Take a piece of cellophane that was wrapped around a package of underwear, or plastic wrap from a new USB cable, or a page from the city section of a morning newspaper (kids, ask your parent).
By themselves, as is? None of them could be more mundane and unremarkable.
But crinkle them up, and any cats in your home will be delighted for hours. Or minutes, anyway.
The lesson? It doesn't matter how mundane or even useless something might be. It's all in the presentation.
Democrats are a lot like that when it comes to legislation; take the most tired, worn-out old ideas, copy and paste them into a new bill, and call them "comprehensive" and, well, see the example of the cats, above.
See also "comprehensive health care".
Or, more germane to today's subject, gun control / "gun safety" legislation.
The gun control movement is pretty happy with itself about the raft of policies that Michigan passed...:
I’m proud of the Michigan Senate Democrats for taking meaningful action to reduce gun violence and keep Michigan families safe. Yesterday, during Gun Violence Prevention Month, they passed a set of commonsense gun safety bills that will save lives.
— Governor Gretchen Whitmer (@GovWhitmer) June 26, 2025
Here’s what they got done ⬇️
...and is trying to implement in a "comprehensive" way
In November, Michigan’s Gun Violence Prevention Task Force, which is housed within the state’s Department of Health and Human Services, released its final report of 2025. It highlights the firearm safety laws passed last year, as well as recent investments in school safety, mental health, and financial support for community violence intervention.
Taken together, these steps position Michigan as one of the few states prepared to pursue a statewide public health approach to gun violence. But those who worked on the plan still expect that turning the framework into results will be a challenge.
And what are the components of that "comprehensive plan"?
Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian, Michigan's top healthcare bureaucrat and head of the state task force, explains. I've added emphasis:
She also pointed to the feasibility of all the policy recommendations, which include a required waiting period for someone buying a gun, a ban on ghost guns, raising the gun-buying age, and building a statewide community violence interruption ecosystem. “Some of the things we are asking for are not possible in the next year or two,” Bagdasarian said. “But it seems tone deaf not to mention these things that have evidence behind them and have worked in other states.”
So - Michigan has taken a bunch of policies that have proven irrelvant (bans on "ghost guns"), comically irrelevant ("violence interruptors", which appear to exist only to transfer tax money to non-profits), likely unconsittutional (raising the age to legally buy a gun, which just failed a court challenge in Minnesota), or irrelevant but passive-aggressive ("waiting periods" that can only affect the law-abiding):
Whitmer got a bit of GUN CONTROL going in Michigan.
— CaptMike (@getcloserhome) September 12, 2025
Went to help daughter purchase a firearm yesterday.
Could not.
NEW LAW makes you have to get a LICENSE TO PURCHASE from a police department BEFORE you can get a handgun. Ten dollar grift for the coven.
More Dem red tape.…
But they sure are proud of themselves:
In Michigan, we passed a red flag law, safe storage, universal background checks, and closed the domestic violence loophole.
— Mallory McMorrow (@MalloryMcMorrow) August 29, 2025
We CAN make change.
But we won’t stop this epidemic of gun violence across the country until we elect people at every level who view our kids and… pic.twitter.com/n0uuBjm0uh
They've taken a slate of measures that have failed consistently for over sixty years...
...but called them "comprehensive' this time.
They've crinkled up the wrapping paper to keep the policy kittens amused, while doing nothing useful.
