Trust but verify, I don't think so.

Celebrities, politicians, bloggers, Democrats, and gun grabbers in general want to prohibit those whose names appear on a "watch list" from purchasing a gun. Let's skip for a moment that the most recent mass killers were not on that list and such legislation is a knee jerk "we have to do something" measure.

Do you really trust your government to only put legitimate national security threats on that list? Be honest. After all, the current administration used the IRS to target organizations with differing political beliefs. So did the Clinton administration. Nixon tried to use the IRS in a like manner. All of these Presidents and the second Bush had a so-called "enmities list" of political opposition. How hard would it be to merge the two lists?

For you liberals who seem to have no problem with Obama using the IRS as an attack dog, what are your fears about a President Trump controlling the list of those who get Constitutional Rights? How big a leap is it to claim First Amendment Rights are a national security threat too? We have already seen attempts to limit free speech on the college campus.

I have seen little in my lifetime that leads me to trust the government from Watergate to the present. We have seen countless examples of the bureaucracy abusing its power. Perhaps even for good. But abuse is abuse.

I have not even discussed the anti-American idea that we do not deprive people of their rights without due process. The same people who find it incomprehensible to provide identification to vote have no qualms about depriving a citizen his right to bear arms based on whim, suspicion, last name, religion, race, or national heritage. 

So I am left with this argument for my progressive friends: do you liberals really trust future administrations to do the right thing? Do you think the Koch Brothers or Trump, or Big Oil will not attempt put those they disagree with on a "watch list". Do you trust future administrations not to deprive you of your rights once we say it is OK to do it once? Me neither.

I'm not a black helicopters tin foil hat kind of guy. I have studied enough to know history is replete with examples of how power corrupts. Once most people taste power, influence, and money they want more and will do anything to keep it. They will even abuse a list of names. 

Freedom is messy. We have to take the good with the bad. But we don't have to make it easy for those with misguided intent to take those freedoms away.

I would welcome and encourage counterpoints in the comments.