Guns Guns Everywhere, and Not a Bit Safer

This entry is part 3 of 13 in the series Guns

In Florida
Well, we already had the “shoot first, ask questions later law” passed here. Now your employer can’t ban you from taking your gun to work. I guess at least it has to be in a locked car. The Senate passed the measure last week, and it’s on it’s way to Gov. Crist for signature. So along with take your daughter to work day, we can have a take your gun to work day.

Durell Peaden, a State Senator says it’s all about protecting the Constitution.:

The second thing they wrote about in that constitution was the right to bear arms,” said Sen. Durell Peaden, a Republican from Crestview, Florida. “It was what was dear in their hearts.”

If that’s the case, why doesn’t Durell take the matter to the Supreme Court. Oh, they do exempt Schools, Nuclear Power Plants, and Homeland Security offices. Let me explain something to you Durell, if you claim to have passed it because of the Constitution…well, the Constitution doesn’t exempt certain locations. You just shit and fell back in it. Liar.

On Airplanes
Feel safer knowing the pilot of your commercial jet might be packing? Well you shouldn’t. On March 22, pilot James Langenhahn was stowing his Heckler & Koch USP .40, issued to him by the Department of Homeland Security under the Federal Flight Deck Officer program, while his co-pilot prepared to land the plane. As he was placing the pistol, locked in its holster, into his flight bag, it discharged a single shot which exited the left side of the plane, doing little damage.

Now what the Reuters report doesn’t go on to tell you is that this was caused by another idiotic policy developed by someone at Homeland Security who clearly knows nothing about gun handling safety. The policy requires that pilots remove the guns from their belts and lock them up using a government-provided combination padlock before leaving the cockpit with a ring through the key guard, a requirement that pilots say creates unsafe conditions.

“The pilot was trying to lock his gun and remove the holster in an airplane going 300 miles per hour in preparation for landing and the padlock depressed the trigger,” said a federal flight deck officer who declined to be identified. “TSA knew this could happen but didn’t get rid of the requirement.”

…Said David Mackett, president of the Airline Pilots Security Alliance. “TSA’s got these pilots taking off and putting on their guns 10 times a day. It’s a recipe for disaster and that’s why no other agency does it.”

Our friends at Homeland Stupidity found out that:

Pilots have been unable to criticize this arrangement publicly because the TSA had classified it; however, a group of federal air marshals met with the TSA last year to recommend that pilots carry their pistols in the same way that air marshals do, not to mention everyone else who carries a firearm safely. “We said, “Just use the same procedures you use for your own air marshals,” said one federal flight officer. “How hard is that to understand?” The TSA took no action on the recommendation.

Mackett goes on to say that the TSA’s requirement has also resulted in numerous guns being lost or stolen. “But, TSA can’t continuously ignore standard procedures pr oven over thousands of other law enforcement officers and then blame the pilot when it goes wrong.”