More Guns? Yes, Please!

 

   United States                         Mexico

As the Biden administration attempts (by executive order, not legislation) to close the regulatory gap with ghost guns – 3D printed weapons with no serial numbers or background checks – the United States seems to be experiencing a feeding frenzy from the radical right working fiercely to ease gun ownership restrictions. Despite a clearly corrupt National Rifle Association leadership – Wayne LaPierre was living so high on the hog with massive unjustified “benefits” from the NRA, forcing a bankruptcy – that gun lobby appears to be having its way as red states are allowing more open carry, more unpermitted concealed weapons and more latitude in defining “self-defense” to gun homicides.

After Easter weekend, CNN reported: “At least 10 mass shootings across the US this weekend left eight people dead and dozens injured, disrupting gatherings including an Easter celebration and a massive house party… The shootings add to the year's increasing toll of mass shootings in the United States, which stands at 144, according to the Gun Violence Archive. The archive and CNN define a mass shooting as an incident in which four or more people are shot, not including the shooter.” Oh, since Easter (as of this writing), they Gun Violence Archive added three more.

Beginning with the 2008 Heller vs. DC Supreme Court opinion in which Justice Antonin Scalia, ignoring the “well regulated militia” provision of the Second Amendment and completely misstating the British law pre-1789, effectively ruled that gun ownership was a basic right for every American adult. We had lived over 200 years since the Second Amendment, passed in a time of muskets and flintlocks, took effect without any judicial ruling from the high court that gun ownership was a ubiquitous American right.

As I have cited in previous blogs, there is one justifiable gun homicide for every thirty-five gun killings in this country. Apparently, that “good guy with a gun” got lost somewhere. You’d almost think our right-wing federal courts are working on a commission basis for American gunmakers. It also rubs me the wrong way as the radical right chastises the Biden administration for increasing homicide statistics and severe numbers of asylum seekers gather at the border, when it is precisely those gun-ownership-enabling red state laws that have both increased the number of guns (and related crimes), particularly assault rifles, within the United States and armed the cartels from which those asylum-seekers are trying leave, terrified for their own lives.

That there are big cities desperately trying to contain gun-driven criminality, that is simply escalating gang violence faster than police can arrest the perps, is countered by neighboring states where guns are so easy to obtain without all those blue state red tape or regulatory restrictions, which limits are being shot down by right-wing courts all the time.

In 2020, a federal district court in Southern California – in Duncan vs. Bacerra (CA attorney General) held that a California statutory ban on large-capacity gun magazines violated the Second Amendment as articulated in Heller, initially affirmed by a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit. In November, however, a Ninth Circuit en banc ruling reversed that holding saying: “The ban on legal possession of large-capacity magazines reasonably supported California’s effort to reduce the devastating damage wrought by mass shootings.” The 7-4 ruling split along party lines, with the majority – all Democratic presidential appointees – overruling the dissenting four justices, all appointed by Republican presidents. That partisan split augurs badly for any gun control statutes facing US Supreme Court review, like the expected decision one pending case this summer.

The right-leaning Supreme Court is currently considering a case filed by a gun club because two members were denied a special need or "proper cause" finding (necessary for self-defense) that is required under a long-standing New York State law restricting the right to carry a concealed pistol. The case, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association vs. Bruen, could fall in line with other high court rulings challenging gun control legislation wherever it appears. Indeed, the harsh questioning by conservative justices during the oral arguments seems to portend a ruling, at some level, in favor of looser gun laws… just what the biggest city in the United States needs.

Talib Visram, writing for the April 21st FastCompany.com, adds this observation to this pending decision: “The case, the most significant on the Second Amendment in 14 years, puts into jeopardy New York State’s tight restrictions on carrying guns in public. Based on the direction of justices’ questions during oral arguments last fall, it appears likely that the conservative court will strike them down as unconstitutional as early as June, forcing the state to drop public safety regulations, and possibly to start issuing concealed carry permits. While there’s no database that tracks gun crimes by concealed permit holders, more mass shootings do tend to occur in states with more relaxed gun laws, including permissive carry rights. The ruling could also have broader implications for other states’ gun regulations.”

To Democrats, who touted reasonable gun control in the November election, this is just one more pledge that they have been unable to deliver: “The struggle for the Biden administration and Democrats in Congress to enact any meaningful legislation to enhance gun safety reflects how the party’s ambitious agenda has been frustratingly stunted by internal squabbling, the persistence of the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. The almost complete Republican opposition to Democratic priorities, including gun rules, has hobbled a party with razor-thin majorities in the House and Senate… But that’s little solace to gun safety advocates and to tens of thousands of shooting victims who were told Democrats would reduce gun violence if given the chance to govern.” Steve Peoples writing for the April 26th. Associated Press. Mid-terms approach.

Nowhere else in the world, except those areas plagued by wars (civil and otherwise), is there a greater legal per capita proliferation of weapons. Certainly, the rest of the developed world has stood aghast by our willing stance permitting gun ownership as American gun homicides have soared to such horrific levels. Even military-grade assault weapons.

I’m Peter Dekom, and I wish the radical right would make up its collective mine: wide open gun ownership or reduced criminal violence and fewer people desperately trying to cross our southern border… those choices are mutually exclusive.