Police: Give Us Your Guns, We’ll Give You Flu Shots

by Tim Brown

The “deal” being offered by Worcester Police in Worcester, Massachusetts seems like a double loss for those who are stupid enough to engage in it. Residents are being asked to turn in firearms, unloaded of course, to the police in exchange for gift cards. However, they are also giving away free flu shots. Apparently they want to provide flu shots instead of gun shots to the community.

The flu shots were being offered last Saturday and this coming Saturday. You didn’t even have to turn in a firearm to obtain the flu shot. Honestly, I don’t see the point of taking a flu shot, but that’s me. After all, do you have any idea what’s in those? Additionally the Center for Disease Control has admitted that they really don’t work.

Those that turn in working firearms are given gift certificates to Wegman’s, which offers expensive looking foods and brews.

So how much do you get for that working firearm? According to the Telegram, “a long rifle earns a $25 gift certificate, a handgun nets a $50 gift certificate, and a semiautomatic weapon yields a $75 gift certificate.”

Wow! You get almost next to nothing for a working firearm. Seriously, people could get a lot more from a pawn shop than from the police in this instance.

According to the police the weapons that are turned in and destroyed. People who are not properly licensed may bring guns to the police station and are granted amnesty by the District Attorney.

“We’re asking folks to bring in any guns that they can’t store properly,” said Dr. Michael P. Hirsh, chief of the Division of Pediatric Surgery & Trauma at UMass Memorial and the city’s acting public health commissioner. “And by being stored properly, I mean unloaded and locked away from children.”

Obviously these people don’t understand something. There is nothing proper about storing a gun unloaded, except in cases where you have absolutely no need to use the weapon.

One young man showed up in a wheelchair for a news conference, obviously to promote the “turn in your guns” drive. LaNyia Johnson, 18, was just 13 when he was hit by a stray bullet while he was on the couch at his aunt’s house. He was hit in the spine and was paralyzed from the waist down as a result.

He seems to be a very positive young man for facing such a trial in his life and encouraged teenagers to “Find a goal in your life and chase it instead of being inside negative activities.”

Linda Bock writes “Terrance Reidy, chief of the gang unit for the district attorney’s office, prosecuted Mr. Johnson’s shooter, and said it was a tragedy that should have never have happened. Mr. Reidy said the way he looks at the program; over 2,000 potential tragedies were averted.”

“There was the potential for over 2,000 people to be hurt,” Mr. Reidy said.

Yes Mr. Reidy that may be the case, but it also may be the case that those weapons could have averted untold thousands of tragedies as well. We always hear only one side from the bleeding hearts. Guns are not our problem, nor are they the problem in Massachusetts. The problem is the wicked hearts of men. Take away their guns and they’ll use a knife. Take away their knives and they’ll find something else. As a society we must get at the root of the issue and inevitably it is the hearts and minds of men that need to be changed, not confiscation of inanimate objects.