Judge and Jury

Picture courtesy of Vancouver Sun


Hmm seems the old adage “Be careful of what you wish for, because you may get it” still has meaning today. The Police Union here in BC has declared that the new tough laws on drinking and driving are causing their members to spend to much time dealing with people that have had only 1 or 2 drinks and not dealing with chronic offenders. Seems the police are not enjoying being the judge and jury and taking the flak for their decisions.
This is what happens when you have laws driven by special interests groups using emotions as a guiding force.
For a law to be effective and focused, you need facts, hardcore facts with unbiased research to back them up. This takes time and politicians hate taking time to get all of the facts. Harder yet with a sobbing mothers telling you that you are a heartless beast for not enacting this law right away. But to have good law it must be well thought out, with a clear and achievable objective, able to withstand the hard cold light of logic and reviewed without emotion. Another aspect is the law of diminishing returns. At some point the cost of enforcement and suppression of civil rights outweighs the gain to society brought by the law. The reality here is no amount of law is going to completely stop people from driving drunk and people getting killed. We can reduce it, but never stop it. Humans just have to many variables for such absolutes.
The politicians have themselves, the police and ourselves in a pickle. Any attempt to reduce the law will cause a backlash with the special interest groups, while the media will enjoy splashing sensational headlines on front pages, which are great for selling papers but not great for solving our issues. As a firearm owners we have been warning about these types of laws and law making, now that it is beginning to effect the rest of the population all we can say is “We told you so”.