The Bonnie and Clyde criminal gang conspiracy may be viewed fondly by some with rose tinted spectacles, but today’s gangsters on US streets arm themselves with AK-47’s, which fire ten rounds per second, and cops are finding themselves outgunned in street battles. So a cop version of the M-16 has been developed to level the playing field. Why buy a violent video game, just hang out in one of the many ganglands or city centres, or schools,  and watch it live for yourself. Fox news will arrive within 15 minutes and you can be live on the dedicated, ‘fair and balanced’ Republican news channel.

The pro-gun lobby in the US has always relied on the constitution to defend their right to bear arms, but is the situation getting out of hand with old ladies barricaded in their homes at night with a twitchy hand on a handgun? This is the scenario that many cops witness each evening as they take 911 calls to ’shots fired’.

The ultimate end to this is for all households to be issued with US government M-16’s, a case of mortars and milan missiles. Then any would be 15 year old crack addicts who want to break in to your house after 8pm can be legally vaporised thereby avoiding any cost to the juvenile legal system. 25 million crimes were reported in the US last year, many by teenage repeat offenders.

Education is of course the answer, not locking kids up in universities of crime. But the education has to be serious, and a contract made with offenders that in return for government agency job help upon release they will sign, under penalty of long term solitary incarceration, to get a life. Offenders must meet their victims, and clean up / pay for their crimes, then perhaps the AK-47 and M-16 will no longer be needed.

This article published by The Football and Politics Blog ©2008.