Prevent gun balance

On Sunday, March 11 in My Nickel’s Worth, Bob Roth wrote passionately in favor of keeping gun laws as they currently are, as the NRA demands, as opposed to the majority of Americans, including polls of NRA membership. “Guns don’t kill people, people do.” “Remember the Second Amendment.” These are worn-out mantras to stop discussion. What they fail to consider are the sensible laws being proposed that will not remove all guns from our citizen’s hands. Target shooting is an acceptable sport. Lawful hunting is a traditional activity. Weapons of war are meant to kill, not threaten, not maim.

Assault rifles inflict catastrophic damage to human tissue and bone greatly reducing the chance of survival. Human beings with compromised mental capacity do not have the ability to reason competently, should not have access to firearms. Increasing the chance of bullets flying in a school by arming school personnel will not make our students safer. Having armed civilians in the marketplace is increasing the possibility of mistaken identity by people not continually trained in situations of heightened tension.

Unlocked or nondisabled guns in the home can lead to unintended shootings in the heat of the moment. Unsecured guns can end up in the hands of a child unintentionally or intentionally — as brought to school in a backpack. Banning assault rifles, improving background-check laws, instituting school-safety measures in lieu of guns and gun safes and locks are only reasonable measures for the safety of all.

Carolyn Hammond

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Misdirection on guns

The Feb. 14 guest column by Gregory Franklin, “Don’t blame guns for violence in schools,” may not entirely be a waste of ink and readers’ time. It does serve as an example of a “straw man argument,” a disingenuous debating trick where one gives the impression of refuting an opponent’s argument while actually refuting something else.

Of course nobody is saying that enacting sensible gun laws “is going to end gun violence.” What they are saying, and what the experience of other countries supports, is that some mass shootings may not occur if there is a waiting period and background check and that, if they do occur, then the impact — the number of dead kids, for example — will be fewer if the shooter isn’t armed with near-military-grade assault weapons.

Franklin ducks from this important discussion completely, serving up one disproved trope after another, from the relevance of the murder rate in gun-restricted Chicago (where guns pour in from neighboring gun-friendly Indiana) to the idea that violent games and movies are the problem (contrary to numerous studies and not true for the rest of the world)

Instead Franklin provides an assortment of unrelated sins that must be rooted out to solve the problem of gun violence. These include pornography, social media, rap music, mayors of sanctuary cities and safe spaces!

We must ignore this moralizing misdirection and stay on topic: Should we as a society regulate the sale of mass-killing devices or not?

David Wadsworth

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Who throws tantrums?

I read with puzzlement the letter by Barry Garley on March 7 (“Sometimes, no trophy”). The letter states that the millions “who vehemently disagreed with virtually all policies of Barack Obama” did not “fall to the floor and kick and scream.” He admonishes those who are “tantrum-throwers” to get over it and give “our president’s policies a chance.”

That is a one-sided view of history, in my opinion. I happen to remember the tantrums at Tea Party rallies; the conspiracy theories about Obama’s birthplace, pushed by none other than President Donald Trump himself; and the obstructionism of Republicans in Congress, led by Mitch McConnell with the stated objective of making Obama a one-term president. Then there were the thousands of hours of kicking and screaming (literally) by right-wing talking heads like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and their ilk.

In short, given this strong opposition to everything Obama by the right, it is quite strange to see progressives (and never-Trump conservatives) criticized for strongly opposing Trump’s policies, as well as his behavioral impairments (juvenile ad hominem attacks, penchant for lying, attraction to Putin and disregard for conclusions by our intelligence services on Russian interference).

Certainly, it is expected that each side will oppose most of the other’s policies. That has been the norm in my long observation of American politics. We can live with that. Now, as to Mr. Garley’s comment that his “side won the election unaided by the Russians” (the electoral college, that is), this claim is only conjectural at this point.

Vernon Threlkeld

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