Chris Christie wants to be president.  He has vetoed the New Jersey gun bill.

Gov. Chris Christie today vetoed a gun control bill that would have reduced the permitted size of ammunition magazines, saying it would do nothing to reduce gun violence.

“This is the very embodiment of reform in name only. It simply defies common sense to believe that imposing a new and entirely arbitrary number of bullets that can be lawfully loaded into a firearm will somehow eradicate, or even reduce, future instances of mass violence,” Christie said. “Nor is it sufficient to claim that a ten-round capacity might spare an eleventh victim.”

Chris Christie made his fame in New Jersey as a gun controller.

Back then, Carroll was known for his staunchly conservative views (he’s a Civil War re-enactor with children named Benjamin Franklin and Robert E. Lee), which he often expressed in the opinion pages of the Daily Record. But today, Carroll is one of the four Republicans on the committee investigating Governor Christie over Bridgegate.

Christie and Merkt attacked Bucco and Carroll for what they called a “Guns for Votes” campaign, claiming they had a “radical plan to legalize assault weapons.”

It’s okay for people to change their mind or revisit issues, as long as they are serious about the change rather than doing it for political gain.  So what about the rest of Christie’s statement today?

But instead of a magazine size reduction, Christie proposed a new standard for involuntary commitment of patients who are not necessarily deemed dangerous “but whose mental illness, if untreated, could deteriorate to the point of harm.”

Christie also proposed new standards for recommending patients for involuntary outpatient treatment, “streamlining” patient transfers between inpatient and outpatient programs, new training programs for first responders likely to encounter unstable people with “modern techniques for de-escalation,” and to require people forced to undergo mental health treatment to demonstrate “adequate medical evidence of suitability” if they want to get a firearms purchase identification card.

Let that wash over you again.  Chris Christie is proposing what might be the most draconian mental health measures in the nation.  He wants to codify involuntary commitment of people who, in the estimation of someone approved by the state, deems that your mental health could deteriorate to the point of harm.

Furthermore, anyone who wants to carry a weapon must undergo forced mental health “treatment” to ascertain whether someone approved by the state deems you fit for your God-given duty of self defense.  Perhaps the belief that weapons are the best defense against tyranny would be reason enough not only to prohibit ownership of weapons, but also to involuntarily commit you to an institution.

Chris Christie, in attempting to shore up his credentials as a “conservative” candidate for president, has shown his true colors.  And we are the better for it.  Collectivists will be collectivists because that’s all they can be.  Can a leopard change its spots?

Prior:

Chris Christie’s Cowardly Dishonesty On Guns

Chris Christie Is A Gun Grabber