You’re the mayor of Noblesville, Indiana, a suburb of about 60,000 people northeast of Indianapolis. A new retail business is having a grand opening event in your town, something you’d think the top elected official would want to celebrate.
Nope.
With last week’s middle school shooting in his town on his mind, Mayor John Ditslear noticed that, as part of its grand opening, Hoosier Armory had a tent in front of their building encouraging shoppers to join the NRA.
“I did approach the owner and I just told him that, ‘No one expected this but you’re hurting your business, in my opinion, strongly, and you’re hurting our city,’ and I asked them to maybe just think about it and take the tent down, and I was asked to leave. And with those types of attitudes, those are very difficult but something needs to happen.
“The NRA needs to realize that they have a place in this to protect gun owners but they also have to make sure that gun owners are responsible.
Hizzoner didn’t explain how the NRA was in any way at fault in the Noblesville shooting, let alone how its presence in the form of a recruitment tent was hurting the city. And the cbs4indy.com reporter apparently never thought to ask him about that.
“Hopefully they learned a lesson,” said Ditslear, a Republican and grandfather to eight children. “I’ve not talked to them. Again, I was asked to leave, so I won’t go in there until I’m asked to come back.”
One lesson probably learned is to never trust a grandstanding politician. And while we don’t know for sure, we’d guess Mayor Ditslear’s phone won’t be ringing with an invitation from Hoosier Armory any time soon.