CO sheriff; new gun laws unenforceable
The Washington Times reports that the Colorado legislature passed new rules regarding background checks – forcing private sellers to pay $10 to get a background check on the buyer;
“Are going to stop all criminals from getting guns? No,” said Democratic Rep. Beth McCann, a sponsor of the background checks bill. “But are we are going to put a barrier there, make it more difficult for them? Yes.”
Yeah, big barrier, bud. Meanwhile, the Greeley Tribune reports that Weld County sheriff, John Cooke, announced that he won’t enforce the new law, or the law passed earlier in the week which limited magazine capacity to 15-rounds;
Cooke said Democratic lawmakers are uninformed but are scrambling in reaction to recent tragedies in the nation.
“They’re feel-good, knee-jerk reactions that are unenforceable,” he said.
Cooke said the bill requiring a $10 background check to legally transfer a gun would not keep firearms out of the hands of those who use them for violence.
“Criminals are still going to get their guns,” he said.
Cooke said the other bill would also technically ban all magazines because of a provision that outlaws any magazine that can be altered. He said all magazines can be altered to a higher capacity.
Cooke said he, like other county sheriffs, “won’t bother enforcing” the laws because it will be impossible for them to keep track of how the requirements are being met by gun owners. He said he and other sheriffs are considering a lawsuit against the state to block the measures if they are signed into law.
Well, it really doesn’t matter if law enforcement won’t prosecute the laws, what’s important is that law makers feel better about themselves. That they can go home at night and proclaim to their mirrors that they “did something” regardless of whether it accomplishes something or not.
Category: Gun Grabbing Fascists
“But are we are going to put a barrier there, make it more difficult for them? Yes.”
Uh, yeah–NO. Again. Zero points for GCE (gross conceptual error.)
Seems to me that there are plenty of barriers now, and that criminals, as always, will ignore this latest one along with all the other laws they break when they illegally obtain weapons.
All you’ve done, dearies, is create more laws which create more criminals–and eventually, you’re going to have so many laws, EVERYONE is a criminal.
Hi Ho, Hi Ho off to the range I go!
[…] This ain’t Hell… features the new Colorado gun laws being unenforceable […]
Well, someone (the sherrif), is speaking out against these new libtard bills and laws. Hopefully an adult in charge is listening. What to do? Other then totally ignoring these – things-.
One issue. Allow me to say this about that:
I disagree with this Sheriff’s statement that he’ll not enforce the law if/when it passes. To me, this is no different than enforcing laws which don’t exist. As a member of the LAW ENFORCEMENT COMMUNITY, he doesn’t get to pick and choose which laws he gets to enforce or doesn’t enforce. Only the judiciary can decide if a law passed by the legislative branch and signed into law by the head of the executive in Constitutional or legal at the state or federal level.
HOWEVER, the level at which he enforces it is entirely up to him, much like how seat belt laws are “enforced” in some jurisdictions, or how Nevada and some other states enforced the 55 mph speed limit back in the 70’s and early 80’s.
executive discretion? thought that only
worked on illegal immigrants
“They’re feel-good, knee-jerk reactions that are unenforceable,” he (the sheriff) said.
That sentence defines the entire mindset behind these poorly-conceived efforts to stop violence. It doesn’t address the real problem — the root causes of all kinds of violence — but it makes the quick-fix-hungry idiots who cook them up pat themselves on the back for ‘doing something’.
If they really want to ‘do something’, they should be doing what people in the neighborhoods on Chicago’s south side are doing: get their flabby butts out on the streets, get the people behind them, and be active about putting a stop to it where it happens.
None of these hystrionics will put a stop to any of the violence or slow down the criminals who are dead set on that kind of behavior.
Ex-PH2 Says: “they should be doing what people in the neighborhoods on Chicago’s south side are doing: get their flabby butts out on the streets, get the people behind them, and be active about putting a stop to it where it happens.”
Where on the South Side is this happening? I grew up on the South Side of Chicago (West Lawn area, a few blocks from Midway Airport) and my mom still lives in our old home. Nice, peaceful Polish neighborhood, over the past 10-15 years, turned into a trashy, violent, gang-riddled Mexican neighborhood. She’s posted twice on Facebook over the past couple months of gunshots in our neighborhood. Last shots were just within the past week or so and came from next door, where the people are apparently involved with drugs or something.
My brothers and I have begged her to move the hell out of that neighborhood.
Michael, it’s happening wherever the people who live in a southside neighborhood are fed up. The latest victim was that tiny baby who was killed in a driveby shooting while her father was changing her diaper.
http://wgntv.com/2013/03/13/community-members-unite-to-catch-man-who-fatally-shot-baby/
Fr. Michael Pflagler is at St. Sabina. Here’s his website.
http://www.saintsabina.org/
Give him a call — number’s in the lower righthand corner of the front page, he’s the guy with the backwards collar in the photo with the Mayor — and ask him to call on your mother and persuade her to move. He’s been active on stopping drug dealers and gangs on the south side for years.
Parents can be really stubborn about some things, like giving up a home they’ve lived in for decades, but common sense has to take over. Maybe Fr. Pflagler can persuade her to leave.
I disagree regarding selective law enforcement as being somehow wrong or contrary to one’s oath. ALL police officers have a great deal of discretion regarding when they will arrest and not arrest. Similarly, prosecutors have discretion regarding when they will prosecute and what charges to lodge, if any. It is highly unusual for either a prosecutor or a police officer to announce that they will not act on a certain law but, as a practical matter, it happens all of the time. And it is not without precedent either. The sodomy laws are a perfect example of this.
Rats. That was yours truly in cmt9.
Arrrgggg. Double screw up. I am anonymous in Cmt 10.
Just WHAT does touchie-feelie-do-gooder knee-jerk legislation like this trash do other than hamper the everyday lives of law-abiding people? Hey, we’ve already outlawed rape, murder, drugs, criminals possessing firearms,…. and it still happens. We should NEVER trust politicians seeking more ways to micromanage our everyday lives!
Ex-PH2 – I hope you’re not talking about this Father Pfleger who is good buddies with Jeremiah Wright. Because there is no way in hell I’m putting my mom in contact with that racist, Wright-defending asshole.
He did not say that they would NOT enforce the law or opine about whether it should or should not be enforced. What he said is that it is unenforceable. Without benefit of crystal balls and ESP, his officers simply cannot enforce the proposed law even if they want to do so.
There is a huge distinction between being able to do something and wanting to do something. (Which is pretty much demonstrated every time a lib opens his or her mouth.)
Retired from USArmy, then retired as a Police Chief (was a PO during break in service):
#5 is wrong
#10 is correct
A peace Officer is required to take action on a violation. That leaves a lot of latitude.
Michael in MI, yes, it’s the same. Sorry about that. He’s in that basic area, he knows how bad it is. It’s so bad, it may turn into what Camden, NJ has become. In the 1970s, when I was in Philadelphia, I lived a few miles from Camden. It was a thriving place. Now, it’s as bad as Detroit.
Maybe one of the Lutheran churches down there would be better.
http://www.whitepages.com/business/IL/Chicago/West-Lawn/Churches
Otherwise, if she won’t move on her own, you may have to move her yourselves. People can be that way.
I lived on the north side for 30 years, one mile from Wrigley Field. Walking distance. I moved to Rogers Park in 1998, which wasn’t too bad then, but my landlord wouldn’t fix things unless forced to, so I moved out 8 years ago to the burbs. I stay in touch with the guy who does maintenance on that building, and he says it’s going badly downhill since 2007. Even the Vietnamese and Korean merchants are leaving. There was a driveby shooting Friday night (3/14) 10 blocks west of where I used to live.
I don’t know what else to tell you, except that Mayor Rahm lives in a damned dream world, fixing up the parks so that kids can have playgrounds and people can hike on unused El tracks, and ignores the gangbangers and drug dealers unless a kid gets killed in a driveby.
Just get her out of there.
“Well, it really doesn’t matter if law enforcement won’t prosecute the laws, what’s important is that law makers feel better about themselves. That they can go home at night and proclaim to their mirrors that they “did something” regardless of whether it accomplishes something or not.”
There’s a shit-ton of money to be made passing laws, rules, and regulations – even if they’re unenforceable.
I expect Sheriff Cooke personally as well as his organization will be sued, and have his family terrorized by the state and anti-gun groups, until the Sheriff is removed and a gun-grabbing prognazi takes over.
Colorado will be lost to liberty entirely in another year.
@18, DaveO, Colorado and other States that liberals have infected now that they’ve migrated after rendering California FUBAR.
Most of our sheriffs stand with Sheriff Cooke. It’s amazing that Hickenlooper and the Legislature aren’t listening to them and the thousands of Colorado citizens that are against these bills. Instead, they trot Mark Kelly and some woman who lives near Sandy Hook instead.
Neither the mag bill nor the background check bill are enforceable. After all, Wyoming is 1.5 hours away.
@20, they don’t care if the laws are unenforceable, they did something. And, apparently, they don’t care if they force companies that employ people out of the state.
@19 Salt Lake City is headed that way too. So many people are jumping ship in California and moving here with the intent to reform it in the image of the “Golden State” that people don’t even bother taking off their California license plates anymore. I’m far more worried about immigrants from California to Utah than I am illegal immigrants from other countries right now.
Sometimes Utah’s legislature is conservative to the point of being unreasonably reactionary (I hear this from people, I don’t see it) but to me that just means it would take longer to mess it up, Colorado-style.
Seriously, these terrified little people need to have their own colony some place safe, where they don’t bother the rest of us.
Are you guys sure they’re from California? They sound more like space aliens to me.
I now refer to Colorado as East California.