Some media chatter regarding guns and gun law

First, there's an op-ed writer in the Massachusetts who apparently frets when otherwise defenseless little old ladies decide to be less defenseless.

Just what are these older women in the affluent suburbs going to defend themselves against? Marauding gang members from Boston? The Joint Terrorism Task Force knocking down their door to take away their gun? Is she going to join a militia and storm the White House if her candidate doesn’t win in November?

The writer wants to portray gun buyers as paranoid fanatics. But he comes across like an ostrich who pleads for another bucket of sand to better hide his head from the economic and societal realities that are building around him.

And then there's this:

Huffington Post notes there's a revived effort to pass a bill in Congress that would deny the right to buy a gun to anyone on the FBI's terrorism watch list:

"This is common-sense legislation that does not infringe on a gun-owner’s rights, and will protect our troops and our nation," said Vet Voice Foundation in a press release. The group, founded by veteran and progressive activist Jon Soltz, recently formed a new working group to rally veterans and ramp up pressure on Congress to prohibit such gun sales.

This push hides behind empty claims only terrorists would be impacted. The truth is anyone citizen who's name makes its way onto the list would lose their ability to purchase a gun.

The FBI's terrorism watch list is not a vetted document. It's a list of people based on (last I checked) undisclosed criteria, assembled by bureaucrats. And we know, it can be filled with errors.

We are a nation where citizens have a right to due process. And there is no due process when it comes to the terrorism watch list.

By the way, two years ago, ABC News reported over a thousand people on the FBI's watch list had lawfully purchased firearms:

From Feb. 2004 through Feb. 2010, FBI data shows that individuals on the U.S. terrorist watch list were involved in firearm or explosives background checks 1,225 times, according to the GAO. About 91 percent of the time, or 1,116 of these transactions were allowed to proceed because no prohibiting information was found, such as felony convictions, illegal immigrant status, or other disqualifying factors, and 109 of the transactions were denied.

Have any of the watch listed people who were allowed to legally purchase guns been charged, indicted or convicted related to terrorist activities? Did they use their guns in terrorist acts? Probably not. If they had, I'm sure we'd have heard about it by now.