I read an article today that deeply disturbs me about the Obama administration newest attempts to control guns. There’s no surprise here in regards to how he and his administration feels about guns, if there was a magic button that destroyed and banned all guns, it would been pressed about two seconds after his first inauguration. Of course, he would have kept them around him for his protection. But this new attempt is just downright scary. The administration is now trying to get a new regulation enacted that would prevent certain people who receives Social Security from owning guns. Let me explain.

Social Security (Income) is a supplementary income that was put in place to help people who can’t work at all or has limits to how much they are able to work for a variety of reasons. It might be due to age, disability or other reasons. When a person receives this supplementary income, the money can come to a relative for the intended individual. For example, when I was eighteen I started receiving Social Security Income (SSI) but the check came to my mother but it was for me. For me personally, we did this because we really didn’t know how exactly things were going to work. Such as writing checks, we thought it would be easier if she was on my checking account so she could write and sign checks for me. In order to be able to do this, the SSI check had to come to her, she was my representative payee. This was year 2000 so rules are probably different now. However, people still have representative payees for other reasons such as lack of mental capacity to handle finances and these are the people that the Obama administration are going after with gun control.

They are trying to claim that the people who are not mentally competent enough to handle their finances are also not mentally competent to have a gun. There are a lot of people who receive SSI, ranging from people with disabilities who can’t work to elderly people who can’t work anymore. I can’t decide what area of this new proposed regulation is the most irrational. First let’s think about the rationale of if you can’t handle finances then you can’t handle gun ownership. I first have to ask how many people who do DO NOT receive SSI have the mental capacity to handle their finances? If the financial situation of people is a way to judge their psychotic tendency, we may have a bigger problem than just the people receiving SSI! I say psychotic tendency because the proposed reason for gun control is to prevent deaths from guns and let’s be honest, unless you are in danger, the only reason you are going to kill is if you have mental issues that are far from being related to the ability to handle money.

So let’s be realistic here, this proposed regulation is not because they are worried about the people receiving SSI owning guns but it is just another nudge forward to banning guns completely. Here is the scary part to this that has me very disturbed. If they do get this enacted, it will be a very big foothold in the next logical step of anybody who receives government assistance not being allowed to own a gun. How difficult will it be for them to say if you receive food stamps for more than a year then you must be unable to handle finances since obviously you can’t buy your own food? Better yet, if you are on housing assistance, then they could say you definitely are incompetent. Medicaid/Medicare? It is a very slippery slope that we have already begun to go down and I fear that if this rule gets enacted, it is be like pouring grease on that slope and turn it into a runaway situation. Especially when you consider how many people get any type of government assistance and the push to make it almost a requirement to get some kind of assistance.

Let’s put aside for a moment the politics of this and let’s think about the logistics. Take away hunting, the propose of having a gun to the normal person is for self defense. Now let’s consider who needs the most help when it comes to self defense, the people who are physical incapable of defending themselves. People who have physical disabilities just might fall into this category, don’t ya think? So they are trying to take away one of the most effective methods of defending yourself from the people who need easy way to do so. I hope I never have to defend myself but if I did have to, I would really like it if I was able to effectively. If someone is coming at me in a threatening way, I need someway to deter them at the very least and if you don’t know me, I’m not exactly a martial arts expert. Just because I have a gun doesn’t mean I am going to have to use it. Let’s say somebody comes into my apartment in the middle of the night and I have a shotgun. Most likely all I am going to have to do is cock it so the perpetrator can hear it and that perpetrator is going to have second thoughts about continuing their venture. Just the shear presence of a gun is enough to deter a lot of people from doing bad!