Speaking of Labyrinthine Laws...

(Hat tip: Don't Tread On Me)

One of the more irksome things about being a gun owner in America, aside from the raging hoplophobic mobs and media talkingheads that don't know a "clip" from a "magazine", is dealing with the decidedly confusing gun control laws. There are only about 20,000 of the suckers to keep straight, and each state has very different attitudes towards firearms, and their laws reflect that fact. And if you make what truly amounts to an honest mistake you can find yourself up that bad, bad creek with that ever important paddle.

Case in point, John Kerry's new shotgun. Nevermind that if he'd had his way, the shotgun in question would have been banned. Let's deal with the ever-changing amorphous blob that is "existing gun control laws".

New legal research by gun-law expert Alan Korwin indicates that merely accepting a gift shotgun from a private party out of his home state would be a five-year federal felony for Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, the Democratic candidate for President [see United States Code, section 922(a)(9)]. Giving him the gun would also be a felony [922(a)(5)].

Note that no one got hurt, except Senator Kerry's laughable credibility on the subject. But that's not exactly anything new. It was simply one private citizen giving another private citizen an inanimate object, a tool with no will of its own. Used to happen all the time. Finely engraved firearms were presented to prominent folks all the time. No big whoop. No need to make a federal case out of it, right?

See folks, this is why gun control laws are stupid. Well, one of the reasons. When even a guy who "never met a gun control law he didn't like" doesn't even know when he's breaking those very same gun control laws, how the heck is John and Jane Q. Public supposed to know?