[Previous entry: ""True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country.""] [Next entry: "N.eeds and Wants"]
04/22/2007: "Revisiting Gun Control"
Following the aftermath at Virginia Tech, every right-wing nutjob is lining up to support removal of restrictions on gun purchases. The argument is that if one of the people who was there was carrying a concealed weapon (which, on a college campus is a violation of Virginia law) then someone could have taken out the armed assailant prior to the body count reaching what it was. Of course, they never quite finish the argument, but usually leave it hanging. 'Who knows what would have happened if . . .' But playing in a counterfactual world is not an argument. Two can play, I imagine: what if one of the armed people had accidentally shot an innocent person? Or perhaps, better yet: what if the laws were amended such that the assailant could never have purchased the gun in the first place? In fact, they were--there is legal precedent.
Not to let the facts get in the way of a good story, but the guns used were purchased legally. In fact, the clips used were banned under the Clinton administration; when Bush let the assault weapons ban lapse, that permitted the sale of the tolls that led to this horrific event. That seems to point to the fact that more, not less restrictions on guns could have stopped this. Further, the second amendment is not an absolute like some of the others (hell, even the first amendment has restrictions). It is the only provision in the bill of Rights which clearly mentions regulation. Further, the founders in their days of muskets could not have foreseen the AK-47's and M-16's that currently are brandished (presumably to shoot a deer). So, not only do these yahoos have to ignore fact, they have to ignore the letter and spirit of the Constitution itself in order to push their agenda.
A modest proposal: the only gun that can be purchased legally is a musket. This way, the far-right's anachronistic interpretation of the Constitution is placed back in its proper context. The 30-second reload time will certainly serve as a deterrent to mass murder. And with my legal musket, I propose our first victim should be Charleton Heston. From your cold dead hands, indeed.
