The Other Side # 63 Common Sense vs fear mongering

 My mothers side of the family immigrated from Germany back in the 19th century and settled on a farm in Gasconade county. Great Grandma lived to be 94 and had 12 children, many had farms of their own. Growing up in St. Louis County, my family would head to the “country” in the winter to help with the butchering. The cousins would gather at one of the farms and buthcher hogs, a lot of hogs. There is no better pork than farm lot pork, and it was a wonderful social time for the family. When you butcher, you must kill hogs and the tool of death was Uncle Oscar’s Remington Model 12 hex-barrel 22 rifle. When Dad bought that gun at the estate auction, one of the cousins told him that rifle had killed a thousand hogs. Now it hangs on my gun rack, and has killed hogs, squrriels, rabbits and varments. When I take it afield to hunt wild game, I am required to have a license, be trained, and I must comply with the Department of Conservation’s regulations. I can’t take it turkey hunting, I must carry a shot gun that holds no more than three shells with shot no larger than #4, and I must carry a separate turkey license. Deer hunting requires more licenses, and more restrictions on the fire arm that I can use.  When I go water foul hunting I must use only steel shot, and carry another special State license, and a Federal “Stamp”. The point is, these restrictions are for my safety, the safety of other people, and the management of the wildlife resources of the State and the country. They are all reasonable and I have absolutely no objection to the cost, the restrictions or the time required to comply. As a hunter, I must carry some weapon of death, and I am proficient in its use.  I know that if I violate the regulations, I could lose my right to hunt. That is common sense. Why don’t we use the same system that works so well for the department of conservation for all uses of firearms? Another good method of regulation is the titling and regulating of motorized vehicles. Motorized vehicles are easily tracked as they are sold and operated on our roads. Common sense would require the titling of all firearms. We have the technology to chip and track the 300,000,000 guns that are in this country, that’s nothing in this age of terra bites. I would have no objection to titling my guns, so if they are stolen, I would have a better chance of getting them back. I know the NRA will scream, but their fear mongering has led to the explosion of gun sales during the Obama administration. Most unlicensed and un-trackable. That is not just wrong, it is stupid. We can never get guns out of the hands of crazy people until we know they have them. From Las Vegas to schools across the country, crazy people with guns pose a greater threat to our families than illegal immigrants or Islamic terrorists.