There is a book that is rather well-known in the pro-gun world, with the title Unintended Consequences. Its theme is the fallout from well-intended gun control laws and their natural conclusion; things go badly, to say the least.

 I read today of another law, whose intent is noble, but whose unintended consequences could generate frightening fallout.

Did you know that it is illegal for a U.S. resident or citizen to have sexual contact with anyone
under the age of 18, outside U.S. borders? Even if such contact would be perfectly legal at home in the U.S.? The law doesn't even require sex to take place, but merely attempting to have sex.

That sounds like a noble idea: stop U.S. perverts from going to poor countries and taking advantage of local custom by having sex with young children. What could be wrong with that? Unintended consequences, that's what.

For starters, it sets the age of consent at 18, even though many states allow consent at 16, or even younger. If two teenagers made out on the wrong side of the street in Derby Line, they could face a mandatory thirty years in prison.

"Oh, but that's not what the law intends!" you say? Of course it's not. But the danger of law is not what it intends, but what it allows.

Income taxes were passed because they would only apply to "those people", not to "us regular people".

Gun control laws were passed because they would only apply to "those people", not to "us regular people".

Immigration restrictions were passed because they would only apply to "those people", not to "our kind of people".

Warrantless wiretaps and surveillance were accepted because they would only apply to "those people", not to "us regular people".

Laws defining "child pornography" to include toddlers in bathtubs were accepted because they would only apply to "those people", not to "us proud parents".

After any law passes, within a few years the intent of the law is forgotten, yet the letter remains. Eventually we all become "those people".

This law is accepted because it applies to grown men seeking sex from prepubescent children. How long until some parents are shocked to find that their 18 year old son has become one of "those people" for something that is perfectly legal both at home and in Canada, or Cancun?

Unintended consequences, indeed.