Chief Flynn headed to D.C. to testify at assault weapons hearing

MILWAUKEE (WITI) -- Milwaukee Police Chief Ed Flynn flew out of Milwaukee Tuesday afternoon, February 26th, headed to D.C. to speak at a hearing on an assault weapons ban.

Chief Flynn is scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee. He's one of just a handful of leaders from across the country invited to speak at the invitation of the Committee Chairman Senator Pat Leahy.

"My challenge is can we get some of these elected officials to move beyond the ideology, to stop trying to impose ideological dreams on the realities of violence in America?" Flynn said.

Chief Flynn says one solution is as achingly simple, yet astonishingly elusive -- banning assault weapons.

"Weapons capable of killing large numbers of people rapidly are too readily available.  That's a practical problem.  Let's leave the ideologies for catechism class," Flynn said.

Chief Flynn says congressional action has proven so difficult because elected officials on both sides often prize the political over practical.

"Political opinions are subject to change on new information.  Political beliefs are acts of faith, and you can't change them with logic of argumentation," Chief Flynn said.

Conservatives like George Will bristle at the discussion, saying those kinds of bans would do nothing to stop crime, but would restrict the rights of law-abiding gun owners.

"Who thinks that's going to stop someone so deranged that he wants to go out and shoot school children? That is saves just one life?  If we wanted to save just one life, we'd ban left turns in automobiles. They're dangerous.  We don't govern our daily behavior that way," Will said.

"All we're saying is we should not widely distribute assault weapons to the population, because if we do, we have Syria not the United States," Chief Flynn said.

Wednesday's hearing is the first that will consider the revamped assault weapons ban.