Bring Lawyers, Guns and Money
Okay, so this article is only about Guns. I couldn’t help but throw in the Warren Zevon quote for the title, so you’ll pardon me. Though this actually isn’t a bad description of Republican policy. As I was saying, the big issue here is gun control. Obama is notorious among the gun-owning community for being a pretty hardcore proponent of gun control. There’s been something of a massive rise in the sale of guns and ammunition since his election because the militias in the hills have been concerned that he was going to ban guns all together, so they’ve been stockpiling arms constantly.
So there’s a shortage of guns and ammo in the U.S. right now, prices are rising, and gun shop owners know that business is a-booming. Barack Obama was one of the best things to ever happen to gun sales.
The NRA still despises him, and they hired Sarah Palin to be the headliner of their annual convention. This choice should highlight what I think of the NRA. I am all for the right to bear arms – this is full disclosure here – but it should be strictly controlled in my opinion. I think handguns make sense. Why shouldn’t you be allowed to own one to protect yourself? But you don’t need a flamethrower or a machine gun. I also am not a huge fan of sport hunting. I go by the Edward Abbey saying about the moral and aesthetic superiority of the dead animal over the man standing over it.
This is frequently a rallying point for Republicans, but Obama hasn’t done anything about it yet. Obama’s priorities are so caught up in foreign policy and health care right now that he’s not even thinking about taking on the Second Amendment. Which, all of the killings stemming from the current gun laws aside, will probably be a boon to Obama. If it’s a non-issue in his first four years, then the Republicans won’t be able to say much about his policies. Not that much of the gun crowd is going to vote for Obama anyway, but it’s one less thing to be enraged about, and it will ironically help him in an election that will be seen as an endorsement of his current policies and will allow him to take steps towards gun control in his second term. Boom.
This is an issue that I see as a bit of a distraction, honestly. It’s kind of like abortion. Anger over it swells at election time and abates when the politicians have nothing to get angry over. Except Sam Brownback, who likes to draw pictures of sad, dead fetuses in public hearings. But it’s a peripheral issue that nothing really gets done on because it just degenerates into a shouting match and gets switched back and forth as the congresses change parties. So yeah the entire point is, don’t expect anyone but the Gun Freaks to get upset about this issue in 2012, unless there are more campus shootings, in which case the gun freaks will argue more guns will fix the problem. Woo.