In the stupid ideas department

The New York Journal News though it would be a great idea to building an interactive map showing where all the handgun owners were in a two county area in New York.

The story by the White Planes based Journal News has caused an explosion of outrage from people saying that handgun permit holders privacy had been violated. There are other saying that the Journal News also gave criminals a road map on who to rob and who not to rob. If a criminal wants to do a burglary ((Burglary)) or home invasion ((Home invasion)), this map provides them the information they need if they either want to steal some guns, or want to avoid the risk of getting their heads blown off by the home owner.

The newspaper has been on the receiving end of lot of negative responses. Some of these responses have gone as far as posting the names, home addresses and hone telephone numbers of the “Journalist” involved with writing the story. I haven’t seen anything about physical threats, (But it wouldn’t surprise me), but there is talk of both lawsuits if anyone is robbed or attacked due to this map.

Now, was the Journal News within it’s rights to publish this map? The answer is yes, they were. The information was a matter of the public record and the Journal News went through the process of getting the data through the lawful means provided. (The New York version of the Freedom of Information Act) Because the information on permit holders is a matter of public record, there was no violation of privacy of the permit holders. Anyone could have looked up the information that wanted to and that includes the criminal class. (No I don’t mean politicians)

Should the Journal News have created and published this map? Hell no, they shouldn’t have. Yes they had the right to, but they also have the responsibility not to. They didn’t do this as part of an investigation. They weren’t looking for permit holders who had slipped through the cracks, as it were, (Felons and the mentally ill), no they did this simply to screw over gun owners. The story was nothing more than a hit piece on lawful gun owners. The way it was presented, they mad it look like that all these crazy, heavily armed people were right next door all set to shoot up the neighborhood.

The blow back on the Journal News, is hot and heavy. Besides bloggers posting the home addresses of the journalists involved, other news organizations and individuals are questioning the wisdom of what the Journal News did. Al Tompkins of the Poynter wrote in an Op-Ed:

If publishing the data because it is public and the public seems to be interested in the topic right now is reason enough, then there are endless databases to exploit.

If your county required dog and cat licenses would you publish that interactive map? I suspect the licenses would be public. I sure would like to know if there were three dogs living behind me before I moved in.

I have seen news organizations publish the salaries of local and state government employees for no reason other than that they can. Why? Did we think they all worked for free? If somebody is playing the system, expose them. But use the surgeon’s tools, not a chainsaw approach.

I like it when journalists take heat for an explosive, necessary, courageous investigation that exposes important wrongdoing. There is journalistic purpose and careful decision-making supporting those stories. But The News Journal is taking heat for starting a gunfight just because it could.

Recently, The Journal News announced they were going to double down on stupid and post more names and addresses. A Reuters post that I saw on Yahoo News this morning said in part:

Further names and addresses will be added as they become available to a map originally published on December 24 in the White Plains, New York-based Journal News, the newspaper said.

The next batch of names will be permit holders in suburban Putnam County, New York, where the county clerk told the newspaper it is still compiling information.

This is nothing less than journalistic arrogance on the part of the Journal News. By and large, the Main Stream Media, no known as the Obama Steno Pool, uniformly despises the 2^nd Amendment. There are very few members of the 5^th Column ((Fifth Column)) 4^th Estate ((Fourth Estate)), who support the 2^nd Amendment, (Except for themselves of course), and would have no problem with the 2^nd Amendment being legislatively suppressed, and the people forced to turn in their firearms.

Now as I said before, at this time, the Journal News was within their rights to publish this information. They were completely irresponsible in doing so. I believe they may have opened themselves up to a civil lawsuit if anyone on that list is a victim of a crime. if someone NOT on that list who is in the same neighborhood as a permit holder becomes a crime victim, the lawsuit floodgates will open wide against that paper, the Gannet News service which owns them and the people involved as well. I also think that criminal charges could also be brought against the people involved.

Now I’m not a lawyer, (Thank GOD!), but a prosecutor could go after the News Journal as accessories before the fact. I’ll leave it to the legal beagles on the specifics. (Law&Order’s Jack McCoy could be counted on to gin up something) There are also calls for legislation locking down access to this information to only law enforcement.

This story was designed to equate gun owners with sex offenders and criminals. It has nothing to do with the public good. This is just another instance of Progressive Liberal propagandists manufacturing a story to further their political views. Is it any wonder that no one believes the newspapers and networks any longer?

Thatisall

~The Angry Webmaster~

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