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“These aren’t easy days for gun control advocates,” the Chicago Sun Times editorial board admits, giving us good news from the git-go. The paper’s anti-pistol polemic proceeds to laud the City’s unconstitutional efforts to subvert the Supreme Court’s McDonald decision, which struck down a handgun ban and incorporated the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms (the 2A now trumps local and state law). And then they stop making sense. “The [gun control] laws — which limits who can own a gun; requires a permit, registry of each gun and firearms training; limits the number of guns per owner, and prohibits guns outside the home — does not discourage gun owners from exercising their Second Amendment rights. It merely regulates that right in a way that helps protect Chicagoans.” Now that is some serious FUD. It gets worse . . .
Research suggests these commonsense regulations will prevent unnecessary death and injury. Studies show that the more guns in the home, the more likely there are to be suicides by gun, accidental shootings by — and of — children, and domestic arguments that end with somebody being shot to death. One important 1998 study found that guns in the home were four times more likely to be used in accidents than in self-defense.
Paging Bruce Krafft. Will TTAG deconstructionist Bruce Krafft please report to the comments section? Suffice it to say that any editorial that cites research or studies to back up its position without providing links to said data is full of shit. Ipso facto.
Here’s the really scary bit: there are readers who nod their proverbial head and accept unsubstantiated quasi-scientific arguments without questioning the authority or veracity of the anonymous writers pushing the propaganda. I suspect (hope?) the Internet generation will not take this kind of crap at face value. Or at least learn to read between the lines. In this case, they don’t have to.
We are under no illusions that handgun regulation will make a big dent in Chicago’s gun violence problem. Chicago once had a gun ban and that failed to stop or curb the shootings in our streets.
Roger that. So WTF are they talking about? I’m seeing this from a pro-gun position, but doesn’t that admission completely undermine the Sun Times’ entire argument?
I suppose you could wiggle around the word “big” describing the gun control laws’ potential “dent” in Chicago’s gun violence. As in “even if it makes a small dent it’s worth it.” But it hardly seems worth the effort. The Times’ desultory conclusion indicates a similar lack of conviction. Thank God.
But easily available guns help make today’s violence possible.
As does gun control.