Okay, I realize that the congress really isn’t non-stop. They take breaks like the rest of us. Heck, they probably take more breaks than the rest of us. But let’s think about it for just a minute: Congress has existed, generally speaking, for nearly two-and-a-half centuries. Is the world so messed up that we really need full-time lawmaking, even after nearly two hundred and fifty years? Why not change things around and have congress actually work for a living?
Let’s take a look at the most recent farce: The assault weapons ban. This has been all over the news this week, because the ban expired on Monday. Beginning Tuesday morning, gunmakers were free to create and sell weapons that formerly would have been prohibited under the ban. Yet the demand for such weapons apparently isn’t that high. Why isn’t it? Let’s take a look at the ban itself.
Weapons prohibited by the ban were semi-automatic rifles that include two or more of these features: A telescoping stock, a pistol grip, a bayonet mount, a flash suppressor or threaded barrel designed to accommodate one or a grenade launcher. Not a single one of these features, much less two of them, will do a thing to stop someone from buying a similar model and using it to fire off the same amount of rounds.
This law may have prevented a drive-by stabbing by bayonet or two. It might have kept someone from using a grenade launcer attachment on the rifle to increase the deadliness of the weapon. But you could still buy a weapon that can fire exactly the same amount of rounds in the same amount of time with the same amount of effort. What sort of law was that? Did it make you feel better? It didn’t help me.
I’m not saying that congress is completly useless. Just that maybe it’s time to rethink things so that we’re on a course that makes some sense. I’m not saying that Kentucky is a model for all things, but apparently they can (or could) survive on a legislative session that took just 40 days every two years. Do we really need a full-time congress?