MAINSTREAM NEWSPAPERS DUPE THE PUBLIC ON GUN DEBATE

It is a curious fact that mainstream newspapers consistently fail to provide their readers with logically sound, consistent, coherent, cogent arguments to support their case against civilian ownership of guns. Indeed, there isn’t a pretense to do so. Rather, these newspapers prefer to recite banal normative prescriptions, empty slogans, and vague statements devoid of any meaningful content. The mainstream newspapers take as a given that civilian gun ownership is untenable. And upon that faulty foundation they spout pious sentiments and posit specious propositions, ostensibly to support a doubtful moral position.

A few days ago, on September 27, 2014, Joe Nocera, an opinion columnist for The New York Times, wrote a piece titled, “Paralysis isn’t Inevitable.” In that Op-Ed Nocera says Congress can act to pass more gun laws. He points to a strategy Daniel Webster  Director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, proposes to accomplish that.

According to Webster, “It’s a loser to call for a gun ban.” Instead {Webster’s} reforms would make it more difficult for criminals to get their hands on guns. Using background checks, {Webster} would keep guns away from people who have a history of violence. {Webster} would raise the age of gun ownership to 21. (Webster notes that homicides peak between the ages of 18 and 20). . . . And {Webster} would mandate something called microstamping, ‘which would make it possible to trace a gun used in a crime to its first purchaser. . . .’ And {Webster} pointed to polls that show the vast majority of gun owners favor such changes.”

Nocera then quotes, with approval, Webster’s obligatory attack on the NRA. “The N.R.A. has been very successful in controlling the conversation and making it about a cultural war. . . . But, I believe that narrative won’t persist. The key . . . is to change the conversation so that it is about pro- and anti-crime instead of pro- and anti-gun. . . . I think that ultimately that idea will prevail, and it will be a pretty mainstream idea.”

Before we analyze the various assertions expressed in this Op-Ed, keep in mind that the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research is not a neutral think tank. It has an agenda and that agenda is decidedly unfavorable toward the Second Amendment. Its purpose: “The Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research began in 1995 with funding from the Joyce Foundation of Chicago. It is dedicated to reducing gun violence by providing information on firearm injuries and gun policy; by developing, analyzing, and evaluating strategies to prevent firearm injuries; and by conducting public health and legal research to identify gun policy needs.”

You will note the absence of any mention of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms in the context of the Center’s mission statement. The normative argument implicit in the Center’s mission statement and as tacitly conveyed in Nocera’s Op-Ed is this: anything that the Center perceives as harmful to the public is morally reprehensible and must be banned. Guns are perceived as harmful to the public. Therefore guns must be banned. That is the moral argument – the normative prescription against gun ownership and possession. And, the goal of the “The Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research” is clear enough from a perusal of its mission statement. Colloquially expressed the goal is simply this: Get guns out of the hands of the civilian population. Now, let’s take a look at the fallacies and speciousness of Webster’s assertions as cited, nonetheless, with approval in Nocera’s NY Times Op-Ed piece.

First, we might well ask how Webster’s strategies prevent criminals from obtaining guns. Clearly, criminals aren’t prevented from obtaining guns. But, a good chunk of law-abiding American citizenry would be precluded from obtaining guns if any of these strategies became law. Apparently, Webster and Nocera equate criminals – who have never had a problem obtaining guns – with law-abiding citizens, whom they do not wish to have access to guns.

Second, Webster says that, “it is a loser to call for a gun ban.” No kidding and rightly so! Yet, in the very assertion Webster admits the need to deceive the public. To get the public to cajole Congress to enact further restrictive gun laws, it is necessary to get the public to think less about the law-abiding citizen’s right to own and possess guns and more about criminals who misuse guns. Of course, Webster fails to acknowledge the myriad laws on the books that prohibit criminals from owning guns – laws that are rarely, if ever, enforced. So, Webster’s desire for further restrictive laws against gun ownership and possession must be directed, not against the career criminal, but, rather, against the law-abiding citizen.

Third, knowing that laws against ownership of guns by law-abiding Americans won’t fly, Webster suggests attacking the right to keep and bear arms obliquely, through the device of “background checks.” Note: Webster hasn’t mentioned using background checks to target criminals. Rather, he wishes to target two other exponentially larger population groups: those under the age of 21, specifically those between the ages of 18 and 20, and those whom, he says, “have a history of violence.”

Let’s take a closer look at these two groups. It should be obvious to all Americans that the minimum age of enlistment in any of the armed forces is 17. So, an American citizen may, as a soldier, handle and possess sophisticated weaponry at age 17, but Webster and Nocera would deny an American citizen, as a civilian, to own and possess a gun until he or she is 21.

You see where this is going. Say a young man or woman leaves the military at age 20. A person risks life and limb to serve his and her Country and is perfectly adept at handling firearms; but, as a civilian, that American citizen isn’t permitted to own a firearm because he or she falls into an age group that, according to Webster, happens to have the highest rates of homicide. Dubious statistics trumps ice-cold logic.

Fourth, and what does the phrase “a history of violence” mean: That a person who had ever said a discouraging word to another person is violent? That a person who was depressed at some point in his or her life is presumptively violent against self and/or against others? That a person who had ever had an altercation with another for whatever reason is violent? That a soldier or sailor or airman who had engaged in armed conflict is violent? Cannot such an open-ended phrase, “a history of violence,” sweep into the clutches of the gun grabbers literally millions of honest, law-abiding Americans? Undoubtedly, Webster wishes to keep the phrase as open-ended and as amorphous as possible, to corral millions of law-abiding Americans.

Fifth, Webster and Nocera refer to that “something” or other called microstamping that would enable the police to trace a gun “to its first purchaser.” The emphasis here is on tracing a gun “to its first purchaser,” and not to the criminal who actually used the gun in the commission of a crime. So, a criminal plants cartridge shells at the scene of the crime or steals a gun from a law-abiding firearms owner. The police duly “trace” the gun “to its first purchaser,” and not to the criminal. And, we are to conclude that microstamping is an acceptable forensics tool for law enforcement? Really? Clearly, microstamping of firearms is worse than useless. Apparently, Webster and Nocera think otherwise. Perhaps they simply don’t care, reasoning that, if a law-abiding person didn’t have a gun in the first place, the gun could never be traced back to him. So, the moral is: don’t own a gun!

Sixth, and what about those opinion polls? Without referring to any particular poll, Webster says that, in the wake of Newtown, gun owners favor changes to existing gun laws. What changes is Webster referring to? And, what questions were asked of “gun owners” whom Webster claims support “changes?” Certainly, one can phrase a question in a multitude of ways to elicit any answer the questioner wishes. And, asking a question about guns, when emotions run high, is not the time to push through legislation. The public should be treated with respect. And appeals should be directed to one’s higher cognitive functions, not to the emotive center of one’s brain.

Seventh, Webster attacks the NRA. The antigun crowd always attacks the NRA. Webster asserts the NRA controls the conversation about guns. If that were only true! Actually, the NRA is forever compelled to repel insistent attacks against it and against the Second Amendment. Webster says the NRA makes the issue about guns a “cultural war.” Since when is the battle to preserve and secure our sacred Bill of Rights reduced to a matter of personal aesthetics, which, apparently, is what Webster is getting at through use of the word ‘culture?’ And, when, if ever, did the NRA profess a cavalier attitude toward crime? Webster suggests that any pro-gun argument, which, actually, is a pro Bill of Rights Second Amendment argument, entails acquiescence toward gun violence. That is absolutely false, but Webster creates the association anyway suggesting, ludicrously, that the NRA, by being strong on guns, is soft on crime.

Bottom line: don’t look to the mainstream news media for cogent, well-reasoned arguments. You won’t get them.