Laws have power. Mostly they have the power of the government behind them. As in: if you don’t do this, we’ll kill you and/or put you away for a long time.

That’s it. That’s the only power laws have.

The left meanwhile seems to think they’re some kind of magical incantations, which, by existing, would make it impossible to do/think/say something.

I don’t understand that.

It is most notable in their crazy rush to forbid guns, which give middle aged, out of shape women like me the possibility to defend themselves against crazy people who might want to kill me. (Up to and including the government, should things go that way.)

What puzzles me about the idea that if you forbid guns no one will have any, and there won’t be any crimes committed with guns is that it’s so widespread. Europe has tried this. Yeah, they still have guns. Britain is now forbidding knives, and yes, they still have knives.

Soon enough all British citizens will only be able to get the kind of ridiculous plastic cutlery you get on airliners.

And yet, people will still murder people. And would be spree-shooters will find other ways to kill a vast multitude of people.

Yes, America’s crime rate is higher than Europe’s. We know. We also know statistics aren’t tracked the same way there and here. And also that, honestly, if you remove our cities which are as hot on gun control as Europe and make sure we’re comparing apples to apples, we have one of the lower rates in the world.

This is because even crazy criminals understand “I might get shot.” And even suicidal mass-shooters understand “I’ll never accomplish my glorious killing spree if I get shot the minute I fire. I might not even kill anyone.”

This is why all shootings of this kind occur in gun free zones.

Making the person or persons who decides to create a “gun free zone” liable for any shootings in the place would do more to make us safe from spree shooters than all the red flag laws in the world.

Because red flag laws can get abused. The left already think anyone who disagrees with them is “crazy.” And look at how the Soviet Union used their mental health system sometime.

And more importantly they’ll do nothing to keep guns off the hands of people who want to misuse them. Nothing will.

Humans are cunning apes. We’ve been killing each other since we only had fists. Stone-ax control would have stopped nothing.

The conceit that a little sign saying “this is a gun free zone” is capable of stopping someone already intent on killing a multitude of people is… I’m not sure? I think believing you can turn back the sea with a word makes more sense. This is madness on a par with the craziest Roman Emperors, an assumption of power that is not only improbable but impossible for a human being.

But it might be part of how the left thinks. They also think we can “teach rapists not to rape.” As tough you know the entire instruction of mankind has failed, but if we specifically tell them not to rape, that will stop it.

The problem with all this is that making laws that won’t be obeyed, or won’t be obeyed by those people who are intent on doing whatever it is the law is supposed to prevent, doesn’t only “not work” and lead to more bad laws, when the hysteria sets in.

No, the problem is that it creates a highly corruptible system, full of contradictory injunctions that can be exploited by fallible and corrupt people, who are often attracted to positions of power and force.

And the other problem is making everyone is a criminal.

Laws that can’t be obeyed, won’t be obeyed. A lot of behaviors will go underground, where they are more dangerous. For instance, if you forbid cloning, you’re guaranteeing cloning will be used for body parts (or whole-body transplants) instead of, say, for infertility issues, or to make a twin for your kid (which whatever you think of the morality, is infinitely more benign.)

Forbidding guns will disarm the law abiding and trusting, leaving them, therefore, vulnerable to those who couldn’t care less.

And giving our law enforcement agencies a mass of self-contradictory, unenforceable law to enforce will corrupt them too. For illustration, look to South America.

Heck, we’re already halfway there. There is no one, left or right in this country who truly believes that Epstein committed “unassisted suicide.” No one. Not even the people who TRY to.

That tells you where we’ve got to.

And that’s the problem. Because the only power of the law is knowing an impartial authority will enforce it with clear eye-ed impartial vision or as close as humans get. That is what makes laws worth respecting. That and the fact that they are not only useful but enforceable/trackable/doable.

When you lose that, and can’t trust your authorities who are just another gang, you’re on your way to the time when every man’s stone ax was needed, every day, to protect his meager belongings.

Neither prosperity nor civilization will survive that.