From Friends of David R. Craig:
Candidate for Maryland Governor and Harford County Executive David R. Craig said using up to 200 front line employees at several state agencies to process record numbers of firearm purchase applications is the wrong approach that invites errors and security breaches.
Craig called on the Governor, Lt. Governor and Attorney General to develop a plan that protects sensitive information and uses sworn police officers to process a backlog of the forms required for background checks. The paperwork glut is an unanticipated consequence of some of the nation’s most restrictive gun laws taking effect in Maryland next month. The additional agencies have no experience processing information on a specialized form that requires social security numbers among other sensitive information.
“Numerous state agencies with no experience in this will be tripping over themselves pretending to mop up the mess created by this ill-conceived legislation,” said Craig. “Moreover, in a state with the most entrenched political monopoly in the nation, there is absolutely no incentive to do the job right, because their ultimate objective has already been accomplished which is to seek media attention and exploit tragedies.”
In the wake of the Sandy Hook school shootings, Governor Martin O’Malley introduced and signed into law this year Senate Bill 281, which bans certain weapons for sale, limits magazine rounds and requires fingerprints among other restrictions. Fearing continued erosion of their second amendment rights, buyers rushed to purchase firearms. Weekly firearm purchase applications are now running over 2400 per week, a three-fold increase over that seen in recent years. The unprocessed backlog is nearly 40,000 according to the most recent Maryland State Police data. Lt. Governor Anthony Brown and Attorney General Doug Gansler, both gubernatorial candidates, endorsed the legislation and support the use of inexperienced state government workers to process the paperwork.
“The people who are now entrusted with the sensitive task of processing background check information work at agencies that enable identity theft according to the state’s own auditors. Even more troubling, one of these agencies encouraged criminal activity among prison inmates,” said Craig, referring to the infamous case in which correction officers enabled a criminal gang to commandeer the state-owned Baltimore City Detention Center. “The agency whose operational personnel are charged with abetting criminal activity is now privy to sensitive information on tens of thousands of law-abiding citizens.”
Employees at the Departments of Health and Mental Hygiene,Transportation, Public Safety and Correctional Services, Human Resources and Juvenile Services will be assigned to the new gun processing application detail. O’Malley successfully sought a $4 million supplemental appropriation to process the paperwork avalanche.
“Marylanders have grown accustomed to the bungling of basic government functions in the O’Malley-Brown Administration,” said Lt. Governor candidate and state delegate Jeannie Haddaway. “At the very least the attorney general, who claims to be in charge of consumer protection, should insist that basic security protocols are established.”
Step 1: Illegally infringe people’s rights
Step 2: If it’s so dangerous, allow them to purchase arms at a pace unseen in this state for an additional 5 months
Step 3: Drag feet on background checks, potentially allowing criminals, habitual drunkards, ect to obtain arms from firearms dealers, contrary to Maryland AND Federal law
Step 4: Call an “all hands on deck” weekend, announce it (not even) on a Document Dump Friday (it was really press released after being caught with hand in cookie jar Saturday)
Step 5: Allow state employees to earn comp time, from agencies that, by law, are prohibited from assisting in the data entry
Step 6: Do not encrypt the database and place it on the WWW in an insecure fashion
Step 6a: Allow said employees from unauthorized state agencies to be bound by a “confidentiality agreement” that doesn’t carry much weight unless you have a verifiable, unique, and individual logon and password for each individual employee, to identify folks who might abuse their access
Step 6b: Allow these folks, to access said Personal Identifiable Information, when the assisting agencies have been know to sell drivers licenses to illegal aliens, parent babies of incarcerated, gang member felons, and provide cell phones to said incarcerated gang members.
Step 6c: All of this was necessitated because the reality has sunk in that you have childish politicians, hell bent upon money and power, wanting to “do something” which they are not entitled to do, and then realizing that their antics have increased the chance of a successful lawsuit against said politicians
Step 7: Lie, deny, obfuscate, object, call people who know what’s going on crazy gun nuts, rubes, or any other derogatory name because they are rushing to exercise their natural freedom
Step 8: Wash, rinse, repeat, run for higher office; and leave the scorched earth behind you
I certainly hope that Mr. Craig will be a better defender of freedom than Lord O’MAOlly, but absent a distinct and unequivocal statement by this gubernatorial candidate that he will A) reverse this law B)Seek to expand not retract gun rights, and C) Support a Maryland State Constitutional Amendment to secure Marylanders’ right to arms, I’ll take my primary vote elsewhere.
What’s the problem with gun owners being public? We see nuts all the time stockpiling guns and ammo and endangering neighborhoods with their arsenals. I’d like to know what is next door to me. the Patriot Act threw away all rights to privacy in the home.
Then subpoena the NSA!
Really…if you don’t know they live next to you, do you really need to worry? Like George Carlin used to joke about:
“People like to say, it’s ‘always the quiet ones.’ What about the guy that comes through the door that shouts ‘I’m heard to rob and shoot everyone of you!’ That’s the guy I’m watching for.”
Not only that, release of personal information has not only opened up the folks who have pending apps to fraud, it also has provided any aspiring thug from the Baltimore gangs, (or maybe that’s the Essex gangs, or the Edgewood gangs, ect) a shopping list of homes to break into, to steal the tools they use to murder rivals and innocents alike. Yup…brilliant!
Or…maybe its a play by the calculating Governor in hopes that folks who own “scary looking guns” have them stolen, and then, by law, will never be able to replace them.
Please…tell me what (or more appropriately) defines “nut” and what defines “stockpile.” Is it 100 rounds of ammo and 2 guns? Is it 10,000 rounds and 20 guns? Perhaps it’s your neighbor that travels to WV or PA on the weekends to shoot 200 rounds of pistol ammo in a competition, shoots another 200 through the week to become a better shooter because he enjoys pulling the trigger on a gun as opposed to a camera.
Sorry, but you can take your camel’s nose and stick it under your own tent, not mine….w00t w00t!
And after you know a neighbor is a firearm enthusiast to whatever degree of collecting they may be; what is it you plan to do after you obtain this information?
Well then, Seriously, I guess it’s about time for you to replace your house walls with windows. You’re all about no privacy, so go ahead and lead the way!
How exactly are they “endangering neighborhoods?” Please explain. Also, If you want to know if your neighbor has a gun; how about knock on the door and ask him/her. Then when there is a problem you’ll know whose house to run to for protection…
Hey Seriously, do you want to know every detail of their religious beliefs or opinions on virtually anything that person thinks? Have you ever heard of the Constitution? When someone starts labeling a group of people as “gun nuts,” their credibility goes straight to the plumbing.
I saw the job posting and they are looking for retired law enforcement to do this job.
Now ya know what you don’t know.
They were looking for retired law enforcement to do the job way back in April and May. MSP told us that they hired about 60 people………………………………..and there’s still a massive backlog.