Sorting through gun debate craziness

For much of the past five weeks I’ve watched and listened to hysterics from anti-gun journalists and activists who know little or nothing about firearms, expounding on a variety of things, including the “heavy power” of the .223 cartridge, which in reality isn’t powerful enough for use as a reliable deer rifle.

A columnist for the Des Moines Register said NRA members should be chained to the back of a pickup truck and dragged around in a parking lot “until they changed their minds about gun control.”

One anti-gun blogger suggested shooting gun owners and NRA members.

That’s what some liberals call an “adult conversation.”

In New York State, a newspaper published the names and addresses of every concealed weapons permit holder in the county, causing outrage among the legal permit holders who included retired policemen, security officers and judge Jeannine Pirro. Then the newspaper hired armed security guards to keep the public away from the newspaper building and from the editorial staff’s own homes. How to you spell “hypocrisy?”

Also in New York State, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) called gun owners “extremists,” and Democrats in the State Assembly quickly passed gun restrictions that will ban the sale of “assault weapons” (meaning ugly-looking semi-autos that fire the .223 cartridge), and limit magazine capacity at seven rounds. Current owners have one year to register their rifles with police, or they will instantly become felons. Take THAT, you New York military veterans who served following 9/11! Registration, of course, eventually will lead to confiscation.

Congressional Democrats have been busy. Currently, more than a dozen bills have been drafted, most of which erode Second Amendment rights. One of the most sweeping is legislation proposed by Sen. Diane Feinstein (D) Calif. If you remember, she famously said several years ago that if she could get 51 votes in the Senate to ban every firearm in the U.S., she’d say “Turn them in, America.”

Mercifully, Democrats from red states are often pro-gun, and if they want to hop on the anti-gun bandwagon, they understand that they do so at their own peril. (It was Bill Clinton who admitted that NRA voters were largely responsible for Al “Aljazeera” Gore’s defeat in 2000.)

There has been talk about improving background checks, particularly at gun shows. Mental health issues, concealed carry in schools, armed guards or police in schools … Pres. Obama came out with 23 executive actions and a plea to the Congress to ban “assault weapons” and “high capacity” magazines. But Senate majority leader Harry Reid (D) Nev. doesn’t seem interested, and anti-gun legislation will go nowhere in the House, thanks largely to the Republican majority.

Most reasonable people realize that new gun laws will do nothing to prevent another tragedy like the Sandy Hook shooting. Politicians feel valuable, though, when they are doing something, even if it is ineffectual. Also, one needs to remember that gun shows and private firearms transactions drive anti-gun people nuts. If they could prevent you from handing down your firearms to your children and grandchildren, they would do it.

Joe Biden’s task force also explored violent video games and movies, but certainly nothing will be done about them. Biden really isn’t concerned with anything but guns, in spite of his theatrics with the task force. Biden spent almost four decades in the U.S. Senate as one of the most anti-gun senators in history. And remember that Hollywood was one of Obama’s biggest donors.

Also consider that Eric Holder’s Justice Department has seen a 40 percent drop in gun-related prosecutions. Still, we are lectured about our gun rights by an Administration responsible for supplying Mexican drug cartel members with firearms under “Fast and Furious.”

East Coast Democrats seem to forget that the founders established the Second Amendment to keep government AWAY from our guns — not the other way around.

One common thread runs through the last three mass shootings: They were each carried out by young, deranged men and they took place in “gun-free zones.”

A final note: A friend e-mailed a picture of a T-shirt to me yesterday. It read: “Dear God, Why do you allow so much violence in our schools?”

“Dear Concerned Student, I am not allowed in schools. GOD.”

Bernie Kuntz, a Jamestown native, has been a columnist for the Sun since 1974

Tags: bernie kuntz, outdoors