Thursday, June 16, 2016

Let's Make a Deal. The Terror Watch List and the No Fly List.

Trump apparantly is going to meet with the NRA about selling guns to those on the Terror Watch List or the No Fly List. This will be an interesting test of his deal making ability.
The NRA has stated emphatically that it opposes selling guns to terrorists. Who in their right mind wouldn't have that same opinion. Obama and Clinton love to beat that straw horse as if the 2nd amendment supporters want terrorists to have guns.
 
The problem is in the details. I looked up the No Fly List on Wikipedia and the article is full of Kafkaesque stories about people being mistakenly on the list who didn't know they were on it, were unable to find out why they were on it, and had to go through all sorts of hoops to get off it. The ACLU has won lawsuits against it. The Orlando shooter was on it but was taken off it in 2013 so was able to buy his guns. How did this failure happen. I'm sure it's not that easy but do we just say it can't be helped?
 
So what about these lists. How do you get on them? How do you know if you're on them and why? If there's a mistake how do you get off them? It seems to me that in this era of jihadists going after "soft targets" the general public has to get involved. In our society we can't criminalize someone who hasn't yet committed a crime or for speech or beliefs but we should be able to know who among us is sympathetic to the jihadists so we can keep an eye on them.
 
So instead of the President and Hillary angrily berating their political opponents about their supposed callousness, why didn't they use their time in office to address these problems and work out a "deal" that everyone can agree about. It'll be interesting to see what Trump comes up with.

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