws aimed at gang members.