Among the welter of new laws going into effect at every level of government this past week are two one must suspect the MN DFL “trifecta” will trot out sooner than later; gun insurance.

San Jose passed a municipal ordinance requiring gun owners carry liability insurance.

Notably, the kinds of coverage mandated by the ordinance would not cover the overwhelming majority of firearms incidents that tend to be the subject of public concern. To start, homeowners and renters policies only extend coverage for injuries to third parties. Generally, this would mean guests, contract workers, or other visitors to the insured’s property, or in some cases, to third parties who were injured by the insured off-premises. Injuries to other members of the household would not be insured. Thus, the paradigmatic example of a tragic firearms accident—a child gets hold of an unsecured firearm and injures his or her sibling—would not be covered.

Naturally, this depends on the integrity of the state’s insurance regulators. After New York’s attack on the NRA’s carry insurance program, it’d seem that trust is misplaced, at least in all “Blue” states.

Depending on one’s point of view, the new law in New Jersey would appear to be even more insidious, or comically incompetent; it doesn’t specifically rule out insuring illegal activities with guns:

As to whether it would violate New Jersey insurance law to extend coverage to criminal acts, the question is—as it is in many states—somewhat complicated. But ultimately, the state Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld exclusions for “expected or intended” injury as barring coverage, including in Voorhees v. Preferred Mutual Insurance Co. (1992), SL Industries v. American Motorists Insurance Co. (1992), and Harleysville Insurance Cos. v. Garitta (2001). Moreover, in 1990’s Figueroa v. Hartford Insurance Co., the Appellate Division of the Superior Court of New Jersey held that an injured party could be collaterally estopped from suing a third-party’s insurer to relitigate questions of intent where that intent had been settled in a previous criminal action, such as by a guilty judgment or plea.

At a minimum, it can therefore be said that New Jersey insurance law broadly permits exclusions for intentional acts in personal liability policies and that state courts have shown deference to criminal proceedings as dispositive in settling questions of intent (which isn’t necessarily true in all states.) Given that backdrop, a broad reading of A. 4769’s text would appear to require the state’s firearms owners to obtain coverage that does not actually exist, particularly in the wake of regulatory actions to shut down the NRA’s Carry Guard program. That would amount to a de facto ban on firearms ownership, directly contravening the Supreme Court’s 2008 decision in District of Columbia v. Heller, even before applying the Court’s more recent Bruen test.

I can see the MNDFL majority copying and pasting either law.

It may perhaps be a sign of a shift in the perceptions of the GOP’s likely behavior in 2024 – but Big Media is already calling Ron DeSantis not only “Hitler”, but even worse than Trump:

I noted on the show a few weeks ago that Democrats referring to Republicans as “literally Hitler” goes back to Harry Truman; he was literally the first candidate who could refer to a Republlican (John Dewey, in this case). I remember it picking up with Reagan – but it was already old hat by then.

Now, the best response to this sort of thing is mockery and laughter.

How best to do this? That’s my project for this month.

A friend of the blog emails:

Saint Paul mayor is pitching a 1% sales tax to increase revenue to repair roads. People say the awful shape of the roads is the reason there are no businesses in Saint Paul “negatively impacts the mobility, safety, and access to the businesses that do so much to grow our community.”

I have some thoughts on this-

A) Does repair roads mean automatic bike lane on any street that this money touches for repair? Because that has been the norm lately, despite what businesses were asking for.

Saint Pauli has one huge advantage in this area: it has Minneapolis next door. If it’s just a little less crazy than Minneapolis, it flies under the radar.

So. yes – I’m sure there will be bike lanes on any street this money touches. But fire hydrants won’t be replaced by EV charging stations [1].

See how that works?

B) Before we go with the 1% sales tax, can we tax and charge all of those multi-unit apartment buildings more if they aren’t adding adequate parking for their tenets? The street parking definitely has an affect on the condition of the streets all year, but especially during snow plowing season.

The city’s mission to make driving an untenable lifestyle choice is proceeding according to pan. . But I can totally see the city taxing multi-unit buildingis 1% more if they have inadequate parking. And 5% if they have adequate parking. Because that sends the right message…

C) As for the actual 1% sales tax, sadly, I’m trying to figure out how this will actually affect me since most of the business that I used to support in Saint Paul have already been chased away.

I’m trying to remember the last time I went to a Saint Paul business that isn’t a restaurant. It’s probably been a few years since I even bought non-Asian groceries here.

[1] Minneapolis hasn’t actually done this yet. Just wait.

As a broad rule, I oppose cancelation of speech and art. It’s a lousy precedent, and a great way to build a stupid society.

But there are exceptions that I can get behind:

Tomas Mazetti, 55, and wife Hannah, 33, have already raised more than £50,000 to banish the song to the history books – but with the rights estimated to be worth anywhere in the region of £20million they still have a long way to go…”‘It started last Christmas – pun not intended – when we asked friends how much they would be willing to pay never to hear the song again.”

Not since Omaha Beach has fate presented a generation with such a surpassing mission.

A friend of the blog emails:

Explain to me how adding more bureaucrats terrified of offending a DFL constituency will prevent fraud committed by a DFL constituency protected by the bureaucracy

I don’t think the governor or his staff read this space, so I will try to explain it.

It will work, because we are moving forward together as One Minnesota. with equity and reproductive rights for Minnesotans of all genders.

I may have the details wrong, but that’s what I remember from the campaign.