Guns Don't Kill People?

Let me be clear about one thing, right up front.

The Blog has a number of friends who are evangelical about the right of gun ownership. Hell! The Blog has at least two friends who own gun shops!

The 2nd Amendment of the of the Constitution of The United States of America guarantees the right to bear arms.

We can quibble over the whole "well regulated militia" thing, but the Supreme Court has made that a moot point. So parsing words and splitting hairs about it is a waste of time and energy.

The 2nd Amendment = Settled Law = Done Deal.

Obama is not coming for your guns and ammo. Neither is the United Nations, Hillary Clinton, James Baker (although, if anyone has good reason to hate guns, it's James Baker) the Democrats, the liberals, Michael Moore, or me.

Even if we wanted to (and some of us do) it just ain't gonna happen. No matter what the daily email blasts from the NRA tell you.

But, while my gun loving friends exercise their 2nd Amendment rights, allow me to exercise my 1st Amendment right to say that I find the whole gun fetish thing unnerving and creepy.

How many more Auroras, Columbines, Virginia Techs and Fort Hoods? How many more Gabby Giffords, or (dare I say it?) Ronald Reagans, before we can have a calm, paranoia free, common sense discussion about making it just a little bit more difficult for goddamned lunatics to arm themselves?

The Blog is an outspoken advocate for the 1st Amendment. The Blog also knows that you do not have the right to yell "FIRE!" in a crowded theater, incite riots or paint swastikas on your jewish neighbor's garage.

In The Blogs not so humble opinion, emptying an AR-15 into a crowded theater is actually worse than yelling "FIRE!" No?

Predictably, the bodies in Aurora weren't yet cold when several far right, NRA funded politicians and even more right-wing pundits wasted no time suggesting that, "if only some of the movie goers had been packing, the shooter might have been stopped."

It's the same tired argument that we hear whenever there is a shooting.

"What we needed in this situation is more guns."

Okay, So here is what I want to know about Friday morning's Colorado movie theater massacre.

Colorado is a "concealed carry" state.

So where were those 2nd Amendment cowboys who should have taken out the psycho shooter before he killed 12 innocent people and wounded something in the neighborhood of 70 others?

Where were the John Waynes and Harry Callahans of the state of Colorado who fantasize taking down The Jokers of the world with their mad gun skillz?

Were they hiding under theater seats? Or were they running like the devil out of the theater?

Or, were they maybe... just maybe... hip to the reality that you can't just start firing a gun willy-nilly into a dark, smoke filled, crowded theater?

Today, The Blog heard a post from someone commenting on the "Armchair Vigilante." The Blog has not been able to find the actual post, so he is paraphrasing here...

"He had a semi-automatic AR-15 and full body armor. You have a pistol and a t-shirt from Walmart. He is focused and practiced. You are caught by surprise, in the dark, disoriented by smoke bombs. So, what good are you in this situation?"

Anyone who knows about our fairly recent history remembers the North Hollywood Bank of America robbery that took place on February 28th, 1997. Two bank robbers, armed with semi-automatic weapons and full body armor, held off Los Angeles police first responders for hours. It took the SWAT team and armor piercing ammo supplied by a local gun shop (and one self-inflicted gunshot) to stop these assholes.

Here is the thing...

The 24 year old shooter who legally purchased a semi-automatic weapon and three other guns and 6000 rounds of ammo, (and, on all accounts, bought 15 thousand dollars worth of body armor) and who knows how much bomb making materials,  could not, legally, rent a car.

Speaking of cars...

Automobiles on our freeways are all potential deadly weapons. Half ton, 65 miles per hour killing machines. All "open carry." But, license and insurance is required.

Should we really be okay with concealed carry, like this shit?

"Guns don't kill people?"

No.

Psychos with access to guns and 6000 rounds of ammo kill people.