Guns, Guns, Guns

Admittedly micturition into the mistral, it’s impossible not to write about America becoming the only country in the world where guns are the leading cause of childhood mortality, and being the world leader in mass murders.

Because we have more guns in circulation than there are people, the barn is out of the bag. Nevertheless, whatever legislation might become law, no one is “coming for your guns.” Kamala Harris won’t march up your driveway and wrestle away your AR. If assault-style weapons were outlawed again (unlikely), they’ll still be out there. On the other hand, the teenage Texas terrorist had just purchased his; if the legal age were twenty-one, he couldn’t have. Legally, anyway. And there were many “red flags” about his prior behavior.

Here’s a partial list, in order of decreasing likelihood of passage, of legislation that might reduce the number of children giving their lives to protect your Second Amendment freedoms:

Red flag laws; raising the age to purchase military-style weapons; universal background checks; banning gravity; licensing of owners; mandatory training; limiting magazine size; banning assault-style weapons; amending the Second Amendment to eliminate ambiguity regarding “well-regulated militia”; beating swords into plowshares.

But nothing will happen until the Senate is rid of its hypocritical, gaslighting, scourge of NRA-owned “conservatives.” Which will occur only if the generation that includes those nineteen now-dead Texas children outlives the many ways errant Republican lawmakers are trying to kill them. And survives long enough to elect reasonable people.

“Reasonable” means responsive to the 90% of Americans, including many of their own, who favor some form of gun-control legislation. “Reasonable” means senators who value their constituents more than NRA money. 

So, while we wait, let’s recount the worn-out excuses and ridiculous arguments produced by wholly-owned Republican enablers. Topping the list is the only cogent argument we’ve heard for keeping and bearing an AR-15. Offered by Senator Doctor Cassidy of Louisiana, it’s to kill feral pigs. Makes splendid sense. 

Not far behind is the faux (pronounced “Fox”) outrage over President Biden “politicizing” tragedy when he spoke about the Texas murders. This, from people for whom there’s never a right time, who’ve politicized gun rights above all, and who’ve evidently forgotten, because of a recent four-year exception, that a president’s job description includes moral leader.

Junior Trump blames massacres on “crazy teachers” indoctrinating our kids. Evidently, though, like most gunophilic Republicans, he’s fine with arming them. Senator Ron Johnson blames Critical Race Theory, wokeness, and “liberal indoctrination,” which “have been going on under the radar for quite some time.”

A favorite Republican “guns aren’t the problem” dodge is mental health. Right. The first bill Trump signed revoked Obama-era regulations making it harder for mentally ill people to obtain firearms. And, having signed several bills that loosened gun laws, Greg Abbott, governor of Texas, which ranks last among states in access to mental health care, cut $211 million of funding for it. It’s a diversional talking point, not an action item.

Schools ARE acting, but they need help. In blue Washington, the legislature provides mental health funds. Will red states follow suit? 

Insurrectionist Rep. Mo Brooks rejects gun safety laws because “we always have the right to take back our government should it become dictatorial.” Sure. Thousands of times over, our government outguns us. Should it become dictatorial, it’d unhesitatingly turn that firepower on us. Under Trump, it almost was and almost did.

We don’t need new laws, they say. We need to enforce the ones already in place. Because of Republican senatorial obstruction, the ATF hasn’t had a confirmed director for sixteen years.

After the Texas slaughter, Senate Republicans (the free speech party) blocked debate on a bill addressing domestic terrorism. Why? Do they consider domestic terrorists their base? After the bloodbath, Michigan’s legislative Republicans (the free speech party) blocked Democrats from speaking about it. So one of them spoke from home. Please listen to her. 

Speaking at the NRA convention in Houston, three days after the Constitutionally-protected carnage, Trump called gun control legislation “grotesque” and “cynical.” Weapons, per usual and unironically, were banned from the venue. And here’s more depressing Americana (warning: includes Ted Cruz offloading bovine-excrement).

Even more: Republicans have consistently blocked funding for research on gun violence. Perhaps it’s because of studies like the one finding no benefit from arming school employees.

Celebrated by both sides for crushing Trump’s pick for Georgia governor (Trump is claiming fraud, of course), Brian Kemp checks every gun-nut, hardcore, right-wing box. 

Will elected Republicans ever accept democracy and listen to the ninety percent? When and if I regain breath, I won’t be holding it.

Replacement Reality

“False flag.” It’s among the preferred excuses offered by the don’t-blame-us right, to defend the indefensible. After the murders of Black Americans in Buffalo, by an admitted white supremacist, racist antisemite bedeviled by bogus “replacement theory,” it took only a day for it to be applied, Alex Jones/Sandy Hook style. Jones, himself, dredged it up again. Republican candidates and legislators, too. 

Guns are now so deeply embedded in America, it won’t ever change. Shortly before the massacre, two Trump-appointed judges struck down a California law banning sales of military-style weapons to people under twenty-one, like the Buffalo assassin, calling it a violation of the Second Amendment. Maybe it was. But the judge who wrote the opinion offered this bit of Trumpismic illogic: "America would not exist without the heroism of the young adults who fought and died in our revolutionary army," Judge Ryan Nelson wrote. "Today we reaffirm that our Constitution still protects the right that enabled their sacrifice: the right of young adults to keep and bear arms."

Right. Because youngsters joined the Revolution keeping and bearing muskets, we must allow modern killing machines to be purchased by everyone of any age. McConnell-selected, Trump-appointed. Nothing more needs saying.

“Consider your man card reissued,” creeps an ad for the Bushmaster war-weapon clone the murderer used. “If it’s good enough for the professional, it’s good enough for you.” That's a testicle-tanning-Tucker two-fer. BTW: studies show shooting accuracy of professionals drops by 40%, in pressure situations. And amateurs? 

In Ohio, you can now carry a concealed weapon without a permit or training. You no longer have to tell a cop who stops you that you’re armed. Lying about it is now a misdemeanor instead of a felony. So guns will only become more available and less regulated. By now, blaming gun laws for Buffalo is like blaming water for drownings.

Innocent lambs, Foxian talkers blame mental health issues. It’s no excuse: knowing mentally ill and impressionable people are out there, they pound their lies anyway. Any sentient human – which, setting the bar low enough, includes Carlson and fellow promoters of “replacement theory” – recognizes the deadly combination and its inevitable tragedies: guns for the having, plus disturbed people vulnerable to fear- and hate-mongering. Violence in response is entirely predictable. It's happened many times before.

If a tinder-dry forest catches fire, you don’t exculpate the person who walked through it with a flame-thrower. Because America will do nothing about the tinder, the only hope for change is confronting the people who, knowing the forest is a firebox, keep firing flames into it. If it’s impossible to rid ourselves of guns and mentally fragile people, it’s possible, theoretically, to do something about the harm people like Tucker are doing.

Our constitution gives them the right to spread their lies, though it’s homicidally close to shouting “fire” in a packed theater. We’re blameless, they insist. But they know who’s out there, on whom their words are falling, and they keep doing it. Lacking morality, they won't stop. Pressuring their sponsors might be the only option. That, and less “bothsiderism” from “liberal” media.

So let’s consider the “replacement theory” they’re pushing, convincing armed and fragile people and everyone else there’s a plot to “replace” them with people unlike them. (We can hope.) Deniers of most reality, Trumpicists have correctly noticed that American demographics are changing. Behind which, they see a dastardly liberal plot. Which is ironic, as it’s their party’s policies that ensure the birth, among others, of more people of the sort they abhor. Who, if they are voting, are Americans, enjoying the same freedom as they. But Trumpophiles reject all Americans’ freedoms except their own.

Then what about immigrants? If it’s true, which it isn’t, that America-hating liberal groomers of innocent children are opening floodgates to create more voters, it’d be the flipside of Republican lawmakers doing everything they can to ensure only their voters vote. Lacking the most minimal empathy, ignoring the fact that, except for Native Americans, we’re all immigrants, they can’t imagine the possibility that it’s BECAUSE we're descendants of immigrants, that liberals welcome them. And because immigrants aspire to the “American dream” far more than those who didn’t have to fight to get here.

As Republicans insist on mis-educating their own, America counts on immigrants, not just to become voters, but to keep the dream alive. Quoting NYT's Brett Stephens, "What the far right calls "replacement" is better described as renewal." (tinyurl.com/nytbrett)

Replacement theory is just another time-tested, dishonest scare tactic to secure votes from people about whom they’ve never cared, for whom they haven’t had helpful policies for decades.

Muskets

Wishful

From what I can tell, the President's proposals and executive actions on gun control are sensible. Those that require Congressional action, of course, don't have an armor-piercing chance in hell. Which won't keep the NRA and its crazy wing from screaming, "See, we told you so. He's coming for our guns."

Because "he" can't. Congress could, but won't. Even then, they really couldn't "come for them," even if they passed a law. Nor, with the current Supreme Court, is an assault weapons ban likely to be upheld. And if it were, people would have a choice: keep their weapons or turn them in. I don't see those "patriot" groups having a problem with holding on to their firepower even if it were declared illegal. But it'll sure as hell be a money-raiser, won't it?

As to the rest, what can possibly be wrong with background checks, resuming research on gun violence, with police agencies sharing information, and with providing more security?

I suppose if there were a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity clips it might make it slightly harder for an individual with no connections to get them. So, go for it, Congress. But there are so many out there that it's silly to think a ban would make much difference. And, given that inarguable fact, I'd like to see the President use his political capital (whatever that is) on the things that might make a difference. In his executive orders, he might have done all that's possible in our current political climate, skewed as it is toward the crazy.

Absent voluntary action by gun owners (ain't gonna happen) we'll never get rid of those military grade weapons. And no one is talking about ending recreational or hunter-gatherer ownership, monster-under-the-bed fantasies notwithstanding.

So, let Congress do its inevitable time-wasting and posturing on gun control. Let the crazies craze. The president took what action is possible, and I think it was bold and brave and admirable of him. And, no doubt, he'll suffer consequences. (We will, too, but less than him, as we'll hear the doomsday and hateful rhetoric flowing from the sewers of society.) But we have an economy to deal with. And education. And infrastructure that's falling apart.

[Image source]

The Problem Is Not Complex And The Solution Is Blindingly Obvious

Thanks, Jacob Horner, for the link!

Interesting, isn't it, that in all the discussions we've heard and read, this is the first time that I know of that someone has pointed out what is, indeed, obvious: the same cultural issues to which Wayne LaPierre and his apologists point, exist around the world. And we're better (which ain't saying a hell of a lot) at addressing mental health issues.

The video ought to be required viewing, as a starting point, for anyone arguing for or against gun control.

Problem Solved

Crossfire

So we've learned that all the innocent bystanders injured at the Empire State Building, other than the intended target of the killer, were shot by the police. There were nine of them. Gail Collins makes a damn good point about that:

... This isn’t surprising; it’s only in movies that people are good shots during a violent encounter. In 2008, Al Baker reported in The Times that the accuracy rate for New York City officers firing in the line of duty was 34 percent.

And these are people trained for this kind of crisis. The moral is that if a lunatic starts shooting, you will not be made safer if your fellow average citizens are carrying concealed weapons.

...

People, try to imagine what would have happened if, instead of diving for the floor, a bunch of those moviegoers [in Colorado] had stood up and started shooting into the dark. Or ask a cop.

I suppose you could argue that if a killer-to-be knew that no matter where he went there'd be dozens of people armed to the teeth he might not go there at all; and it may be a good point. But so is the other, and it's the one for which we have some proof. Knowing human frailties, which include hotheadedness, paranoia, hatefulness, and just down-home clumsiness, not to mention stupidity, I'd say there's a lot more mayhem to be had than prevented were everyone to be packing, everywhere.

One of my occasional coffee-buddies, a hunter, owner of many guns, a loader of his own ammo, a proud NRA member, recently returned from a trip to Texas. At the home of a friend of a friend he was asked if he'd like to head to the back forty to shoot a few rounds. Expecting some kind of target practice, he was surprised to see young men running around with assault rifles, playing war. With seriousness and pride, he was shown a cache of forty-thousand rounds of ammunition. Literally. A couple of .50 cal sniper rifles. My friend, with whose love and use of guns I have zero problem (I like shooting, too, got a little training with M-16s at the behest of Uncle Sam), was stunned. Felt as if he were on a strange planet. It wasn't recreation: it was training. For you-know-what.

The good judge of whom I recently wrote is among friends in his home state.

As a realist, I know there's no way gun laws will change significantly in this country; nor do I believe that if they did it would solve anything. That ship has sailed out of the toothpaste. But the idea of arming everyone, which is the way Wayne LaPierre would have it, gives me the creeps.

If my friend, or people like him, were the ones sitting in the theater all weaponized, at least I wouldn't feel less safe. But those good ol' boys down in Texas, with their paranoid fever-dreams and imaginary enemies? They come into the theater, I'm going out.

Guns and Poses

Gun control. Yada yada. Liberal bleeding hearts. Yada yada. They're coming for your guns. Yada yada. My cold dead hands. Yada yada. Only criminals will have guns. Yada yada. Assault on Judeo-christian values (the judeo part thrown in reluctantly), prayer in schools. Yada yada. He's a teabagger, he's a liberal, he's one of those overeducated elitists, he's a sign of ____

(fill in the blank.) Yada yada. It makes us stronger, it makes us weaker. Yada yada.

Same old, same old. Something for everyone, nothing for anyone.

We're staying in a motel in Portland. It has a bunch of umbrellas in a tube by the door for use by customers. Maybe theaters should have something similar, with guns.

Simple

Nothing like fear of death to clarify one's thinking.

On gun control, Peter King, hard-core Republican Congressman and teabagger favorite, sticks his neck out.

Rep. Peter King, a Republican from New York, is planning to introduce legislation that would make it illegal to bring a gun within 1,000 feet of a government official, according to a person familiar with the congressman's intentions.

King is chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee.

I'm sure he'll get flack for it. But here's my question: if it's okay for the people's elected representatives, why not for the people who elected them? Are congressional lives specialer than mine? Teabaggers, after all, are for the common people, right, not those Washington elites. So why not expand the law to include you and me? (Well, yeah, they rejected the idea of giving us the health care privileges of Congress, so I guess they're okay with letting the rest of us get shot. It's a health thing...)

It's pretty simple, really. No need to outlaw guns. Just go with Peter King and make it illegal to bring a gun within 1000 feet of anyone, not just government officials. In fact, although I don't know the strict definition of "officials," it might go without specifying, given the number of people around the country on government payrolls. And we can give everyone really long tape measures.

If it's good for them, it's good for us. I'm liking it. A thousand feet. Brilliant -- and from a Republican.