Guns Rights, NRA, and Democracy

For what it’s worth, I’m adding my voice to the gun control debate. From when I first shot a rifle at the gun range in the basement of Mississauga’s Thomas Kennedy High School I’ve enjoyed shooting rifles. I affirm the right of hunters and recreational target shooters to own guns. I also seek to understand the Second Amendment within its original context rather than the twisted recasting that has current sway.    
 

After yesterday’s drivel from NRA’s Wayne Lapierre, I cannot remain silent. He has drawn me into expressing my views to my elected officials. Some gun advocates say that this is not the time to discuss such issues. When would be the time? Two months later following another shooting? Six months later? There is bound to be another shooting that would be used to justify the “now is not the time” posture. The “now is not the time” statement is commonly made after shootings. Yet I remain perplexed why many of the same people don’t refrain from speaking out and taking action doing similar when people are killed by drunk drivers, or underage drinking parties, or major accidents with loss of life occur at poorly designed intersections, or when mass transit safety is a concern following an accident, or with regard to abortion, in rare cases of voter fraud, etc. They would never accept, “now is not the time” argument on these type of issues. Many of those who advocate “respectful silence during a time of grief” after a shooting are the first to call for action and push for redress to limit its recurrence. I don’t see any reason to treat Second Amendment rights under different rules than other issues.


The NRA’s reasoning is flawed, and we would never accept such flawed reasoning on any other issue. Nonetheless, it is accepted widely and embraced because it taps into our own fears and paranoia, both national and individual. Therefore, we want to accept such reasons to justify gun ownership. If I understand LaPierre’s reasoning, it runs this way…gun ownership provides the foundation to keep America free. Furthermore, America is a dangerous country, so much so that all its citizens must be armed to protect themselves from each other; if more citizens were armed, gun crime would decrease as people would be afraid to use guns illicitly; and as gun free zones schools are particularly vulnerable because they invite people to take guns there and to use them against helpless victims.

The NRA argues that government legislation should not prevent law-abiding citizens from buying whatever guns they want. I have two problems with this argument. First, it opens the door wide open to enabling criminals and the emotional unstable to buy guns too. Just as we do by locking our doors and by having keys to start our cars limit theft, having some gun purchase barriers/qualifications helps limit the opportunity and the frequency of criminals and the unstable securing guns. Second, it also overlooks that a good number of those who have used a gun in suicide, to commit homicide and even many of these mass shootings that catch our attention, were law-abiding citizens up until the moment they pulled the trigger.

What Lapierre is proposing for arming schools with armed officers is exactly what Columbine High School had when the shootings occurred there. In fact, that school had two armed police officers on duty at the moment of the shooting. The shooters knew their school had armed officers, but that knowledge did not instill any fear in them. The shootings still took place. The mall in Washington state had armed security, yet the shootings still occurred. The shooter in the Sandy Hook had guns in his home, which were owned by his mother. Instead of her guns protecting her, as the NRA argues should have been the case, they were used against her.

When the shooter of President Ronald Regan drew out his weapon, he knew there would be a multitude of Secret Service agents and local police officers with weapons ready to be used. The shooter who attempted to shoot President Ford faced the same and she knew it. Robert Kennedy had similar protection. Yet in all three cases, did all that well armed protection deter the shooters? Evidently, the armed protection was not a deterrent, which argues against LaPierre’s reasoning. Also arguing against Lapierre’s reasoning is the Fort Hood shooting, a place where thousands of people were well armed, and still unable to prevent a tragedy.

More Americans have guns in their homes than at any other time than in over a hundred years. According to LaPierre’s reasoning, gun crime should be decreasing. We should be at our lowest point. Have the number of gun crimes decreased? No, they have not; in fact, they have increased. The severity of the shootings higher than it was in the 70s and 80s when large gun clips were not available to the general public.

Switzerland and Israel are two countries with trained civilian military who, until recent years, took their military arms home. Both countries were experiencing unaccepted levels of accidental shootings, domestic homicides and suicide. After they changed their policies regarding military guns in home, the rates of such instances in all three types of gun activity dramatically decreased.

Israel discovered that when a soldier had a gun in the home and became depressed, that the gun was too available to be used in a moment of depression and heightened emotions. Removing the gun allowed time for the heightened emotions to diminish and moments of depression to work themselves out. Is gun availability in the home a factor behind law enforcement being the highest profession for suicide by gun? It’s a question that needs attention.

Part of me pities Lapierre for having such a negative feeling about the society in which he lives and works. Imagine living in such fear, believing that your society is so dangerous that you must be heavily armed at work, as you drive around your community, as you shop, as you travel, as you go out to restaurants and entertainment venues and as you live in your home. I cannot imagine living with such fear. I could not work in an office where I felt I needed to have a weapon at hand, because I did not think highly about my workmates and had a gun just in case they started shooting and I had to be willing to kill some of them. The same applies to how I view my neighbors or who will be with me tomorrow morning in church. I live and work in the neighborhood in which he works, travels and lives. The NRA headquarters is just two hundred yards from my home and I have never had a fear walking and driving in the community. But alas he has such fear. Then I remind myself that LaPierre is a paid mouthpiece, albeit a highly paid one, for the gun manufacturers and dealers who underwrite the bulk of the NRA budget and much of LaPierre’s salary. He is paid by gun manufacturers and dealers to spin a story to help protect their business and pump gun sales.

I think it is a sad commentary that an organization is advocating that every school become an armed camp. In a time when schools are cutting teaching positions due to budgetary constraints, it is being argued, implicitly, that more teaching positions should be eliminated so armed police officers can patrol school hallways and guard school doors. I do not want my children, or future grandchildren, stepping off school buses and having to walk past guards carrying military grade rifles; I don’t want students to be compelled to pass through metal detectors as they enter their school, nor do I want them to see their teachers standing before them with guns on their hips. What a horrible message to send to them day after day, year after year. What a horrible message to send about a free democratic society, that they are no safer in the community than children in conflict torn countries.

As an aside, the NRA boasts about its membership numbers, which have, sadly, increased since the Newtown massacre. I look at such boasting with askance. If you own a gun and wish to go to a gun range, you are likely going to have to join the NRA as a condition of using the range. Like the closed union shops with union membership required to work at the plant, NRA membership is required to practice with your gun at gun ranges, and though the majority of NRA members hold that registration, background checks and clip limits are reasonable protections, the NRA uses their dues to advance views that many of their members do not support. Yet, while conservatives decree the unions for having closed shops, no one word of protest is heard about the NRA requirement to use a gun range…a most interesting inconsistency that suggests that when it comes to the gun industry in America, it is allowed operate by a different set of laws.

To hold that the gun is the foundation is our democracy is a most unfortunate commentary on the nature and fragility of American democracy. History continues to teach us that armed, biased local militias and thugs stifle democracy, not enhance it. Further, does this not imply that countries that have gun control laws are not true democracies? The Canadians, Japanese, British, French, Germans, Swiss, Italians, Austrians, Dutch, Danes, Norwegians, Swedes, Fins, Australians, all vigorous democracies with gun control, would disagree with such a position. The ballot and free speech, not guns, are the true foundations of democracy. American democracy is well and strong, it is no so fragile that it needs a gun to protect it!

I favor reasonable registration of all firearms, background checks, limits on the type of guns and clip sizes available to civilians, and mandatory firearms safety certifications. Would such laws eliminate all gun violence? No, and to think otherwise would be delusional. Do car registrations, required annual safety inspections and safety standards, driver licenses and licensing standards eliminate all accidents? No, but accidents rate would be much higher with poorly trained (or untrained) drivers. And vehicle safety standards help remove unsafe cars from the road, thereby make driving our roads a much safer experience for all. The same things apply for gun use and regulation.

At the top I noted that I enjoyed target shooting. It is a sport I would like to enjoy again, but, unfortunately, to do so functionally requires that I be a member of the NRA. THAT I will not do, for I repudiate that organization’s irresponsible policies, as well as its warped views of my neighbors, workmates, and society in general. Unlike Wayne LaPierre, I choose to respect rather than fear my fellow humans.

Scoundrels, Ballots and Power Trips

Politics has always been a cutthroat endeavor. For millennium men, and in more recent decades women too, have manipulated the public through misrepresentation, obfuscation of facts, inflaming people by playing to their more base fears and with carefully crafted public relations machines that help to project one persona while in private another and a contrary persona exists. They have manipulated the power system for their own personal gain, those of their friends and those who give them the most money to get elected.

We only need to look at the recent scandals to see this…and I am not just talking about those who are caught but the reaction of the opposition and their own party to their unsavory actions. I find it appalling and hypocritical that those who defended and kept a “family values” Senator in power after it was discovered that the Senator was visiting high priced prostitutes regularly, and maybe paying for them out of campaign contributions, were the first voices to attack a man of the other party for sending a nude picture of himself to several women. I was gravely disappointed that a Senator who covered up sexual harassment and an offer another Senator had with a woman who worked for him and delivered money to hush her received to calls for resignation from his own party. It happens with all parties…defend my party member, explain away his actions, and if the actions were wrong then minimize their significance while aggressively attacking the other party on the same, overplaying it, keeping the story going with the press by adding to the feeding frenzy.

Politics by its nature draws scoundrels and vipers. By its nature, it seductively boosts egos and inflames libidos. Power and the money are corrupting. Hence some cynics state that the only honest politician is the one who was not elected. I am not quite so cynical as there are politicians of every stripe across the globe who provide honorable service to their constituents and country. It is incumbent upon us, the voters, to cut through the clutter, to cease holding the view that my guy is always right, and that we seek people to be in office who consistently put the needs of the country ahead of the needs of their party, their friends or those who are filling their campaign coffers. We need to be diligent to not be unduly influenced by the politics of fear, image projection, the sound bite and the misleading obfuscations.

We do not need angry demanding movements who shout and press an agenda that more often than not is too narrow and unbalanced. An angry demanding movement is easily inflamed, co-opted and reactionary. Instead, we need thoughtful reflected voters who research issues, speak cogently to their elected officials and weight a host of issues when casting their ballots. We need voters not only hold our election officials accountable but who push beyond the superficial campaign image to give due diligence before casting their ballots.

America's Commitment to Democracy is Tested

With what has been taking place in Egypt we are seeing played out in the White House and in Congress the depth and nature of the United States’ commitment to democracy and the citizenry choice of government. Politicians of both parties and citizens of the United States repeated proclaim that democracy is one of its core values, yet cracks have appeared in the nature and depth of that commitment when an American friendly despot is being openly challenged by his citizens.

Some have criticized President Obama and his administration from giving mixed signals to Egypt in the first day or two the protests started. One can understand some mixed signals while information is being evaluated. In those early hours we heard statements supporting the citizenry to peacefully express their opinions, for the Egyptian leadership to listen to those voices and not respond with violence. As the days passed the public statements by the Obama administration clearly signaled that the Egyptian despotic government had lost credibility.

There were too many political voices who have insist that the United States government should have stood behind Mubarak as Mubarak had been a good friend. Those voices still continue to insist that it was better for the USA to support a tyrannical regime that is friendly to the USA than risk the people establishing, even via a democratic process, a government that is less friendly or even hostile to America. When it is all boiled down to the essence, those voices, regardless of pontifications otherwise, are stating the democracy, an empowered citizenry, and personal freedom are not the dominant principles as they hold them to be.

He Who Controls the Megaphone

Two weeks ago the US Supreme Court tossed out the limits on what can be contributed by individuals or companies to politicians and political action committees. The court also tossed out what individuals or political action committees are able to spend on political advocacy advertisements in the weeks before an election.

The Court’s 5-4 majority position is that contribution limits hinder free speech, stifle dialogue and hinder the election process. These wise judges on the Court dismiss the idea that money can influence elections. They do agree that a small group who can control the megaphone, outshout their opponents and can pour money into slick messaging will overpower the message and arguments of their opponents and in the process determine who will be in power.

Essentially their position is that minor parties who have tried to get candidates elected have not been successful because the messages of these candidates have not had any traction. Lack of access to the public forum has little to do with their lack of success.

American and world history is replete with examples of the powerful installing elected officials into office and having them function more or less as their puppets. Over the centuries various despots have learned that he who is able to control the mass communication process will control the masses. The Iranian government fully understands this principle as it used the mass communication system over and over again to limit the extent and then to quell the protests over the election process.

Over the last 13 Presidential elections since 1960 the Republicans have won seven times. Over the last 9 Presidential elections the Republicans have won five times. Rarely has 58% or more of the House or Senate been in the hands of one party. If the Court is correct there will not be a significant shift in this pattern over the next ten to fifteen years. On the other hand if critics of the Court's ruling are correct, out ten years there will be fewer Democratic victories in races for the House, Senate and White House with well healed corporations and the wealthy pouring money into candidates of their choice, most likely Republican races. Increasingly Democrats will sound like current Republicans and more Republicans will start to sound like Forbs 500 executives. The end result is that America could move towards having the trapings of a democracy with elected officials functioning as an extension of an oligarchy.

The theory that he who controls the megaphone controls the election results is about to be tested.

Tyranny and Theocracy

The purpose of the Iranian revolution was not just to overthrow the Shah and his despotic regime but to establish a theocracy. The Iranians held a theocracy under a collective of spiritual men would establish and lead a just upright society and the country would flourish.

One of the principle architects of the theocracy Grand Ayatullah Montazeri recently died at the age of 87 as an outspoken critic of the theocracy he helped established. As one of the theocracy’s founders and Grand Ayatullahs Montazeri even though under house arrest since 1997 he had greater freedom to speak his mind and thereby give some legitimacy to the Green Movement for questioning the results of recent elections.

While maintaining he was not disillusioned he criticized the theocratic government for exchanging one oppressive tyranny for another. Monatzeri took issue with political clerics for amassing power and wealth rather than serving the people. He condemned ongoing mass executions of dissidents and for issuing death statements that give people the impression that the Iranian theocratic government is in the business of killing people. He came to advocate freer speech and an open press that he repressed in his earlier years.

I suspect that most conservative and middle of the road Christians would say that they are not surprised by the religious tyranny and clerics using their positions to accumulate power and wealth for themselves. They are not surprised because Iranians cannot have a true theocracy since they worship a false god and have a flawed human penned holy book. Hence, the theocracy is a failed experiment. Rather than the clerics being spiritually minded and guided by the God’s Spirit, they are guided by self-centered motives and do things to keep themselves in power rather than serving the people.

I concur that the Iranian theocracy has not served the Iranian nation and that it is a very impressive regime. History is replete with examples of leaders corrupted by absolute power. It happened in Rome, in France, England, and the Soviet Union. It occurred in the Roman Catholic Church. It happens within an unfettered capitalist system. Even though there are checks and balances against absolute power, the corrupting nature of power and amassing of wealth through office also happens within a democratic system.

Some conservative Christians dream of having a theocracy. If a Christian theocracy were established in any country would we see the same corrupting influence? It is pity to say this, but yes we would see the same. Human beings who are high minded have a way justifying their actions while doing ungodly and unrighteous things. It would not take long for narrow set of religious views to prevail while those who differ in thought and lifestyle are oppressed, and sometimes oppressed in an ungodly fashion. Quietly at first leaders would gather greater power and the wealth trappings of that come with it. Two decades or so later their hording of self-serving power and gathering of immense personal wealth will be done less quietly. Hence, over the years tyranny would be firmly entrenched.

Regardless of the title or the justification absolute power is dangerous for the populous.

Is the Ballot Box Supreme?

In a democracy is the ballet box supreme over the Constitution? Does majority rule of ballot box such an inviolate principle that the majority can use ballot measures to marginalize unpopular groups?

In the United States these questions are real. Over the last twenty years local and state-wide initiatives on the ballot have become increasingly popular. They are being used “to correct” legislation and court rulings. While proponents claim not to be bigoted, a significant number of the initiatives are aimed at minorities, such as gays, Hispanics, Muslims, non-Christian groups in general and atheists.

When unfettered majority rules does that then not mean that the equality clauses in the founding documents like the Constitution becomes merely lofty words with little effective meaning? I think so. The character of a nation is partly measured by how it treats and protects the rights of unpopular groups...and that character is being tested by various ballot initiatives targeting minority groups.

The ballot box cannot be supreme or we can end up with the tyranny of the majority. The nation's primary documents take primacy over the ballot box and so do court rulings, even the court rulings I do not like.