Guns Guns Guns

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” Much conversation has taken place over the 2^nd Amendment of the United States the past few weeks in the wake of the Tucson shooting tragedy, prompting some lawmakers to call for more gun control to solve the problem and potentially prevent an event like this from happening again. One politician is even going so far as to suggest a law that would prevent people from carrying guns within so many feet of a politician? That’s definitely the answer, I’m sure had the law been in effect this whole tragedy would never have happened.

The Constitution gives us the right to bear arms. While some have argued our forefathers meant the right pertained to militias, the Supreme Court made it clear, most notably in 2008 and 2010, the 2^nd amendment is an “individual” right. But does that mean we as a nation should be okay with people being able to obtain automatic/ sub automatic weapons, which hold countless rounds of ammunition? Let us remember when the Constitution was written the choice of guns was pretty much limited to a single shot musket which had approximately 13 steps to reload and a single shot pistol which was only accurate at very close range. So the fact our forefathers didn’t place any other limitations in the Constitution isn’t surprising. In 1994, then President Bill Clinton signed into law the Assault Weapons Ban that was allowed to expire in 2004. The law prevented the manufacturing and selling of high capacity magazines like those that were legally purchased and used in the Tucson tragedy. Had this law still been in effect it most likely would not have prevented this tragedy, but quite possibly limited the size of the tragedy.

Like most big issues (healthcare, national debt, economy etc.) though in the United States you cannot just address the surface issue and expect to fix the whole problem. The answer is never in the first answer of why a problem exists. It takes at least 5 whys to uncover all the issues. When you do this with the Tucson tragedy you uncover several issues which need to be addressed in order to mitigate the risk of something like this happening again.

As the majority of people will argue “guns do not kill people, people kill people”. While this is 100% true we can potentially limit the number of people killed in a single tragedy by re-enacting the high capacity magazine limit of the assault weapons banned. I can’t for the life of me understand why a random civilian needs a 30 round clip. This however is just a surface issue. The country needs to enforce and in some cases improve laws already in place.

Better enforcement and usage of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) could have prevented this tragedy or at least made it much harder for the individual to get a weapon. According to the FBI website, the NICS is a national system that checks available records on persons who may be disqualified from receiving firearms. The FBI developed the system through a cooperative effort with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and local and state law enforcement agencies. The NICS is a computerized background check system designed to respond within 30 seconds on most background check inquiries so the purchaser receives an almost immediate response. While this is a great start the fact that you don’t need a background check when purchasing from a gun show or private dealer is crazy. What’s the purpose of only getting a background check if you purchase from Wal-Mart but not at the local gun show? When you do get a background check the information needs to be in the system. Currently there are a handful of states that have submitted zero mental health records to the NICS and several other states that have only submitted a small few. Garbage in yields garbage out; if the system isn’t up to date it will never work as intended. States need to be held accountable for getting vital information into the system. Had Tucson shooter’s information been in the system he would not have passed the background check and never been allowed to purchase the weapon.

According to the Brady Campaign 268 people are shot per day in the U.S., 9,484 are murdered in the U.S. each year by a gun. That is 17.4 times more murders by gun than Canada, Germany, Spain, England, Australia, and Finland combined. You can look at a litany of polling on all aspects of gun control from background checks, licensing, registration, assault weapons, waiting periods etc. and a major majority of the country, to include NRA members, are in favor of it. While creating better gun laws may never happen, re-enacting portions of the assault weapon ban, enforcing the use of the NICS, and requiring a background check for all weapon purchases will go a long way to improving the situation.

Political Rhetoric

Buddha once said, "Whatever words we utter should be chosen with care for people will hear them and be influenced by them for good or ill." While this has nothing to do with food or fun I feel compelled to comment about what I've seen over the last 72 hrs in relationship to the tragedy in Arizona. I think it is safe to say all "rational" people will conclude political rhetoric probably had nothing to do with the incident, but rather this was an unfortunate act by an extremely disturbed individual. With that said the fact the topic was brought up should be used as chance for our high level leader, news media and such to examine what it is they say on a daily basis. Like it or not there are people in this country that hang on every word these people say. All you have to do is read some of the comments on blogs and various news sites to figure that out. For the past three days I’ve seen nothing but this person blaming that person and this news outlet blaming the other. It's all quite ridiculous and somewhat sad. Instead of taking the opportunity to improve ourselves and the way we act, we've decided to instead blame one another.

 From an early age you are taught that words have meanings. "Say what you mean and mean what you say" is a simple saying which one should live by. So if there is even a 0.01% chance the actions and comments coming out of our leaders and or news media had anything to do with this the opportunity to address it is now. As one of my friends tweeted "What's so wrong with being more civil and toning down harsh speech? Why are some people so up in arms over this?" By no means is one (me) advocating curtailing our country's 1st amendment rights of free speech. Say whatever you want, however, if you are leader in this country or a leader anywhere say it the right way.

With this is mind why can’t we permanently do away with the terms like “Battle Ground States”? There are plenty of other better words for what the media and politicians are trying to get across such as “Swing States”, “Purple States”, “Highly Contested States. Trust me when I say I have seen the remnants of a “battle ground” and they don’t resemble an election in the United States.

I will leave you with this. I saw an interesting analogy on a news site today which helped put this in perspective. The article quoted a Senator who basically said if you have a heart attack and the doctor tells you as part of your treatment plan that you need to stop smoking, he’s not necessarily saying smoking caused your current heart attack but it very well could lead to your next one.