Professor Reynolds is always on target.
After the state of New York passed its far-reaching and poorly thought out post-Newtown gun law with unseemly haste, I suggested that we might need a waiting period for laws more than for guns. After all, the idea behind waiting periods for guns was that people might get overexcited and do something rash, but would “cool off” if they had to wait a few days before getting their hands on a dangerous instrument. But laws are dangerous instruments, too, and legislators seem highly prone to sudden fits of hysteria.
Suddenly, I’m hearing agreement with this idea from an unlikely source — New York’s Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a tireless champion of gun restrictions. The 7-round magazine restriction that was a major feature of the New York law turns out to be unworkable and to make the state’s police (who aren’t exempted from the law’s coverage) criminals if they carry their usual Glocks.
Bloomberg observed: “We just got to start to thinking a little bit more about the implications of things before we rush to legislate and rush to legislate everything.”