Is there any reason to vote for Initiative 594? Nope. It’s not about gun safety or even supervision. It is about control, registration and taxation, lots of taxation. Of course this only applies to the law-abiding. Criminals, being criminals, won’t adhere to the law anyway,

Let’s suppose that a grandfather is at a gun range with his grandson and he gives him a firearm to try. He’s just committed a felony. The backers say,” Oh that isn’t the ‘intent’ of the law and would never happen.” Wanna bet?

There is no exception to this proposed law. Not people in law enforcement and not Concealed Weapon Permit holders. Concealed carry holders have to go through a background check and are fingerprinted and run through a data base. Yet there’s no exceptions. Why? Taxes. They want to tax every transaction. Probably equating it to a “sin tax.”

If the state of Washington would enforce existing laws, the violent crime rate would certainly decrease, i.e. felon in possession of a firearm. Too often this is plea-bargained out of a case. Better yet, if the major cities would adopt a “stop and frisk” law, crime would drop precipitously. New York adopted this law and the crime rate went way down. Conversely, Chicago (which doesn’t have a “stop and frisk” law) has the most stringent gun laws in the country……and it has the highest crime rate and murder rate in the country.

Going after law-abiding citizens is not the answer. When asked what they liked about the law one of the backers replied, “It’s a good start.” A good start toward the backer’s ultimate goal total confiscation of all firearms.

Denny Andrews, Bellevue