One of the particularly frustrating aspects of the ineptitude of the D.C. police department is that D.C.’s all-knowing city council has made it virtually impossible for residents to legally defend themselves. Not only is there no real way to own a gun in the nation’s capital, it’s actually illegal to defend yourself with one. Stun guns are also banned. As is mace. As I understand it, pepper spray is legal, but requires some sort of permit. Which means that as the violent crime rate soars, and DCPD spins its collective wheels, law-abiding residents are rendered helpless.

Of course, as you can see, all that gun control has done wonders to keep D.C. safe.

In any case, this is all build-up for a “clueless politician” anecdote: I was chatting with a friend a few weeks ago about the crime wave. The guy lives in Georgetown, site of the grisly throat-slashing murder last month (speculation around town is that this — the murder of a British man in the driveway of a Georgetown mansion — is what triggered the “crime emergency.” Start killing white people in rich neighborhoods, and the public servants take notice. It’s ugly. But there it is.).

My friend approached his city councilman and asked, alluding to the Georgetown murder, how the victim or the woman with him (she was nearly raped) could possibly have defended themselves, given D.C.’s strict gun control laws. My friend correctly noted that a stun gun or a handgun may well have thwarted the attack.

The councilman’s answer?

“Wear a whistle around your neck.”

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 8th, 2006 at 11:13 am by Radley Balko and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.