Alphecca

A Little Fisk Of An AWB Editorial

The San Francisco Examiner had an editorial yesterday that deserves some attention. It starts off:

IF YOU HAVE ever watched old black-and-white gangster movies on late-night television, you've seen cops and robbers blasting away at each other with Tommy guns, those 1920s submachine guns with the big, round cartridge chambers.

After some of J. Edgar Hoover's FBI agents got outgunned and killed with the fast-firing Thompson submachine guns, Hoover used his legendary political clout to push a nationwide ban on Tommy guns through Congress.

Maybe the National Rifle Association didn't have as much power back then. But the Tommy gun ban apparently passed without any huge outcry about a guaranteed constitutional right to hunt deer or shoot targets with submachine guns.

Since this is an editorial lamenting that the phony "Assault Weapons Ban" will probably lapse in September, bringing up machine guns is an obvious attempt to link the guns covered by that bill with images of gangsters roaming our streets toting Tommy guns.

I'm not going to argue the merits of machine guns here. Instead I'll just point out that the comparison is as inaccurate as comparing a 1911 style pistol to a 19th century single-shot dueling pistol. The guns prohibited by the AWB are not machine guns. They operate the same as any modern firearm, whether a typical semi-automatic or a revolver. You pull the trigger and just ONE bullet fires. Then the gun reloads itself. You have to pull the trigger AGAIN to get that next bullet to fire.

So bringing up the Tommy gun is a simple scare tactic. It bears NO relevance to the issue at hand.

Things are very different today. The NRA might now be the most fearsome lobbying organization in politics. It boasts of mobilizing single-issue voters by the hundreds of thousands -- perhaps even several million -- to cast ballots in elections all across Middle America.

"Fearsome?" The NRA has about 4 million members who pay dues to have their interests represented in Congress. How is this different than what the NEA does, representing educators? Are THEY "fearsome?"

The AARP "boasts" over 35 million members! That's almost nine times as many as the NRA. Is the AARP "fearsome?" The NRA is simply doing it's job. But because they support a position that the SF Examiner clearly doesn't, they're "fearsome."

Gun control is clearly one of America's most polarizing issues. Urban areas demand protection from gang members running rampant. Rural states fiercely defend their Second Amendment right to recreational shooting. Opening day of hunting season is an official holiday in numerous states.

Read that second sentence again. If gang members are running rampant, then shouldn't the writer of this unsigned editorial be calling for Criminal Control? More cops on the street? Longer jail sentences?

And once again, they throw in the "red-herring" that the Second Amendment is about hunting and target shooting. Not So! It's about the right to bear arms for protection of the states, and by extension (based on all contemporaneous writings) protection of the individual.

And if these mutant gang-members are toting a Tek-9, shouldn't the average, law-abiding citizen attempting self-preservation be able to own at least as much firepower? But of course, the AWB was never about firepower and point of fact, the Tek-9 operates EXACTLY the same as any other modern firearm and shoots the EXACT same ammo. No, the AWB was about looks, cosmetics. To use the Examiner's own word; they looked "fearsome" so they had to be banned.

The big problem with the NRA is that it acts as if any restriction on any gun anywhere must inevitably lead to the total confiscation of every privately owned guns in the U.S.

Maybe that's because the NRA, and other pro-2A organizations -- and their members -- have seen what happens in other countries such as England and Australia. It starts with national registration. Then a few "scary" guns are banned and confiscated. When that doesn't reduce the crime rate (since criminals don't obey gun laws), more guns are banned. And soon, as we see in England, all handguns and most long guns have been taken away. In fact, all that seems to remain is increasing gun crime since -- guess what? -- the mutants know their victims are unable to defend themselves!

Actually, you don't even have to look to other nations. Chicago and Washington DC both ban handgun (and most long guns) ownership. They have for a long time. And guess what, again? Chicago and Washington DC lead the nation in murder!

An analogy could also be made to the "pro-choice" movement that tries to prevent any infringement on the right to abortion. Maybe it's because supporters know that first comes a few restrictions, then more, and finally outright ban.

The editorial concludes:

Sadly, this means we're probably not going to see much more in the way of meaningful street disarmament unless a large number of American voters get angry enough about it to scare politicians more than the NRA does.

I'm an American voter and I'm not angry about protecting the Second Amendment. I'm not in fear of legal ownership of any firearms. What I'm afraid of is criminals. I fear for myself, my home, and my family. Even in rural Vermont, some of these mutants are moving in. Not a lot, yet, but they're coming. Gangs are now a problem in Rutland and St. Jay. I want to be ready for them. I want the ability to defend myself. That's what the Second Amendment is all about and organizations that work to protect it are anything but "fearsome."

Posted by Jeff Soyer at July 6, 2004 07:50 AM