Pantagraph Reporter Changes Opinion on Guns
This past weekend writer Edith Brady-Lunny offered personal experiences on the issue of firearms for Pantagraph. But consider how this piece starts out:
Personal bias is something journalists are trained avoid [sic] when they cover the news.
When I started working on a story about the controversial issue of concealed carry of weapons in Illinois, I was forced to face my own bias. I have never lived in a home with guns and considered myself the quintessential anti-gun nut.
First, we congratulate Brady-Lunny, not for the article that follows – where she describes her experience at the gun range – but rather that she admits she has her own bias. Too many journalists, for reasons that we don’t truly understand, have a natural bias against guns. At least Brady-Lunny admitted of such.
But let’s look at one other statement she makes:
My aversion to guns and my long-held belief that less is better when it comes to firearms in the hands of anyone other than peace officers or soldiers is rooted in my experience as a journalist. I have witnessed firsthand the harm and carnage that comes from people wielding guns. The images of a heart or a head riddled with bullets and stories of the aftermath of gun violence have always stayed with me.
And here is the root of the bias, which we don’t understand. Brady-Lunny is clearly an idealist, someone who believes cops are always the good guys, soldiers only protect the innocent and only bad people would want a gun otherwise. Clearly this journalist hasn’t watched the world news – where it took guns from Libyan rebels (and help from NATO in the way of air support) to take down a dictator, or where the military in Syria retains control despite attempts to start a revolution. Clearly this journalist doesn’t follow the news that SWAT team guns were stolen in Los Angeles, or read that a police chief in New Mexico helped arm criminals. And there was the soldier smuggling guns into the U.K.
Clearly those examples that we show that this idealistic view can be far from ideal in the real, cold, hard world. But she also notes the “images of a heart or a head riddled with bullets,” and yet does she not think of the 18-year old mother who defended her home and infant son on New Year’s Eve? Just something to think about.
But again, at least this journalist admitted to her bias. And as with addiction, the first step is admitting there is a problem.
NY Post Notes: Tourist’s Brothers in Arms
Apparently not every media outlet from the Big Apple is looking to target Ryan Jerome. This week The New York Post offered a story titled, “Tourist’s brothers in arms,” which noted that many Marines are lining to support the former Marine who made a mistake of bringing a gun to New York City.
The Post even offered this passage:
The irony that someone so highly trained and trusted to keep America safe might be thrown into prison — for a .45-caliber Ruger that he had legally registered in his home state and that he was actually trying to check with authorities — has not been lost on his Marine brethren.
Even the comments for this article show that many support Jerome, and blame Mayor Bloomberg. Maybe others have begun to see that Bloomberg is just a loud-mouthed anti-gun zealot who doesn’t care about the Constitution of the United States.
New York News Website Shows New York Arrogance
Ask a New Yorker to name the capital city of Alabama and most probably wouldn’t know. Ask a New Yorker what a “Michigan U-Turn” is when driving a car, and they probably wouldn’t know. Ask a New Yorker about laws for purchasing alcohol in Utah and chances are they might not know. Yet the New York City media seems to question why tourists don’t understand New York’s gun laws.
Website Gothamist for example noted:
Who believes that carrying a firearm into iconic, highly secured New York landmarks is a good idea? Metal detectors are designed to expose weapons, not belt buckles, yet clueless tourists keep getting hauled into court for packing heat at the Empire State Building. Now some Marines are claiming that Indiana native Ryan Jerome, himself a Marine who was arrested for trying to check his .45 Ruger with authorities in September, is more equal than others who have made the same mistake.
Is it necessary o describe these people as “clueless tourists,” especially in the case of Ryan Jerome, who was actually in New York City on business. But of course this is par for the course from the New Yorkers.
Forbes: Have Gun? Don’t Travel
Last week Harvey Silverglade offered his thoughts on the trouble involving Ryan Jerome, who was arrested for brining a gun to New York City. In a piece titled, Have Gun? Don’t Travel!,” he explains how and why Jerome could fact to up to 15 years in prison, and could likely serve at least two years. Silverglade writes:
The first major issue Jerome’s case raises is the justice of the “mandatory minimum” sentence. Mandatory minimums are what they sound like—they are minimum sentences delineated by state legislatures or Congress to ensure that certain acts are punished with at least a given amount of time in prison, notwithstanding that a judge, knowing the relevant facts of a particular case, might feel that a lower sentence would better serve the ends of justice.
He adds:
So what becomes of a person who clearly has an “innocence of intent”, who may have been aware that he possessed a gun, but had no idea he or she was committing a crime until the cuffs were put on.
The answer is not entirely clear, but as time has gone on in the last fifty years, intent has begun to matter less and less. There is an ancient tradition in the Anglo-American “common law” (inherited from the nation’s colonial past) that an individual should know not only that he is committing the act, but that the act is a crime, before being charged and convicted.
What is so frustrating and upsetting about this situation is that law-abiding citizens are facing jail time because they traveled to New York City and inadvertently broke the law, while street thugs and criminals carry guns illegally and never serve jail time!
Likewise, we’ve heard about high-profile celebrities who are able to “legally” obtain concealed carry permits – something almost impossible for the average New Yorker to obtain!
NRA News: Women Need National Concealed-Carry Reciprocity
Cam Edwards talks to Anna Rittgers, Senior Fellow at the Independent Women’s Forum
NY Times: Reckless Disregard for Safety
The New York Times offered an editorial this week titled, “Reckless Disregard for Safety,” noting:
The House showed its utter disregard for public safety in November when it approved the National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act, which would take away the authority of states to decide who is allowed to carry a concealed and loaded handgun within their borders.
This is really “utter disregard.” Consider the following passage:
For example, New York, New Jersey and other states that bar individuals under 21 from obtaining a concealed carry permit would have to honor permits from states with no age requirement. The measure would also hamper efforts to combat illegal gun trafficking. An individual with a concealed carry permit from Florida — which allows the holder to carry unlimited numbers of concealed weapons — could drive a stash of weapons into New York and would have to be caught selling the guns on the street to get arrested.
What is stopping those teenagers in Harlem from arming themselves now? They don’t have concealed carry permits. This argument only aims to show that it would punish the law-abiding as the criminals are already breaking the law.
Does a posted speed limit by itself stop speeding? No, so why would a law such as this change who is packing an illegal gun and who is legally carrying a gun? Except to make it illegal to even carry a gun in the first place? In the end it seems to use the illegal gun would still be carried.
NRA News: Ohio State University Crime Alerts Fuel Concealed Carry Push On Campus
Cam Edwards talks to Michael Newbern - Buckeyes for Concealed Carry
Grass Roots North Carolina for Firearms Education: Lawsuit Pending For Winston-Salem NC Gun Ban
Grass Roots North Carolina for Firearms Education:
GRNC has just received legal analysis of Winston-Salem’s park ban, and the situation is even worse than originally thought. It is best we inform you of these developments as rapidly as possible – particularly because we need to immediately recruit Winston-Salem residents as plaintiffs!
WINSTON-SALEM PARK BAN VIOLATES STATE LAW! Read more
Henigan Huffs and Puffs: A Gun Lobby Bill That Conservatives Should Hate
Writing for the Huffington Post this week, Brady Campaign President Dennis A. Henigan in a piece titled, “A Gun Lobby Bill That Conservatives Should Hate,” suggests that H.R. 822 is against states rights and therefore true conservatives should hate it.
This again is just another attempt to suggest that conservatives are completely rigid in thinking. Of course Henigan offers some other compelling statements:
Is it a bill to ban the high-capacity assault clips that allowed Jared Loughner, in a span of around sixteen seconds, to kill six people…
We all due respect to those involved, there never has been an assault clip until the Brady Campaign coined the term. But Henigan had more to offer too:
The legislation recently passed by the House would allow the Jared Loughners of the world to carry their loaded, hidden handguns virtually anywhere in the country.
The truth is that Loughners of the world, as well as the gangsters in our urban centers, already carry guns anywhere and everywhere they want. Henigan just fails to note that all you need to do to carry a gun is have one, and of course, be willing to break the law. H.R. 822 only applies to law-abiding citizens.
And later in the same editorial Henigan tries the divide and conquer approach:
Conservatives don’t have to believe that concealed carry of loaded guns in public places poses unacceptable risks in order to be opposed to H.R. 822. Principled conservatives — even those who think concealed carry is a positive good — should be driven to the same conclusion.
While it may be bad for state’s rights, it is good for gun owner’s rights. The fact is that this is a democracy with compromises and conservatives can see that point, the truth is that anti-gun zealots are the one who twist logic and facts to take away any right involving guns – whether at the national, state or community level!
Philadelphia Inquirer: States should set own rules
There is an irony in that some editorials support gun bans nationwide, but then suggest “States should set own rules,” which is the tone of an editorial from The Philadelphia Inquirer this week regarding the National Right to Carry Reciprocity Act, and the paper offered this thought:
The threat of gun violence to Philadelphia-area residents from the so-called Florida loophole could go national – unless U.S. senators such as Pennsylvania Democrat Bob Casey, and many others, do the right thing.
First we need to note that the “threat of gun violence to Philadelphia” or anywhere has nothing to do with gun laws. Criminals don’t heed the law and therefore this argument is moot from the first sentence.
But logic doesn’t seem to matter, as the piece added:
…making the right determination about who should – and should not – carry a gun is a potential matter of life and death to a degree unmatched by rules about who gets to slide behind the wheel of a vehicle.
Again, the problem is that this assume everyone – including criminals – follow the law. Anyone who ignores the law is thus immediately out of the equation. Are the editors so naïve as to assume that criminals aren’t carrying guns already? So even if states set their own rules, how do we expect everyone to follow them?
