I’m writing this column on my 70th birthday. In so doing I find myself recalling the words of that great philosopher, Mickey Mantle, who said, “If I had known I was going to live this long I would have taken better care of myself.”
Normally I tend to focus here on the oddball antics of Kentucky’s congressional delegation, which, given the consistent nincompoopery these guys brandish, is a fulltime job suited for a much younger person. But given the lack of volunteers stepping up to fill this news breach, I soldier on.
This week warrants a change. A birthday present to me, I guess. It’s about guns. And insanity. And how these two things much too often merge in this nation of ours.
I will acknowledge from the outset this is likely a waste of time, an example of barking at a brick wall or an old man yelling at clouds. So be it. It was Clarence Darrow who averred that lost causes are the only ones worth fighting for. Frankly, I would never feel comfortable over the next 70 years if I failed to issue a plea for this nation to finally comes to its senses over firearms and the vicious, destructive path we seem doomed to follow.
On Monday, a lone gunman went on a shooting spree at Michigan State University in East Lansing, peppering two separate campus buildings, killing three students and critically wounding three others. The perpetrator, who reportedly was armed with two handguns and multiple loaded magazines, committed suicide.
That was followed by yet another mass shooting in El Paso, TX, on Wednesday. One man was killed and three were wounded at a shopping mall, sparking renewed fears in a city that suffered a racially-motivated massacre three years ago that resulted in 23 deaths and 22 injuries. Two were arrested.
Mass shootings like these are becoming increasingly commonplace in the United States. In January, the Centers for Disease Control issued its firearm mortality data for 2021, showing that the nation suffered the most mass shootings in recorded history with at least 705 people killed in 690 mass incidents — an average of almost two per day. It represented a 13.1 percent increase over 2020.
The red tide doesn’t end there. The CDC further determined that guns accounted for 80.5 percent of the 26,031 homicides in the U.S. in 2021. Among those killed, 1,537 were children.
And we do nothing. In fact, we do less than nothing. America is marching backwards on gun control, thanks at least in some measure to a truly devastating Supreme Court decision issued in June 2022, authored by Justice Clarence Thomas, in the case of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, declaring that gun control laws must be “consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.”
What the hell does that mean? Must we return to 1776 to determine how colonial New York handled regulating the blunderbuss in deciding how to put the clamps on an AK-47? As it is, the decision struck down a New York state law enacted more than a century ago that placed restrictions on carrying concealed handguns outside the home. So now an untold number of state gun control regulations are being called into question.
Welcome to Dodge City.
Of course Kentucky didn’t need the Supreme Court to promote firearm absurdity. During the current legislative session alone lawmakers are considering bills that essentially end any and all restrictions. One measure that has already passed a House committee would make the commonwealth a so-called “sanctuary state” — protecting gun owners from any potential federal restrictions on gun ownership.
It’s the same story in a mess of other states. As firearms deaths increase, states like Kentucky respond by assuring an increase in gun ownership. It’s like treating an alcoholic with more Wild Turkey.
Despite protests to the contrary, we know what will reduce gun violence – fewer guns. In 1994, President Bill Clinton signed the Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act, “to prohibit the manufacture, transfer, or possession of a semiautomatic assault weapons,” specifically identifying armaments that were banned. That law further prohibited the “transfer or possession” of large-capacity ammunition devices that carried more than 10 bullets.
The law was not perfect, riddled with loopholes resulting from the negotiation process. But you know what? An assessment released in July 2004 by the Justice Department found that “the share of gun crimes involving AWs (assault weapons) declined by 17% to 72% across the localities examined for this study (Baltimore, Miami, Milwaukee, Boston, St. Louis, and Anchorage), based on data covering all or portions of the 1995-2003 post-ban period. This is consistent with patterns found in national data on guns recovered by police and reported to ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms).”
Unfortunately, the law sunset in 2003. And, as shown by the aforementioned 2021 statistics, firearm offenses have risen, fueled in part by the courts but mostly through gun-happy state legislatures.
The gun nut response is always the same, maintaining that bans deprive “law-abiding citizens” of the right to protect themselves.
Hence the problem — law-abiding citizens are law-abiding citizens until they’re not.
In 2017, 64-year-old Stephen Paddock checked into a hotel room on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas, stuck a firearm out of his window and opened fire into a crowd of about 22,000 people attending a country music concert. Sixty people died and 867 were injured – at least 413 wounded by gunfire.
Paddock did not have a criminal record. He was law-abiding. Until he wasn’t.
And, of course, when atrocities like Las Vegas occur, gun nuts respond with “thoughts and prayers,” a response that has become something of a running, sick joke. It’s like coming upon a bullet-riddled body, offering thoughts and prayers to the corpse, and then going on about your regular business, paying no real heed to the tragedy in front of your eyes.
It’s a true American tragedy, truly unknown elsewhere in the developed world.
But the United States, proudly defiant, will do nothing but watch the bodies mount. That was proven on Dec. 14, 2012, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CN, when a gunman entered and mowed down 26 people – 21 of the “people’” being infants, babies, really, tots who likely were looking excitedly at Christmas coming just 11 days later that they were destined to miss.
On a personal level, I’ll never get over that one, how babies were slaughtered and the nation essentially shrugged its shoulders, moved on and did nothing. Nothing. And we’re still suffering the consequences of this gun insanity.
May God have mercy on us all.
Yes, Virginia, there is gun control.
Nevermind your complete lack of context when citing deaths involving guns, your observations are clouded with emotion where you sound like one of the three stooges, “I’m trying to think, but nothins happenin!”.
I’m curious, what are the % of mass shootings per capita over the centuries?
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) defines a mass murderer as “someone who kills four or more people in a single incident (not including himself) with no “cooling-off period” between the murders, typically in a single location.” The FBI’s numbers prove: Between 1988 (when officials began documenting detailed information) and August 4, 2019, “assault rifles” were used in only 14 percent of those events.
In the US, we have the right to bear arms.. You openly advocate for taking away rights all law-abiding people have had since the beginning of this country. The type of firearm does not matter, the intent of the 2nd Amendment wasn’t to keep muzzle loaders in each cabin, it was to keep the people well armed and an overzealous government(s) or other bad actors at bay.
Despite our 2nd Amendment, there are controls on fire arms and other munitions in place.
Instead of focusing on taking away rights (the how), you should be focused on the people who are choosing to accomplish such grievous feats (the why). How many mass shootings are gang related? How many mass shootings are a result of other social ills? Although this thinking can be a slippery slope to red flag laws, it at least attempts to grasp the full situation before taking away people’s rights.
Until we can know why, we wont know how. Until then, yes, there are gun controls despite our 2nd Amendment, but those only affect law abiding citizens.