A small Colorado newspaper triggered major panic earlier this week when their annual April Fools Day special had a screaming headline about the Colorado General Assembly (the legislature) passing new laws telling gunowners to surrender their weapons or go to jail

The Teller County Sheriff has long told his County’s citizens that he will NOT confiscate their guns, even if it means going to jail himself. Indeed, Jason Mikesell posted this to social media several years ago: “Your right to bear arms is absolute and will not be infringed upon by my office, regardless of any orders or legislative decrees,” states the post.

That has not kept the General Assembly, with a Democratic, regressive, liberty-hating supermajority, from passing more and more laws to steal self-defense (and many other) rights from Coloradoans and even those traveling in and through the State. Fortunately Teller is one of many counties where sheriffs and county and district attorneys have made it clear they will honor the US and Colorado Constitutions and not the stupid, freedom-hating hoploclastic actions of the State government in Denver. (Where three years after COVID-19, State employees still have to work from home most of the time and the public is banned from State office buildings (and the Capitol with its trademark gold dome and mile-high marker) because of a fear of protesters (rioters). Especially since they are not allowed to carry arms for their own defense when the enraged mobs (whipped up by the very groups and activists the legislators seem to empower more and more) storm the buildings.

However, many people didn’t bother to read and realize it was an April Fools joke. It reminded one of the staff of TPOL of an event back in high school days (the ’70s) when the April Fools rumor at her school was that the US had declared war on North Korea and the draft call-ups were starting right after graduation day. In fact, Sheriff Mikesell had to send out a notice that his electorate didn’t need to panic.

But the real April Fools joke is that although such a law has NOT passed in Colorado, every session sees more and more attempts to do just that: baby-steps maybe, but with the clear (and stated) goal of confiscation. Disarming the people of Colorado. The people calling and spreading the word and asking for answers from the Sheriff rightly worried that somehow that Demo supermajority had sneaked something (more) through.

It is the same in many other States. Just has been done around the world, including our sister polities in England, Scotland, Wales, West Australia, North Island (New Zealand), and Ontario and Alberta, to name just a few.

A story at Front Page gives some better balance: of the 44% of gun deaths which are homicides (54% are suicides and the remaining 2% or so are accidents) 56% of those homicides are in just 62 counties: one percent of the States’ counties and parishes and districts. John Lott’s groundbreaking study  revealed that “1% of counties have 21% of the population and 42% of the murders” and  “2% of counties contain 31% of the population and 56% of the murders.” When you look at data State-by-State, so-called Republican Red States sometimes have more murders per 100,000 population than Democrat Blue States. An example is Oklahoma: more than either California or New York State. This supposedly proves that gun control works. But when you zoom in on the county/city level, you find the truth. (And that statistics CAN be used to lie.) Two-thirds of Oklahoma’s murders occur in just two counties: home of Oklahoma City and Tulsa. Both cities are run by regressive Democrat types. It is the case even in the Blue States: the votes and the killing are greatest in the so-called Progressive cities and counties.

But we aren’t going to let the Republicans, the GOP, off the hook. Indeed, the April fools’ joke is on those of that political persuasion: the GOP is responsible for refusing to take a stand on God-given rights as protected by the Constitution. And have done so for most of a century. No, it is not just the RINOs: Eisenhower and a Republican Congress refused to end the National Firearms Act passed under FDR by a lickspittle Democratic Congress. Nixon and a Republican Congress made no serious attempt to overturn the Gun Control Act of 1968 passed by LBJ and the Democrats. (It used a Nazi-era law as a model for the legislation!) Nor was there any attempt made during the Ford, Reagan, Bush I, Bush II, or Trump administrations.

The same model is generally found in the various States. And many Republican-dominant States have protested with loud voices and cries, but done next to nothing to actually resist the Federal tyranny which denies more and more people their right to defend themselves, their loved ones, neighbors and communities.

And the growing inability in many States, counties, and cities to bear arms has shown to have a direct impact on murder rates. People are dying because while their attackers are just feet and seconds away, the cops are minutes and often miles distant.

Afterword: the other problem with that Colorado newspaper’s joke is that it is literally a case of crying wolf, even if intended to be a joke.

NOTE: This commentary is NOT an April fools joke. Seriously.