Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg is concerned. Terrorists might be
buying guns. They must be stopped, all one million of them!
It seems that being placed on the government's supposed terrorist
list doesn't prevent you from buying guns. It worries Sen.
Lautenberg. And it would worry me ... if being on a watch list
with a million supposed terrorists actually meant anything.
Reports the New York Times:
The government's consolidated watch list, used to identify
people suspected of links to terrorists, has grown to more than
one million names since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. It also
has drawn widespread criticism over the prevalence of mistaken
identities and unclear links to terrorism.
A report in May from the Justice Department inspector general
found that the list kept by the Federal
Bureau of Investigation carried the names of 24,000 people
included on the basis of outdated or sometimes irrelevant
information.
Gun rights advocates said showing up on a terrorist watch list
should not be grounds for being denied a gun.
"We're concerned about the quality and the integrity of the
list," said Andrew Arulanandam, a spokesman for the National
Rifle Association. "There have been numerous studies and
reports questioning the integrity, and we believe law-abiding
people who are on the list by error should not be arbitrarily
denied their civil rights" under the Second Amendment.
The government can't take away people's constitutional rights by
simply putting their name on a list. It certainly can't do
so when there's no evidence the list is accurate. Sen.
Lautenberg should start by insisting that the government clean up
its watch list and stop categorizing innocent people as
terrorists.
About the Author
Doug Bandow is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute and the Senior Fellow in International Religious Persecution at the Institute on Religion and Public Policy. A former Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan, he is author of Beyond Good Intentions: A Biblical View of Politics (Crossway).
