Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
It was inevitable that after the shootings in the high school in Littleton, Colo., there would be a cry for more gun control.
And I knew it would come in the form of a plea from President Bill Clinton because the polls show that a slim majority of Americans favor more gun control.
President Clinton has always governed by the polls so there is no reason for the gun issue to be an exception.
According to an Associated Press poll, 51 percent of the people surveyed said they think tougher gun laws are more effective than tighter enforcement of existing gun laws. That's up about 9 percent from just before the slaughter at Columbine High School. Another 40 percent of people surveyed think that parents should face charges if a child younger than 18 commits a crime with a gun.
So, voila, guess what President Clinton proposes? Raising the legal age for handgun possession from 18 to 21 and holding parents responsible when their children commit crimes with guns.
I know, I know, it sounds great and all. But what they fail to tell us is that lots of states already have the 21-year-old restriction.
And as for the parents thing, well, I just think that's stupid. I mean, really. How would that work? Your kid goes out, steals a gun and holds up a liquor store while you're at home in bed. You get awakened by the cops and hauled off to jail? Come on. That's ludicrous.
I know the good intention here. It's trying to force parents to be more involved with their kids. To know what they're up to. The law is aimed at parents who are out of touch with their kids. Or parents who just don't care what their kids do. But I'd be willing to bet that for every two parents out there who don't care what their kids do, there is one parent who really does care but simply can't control the kid.
Take these kids in Colorado, for example. From middle class homes. Getting good grades. A couple minor scrapes with the law. One of them was seeing a psychiatrist and was on an anti-depressant. Do you suppose that kid made the appointment with the shrink all by himself? I doubt it. I'll bet mom and dad made the appointment for him.
Apparently, one of the Colorado kids had a shotgun barrel on his dresser when the cops searched the house. I thought that was weird. But then I asked myself, what does my 14-year-old have on his dresser? I had no clue. I went home and looked.
No bombs or shotgun barrels, I must say, but I did feel a little guilty snooping around. So, all you parents of teens out there, have you inventoried your kid's dresser lately? Is that part of your routine?
Well, maybe it better be, or you'll wind up doing time if your kid snaps.
Proposals like this show exactly how knee-jerk some of our politicians are. After a tragedy, they feel like they have to do something - anything - to make it look like they really care about us. So we end up with dumb laws.
I wonder why we're only singling out parents of kids who commit crimes with guns. What if a kid hacks somebody up with a machete? Shouldn't those parents be charged? Or what if a kid gets loaded and kills somebody with a car? Shouldn't those parents be charged? What if a kid sells dope to another kid who overdoses and dies? Shouldn't those parents be charged?
Nope. Only parents of kids who do bad things with guns. It's an absurd concept and an even worse law.
But now is the time to strike for more gun laws. In fact, whether or not the president succeeds in getting some laws passed depends largely on whether the current spate of increased support is permanent or just a short-lived reaction to the Littleton tragedy.
The first attempt for Clinton failed when the Senate failed to pass those two Clinton proposals and several others, including tightening controls on gun shows.
But by Friday there were other proposals and members of both parties were pointing fingers and painting each other as soft on crime and violence.
And it will continue as long as the polls show it's the popular thing to do.
So for what it's worth, here's how I sum up the gun issue. Just a few little tidbits for you to think about as the drama unfolds in the near future.
First, America is awash in guns. There are somewhere in the neighborhood of 250 million of them. That's just about one for every man, woman and child in the nation. And just as we are awash in guns, we are awash in gun laws. There are some 20,000 gun laws on the books. If they were all enforced routinely, prison populations would grow exponentially.
The killers in Columbine, as best as anybody can tell, broke somewhere in the neighborhood of 17 gun laws during the commission of their crimes. If they had broken 20 gun laws, would that have helped? How about 30 or 40? And if there were a few more gun laws, would that deter others who might want to shoot up a school or office or post office?
I took a logic class in college. I don't remember a lot about it but I remember one thing. If you start out with a false premise, everything that follows, logically, can't be true. The false premise in the gun debate is that more gun laws will reduce crime or gun violence.
Logically, one must deduce that more laws won't make much difference. The only way then can is if they are somehow fundamentally different and more soundly conceived than existing laws. What I'm hearing so far doesn't measure up.
Like the proposal to require instant background checks of people buying guns at gun shows. Great. Let it happen. But also be honest and concede that the people who go to gun shows are not generally malicious people. Most are hunters and collectors of antiques. Lots of guns that are purchased at those shows don't even shoot.
Sure, there may be somebody at a gun show who wants to buy cheap guns for resale to criminals. But they'll pass the background check anyway unless they happen to be a convicted felon.
And even if you thwart that tiny number of criminals from buying guns at gun shows, it certainly doesn't preclude them from buying guns somewhere else. If a criminal wants a gun, no law written will prevent him from getting one.
Virtually all gun laws have the same flaws because all start out with that false premise. More gun laws equals less crime or less violence. It's simply not true.
And then, after all, there is the pesky little Second Amendment problem. Our Constitution, debatable and up for interpretation as it is, quite clearly prohibits anything as drastic as gun confiscation.
So what do we do about all those 250 million guns out there? We have to do something.
Go after the manufacturers? Go after the parents? Go after the kids? Who knows.
Frankly, I'll bet alcohol kills more people and destroys more lives than guns in any given year. Fast food probably clogs more arteries and kills more people. Adverse reactions to prescription drugs probably kill more people.
So really, I think it's more a matter of what the polls show and what is currently the politically correct thing to do.
