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Even in the South, gun control's a loaded issue
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
Even in the South, gun control's a loaded issue
To believe everyone who enjoys guns is a wild-eyed barbarian is to be ignorant of rural culture.
But the prospect that the National Rifle Association's brand of zealotry serves as a litmus test for voters should frighten the living hell out of anyone who respects the Constitution.
''You are why Al Gore isn't in the White House,'' Wayne LaPierre told 4,000 NRA members at their annual meeting April 28 in Nevada.
That is a generous credit to assign, even to such a politically rabid group. Yet there is an alarming truth in the warped premise he suggests: It's the guns, stupid. Not the economy, not the environment, but the firearms.
''What many do not understand is that the gun issue is not just about guns,'' Georgia's Sen. Zell Miller told NRA members later that same day. ``It's about values. It's about setting priorities. It's about personal freedom. It's about trust.''
He went on to say Al Gore's stands on gun rights cost the Democrats key Southern states in the 2000 presidential election, including Arkansas, West Virginia and Tennessee. And last week six Democratic Southern governors told USA Today they agreed with him.
They made it clear that they are comfortable with the gun culture as they see it.
''It's a rite of passage,'' said Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes.
''My two children, 14 and 16, are avid hunters, as I am,'' said Ronnie Musgrove of Mississippi.
The trouble is, that's a one-sided view of the issue, even in Southern communities.
Ricky Lee Hamill, age 6, fired four shots last deer season and killed four bucks. He has been shooting since age 3, hunting the woods of rural eastern North Carolina. But he would not dare pick up a gun without Rick, his grandfather and hunting buddy. He knows the rules.
Some 10 miles away, in a public housing neighborhood, a 14-year-old fired a shot last fall into the back of a friend, also age 14. The shooter, Malcolm Washington, is in a juvenile training school, serving time for murder. The victim, Raheem Morrison, is in the ground.
Those two extremes show why the right to bear arms is a loaded issue. What is a way of life for some is an open door to tragedy for others.
This nation does not need the kinds of measures that would keep guns out of the hands of Ricky Lee Hamill. It is hard to see any relationship between the nurturing culture that produced this young sportsman, and thousands of others like him, and guns in the hands of the reckless, the uninformed or the unsupervised.
But the Second Amendment connects them neatly and unequivocally. And those who see -- or choose to see -- only the benign side of weaponry take the blind view.
The thirst for blood, in most cases, is not what makes a Southerner's gut contract at talk about gun control. More than anything else, it is living in a place where a closeness to the land still holds such sway over daily life. An affinity for arms becomes a part of looking out for yourself.
That gut response may indeed have hurt Al Gore's case in rural states. If so, that's one thing. But many so-called gun-control measures -- from prohibiting concealed weapons in public buildings to a waiting period to a ban on outright weapons of war -- have practical value. And they take nothing away from broad rights.
The Constitution has far more to fear from the unbridled, well-funded political activism of special interests like the NRA than from reasoned gun control.
Mary Schulken is senior associate editor and editorial page editor of The (Greenville, N.C.) Daily Reflector.
c2002 Cox News Service http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/3210466.htm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
To believe everyone who enjoys guns is a wild-eyed barbarian is to be ignorant of rural culture.
But the prospect that the National Rifle Association's brand of zealotry serves as a litmus test for voters should frighten the living hell out of anyone who respects the Constitution.
''You are why Al Gore isn't in the White House,'' Wayne LaPierre told 4,000 NRA members at their annual meeting April 28 in Nevada.
That is a generous credit to assign, even to such a politically rabid group. Yet there is an alarming truth in the warped premise he suggests: It's the guns, stupid. Not the economy, not the environment, but the firearms.
''What many do not understand is that the gun issue is not just about guns,'' Georgia's Sen. Zell Miller told NRA members later that same day. ``It's about values. It's about setting priorities. It's about personal freedom. It's about trust.''
He went on to say Al Gore's stands on gun rights cost the Democrats key Southern states in the 2000 presidential election, including Arkansas, West Virginia and Tennessee. And last week six Democratic Southern governors told USA Today they agreed with him.
They made it clear that they are comfortable with the gun culture as they see it.
''It's a rite of passage,'' said Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes.
''My two children, 14 and 16, are avid hunters, as I am,'' said Ronnie Musgrove of Mississippi.
The trouble is, that's a one-sided view of the issue, even in Southern communities.
Ricky Lee Hamill, age 6, fired four shots last deer season and killed four bucks. He has been shooting since age 3, hunting the woods of rural eastern North Carolina. But he would not dare pick up a gun without Rick, his grandfather and hunting buddy. He knows the rules.
Some 10 miles away, in a public housing neighborhood, a 14-year-old fired a shot last fall into the back of a friend, also age 14. The shooter, Malcolm Washington, is in a juvenile training school, serving time for murder. The victim, Raheem Morrison, is in the ground.
Those two extremes show why the right to bear arms is a loaded issue. What is a way of life for some is an open door to tragedy for others.
This nation does not need the kinds of measures that would keep guns out of the hands of Ricky Lee Hamill. It is hard to see any relationship between the nurturing culture that produced this young sportsman, and thousands of others like him, and guns in the hands of the reckless, the uninformed or the unsupervised.
But the Second Amendment connects them neatly and unequivocally. And those who see -- or choose to see -- only the benign side of weaponry take the blind view.
The thirst for blood, in most cases, is not what makes a Southerner's gut contract at talk about gun control. More than anything else, it is living in a place where a closeness to the land still holds such sway over daily life. An affinity for arms becomes a part of looking out for yourself.
That gut response may indeed have hurt Al Gore's case in rural states. If so, that's one thing. But many so-called gun-control measures -- from prohibiting concealed weapons in public buildings to a waiting period to a ban on outright weapons of war -- have practical value. And they take nothing away from broad rights.
The Constitution has far more to fear from the unbridled, well-funded political activism of special interests like the NRA than from reasoned gun control.
Mary Schulken is senior associate editor and editorial page editor of The (Greenville, N.C.) Daily Reflector.
c2002 Cox News Service http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/3210466.htm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
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