Will A Delusional Narrative Cause Washington State Democrats To Throw Away Control Of The State Legislature In 2018?

The November 2017 election flipped a seat in the Washington state Senate, giving Democrats a 1 vote majority. Democrats also control the state House and the governor is a Democrat. What will the party do with the razor thin degree of control with which they control the legislature? One possibility is that they will seek common ground with non-Democrats and work together on common goals. The other possibility is that they will try to enact extremist legislation and possibly even succeed.

A few Democrats are crowing that they will take the opportunity to enact the harsh gun controls that they have been unable to enact in recent years. If this is attempted, they will probably fail. Whether they succeed or fail, rest assured that the political retribution for the attempt will be BRUTAL.

Let me explain why.

1) Washington state, while tending towards being politically moderate, is a VERY gun friendly state

Recent years have seen marijuana legalized and gay marriage equality achieved. One school of thought is that this indicates that the population supports the entire Democratic party agenda. Rather, I maintain that it indicates we are "live and let live" moderates. We are also a very gun friendly state.

A very graphic illustration of this can be obtained by looking at a Concealed Carry statistics web site, Guns to Carry (link).  This site researched concealed carry trends across the US by obtaining statistics about concealed carry from the states’ licensing departments.

This illustration looks at the states with the highest percentages of the population holding carry permits, showing their percentage in descending order. Alabama tops the list with over 20%. Washington state is #10 with well over 10% of the population licensed and the 4 immediately above Washington state are only about 1 percentage point higher.

The state immediately below Washington is West Virginia. Yes, Democrat-heavy Washington state has a higher percentage of legal concealed pistol carriers than a traditionally Conservative state where 68% of voters voted for President Trump in 2016. And we are one of the leading states for concealed carry in the entire nation. A large number of very conservative states have a lower CPL density in the population than Washington state does.

Note that many or perhaps most of those CPL holders carry handguns whose magazines would be banned under some proposals Democrats are bandying about. Yes, if you legally carry a Glock or Beretta handgun, some legislators want to declare it an assault weapon and require you to renew a license for it EVERY YEAR. This will needlessly antagonize those licensed, responsibly armed people.

I know dozens of people with a wide range of political views, diverse ethnic backgrounds and of both sexes who own several firearms. AR15s are ubiquitous. And we often vote on that basis. Which brings me to my next point.

2) Washington state’s gun control advocating minority ALWAYS overreaches badly and does not try to work with the gun community

In 1997, the year that I moved here, Washington Ceasefire ran an initiative which was basically a nasty handgun licensing scheme ineptly disguised as a trigger lock and bill. The final vote was over 70% against it and it even lost in King County, the most liberal county in the state. A Seattle Times reporter said at the time that the initiative had set gun control in the state back 20 years.

Now state Democrats are casually discussing even more extreme ideas which could set back the party and numerous liberal causes even further.

"Assault weapon" bans (pointless legislation which caused enraged Washingtonians to De-Foley-ate Congress in 1994), magazine bans (which are pointless and also politically toxic) and also a proposal to revoke the state's Preemption statute.

That last idea really needs to be thought through. I know Seattle wants to enact its own gun control laws but do we REALLY want to make gun laws so confusing that they are difficult to comply with? Why would it make sense for gun owners to have to research gun laws any time they venture out of their towns?

3) Serious attempts to enact punitive laws will create a terrific backlash 

I have already mentioned two instances of backlash against  gun controls in this state in recent memory:

• 1994: House speaker Foley removed from office for supporting the 1994 Federal "Assault Weapon" ban

• 1997: Initiative 676 essentially killed gun control in Washington state for 20 years. 

Another example:

• 2014: Following passage of I594's mandatory background check initiative, between 1,000 and 3,000 people showed up in Olympia and staged what may have been the largest action of civil disobedience in US history. Notice was given that people would be exchanging and even selling firearms in direct violation of the new law. No permit to assembled was requested or given. Several legislators even attended, at least one of them armed with an AR15. (link)
  
  No attempt was made to arrest anyone there.
  
  (Note that gun owners in New York state and Connecticut have largely ignored requirements rammed through in midnight sessions that they register their "assault weapons". If two states used to tolerating severe gun controls are refusing to obey because they have been pushed too far, what will happen here??)

I see two possibilities for 2018. Either no serious attempt will be made to pass "assault weapon" bans or licensing, magazine bans or to revoke firearms preemption or serious attempts will be made...and the backlash will be FURIOUS in the next election. As in the aftermath of the Federal ban, electoral retribution will be harshest against moderate Democrats who had previously supported gun rights. I sincerely hope that Democrats in the legislature are not foolhardy enough to doom their control there to enact foolish laws instead of focusing on the positive aspects of their party platform.

If strict controls are enacted, civil disobedience will be rampant and attempts to actually enforce the laws spotty or non-existent. Respect for the law and for officers enforcing it will plummet.

And God help us all if someone gets hurt trying because such laws ARE being enforced.

Democratic "leadership" in Washington state shows why party is in decline: Dishonesty, Arrogance

A few months after I moved to Washington state in 1997, the state election included an initiative which would have required that all handgun owners in the state obtain a handgun license or face felony charges (for continuing to own a firearm they had owned responsibly for decades). Despite predictions that it would pass easily, the measure lost by 71%. A gun control supporter at the time lamented that it had set gun control back 20 years because it contained such blatant overreach.

Now it's 20 years later and the gun control lobby is pushing bills which could end up setting their efforts back by another 20 years.

Grandstanding Attorney General Bob Ferguson has proposed restrictions which form the basis of two separate bills concerning so-called "assault weapons". Should these bills fail, as they are expected to do, there is already talk about them being formed into a ballot initiative for 2018.

I have written in a previous blog post why such restrictions are absolutely foolhardy:

• Rifles are not used often for murder. They are used to kill substantially less people annually than are killed by people with their bare hands...or other common weapons such as knives or blunt objects like baseball bats
  
• These rifles are very commonly owned, undoubtedly in the hundreds of thousands in the state and we have see in other states that complying would lead to confiscation (as in California). Compliance would be low, leading to massive disrespect for the law. (Hint: if you want to discourage ownership of a type of gun, proposing a ban is NOT the way to do so)
  
• Egregious restrictions like these have been a significant factor in Democratic party losses nationwide

The more obnoxious version of Ferguson's legislation, HB 1387 would mandate licensing to own "assault weapons", with annual renewal required. The consequences of this would be simply stunning: gross overreach attempting to turn Washington state (which is politically moderate but VERY gun friendly) into a state with worse gun control laws than any other state in the West, including California.

I referenced I676 and the consequences to the gun control lobby of its arrogant overreach earlier. But perhaps even more disturbing is the willingness, nay, eagerness of gun control proponents to utter statements that are blatantly dishonest...and the media's tendency to report those statements without even the pretense of fact checking.

Take for example the Seattle Times and their witless reporting of politicians pushing for these gun control bills here.

Laurie Jinkins of Tacoma opined:

“We have a lot of data now with mass shootings that assault weapons hurt and kill a lot more people and do it a lot faster,” she said. “We’re trying to make sure that these kinds of weapons stay out of the hands of dangerous people”

However, the FBI Uniform Crime Report consistently shows rifles as uncommon crime weapons, used in very few murders. And "mass shooting" statistics are being manipulated to inflate numbers by counting any situation where more than one person as shot.

Deputy prosecuting attorney Adam Cornell, told the group his worst day out of the 15 years working in Snohomish County was when he arrived at the scene where a 19-year-old, Allen C. Ivanov, shot and killed three of his former high school classmates at a house party in Mukilteo last year. 

Authorities say Ivanov opened fire with an AR-15-style rifle he had just purchased. Ivanov pleaded guilty and has been sentenced to life in prison. 

“That shooting, those murders,” he paused and said, “occurred in a span of less than 35 seconds … Assault weapons are the most efficient killers of people that we have in our communities.”

While that was an awful crime, it could have easily been committed with a 5 shot revolver. Grandstanding because a scary looking rifle was used is simply idiotic.

However the most awful part of this article could easily be this sentence:

Inslee said there’s a loophole in the state’s law that doesn’t require background checks for assault weapons.

Think about that for a moment. The governor of Washington state stated in the mainstream media that Washington state doesn't have a background check for these rifles. And the Seattle Times reported that statement AS FACT.

In point of fact, all firearms sold through dealers in Washington state require a Federal NICS background check. And since I594 passed, ALL firearms purchases are required to go through a dealer.

Governor Inslee and Attorney General Ferguson: are you actually so low as to attack a civil liberty through rank dishonesty or are you actually this ignorant of existing law?

Letter to the Seattle Times about gun legislation

I am writing to provide some feedback about your opinion columns
about gun control this weekend, as well as the general tone of the
discussion. For your information, I am a moderate liberal Democrat in
most respects who also happens to be an NRA Life Member; I believe
that makes me a consistent liberal.

In general, I find the idea of firearms "discussion" in this country to be
an unfortunate oxymoron. Firearms owners possess the technical acumen
for real debate and a first person knowledge of the issues. Most gun control
advocates seem to fall more into the "guns are icky and we want all the
controls we can get" camp. Attempts to rebrand "gun control" to "gun safety"
will only have any veracity when the control side provides more data than
the equivalent of sex ed composed solely of "abstinence" instruction.
The firearms community reduced the fatal gun accident rate from 2500/year
around 1970 to about 600/year now, mostly through OUR initiative and
without significant legal requirements.

To reiterate and rephrase: we don't want to be talked at by those with no
knowledge any more than women wanted to be talked down to be
anti-choice extremists last year.

Having lived in 4 states and experienced a variety of gun controls first
hand, including their unintended consequences, I'd like to respond to
some editorials by Danny Westneat and Jenny Durkan in the Time,
this weekend.

I was most impressed by Danny Westneat's comments and I believe
that he and my representative Hope have a sincere interest in finding
intelligent discussion points. Where this breaks down is if HB 1588 includes
a requirement to record firearm type and serial numbers. A carefully
defined background check can be an excellent idea but legislation which
results in full firearms registration is unacceptable. That reading of
1588 would put it on par with California's requirement that records all
firearms transactions. This is not so much in regard to gun show transactions
as to private purchases between individuals.

An approach which could be much more acceptable to the firearms
community would be something like Iowa's pistol purchase permit,
which I experienced in the mid 1990s. It included a background check
good for a year or two pf purchases. A background check meets the
stated goals of Rep Hope, without venturing into firearms registration
territory. Another equivalent would be to exempt firearms purchases where
the purchaser possesses a valid WA state concealed pistol license.
I have personally only sold firearms to persons possessing a valid CPL,
which I believe meets my responsibility as a gun owner squarely.

I am frankly disappointed with Jenny Durkan's attempt to ingratiate
herself with the firearms community by saying "I grew up with shotguns"
and then have her go on to urge a ban on so-called "assault weapons". If Ms
Durkan grew up with guns, surely she knows that these firearms are
functionally equivalent to hunting firearms. The idea of banning rifles which are
used to kill less people than blunt objects and half the people killed with
hands and feet is patently ridiculous.

The US will never have its gun culture destroyed in the way that other
countries have. There are many millions of handguns in private hands
and tens of millions of semi-automatic rifles and normal capacity magazines
for them as well. The djinn is out of the bottle but gun rights advocates share
your concern in reducing violence.  Why not ask for our ideas?

If you ask us how instead of "splaining" to us what controls we have to
accept, we can work together to improve the situation. But we don't have
to accept any bad idea you come up with and we won't. Something like
a hundred thousand gun owners took the time to show up and protest
peacefully for our rights in state capitols around the country, two weeks
ago. We're not going anywhere.