Sad Days, Yet Again

Today the better angels of our nature must have wept. Certainly tears were spilled for the tragic loss of life among the victims of the gun madness in Connecticut. But because these are our "better angels", they must have also shed tears for the loss of a certain number of grains of hope in our nation.

Who can catalog the number of wanton sprees of violence loosed against our citizens in a given span of time? Since Columbine? Since the Colorado movie house shooting? Since Virginia Tech? Since Standard Gravure in Louisville?

In a few countries, which we would not likely group as our international peers, such as El Salvador, Colombia, Honduras, Jamaica, and Swaziland, guns kill more people per capita than in the U.S. But in those countries with which we most choose to compare ourselves, Canada, France, Sweden, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, among many others, citizens shooting and killing citizens is a relative rarity.

To what do we owe this bloody distinction? Is it in our DNA? Or, more truthfully, is it in our NRA?

The United States is a nation, working toward a civilization, floating on a sea of compromise. Interest groups, historically at least, have had to settle for the truism of, "a half a loaf beats no bread at all." This basic tenet of governance seems to have eluded the National Rifle Association. This group of venal lobbyers, ostensibly speaking for its general membership, is committed to drawing lines, big, bold, indelible, lines in the sand of our national debate on guns. Politicians who dare step over those lines may feel the sting of the NRA whip, which could come in the form of a Teabagger primary challenger, or perhaps worse, the withdrawal of campaign largess. Toadying politicians at the state, local, and federal, level have bent over to accommodate the blued, barrel of logic  brandished and thrusted by the NRA. Just a couple years back, local state representatives and state senators voted for the absurd proposition that gun regulation could not be permitted at the local level, thus allowing firearms to be legally borne into any public structure other than a courthouse. Today Indiana lives under that law. Thanks legislators, at least we can duck behind the stacks to dodge the lead when visiting a library.

After the Colorado movie house shooting it was common to hear,  in the wake of that event, that it was not the time to discuss gun control. In all likelihood, those same slanted voices would offer the same twisted logic in the wake of this tragedy. To those voices I can only say, "shut the ---- up". This is precisely when to address the issue of senseless slaughter in a nation whose supine leaders are captive to the malevolent forces of the NRA and its radical right wing agenda. The gun lobby seeks to prevent any measure from becoming law if it would restrict guns in any way. Constant referral to the Second Amendment as permission to establish the U.S. as a free-fire zone is illogic at its worst. The most brilliant minds of the Eighteenth Century, of which it could be argued included our founding fathers, could not have conceived of firearms with the features of modern weapons, such as automatic weapons and hundred shot magazines. I believe the Second Amendment allowed for a militia to hold arms and that was that, but even if a more liberal interpretation is granted, to an Eighteenth century mind guns were muzzle loaded, cumbersome devices which would not allow a single person to go on the type of bloody rampage that's the hallmark of modern America.

So now, today, the day of the Newtown, Connecticut murders, let us reflect on how the NRA might dial back its insanity and return to a more sensible view of guns. I would say that any long gun suitable for hunting or target shooting be allowed, but the number of rounds the gun holds should be limited. Assault weapons should be prohibited. Large magazines should be prohibited in any firearm. Pistol ownership should be legal, but the ability to carry the weapon in public should be drastically curtailed and subject to sensible, limited use. Any legal firearm should carry with it the responsibility to show mental capacity and emotional stability to allow for ownership. Some form of registration should be adopted. Firearm safety instruction should be a requirement of ownership.

At the very least, the NRA should have to prove that certain types of weapons have a legitimate place in civilization. It may be fun to shoot a machine gun or an AK-47, but what is a legitimate use for those weapons? If no honest, legitimate use can be shown, the National Rifle Association needs to back away from supporting those weapons and focus its efforts on promoting the safe use of legitimate firearms. Otherwise, the NRA needs to accept that its role in creating a free-wheeling gun culture in the USA has bloodied its hands. And, perhaps after Newtown, or perhaps after the next, or the next after that incident, the NRA will find that no amount of bluff and bluster can stop the citizens of the United States from balancing out the gun lobby's radical agenda.