We
hear the word awfully regularly and perhaps too often: loophole.
Regular
users of this word include bankers, car dealers, and lawyers. But
the most common users are politicians.
Politicians
are those sub-humans that have two distinctive traits that always
give themselves away. One, is that when their lips are moving, they
are lying. The second trait is that when their lips aren’t moving,
they’re smiling. Two dead giveaways.
Whether
making pious speeches about gun violence, drug influx, preserving
rights for the homeless, encouraging illegal entry into America, or
releasing hardened criminals from incarceration, politicians usually
reach into their velvet bag of sleazy words to help slither their way
out of the truth.
Inside
that bag are notes with words such as: racist, misogynist, “I can’t
recall,” “I don’t believe so,” and “loophole.” These are
“wiggle words” permitting tattoos of arrogance to disappear
before the eyes of the world.
Years
ago, Our Lady of Perpetual Grievances, St. Hillary Clinton, was
caught with a hammer in her grubby hands, breaking her cellphones
into teeny weeny pieces. It seems as though she was suspected of
nefarious activities to include having foreign sources create and
distribute fictitious documents.
Those
documents which contained phony accusations against her once close
friend, Donald Trump, including his “collusion” with Russians who
supposedly had clout. All a giant lie aimed at hobbling Trump in
order to punish him for telling the truth.
At
a Congressional trial, Clinton, often touted as “The World’s
Smartest Woman,” used the words, “I don’t recall,” or a
variation thereof, hundreds of time. Pretty convenient. That’s an
example of a loophole.
The
long and short of it is the ability to tell an overt lie and get away
with it while the world watches. The official definition of loophole
is: “an ambiguity or inadequacy in the law or a set of rules.”
So,
to avoid criminal or civil prosecution for lack of candor, a person
on the stand in court can defer to a poor memory; who’s to know if
one’s mind in unable to remember? Then it’s on to more
shenanigans back in the office until the next subpoena.
But
it’s the mother of all escape routes, the “loophole,” that
we’re going to examine right now.
A
cousin to ‘I can’t recall,’ the loophole is a terrific toll for
the smarmy politician to blame their shortcomings – or intentional
escape route – when writing and introducing bills.
For
example, politicians are always in the game for votes. Votes are
needed to get elected as well as remain elected. To do so behooves
the politician who would rather loaf around their multiple offices
than put on a pair of gloves and perform manual labor.
In
order to win those precious votes, incumbents resort to giveaways in
the form of benefits. Free child school meals, free bus tickets,
coupons for electric vehicles, house down payment assistance, free
cell phones, monthly cash and food stipends for the underprivileged,
even student loan repayments for the wealthy.
None
of the criteria make sense, though. Electric vehicle (EV) coupons
offer thousands of dollars to
|
An EV wealth redistribution effort in the form of a loophole |
people well-off enough to afford a
$75,000 - $100,000 EV without extra funding or help. Middle income
families are now footing the bill for these bonus dollars that amount
to wealth redistribution.
The
same holds true for gratis bus tickets, cell phones, and other
cash stipends for illegal aliens and American underprivileged folks,
alike.
But
as of late, politicians – on both sides of the aisle – have been
carping over guns. Not only guns, but those guns in the hands of
individual citizenry. Guns, they say, are just fine in the hands of
police and the military, because they have been trained in their use.
Crazy
talk from political baboons who have never held nor touched a real
gun are circling their wagons in an attempt to outlaw firearm
technology that is roughly a century-and-a-half old. Created around
the time of Reconstruction, inventors tested and manufactured
firearms for a variety of uses known as “semi-automatic.”
After
90-years since the federal government created the National Firearms
Act of 1934 – a law that limited public ownership of
fully-automatic firearms – this law, and the firearms and
accessories associated therewith, continue to be debated.
Subject
to that debate is a relatively new product called a “bump stock.”
A bump stock is an inanimate device using the recoil action from a
bullet discharge. Normally absorbed by the shooter’s shoulder in
long guns, the recoil alters the rearward motion against the shoulder
to be directed toward the shooter’s finger.
That
stationary finger, in conjugation with the bump stock, is now being
closely examined by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and
Explosives (BATFE). It seems as though some mentally ill guy bought
semi-automatic rifles and fitted them with completely legal bump
stocks. He proceeded to shoot hundreds of innocent concert and
festival goers in Las Vegas, for no apparent reason.
Politicians
immediately lined up as if someone yelled “Free meal!” to offer
their opinions to the world.
“Loopholes!
We need to immediately close the loopholes on bump stocks! They’re
dangerous!!!” they piously yelled, ad nauseam. Of
course they’re not dangerous; the finger pulling the trigger
belongs to the guilty party in this equation.
Catching
the attention of other even less-knowledgeable pols, they finally
decided to outlaw these stocks with then-President Donald Trump
signing the authorization bill. Naturally it was challenged in court
after court after court. It is now in the hands of the Supreme
Court.
Not
unlike watching a jellyfish attempt to climb a ladder, The Justices
appear flabbergasted, admittedly turning to YouTube for advice about
exactly how a bump stock functions. (As an aside: I’ll wager
they still don’t have a clue.)
For
the record, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was baffled when asked
about the definition of a ‘woman,’ not string theory. She
publicly stated, “It’s really not about the operation of the
thing. It’s about what it can achieve, what it’s being used for…
The function of this trigger is to cause this kind of damage, 800
rounds a second or whatever,” per Fox News. Yes, she said 800
rounds per second! Quite the
eye for detail that could affect more than 500,000 current
non-criminal owners
of these stocks.
This
should come as no surprise, though. The legality, or illegality, of
the bills under review are penned by the very people –
lawyers/Senators/Congresspeople, most of whom have law degrees –
who actually wrote them. But as is evident, they’re not worth the
paper on which they are written. That’s because they are chock
full o’ loopholes.
I’m
not condemning these political gasbags, but they might want to know
there are already in excess of 22,000-gun laws on the books to
prevent gun crimes. Any new bills will likely contain new loopholes
for future media attention following the next crime. That being
said, what makes you think this bill will prevent anything?
Of
course, we know the answer: nothing will prevent the illegal use of
guns. Our British brethren fought a mediocre fight a handful of
years ago by outlawing most firearms in the name of public safety.
Just
within the last few weeks, English lawmakers began scribing a new
bill to outlaw knives due to the out-of-control crimes being
committed with knives. Soon it will outlaw cricket bats, cast iron
skillets, and sharp sticks, all in the name of public safety.
Perhaps
its not the knives, machetes, hatchets, hammers, poisons, cars, or
guns. Maybe it’s simply crazy people – people that are mentally
deficient and/or evil. That’s where I’d concentrate my efforts.
But
I’m not a media whore like our politicians.