Hearing the Falconer #28 ~ 5-April-2019 ~ Renewing the Violence Against Women Act

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world....
from The Second Coming, William Butler Yeats, 1919

The middle of the road is all of the usable surface.
The extremes, right and left, are in the gutters.
Dwight D. Eisenhower

**********
5-April-2019: Should We Close the Boyfriend Loophole in the Violence Against Women Act?
House Votes to Renew Domestic Violence Law
**********

Should people convicted of domestic violence or stalking be able to own guns?

The recently expired Violence Against Women Act said that people convicted of domestic violence can lose their guns "if they are currently or formerly married to their victim, live with the victim, have a child together or are a victim's parent or guardian." This leaves the "boyfriend loophole." This loophole allows current or former dating partners to keep their guns even after they are convicted of "abusing, assaulting or stalking" their partner.

If we try to take all guns away from everyone that is too extreme in one direction. If we allow people convicted of "abusing, assaulting or stalking" their dating partners to keep guns we are going too far in the other direction.

In simplest terms the moderate principle on gun ownership is to make sure good people CAN own guns and to make sure that BAD people CANNOT own guns. People convicted of assault or abuse or stalking are NOT good people who should have guns.

Let's close this "boyfriend loophole" right now.

**********

The "Hearing the Falconer" Library

Books for Independent Thinkers

Moderates: The Vital Center of American Politics, from the Founding to Today

The American Political Tradition: And the Men Who Made It

Unapologetically Moderate: My Search for the Rational Center in American Politics

The Deliberate Moderate: Influencing From the Middle

Eisenhower: The White House Years

The Constitutional Convention: A Narrative History from the Notes of James Madison

Lincoln

Reflections of a Radical Moderate

Washington: A Life

The Reluctant Republican: My Fight for the Moderate Majority

Rule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party, From Eisenhower to the Tea Party

Franklin D. Roosevelt: A Political Life

Theodore Roosevelt: A Life

The Three Languages of Politics: Talking Across the Political Divides

Beyond Red and Blue: How Twelve Political Philosophies Shape American Debates

Truman