Waffeninitiative

As we know from past minaret and foreign-criminal experience, the Swiss like to vote for things. It is, after all, their right to start an initiative, collect the signatures and give it to parliament for the whole country to vote on. This time, however, it wasn't started by our friends at the SVP (think halfway between the BNP and the Tories, but just as powerful as the latter). But what is it that the oath-comrades are voting on, I hear you (probably not) ask.

It's like this. When a Swiss man completes his military service, which is obligatory, he's allowed to take his gun away with him and keep it at home, for future use in the army. The initiative wants to put an end to this, and to say that without special license, all weapons must be kept in a military arsenal. Seems simple and sensible enough to me. It is, after all, the Volksinitiative für den Schutz vor Waffengewalt- the initiatve for protection from gun-violence. The opponents see things otherwise, and believe that the whole thing is a leftist attack on traditional Swiss values (which is their typical reasoning).

The vote's on Sunday. We shall see how things turn out.