Bill Moyers Says it Best.

Yesterday I read Cliff's post about well-respected journalist Bill Moyers' piece on guns. My first reaction was that even the pro-gun crowd would listen up when someone like Moyers says it. Here's the link to the video on Bill Moyers Journal.

We're arming ourselves to death. Even as gunshots ricocheted around the country, an amendment allowing concealed weapons in national parks snuck into the popular credit card reform bill. Another victory for the gun lobby, to sounds of silence from the White House.

The fact is, neither party will stand up to the National Rifle Association, the best known front group for the arms merchants. In Virginia, just across the Potomac River from the Holocaust Museum, this week's Democratic primary for governor was won by state legislator R. Creigh Deeds, a man who supports allowing concealed weapons in restaurants that serve alcohol and opposes limiting handgun purchases to one a month.

One thing occurred to me while reading this comment. Bill said the NRA is the "best known front group for the arms merchants." I'm wondering if perhaps our focus has been wrong all along. Usually we're talking about the 80 million gun owners as if it were their fault. Perhaps the real fault lies with the gun manufacturers. Perhaps that's where effective controls can best be implemented.

These are just ideas that came to mind. What's your opinion? Bill Moyers sums it up like this.

So let the faithful of every persuasion keep their guns for hunting and skeet, for trap and target practice, for collecting. They can even have a permit for a gun to protect their business or home, even though it's 22 times more likely to shoot a member of the family (including suicides) than an intruder.

But please, there are already some 200 million, privately owned firearms in America. Every year there are 30,000 gun deaths and in some years more than 400,000 non-fatal, gun-related assaults. The next time someone wades through a pool of blood to sidle up and champion the preservation of firearms, can't we just say, no thanks?

Enough's enough.

What do you think about that "22 times more likely to shoot a member of the family" idea? Even if it's wildly exaggerated, let's say by a factor of five, wouldn't it still mean that to have a gun in the house is a bad idea?

Please feel free to leave a comment.

von Brunn's Rifle Impossible to Trace

CNN reports on the failed attempts of the authorities to trace the weapon used in the fatal shooting at the Holocaust Museum. James W. von Brunn, a convicted felon with a history of association with hate groups, went into the Washington D.C. museum last week, and opened fire killing one guard.

It is not possible for authorities to trace the rifle used in this week's shooting at the Holocaust Memorial Museum to the original purchaser, a law enforcement source said Friday.

The source, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the investigation, said the weapon is a Winchester Model 6, .22 caliber rifle -- a type of gun manufactured between 1908 and 1928 -- long before records were kept on gun purchases.

Authorities also were checking to see if the weapon had been used in any other crime, the source said.

Now, that's very interesting. The "authorities," whoever they are, seem to be focusing on the gun. Maybe they're taking their cue from Paul Helmke, do you think?

I would imagine the reason they focus on the gun, in all seriousness, is because of all the variables in a crime like this, the weapon is one of the most concrete. You've got the impossible-to-predict behaviour of a human being who is acting criminally, you've got whatever influences have played a part in his personality, involvement in the hate groups, etc., you've got the random instances of other people being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and then you've got the gun.

Because of its age, they were unable to determine who the original purchaser of the gun was . But they also tried to learn if it had been used in any other crimes. I guess that's two different types of traces. I'm not sure exactly how it works. Let's say they had been able to trace the weapon to a gun shop in Virginia. Would that help to prove the theory that strict gun laws in D.C. are useless if just over the bridge they're lax?

What kind of gun is that anyway, the Winchester Model 6, .22 caliber rifle? Isn't that the kind often given to kids to learn with? Don't they use that one in summer camp for target practice?

What's your opinion? Do you think trying to trace the gun's provenance could yield valuable information. How difficult is it to purchase a rifle like that? Can you still just walk into a store and buy one, like in the good old days?

Please leave a comment.

Sotomayor on Guns

A couple weeks ago a "satirical" story went around the internet about Sonia Sotomayor's law-school papers. When I posted about it, I hadn't noticed that it was supposed to be satire. The ribbing I got from some of the commenters a few hours later when everyone in the world saw the truth was well-deserved, and I think well-received.

Now, Yahoo News reports on the latest, hopefully genuine information, about the judge's gun stance.

Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor told a senator Thursday that she would follow a historic ruling affirming Americans' right to own guns for self-defense, but pro-gun activists said they still believe she'd work to limit gun rights if confirmed for the high court.

Democratic Sen. Mark Udall of Colorado said Sotomayor told him during a private meeting that she considers the 2008 ruling that struck down a Washington, D.C., handgun ban as settled law that would guide her decisions in future cases. In District of Columbia v. Heller, the Supreme Court held that individuals have a constitutional right to guns.

But the statement gave little comfort to gun rights activists. Conservative Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., said that earlier in the week, Sotomayor told him in a similar closed-door session that she stood by an appellate court decision she signed this year that said the Second Amendment protection from curbs on the right to bear arms applied only to federal laws — not state or local ones. That ruling, Maloney v. Cuomo, left it up to the Supreme Court to decide whether the rights recognized in the Heller case applied throughout the country.

Gun rights activists are right to be concerned. The Maloney decision is one in which Sotomayor and two other judges on the 2nd Circuit appeals court upheld a New York state law banning the possession of "chuka sticks." They said they were bound by an 1886 Supreme Court ruling — not by Heller, which didn't address the question of whether the Second Amendment applied to states.

I'm tempted to say, now who's going to have the last laugh, but I'm doubtful she'll survive the gruelling confirmation process. I've already seen too much negative propaganda, much of which must have the NRA's fingerprints on it.

What's your opinion? Do you think she's hostile to gun rights? Would that make her anti-freedom? Isn't it possible for someone to oppose the pro-gun movement and do so with integrity and good intentions?

Please leave a comment.

AA Shooter Cleared of All Charges

Philly.com reports on the decision taken by the South Carolina prosecutors.

A South Carolina prosecutor says an attorney was justified when he shot and killed a robber at an Alcoholics Anonymous club in Columbia earlier this year.

The State reported Thursday that prosecutor Barney Giese (guh-ZAY') concluded that 61-year-old James Corley acted in self-defense when he shot and killed 18-year-old Kayson Helms of Edison, N.J.

Giese's decision means to charges will be filed.

The prosecutor says Helms had pulled a pistol when he entered the club April 11 and took the cell phone of one of the people.

Corley says he knew he would be cleared.

When we spoke about this before, I referred to the shooting as a "summary execution." Although some people took strong exception to that characterization of the incident, in retrospect, and considering the prosecutors decision, I think it pretty well describes what happened. Yet, I fully realize that a man carrying a concealed weapon who becomes the intended victim of an armed robbery, cannot be expected to read the robber's mind to understand his intent. So, legally, it's justified.

The problem with the increase of concealed carry activity among the gun folks is that we're going to have an increase of defensive shootings like this. The percentage of armed robberies that turn murderous is very small, so the more defensive killings we have the more unnecessary ones we'll have. That's the problem.

What's your opinion? From what you've read about Kayson, had James Corley not gunned him down, do you think murder would have taken place that day? In other words, if no one but the criminal had had a gun, what do you think would have happened? I'd say, those alcoholics would have lost a few bucks, cell phones and watches and then they would have had their meeting, thanking the Higher Power for their lives. Instead they had a dead kid on the floor of their club bleeding all over the place. And most people are saying "he asked for it."

Please leave us a comment.

Irate Dad Takes Gun to School

CNN reports on the story of a parent who, after becoming angry over a school-issued memo about the swine flu, confronted a school administrator with a gun.

Police and school officials identified the suspect as Peter Cocker, 37, parent of a recently ill student at South Orangetown Middle School in Rockland County.

The man barged into the office of South Orangetown School District Superintendent Ken Mitchell brandishing a gun.

The man locked the office door and confronted Mitchell about his latest H1N1 memo, released a day earlier.

Fortunately no injuries resulted, thanks to the heads-up intervention of a New York school district superintendent who wrestled Cocker to the ground.

Peter Cocker was arraigned on charges of burglary, kidnapping, coercion and criminal use of a weapon.

I wish they would tell us more about the gun, you know that inanimate object that is more-or-less like any other tool. In New York State there are very strict gun laws. I wonder if Mr. Cocker, who is a former police officer with a clean record, owned the gun legally. I wonder if he's yet another example of a lawful gun owner who suddenly becomes a criminal. This is also called "gun flow" just as surely as the movement of weapons from States like Virginia and Arizona up to New York. The problem with this type of "gun flow" is it's extremely difficult to prevent.

My pro-gun friends seem to continually misunderstand me. I accept the fact that the great majority of gun owners are responsible and I'm willing to presume the ones who comment here are members of that group. But I believe there is a percentage of their group that is like Mr. Peter Cocker. Some of them have been breaking the rules all along and only come to our attention when they get caught. Others are really good guys who, at a certain point, go bad.

The point is, it's from this small percentage that we have most of the trouble. Why is that considered slander against all gun owners? It's not.

The question is how big is this problem group. Some people say it's tiny, practically insignificant. I say it's 10 or 20 or 30%. This is what we're haggling about, among other things.

What's your opinion? Is Mr. Cocker a true anomaly or does he represent a fairly significant percentage of gun owners? What do you think would have happened if the school superintendent had been armed? I know the answer: we'd have one dead Cocker and another legitimate DGU.

Please leave a comment.

Jew Hater Visits Holocaust Museum

CNN reports on the latest terrible shooting to grab the national headlines (international too).

An 88-year-old Maryland man with a long history of ties to white supremacist groups is the suspect in Wednesday's fatal shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

James W. von Brunn served six years in prison for trying to make what he called a "legal, non-violent citizens arrest" of Federal Reserve Board members in 1981 -- a prison term he blamed on "a Negro jury, Jew/Negro attorneys" and "a Jew judge," he said on his Web site, Holy Western Empire.

Von Brunn is a native of St. Louis, Missouri, and a 1943 graduate of Washington University there. According to his online biography, he served as a Navy officer in World War II and became an advertising artist and executive after the war.

But by the late 1970s, he had become a "hard-core neo-Nazi" and an associate of William Pierce -- the white supremacist leader whose 1978 book, "The Turner Diaries," is blamed for inspiring Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh.

I read about the shooting last night online, but this morning while having my coffee at 6:00 a.m., I heard it on the Italian radio news. I can only imagine the Italians just shake their heads in wonder at America, its guns and its violence. What kind of civilized country would put up with that? The answer is obvious, no civilized country, only the good old US of A.

The man was a convicted felon and an ex-con. Does that mean he wouldn't legally have been able to own a shotgun? If so, what can be done about these disobedient criminals who just won't get in line?

Here's my answer. We stop flooding the marketplace with weapons to the saturation point. We diminish the number of guns to the point that every homicidal maniac who wants a gun, just can't get one. Is that going to inconvenience the law abiding? You betcha. But I'm afraid that's just the price we're going to eventually have to pay for freedom.

Yes, I actually said "freedom." I reject all this nonsense about freedom being the ability to arm oneself. I reject it outright. The folks who feel they need to arm themselves are not free, as far as I can see. Real freedom would be a state in which there's such a diminishment of weapons in the public hands that it's once again safe to go outside. That would be freedom.

What's your opinion?

Deadwood

I just started watching Deadwood. I wondered what our friends in Montana think about it. Are the present-day residents of that state offended by the depiction of their fairly recent ancestors? What must the folks of a hundred years earlier been like? So often from the pro-gun crowd we hear talk of the "Framers" and the "Founding Fathers," as if we were talking about the golden age of Pericles.

It's certainly a thought-provoking and interesting show on many levels. What do you think?