TEAM LAST CALL

Part of my morning routine each weekday is to listen to WITF’s call-in program Radio Smart Talk, a terrific new show that I appreciate for both its insightfulness and the fact that it means one less hour a day of classical music.

Several weeks ago, Radio Smart Talk did a program about a new gun law that has already been passed in many parts of PA. Apparently, the “lost gun law,” as it’s called, is causing quite an outrage within the NRA community, which is a very bad thing, in that these people by definition like to spend their downtime shooting things. In order to smooth out the situation, I’d like to, in a completely unbiased and not at all gun-hating way, take a moment to more fully explain the law.

The several gun owners who called in to the program came across as intelligent and reasonable and not at all like the kind of people who would murder someone who made fun of them. That being said, I’d still like to clarify that I’m not interested in choosing sides or stirring up trouble that in any way could result in me getting shot a lot. I promise to be understanding and respectful of gun owners and extremely sensitive to the fact that they know where I work and what I look like. So any readers expecting to see a column full of fiery rhetoric about how owning a gun is “lame” or “dumb” or “super-lame and dumb” is going to be very disappointed.

It just so happens that I love guns. I also love NASCAR, plus Old Milwaukee beer, and agree wholeheartedly that Sarah Palin should be president because she’s hot. So clearly, there’s no need for anyone to shoot anyone else.

And now, without any further ado about the fact that I would totally marry a gun if I could, it’s time to take a look at the law. The “lost gun law” can basically be summarized as such: If you own a gun, and that gun is lost or stolen, your wife and children will be sold to a democrat. Just kidding! All it says is that you’re required by law to report your missing gun to authorities within 72 hours. That’s it.

As many gun owners have astutely observed, this law is a clear violation of their god-given rights, especially their right to lose their deadly weapon and not do anything about it. But here’s why the law is important: It will help to cut down on the widespread practice of “straw sales,” or the sale of guns by legal gun owners to people who have no business being anywhere near a gun, like a terrorist, or Dick Cheney. Which I realize is redundant. Under the old law, when a gun is discovered at a crime scene and traced back to its original owner, the owner can simply claim that he lost the gun. While the gun owner in this scenario is, technically speaking, an idiot, he is not a criminal, and is therefore off the hook. But under the new law, that person would at least be held accountable if he knowingly lost his gun, especially if he knowingly lost it under a bag of money handed to him by a felon.

How you can prove that someone knew his gun was missing is unclear. But even if the law has some imperfections, it’s sure to at least slow down the illegal sale of weapons. So to me, the law is worth passing, even if you can’t always enforce it. I mean, you’d never be able to enforce a ban on listening to Nickelback’s music, either, but that doesn’t mean it’s not the right thing to do.

According to the NRA, all this law does is “victimize the victims” of gun theft. And they’ve got a point. First someone takes your gun, and now you’re forced by law to report it? That’s oppressive. Next they’ll expect you to go crying to the police every time someone steals your car.

But all lawmakers are really asking is that 1) if you own a gun, you do your very best to not sell it to terrorists, and 2) if you do sell it, I mean lose it, just give the police a little heads-up that there’s a new deadly weapon on the streets. If it helps, think of your gun like a baby: There’s no law that prevents idiots from having a baby, but there is a law penalizing them for knowingly losing one. And way less people have been shot and killed by lost babies than lost guns. To reiterate, no one here is arguing a person’s right to own a gun. Gun ownership is protected by law, and I’ll support it until the day I die, which hopefully isn’t soon via gunshot.

There are some people out there, like Jesus, who say that owning a gun is wrong. Maybe if these crybabies weren’t so busy growing out their hair and hugging trees and “living their lives according to the Bible,” they’d have time to read the Second Amendment for once. The fact is, gun owners have a right to bear arms. And the only way they can get the bear arms off the bear’s body is by shooting it with their guns.

In summation, everyone on Earth can and should have a gun. That way, if anyone ever shoots you, you can shoot them back, and they can shoot you back, and all of your friends and your dog and your grandma can join in and everyone can run around shooting everyone else all the time, just like the Constitution says. God bless America.