Off color: WTOP reporter offers a counter-argument to the latest DC gun flap

Yesterday I wrote about a woman living in DC whose application to register a gun was denied. The story was referenced today in an blog at WTOP called “Malcontent Minute” by Mark Segraves. Segraves was the reporter who jumped through the insane hoops DC set up after getting their collective butt handed to them in the Supreme Court Heller decision so I consider him something of an expert on the DC gun regulations. He contends that the point about this being a denied application over the color of the gun is wrong:

Gun rights activists would have you believe D.C. refused to allow a woman to register a handgun because of the color of the gun. That’s not entirely true. But the lawsuit does bring to light a possible flaw in the District’s new gun laws.

OK, first things first: “gun rights activists” didn’t put the story up on the WTOP web site, which is where I saw this first and is the story I linked in my post yesterday. The editors at WTOP did that. If Segraves is contending they were sloppy in their due diligence put slapping up a story without properly confirming the facts then, as a reporter interested in the facts, he should say that. No where in his post does he mention the fact that the story was up on WTOP the day before. Come to think of it, he doesn’t provide a link to that original story, either. Ummm, Mark? That’s really bad blogging ettiquite. I’d have thought you’d know better by now.

Segraves continues:

According to the lawsuit, one of the three plaintiffs, Tracey Ambeau Hanson, tried to register a Springfield Armory XD-45 Tactical 5″ Bi-Tone stainless steel and black handgun. Her application was denied. The complaint goes on to say under D.C. law, Hanson would have been allowed to register the identical gun in a different color.

True.

If Hanson had tried to register the XD-45 in black, green, or dark earth, she would be home with her handgun right now, and I would be writing about something else.

He then points out that the color isn’t what got the application denied, it was the fact that the steel/black variant of the gun isn’t on the California Safe Hangun Roster. I, on the other hand, would point out in return that the quality of that firearm that makes it not on the list where the exact same weapon in olive drab is on the list is the only physical characteristic that differs between the 2: color scheme.

Except that Segraves correctly points out that the color wasn’t the deciding factor in whether the gun got onto the list. He’s right, and the real reasons are much worse. The reasons are that the California nutjobs that manage this list decided to move the goalposts in determining whether this weapon qualified to be on the list and the fact that the gun manufacturer, Springfield Armory, declined to pay the $200 bribe necessary to get onto the list.

The 3 guns on the list are mechanically identical to the 1 that’s not. All 4 have precisely the same safety features. The 3 guns that are on the list today were on the list before California decided to change the rules so they grandfathered them in. The steel/black variant wasn’t on the list, yet, and the CA people decided this model of gun didn’t meet the safety requirements. So, what that means is that CA’s list people are deliberately approving of a gun type that doesn’t fit their definition of “safe” so long as that gun is the right color: olive drab, dark earth, or black.

Conclusion: CA’s list is completely arbitrary with absolutely no basis in safety or the facts. Yet this is what DC’s Council abdicated their responsibilies and duties to. They have placed the welfare of their citizens and the ability of their citizens to exercise their rights completely at the mercy of bureaucrats thousands of miles away over whom DC’s citizens have no authority and no ability to remove from office. We fought a war over that kind of thing a couple of centuries ago. Come to think of it, “no taxation without representation” was a motto of theirs, too.

Segraves correctly sums things up:

One thing is clear. District leaders are going to have revamp the current gun laws before the courts or Congress do it for them, or prepare themselves for a long battle.

Yes, a very long battle. And it’s going to be a costly one both in terms of dollars spent (that would be far better spent elsewhere in DC) and in terms of their legislative efforts when the courts overturn their ludicrous gun laws. The faster the better.

Motivational poster

Heh™.