MattB
2014-10-12 18:41:19 UTC
My Turn: Monitor gets it wrong on gun control
By MICHAEL E. HAMMOND
For the Monitor
Sunday, October 12, 2014
http://www.concordmonitor.com/home/13879006-95/my-turn-monitor-gets-it-wrong-on-gun-control
Anti-gun liberals are seldom persuaded by logic. So its hard to
believe that responding to the Oct. 3 Monitor editorial is not a waste
of time. But gun owners take offense to the Monitors childish
name-calling, branding the Second Amendment community as engaging in
absolutism and brandishing the old fire in a crowded theater
trope.
First of all, the spate of mass shootings the Monitor worries about
is a myth. Not only are they on the decline, one is more likely to die
by fire, bicycles or falls. And many of the states that have witnessed
these mass shootings are places like Connecticut, California,
Illinois and New York. These states had the gun bans, magazine bans
and background checks that the Monitor craves. And that was,
tragically, not enough.
On the point of concealed carry permits, these states started with the
proposition that Americans needed to get the governments permission
to carry a firearm, and the end-result was that the government stopped
giving its permission.
Vermont, on the other hand which is not that unlike New Hampshire
doesnt require any permit to carry a firearm. And how many people, as
a result, would feel less safe in any place in Vermont than they would
in Watts, Chicago, New York or Hartford?
As a result, Gun Owners of America will make it a chief priority in
New Hampshire in 2015 to adopt a New Hampshire constitutional carry
statute similar to Vermonts, and to reject the anti-gun hysteria of
states like New York and California.
When you think about it, gun control is one of the few areas where
there is an almost psychotic will to adopt the policies of failure. It
is like trying to crib test answers from the class dummy.
In fact, the one thing that all rabidly anti-gun places like
Baltimore, Chicago and Washington, D.C., have in common is that they
all have high murder rates.
Now, with respect to the accusation that the Second Amendment
community consists of absolutists would that that were true.
Since 1968, Congress has passed one anti-gun bill after another
moving from the Gun Control Act, to the ban on plastic guns, to the
ban on new automatics, to the ban on armor piercing bullets, to the
ban on semi-automatics and the Brady Law, to the veterans gun ban and
bans in school zones.
In most cases, the bogeyman NRA supported these bills. And in all
cases, the restrictions on freedom proved to be ineffectual political
exercises that, in retrospect, were nothing but platforms to the next
gun control demands.
No one is going to take away guns or deny permits to law-abiding
citizens, says the Monitor. But thats exactly whats happening in
those parts of the country where gun owners failed to resist the
creeping incursion of the anti-gun lobby. No one has any doubt that
New Hampshire Democrats are planning for the day when New Hampshire is
sufficiently blue to join them.
Commment
William
No surprise Michael. Most gun crime happens in the inner city areas
like Chicago, Detroit, New Orleans and Washington DC. All areas where
they have some of the strictest gun laws. The Monitor is a progressive
organization, the editors are ordinary people with an opinion. The
difference is that they have the bully pulpit and they use it to
spread their disinformation.
By MICHAEL E. HAMMOND
For the Monitor
Sunday, October 12, 2014
http://www.concordmonitor.com/home/13879006-95/my-turn-monitor-gets-it-wrong-on-gun-control
Anti-gun liberals are seldom persuaded by logic. So its hard to
believe that responding to the Oct. 3 Monitor editorial is not a waste
of time. But gun owners take offense to the Monitors childish
name-calling, branding the Second Amendment community as engaging in
absolutism and brandishing the old fire in a crowded theater
trope.
First of all, the spate of mass shootings the Monitor worries about
is a myth. Not only are they on the decline, one is more likely to die
by fire, bicycles or falls. And many of the states that have witnessed
these mass shootings are places like Connecticut, California,
Illinois and New York. These states had the gun bans, magazine bans
and background checks that the Monitor craves. And that was,
tragically, not enough.
On the point of concealed carry permits, these states started with the
proposition that Americans needed to get the governments permission
to carry a firearm, and the end-result was that the government stopped
giving its permission.
Vermont, on the other hand which is not that unlike New Hampshire
doesnt require any permit to carry a firearm. And how many people, as
a result, would feel less safe in any place in Vermont than they would
in Watts, Chicago, New York or Hartford?
As a result, Gun Owners of America will make it a chief priority in
New Hampshire in 2015 to adopt a New Hampshire constitutional carry
statute similar to Vermonts, and to reject the anti-gun hysteria of
states like New York and California.
When you think about it, gun control is one of the few areas where
there is an almost psychotic will to adopt the policies of failure. It
is like trying to crib test answers from the class dummy.
In fact, the one thing that all rabidly anti-gun places like
Baltimore, Chicago and Washington, D.C., have in common is that they
all have high murder rates.
Now, with respect to the accusation that the Second Amendment
community consists of absolutists would that that were true.
Since 1968, Congress has passed one anti-gun bill after another
moving from the Gun Control Act, to the ban on plastic guns, to the
ban on new automatics, to the ban on armor piercing bullets, to the
ban on semi-automatics and the Brady Law, to the veterans gun ban and
bans in school zones.
In most cases, the bogeyman NRA supported these bills. And in all
cases, the restrictions on freedom proved to be ineffectual political
exercises that, in retrospect, were nothing but platforms to the next
gun control demands.
No one is going to take away guns or deny permits to law-abiding
citizens, says the Monitor. But thats exactly whats happening in
those parts of the country where gun owners failed to resist the
creeping incursion of the anti-gun lobby. No one has any doubt that
New Hampshire Democrats are planning for the day when New Hampshire is
sufficiently blue to join them.
Commment
William
No surprise Michael. Most gun crime happens in the inner city areas
like Chicago, Detroit, New Orleans and Washington DC. All areas where
they have some of the strictest gun laws. The Monitor is a progressive
organization, the editors are ordinary people with an opinion. The
difference is that they have the bully pulpit and they use it to
spread their disinformation.