"Aiming at the NRA"

A few days ago, a gentleman wrote in to the Altoona Mirror concerning the NRA and gun ownership. Normally, I don't really care, but this letter in particular I found myself compelled to respond to. Here is his letter to the editor:

I want to congratulate the National Rifle Association and all its proud members for their success in the war on regulation of guns and bullets in America.

We have gone past the point of no return in access to guns.

The saturation of guns is beyond moderation and almost anyone can get enough guns and bullets to kill people, kill lots of people at once or only kill one at a time.

Again, congratulations to the NRA and its members. You should be proud of what you have done.

Do not let even one of the almost 30,000 bullet deaths annually in America diminish your pride. You deserve it.

Ralph Galbraith

And of course, I had to respond to this. Here is the reply I sent in to the Altoona Mirror:

I wanted to thank Ralph for his astute praise of the NRA at their incessant gun-mongering. His excellent locution is to be praised. After all, the NRA was there from the beginning, even with the founding fathers back in the day, making sure that the citizens had more guns than even the army at the time!

Similarly, his wit is entirely appropriate in proving the evils of a nation with guns, as compared to nations with a complete gun ban, like the UK. It's a great example: England has a violent crime rate that is... higher, in fact, than the US.

Or maybe it should be pointed out that Chicago, the city with the highest gun control in the US, has more than double the murder rate of the entire country. Clearly the NRA is at fault here. But perhaps we should examine something other than facts, just to be certain. 

We can even examine human psychology, just for fun.

The fact is that criminals will always exist; they don't care about laws, and will use every opportunity to not only circumvent the laws, but to use those very laws against others. And, being afraid of death, we now understand why nearly every mass shooting in the past fifty years has happened at a gun show with all those gun nuts instead of in a peaceful, gun-free zone. 

Ten points for spotting the sarcasm.

Possibly you may notice my vitriol. Normally I'm a very nice guy, and like the vast majority of gun owners (unlike most criminals, who happen to be gun *stealers* - oops, another law they like to break), I like to live peaceably. I'm not even a member of the NRA. I take issue with such poor argumentation. But I do take exception to such unqualified and malicious slander. 

The truth is we will never fully eliminate crime; human nature dictates that some people will choose to destroy others at any opportunity. It's an unhappy reality, and it's something that we are forced to confront the ugliness of on a daily basis. While we cannot legislate crime out of existence, what we can do is write such laws that fully enable the law-abiding citizens in this country to fully defend themselves while doing everything possible to limit criminal activity. Secret: trashing the NRA will do neither.

So let's stop pretending that any form of "assault weapons" ban will do anything to help the law-abiding citizens to defend themselves against those who would do them harm. Let's find something constructive that will actually help. Here's an idea: let's take off the targets that we paint any time "no guns allowed" is posted somewhere. After all, nothing says "perfect location for mass murder" like a sign declaring that no one can stop you - and that's what criminals read when they see that sign.

Thank you, Ralph, for your brilliant insight. Maybe next time we can ban knives, like the EU is considering doing. Heck, let's just keep banning weapons; we'll even ban rocks! Eventually it'll work! Sincerely, the "point of no return" occurred sometime around 1776.

This level of idiocy is one of the few things that is so instantly angering to me. Sure, be against gun ownership, it's your right! But mass blaming a good section of Americans for something that they did not do with high malice and contempt? Unacceptable.

Man, I really need to post on something positive here. Maybe soon.