Oh, controversy.  Get thee behind me.  Yes, I know a lot of you are, shall we say, not completely of open mind about the issue of gun ownership, but I am, nevertheless, compelled to speak my mind on the subject.  I am myself a gun owner having a Browning 20 gauge secreted somewhere at my ranch.  I even have some shotgun shells around, but I can only find them when I have no use for them. A few years ago in a fit of excessive gun safety, I bought and installed a trigger guard, and promptly lost the key.  I’ve hunted off and on since the age of twelve, but not distinguished myself at it, and during my brief military career, I qualified, or at least shot,  M-14’s, M-16’s, a .45 caliber pistol, an M-60 machine gun,  M-79 grenade launchers and even 81 mm mortars, and probably a few others that I’ve thankfully forgotten.  I never fired at a human or at anything else in anger and for that, I give thanks.

There is no further evidence I can give regarding the Second Amendment argument for or against gun ownership that has not already been offered, and repeated ad nauseam,  except to say that I personally would be pleased to allow every single person in the militia to own whatever manner of firepower they deem useful.  No, I’m more about consequences and common sense than proffering any legalistic argument.  I do think it odd, however, that states can, and do, require  training, testing and licensing before allowing an adult to drive.  As far as I know there has never a constitutional case arising from the states restricting citizens from exercising their right to drive.

Let’s get some facts on the table.

In Texas, as in most states, there is absolutely no prohibitive requirement regarding the purchasing or carrying a rifle, of any power, or shotguns.  Further there is not a requirement to register your possession of these firearms with any governmental entity.  Purchasing a handgun or shotgun with a pistol grip (hmm…what do you think this item is used for) requires little more.  You have to fill out a form 4473 which is used to determine if you have been convicted of a Class A felony or if you are insane.  Then, after NCIS runs a quick background check to confirm, you’re on your way.  No fuss, no muss, no training, no test, nada.  You are sailing clear with the NRA and the Second amendment as your hand maidens.  However, if you want to secrete a handgun on your person or carry it it your brief case or the glove compartment of your car, you have to go a bit further.  If you want to carry it in a holster on your person or around your neck for that matter, you need to go to one of the thirty-six states that allow open carry.  For reasons lost in history, Texas does not…yet.

In Texas, and many other states, the acquisition of the right to a concealed handgun license (CHL) imposes the dastardly requirement of paying ninety nine dollars or so  to take a ten hour class (which can be crammed in to one hour on-line) and sign an affidavit that you understand the law.  Oh yes, there is a test of fifty questions that you must take and answer thirty five of them correctly (with coaching of course).  Now you are qualified to not only own a .360 magnum, but you can carry it in a shoulder holster under your madras sport coat.  Contrast this, if you will, to the requirement to get a license from the state of Texas to practice therapeutic massage (I won’t comment on the requirements for the non-therapeutic type).  To press the flesh, so to speak, you have to study for two hundred fifty hours, intern for fifty hours and pass a written and practical exam.

I will admit that my motivation to comment on the gun issue was, in part, stimulated by the recent case in Florida where, under the presumed protection of the recently adopted “Stand Your Ground” legislation, the local jurisdiction had refused to arrest a self proclaimed neighborhood watchman for shooting an unarmed youth.  Presumably, this volunteer night watchman met all the limited requirements for owning a handgun.  He had no record of a previous Class A felonies and was willing to attest that he was not insane; although, some of his prior behavior may call this into question.  My point in mentioning this is that it isn’t about legal or illegal gun ownership.  It’s about the irrefutable fact that people who own guns are more likely to shoot someone than people who don’t don’t own guns.  And no where is this more true than in the good old US of A.

To wit:

 

  1. Over one hundred thousand people are shot in the US each year.  Of these, over thirty one thousand die.
  2. Over one million of us have been killed with guns in the US since 1968.
  3. Firearm homicide is twenty times higher in the US than among twenty three other high population, high income countries.
  4. In the last year, 2009, for which there is complete data, there were only two hundred cases adjudicated in which justifiable homicide/self defense was claimed.  This will surely go up as the Florida model spreads.
  5. A person who owned and had a gun in possession was four and a half  times more likely to be shot during an assault.
  6. While the population of the US is roughly ten times that of Canada, there are fifty times more homicides by gun in the US.
  7. Over one hundred fifteen thousand children have been killed by guns since 1979, the first year in which the data was collected.

And on, and on, and on.

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not against all gun ownership.  Rather, I’m for responsible and accountable gun ownership.  In 1988, my friend Jack Kemp was running for the GOP nomination for president.  He came to Dallas on a campaign swing to raise money and press the flesh.  I attended a neighborhood fund raiser in North Dallas at which I knew many, if not most of the attendees.  I noticed  a young man that I didn’t know in a very republican blue suit and silk rep tie and introduced myself.  I sociably asked why he was there and he said that he was a campaign stringer for the National Rifle Association (NRA).  I naturally asked what did a campaign stringer do, to which he replied matter-of-factly that his job was to make sure that Kemp did not say anything, or take any position contrary to the interest of the NRA, and if he did, to report it to the national office who would take “appropriate action”.  He went on to say that there were similar stringers assigned to all the other candidates as well.  He said that the position of the NRA was not to give an inch on any gun related issue.  In fact, he said, we want to be on the offense.  Huh?  What?  I didn’t get it then, but I get it now.  It seems that the NRA policy that not only is gun ownership unlimited, but that no one even says anything bad about gun ownership.

To a certain subset of our fellow Americans, facts don’t matter, and, evidently  consequences don’t matter either.  An unfettered right to own a semi-automatic AK-47 assault rifle which can fire up to six hundred rounds per minute is more important to the NRA and evidently, many  Americans, than the possible, horrible consequences of such ownership.  The ever popular Newtster, who is running his presidential campaign on fumes, recently proclaimed at the annual NRA convention that it was a fundamental right of every human being in the world to have gun ownership available to him.  Every human being in the world!

Perhaps, as Gail Collins recently suggested in her NY Times article, the NRA will soon have lobbied congress and state legislatures into passing every conceivable gun law favorable to their world view, and they will have no longer have a reason for existence and they will go away.  Maybe we will then be able to return to sanity.  Until then, I’m ducking for cover and keeping my Louisville Slugger beside my bed.