Greed, Guns and Gumption

Christmas Eve 2012. Just another day in the lust-love of too many Americans and their weapon systems. Usual stories in the press.

Story One: “Authorities say four firefighters were shot, two of them killed while responding to a house fire in western New York… Officials in the town of Webster tell local media outlets that someone shot at firefighters around 6 a.m. Monday [December 24^th] when they arrived at the scene of the blaze just east of Rochester… CNN reports that two responding firefighters are being treated for gunshot wounds. Two other firefighters were killed, but officials wouldn’t elaborate on how they died… A Webster fire official told ABC that the firefighters were shot at when they pulled up to a house in the 100 block of Lake Road.” Huffington Post, December 24^th. It was a trap. The shooter and assumed arsonist, a convicted killer, was found dead at the scene from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. Merry Christmas.

Story Two: Received: Well-more than the necessary 25,000 signatures to require White House attention to an attempt to deport CNN host, Piers Morgan, exercising First Amendment rights in expressing his support of new gun control legislation. The text of the message? “British Citizen and CNN television host Piers Morgan is engaged in a hostile attack against the U.S. Constitution by targeting the Second Amendment. We demand that Mr. Morgan be deported immediately for his effort to undermine the Bill of Rights and for exploiting his position as a national network television host to stage attacks against the rights of American citizens.” Yep, back in the late 1700s, our forefathers clearly supported the mass distribution of assault rifles and high-capacity magazines, which with minor adjustment, are capable of spraying a 100 or more bullets a minute to extinguish the lives of a maximum number of people who disagree with you. Deport me!!!! Good to know that a clear misinterpretation of one Constitutional provision – one that kills – trumps another – one that defines our democracy. Free speech behind the barrel of a pointed gun!

Story Three: As Newtown, Connecticut struggles in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook massacre, state legislators are contemplating tightening restrictions on gun ownership so that such school shootings become decreasingly likely. But the local gun manufacturers are threatening to leave the state– and the jobs they represent (Connecticut is the 7^th largest gun manufacturing state) – should such limitations actually be imposed. “Colt, based in Connecticut since the 1800s, employs roughly 900 people in the state. Two other major gun companies, Sturm, Ruger & Company and Mossberg & Sons, are also based in the state. In all, the industry employs about 2,000 people in Connecticut, company officials said…

“In Connecticut, the United Automobile Workers, which represents Colt workers, has testified against restrictions. The union’s arguments were bolstered last year when Marlin Firearms, a leading manufacturer of rifles, closed a factory in Connecticut that employed more than 200 people.” New York Times, December 23^rd.

Story Four: NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, fresh from his astounding “let’s put guns into our schools” as the solution to the waves of academic gun violence that have plagued the nation, refused an invitation to join the Presidential task force (led by VP Joe Biden) charged with developing a new gun policy in light of Sandy Hook. His statement on NBC’s Meet the Press on December 23^rd: “If it’s a panel that’s just going to be made up of a bunch of people that, for the last 20 years, have been trying to destroy the Second Amendment, I’m not interested in sitting on that panel… [The] N.R.A. is not going to let people lose the Second Amendment in this country, which is supported by the overwhelming majority of the American people.”

I can’t seem to shake the image of an NRA volunteer posted to an urban high school in South Central LA making eye contact with the few gangbangers who haven’t dropped out… who really want his Bushmaster assault rifle to add to their collection. Or the bored and well-armed NRA “protector of children” at a small elementary school having a bad day and getting into an altercation with someone trying to visit his or her child at the school. Always good to have lone gunmen with deep political prejudices charged with interpreting the law against those who just might disagree with them. Picture an NRA gunman-guard dealing with parents protesting against his armed presence in their child’s school. The NRA proposal may be the most colossally stupid proposal I have ever heard… and if we were to implement this idiotic policy, I wonder what the death toll of innocents would be.

I’m Peter Dekom, and it is clear that blind passion does not mix well with common sense or facts.