To: CA-firearms 
From: Joe Brower 
Date: Fri, 15 Nov 2002 08:34:51 -0500
Subject: [ca-firearms] My Op-Ed was printed today in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune...


...will wonders never cease.

URL:
http://www.newscoast.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?Site=SH&Date=20021115&Category=COLUMNIST13&ArtNo=211150301&Ref=AR&Profile=1060

They changed the title to "'Ballistic fingerprinting' advocates follow
emotion, not reason". My original title was "The Heart, The Mind, and
'Ballistic Fingerprints'".  And for some reason (which I can only view as
fortuitous), this op-ed is also the first item on the front page of the
Sarasota Herald-Tribune's website today, at least, as of 8 AM EST. Cool.

I also love the "black silhouette" they have as a placeholder for where the
author's picture would go.

Of course, this wholly-owned subsidiary of the NY Times has seen fit to
print no less than TEN anti-firearm columns/cartoons in the last month,
capitalizing on the "beltway sniper" hysteria, but we take what we can get,
I suppose.

I have included the text below for those of you who don't have a browser
handy, or don't want to give the SHT's website any hits.

Let Freedom Ring,

Joe Brower
Venice, FL

***

'Ballistic fingerprinting' advocates follow emotion, not reason
Joe Brower, guest columnist
Nov 15, 2002


With the advent of the "Beltway Sniper" shootings, there has been the
predictable hue and cry for more gun control, mostly in the form of a
"ballistic fingerprinting database" for all firearms. Simply put, the idea
is that bullets recovered from shootings could be matched to images stored
in a computer, the owner of the weapon could then be determined and an
arrest could be made.

Sounds good, doesn't it?

Unfortunately, in the real world, it doesn't work. The federal government
has been working on such a system for a decade. Since 1999, its advocates
like to proclaim, it's made more than 12,000 matches. But it has yielded no
convictions.

Why? Because the "fingerprints" are nowhere near distinct enough to provide
matches that are truly viable as evidence. Maryland has had a similar system
in use for the last two years. Number of convictions: zero. California has
reviewed the feasibility of this idea and deemed it "unworkable."

The term "fingerprint" is a deliberate misnomer. Real fingerprints cannot be
changed. A firearm's working parts can all be altered in five minutes with
tools commonly found in any garage.

Don't think that criminals don't know this; they most certainly do. Even
normal use will change the "fingerprint" in time.

So why is such an ineffective measure even considered?

"Ballistic fingerprinting" is just a facade for what is truly desired by its
advocates: a national gun registry. A list of every gun owner in the United
States, where they live and what firearms they possess. This is hardly a
concept befitting a nation that professes to be "the land of the free."

Who would even want such a thing? Need you ask?

The voices that have immediately sought to capitalize on this tragedy are
the same ones who attempt to use every abuse of firearms to further their
goal of restricting guns or banning them outright. These include Charles
Schumer, D-N.Y., in the U.S. Senate, the appointed bureaucrats of the Bureau
of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, and such groups as the Brady Campaign and
the Violence Policy Center, among others.

Even so, is a national firearms registry a bad thing? Absolutely.

Why? Because all registration schemes lead to eventual confiscation. This is
readily verifiable. This inevitable progression is ongoing in Britain and
Australia. In the 20th century, it preceded much of the conflict in Europe
and Asia.

Those who say "it can't happen here" are whistling past the graveyard of
history. It's simply not worth the risk.

Thankfully, the truth of this is obvious to many, and is the primary reason
why "ballistic fingerprinting" proposals have gone nowhere.

The whole scheme violates the Second, Fourth, Fifth and 10th Amendments to
the Constitution, as well as the concept of prior restraint and the
prohibition of ex-post-facto laws. We still live in a nation where people
are considered innocent until proven guilty.

If the police have probable cause to suspect our involvement in a crime,
they have the right to fingerprint us, take a DNA sample or check the
ballistic identification of our guns. If they don't have probable cause,
they don't. It's that simple.

Of all the articles in the Bill of Rights, the Second Amendment is the one
that specifically states "shall not be infringed," but is, ironically, the
most infringed upon. Any honest man could simply look up the word "infringe"
in the dictionary and go from there. Over 20,000 laws now hinder this
fundamental human right -- the right to self-defense.

We human beings, for all our technology and civilization, are creatures who
still feel more quickly and more strongly than we think. The heart betrays
the mind; gun control is primarily an illogical response to fear. Impelled
by the need to "do something," we are misled into actions that do more harm
than good.

The truth is that no law is better than a bad law, and knee- jerk concepts
like "ballistic fingerprinting" are bad law.

Every time a crime is committed involving firearms, there invariably follows
the usual demands that we surrender even more of our freedoms, all for a
false promise of safety that politicians know can never be delivered. It is
a siren call that rational, thinking people cannot, will not heed.

Joe Brower is a Venice software engineer and freedom advocate.