String theory

Not to be outdone by the foolishness of their upstart neighbor to the south, Cleveland is holding a gun "buyback."

On Saturday, Cleveland police will hold a gun buyback program at the Cleveland Convention Center. City of Cleveland residents are encouraged to bring working, unloaded. Those who surrender a firearm will receive a $50 gas or food card, a pair of Cavalier tickets and a chance to win up to $1000.

"Last year," we are told, "a similar program took 423 firearms off the streets." How many crimes of violence were prevented is left unsaid. Those were gangbangers, robbers, rapists and murderers who turned those guns in, right?

And they're getting cheaper. C'mon, guys. Real cities pay their cud-chewers $200. And you're not paying a thing for "rifles and shotguns"?

Again, assuming we're talking about that greatest of threats to civilization, old widow ladies who found their deceased husbands' rusty pistol in a shoebox in the closet, the assumption is made that they know how to safely handle and transport a firearm, and they know how to ensure it is unloaded.

What I love is the requirement that it be "a working handgun." How will they know, and why would they risk going through all that effort just to have the cops on the receiving end tell them it was for naught, that they're going to go away gasless, foodless, Cavsless, and oh, by the way, we'll just keep this gun...?

I mean, what could make more sense than giving someone who knows nothing about guns financial incentive to pull the trigger to make sure it works?

The thought struck that if we're going to determine whether or not a firearm qualifies as working, we ought to consult the nation's premier authority, the fine folks at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, who declared a...uh...shoestring was a machine gun.

Yes, you read that right. I was actually thinking of getting some laces and turning them in for the incentive, and also for the satisfaction of realizing I helped get another dangerous length of string off the street. After all, who are Cleveland cops to disagree with the feds? But then the agency apparently got embarrassed and reversed their ruling...

So I guess I'll have to go to Plan B. I wonder what would happen if I stood outside the Convention Center with a big sign that read:

WHY SETTLE FOR TICKETS?
GET CASH FOR UNWANTED GUNS
TOP DOLLAR PAID