We Are Still Talking About Guns
The President came out today with 23 executive orders aimed at trying to move the needle on this debate about guns.
I have written about it a few times.
On Fox News, they had a package ready to go showing how these orders wouldn’t make any difference.
They started with a gun shop owner. His task was to show that there was no difference between a 30 shot clip and three 10 shot clips. He put an empty clip in the gun, pressed the trigger to let off ten imaginary shots and then pulled the empty clip out, fumbled around a bit putting in the new one, fired off ten more, pulled the clip, tried to put the clip in backwards, turned it in the right direction, put it in and fired off ten more shots.
He then said, “See. It’s the same.”
Except, of course, it wasn’t.
So, let’s say for the sake of argument, he was a real shooter in a small room. In the scenario where the victims can rush the shooter, obviously there was a bit of time to move while he was fumbling around between clips. A hail of thirty consecutive bullets would probably not leave anyone able to attempt to tackle him.
Let’s take the other scenario where people in the room are also armed. While he is fumbling around, there would be a possibility for the good guys to shoot at him, maybe rendering him unable to reload his next 10 round clip.
We are assuming in the last example that the good guys can shoot straight. That is, I contend, a very big leap of faith.
The rest of the segment turned into the usual “How dare Obama (They can not call him the President. It must be in their style book) try to run the government through executive order”.
I am not sure where they were when the last President would use signing statements to get around provisions in bills that he would sign.
This debate just wears me out. I think that is the NRA’s strategy. Keep changing the argument while continuing to grease the palms of Congress.
I will bring this up here from time to time. The kids in Newtown, Chicago and anywhere else in this country deserve better from us.
Just as an example, in 1982 7 people died from poisoning due to someone tampering with Tylenol bottles.
SEVEN people
For the last 30 years, the packaging has been changed by the drug companies to try to prevent that from happening again.
SEVEN people and an entire industry reacted with a solution.
An average weekend in Chicago can see that many shootings yet the gun folks and Congress sit on their hands.
We have got to do better.
Peace
Fantastic ending. Great stuff John as always.
Thank you, sir.
I’ll refrain from commenting on internal politics in a country other than my own, but I agree that the debate looks very tilted.
(Also, as a side note or perhaps an external point of view, people here in Europe have real problems understanding this “right to carry arms” business. It’s just incomprehensible to us. I’ve lately started to accept that it’s something I’ll never understand, and just will have to accept as an unexplained phenomenon. (Dammit. I just commented on your internal politics anyway, didn’t I?))
I can’t explain it either. I admire your restraint in offering an opinion. There isn’t a lot of that in this country. I would like the debate here better if people would think more before they offer one.
We’ve had 4 shootings in just over 24 hours in our valley. FOUR. Sadly, this seems to be “normal” where I live; gang activity runs rampant. Handguns are the weapon of choice here, but a bullet is a bullet and the damage these shootings caused is clear; a 15 year old and a young adult dead; two others clinging to life. Controlling the capacity of clips is a good start. What will work to end gun violence from there is a mystery. I don’t know how to solve it…I am sure our lawmakers are also at a loss for a reasonable fix.
Most of the violence is handgun-related and they are easy to steal and easy to carry. Something has got to give. The combination of donations and fearing to look soft is keeping politicians from doing even the slightest thing.