Last month, New York's GOP governor, George Pataki, called for mandatory trigger locks for all guns. And GOP presidential candidate George W. Bush has pledged repeated support for requiring that trigger locks be sold with guns. Craven strategists in both parties point to recent polls showing popular support for mandatory child trigger locks. But when given the chance to vote directly on the issue, an overwhelmingly majority of Americans will oppose such mandates for the transparent political gimmicks they really are. In left-leaning Washington state, for example, a whopping 71 percent of voters rejected a 1997 statewide initiative requiring trigger locks on all guns.
Trigger locks are the crime-policy opiate of the elite.
Republicans should be clearing the smoke, not inhaling it. JWR contributor Michelle Malkin can be reached by clicking here.