Locked and Coded

By Bill Maher

You can have my drone controller when you pry it from my cold, dead hand. The evil, meddling, freedom-hating federal government announced recently that hobbyists who fly those camera-mounted drones must register them or face penalties.

The problem has been that idiots flying camera drones have interfered with certain law enforcement and rescue activities and have had close calls with airplanes. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx says, “Finding the drone has not been as much of a problem as finding the person who was using the drone,” and added that mandatory registration will provide “information to trace back to the user.”

Seems logical. You have a contraption that you purchase and use responsibly as a hobby, but when you use it irresponsibly or unlawfully, causing injury or death, we have you registered and linked to your contraption. So, why can we do that with all private drones, which to date have killed no one as far as I can tell, but not with all guns, which kill over 32,000 Americans per year?

I bring this up because people watching the movie “Maze Runner” in a Kansas theater a couple weeks ago suddenly heard a loud pop. It was a gunshot, followed by what local news reports said was a man yelling, “Oh my God, I just shot myself! I just got my concealed and carry!” The story notes that a state law recently went into effect allowing gun owners to conceal and carry without training or a permit.

Yes, we should revisit the Second Amendment but, until then, maybe a little nibbling around the edges wouldn’t hurt. Having a national registry where all guns are linked to their owners – like we now apparently do with drones – and requiring training before you can become one of those concealed-carry “good guys with a gun” seems reasonable.