Tuesday, June 23, 2009

If guns don't kill, why not send soldiers to war without them?

Just in time for the June 26th first anniversary of the Supreme Court’s DC v. Heller decision, a new book is coming out that challenges the gun ruling. In the Heller decision last June, the high court held in a 5-4 decision that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to have a gun, at least in one’s home. The ruling struck down a District of Columbia ban on handgun possession.

In "Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths that Paralyze American Gun Policy," author, Dennis Henigan, who founded the Brady Center’s Legal Action Project 20 years ago to represent gun violence victims in lawsuits against the gun industry, takes issue with gun advocates' slogans. and other relentless opponents of sensible gun laws, and dismantles them one by one. Here's one: “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” Henigan says: “If that’s the case, why do we give people guns when they go to war? Why not just send the people?”
Here's another: “An armed society is a polite society.” Gun advocates cite Switzerland as Utopia. But Henigan says Switzerland has high gun ownership because of mandatory militia service, and that citizens in mandatory militia service face government inspection of the guns in their homes and must account for all their bullets. “Can you imagine the fury of the NRA’s opposition to any suggestion that guns in the homes of U.S. citizens be subject to government inspection?”
“Dennis Henigan has long been one of the nation’s leading thinkers on the gun violence issue,” said Sarah Brady, the Chair of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, the sister organization of the Brady Center. “In Lethal Logic, he has given us a clear roadmap toward destruction of the ‘any gun, any time, any place’ arguments of the gun lobby.”


That's what gun opponents think. But we're betting that's not what gun supporters think. Is it?

5 comments:

Unknown said...

My gun must be broken...

I set it on the table.... stared at it...waited...waited...nothing...

It's didn't kill anybody.

Guess I'll go buy another one...

The people that wrote this article and the Brady supporters are just plain stupid.

Unknown said...

That's the dumbest comment ever. I guess he'll have us believe that until guns were invented, humans didn't have wars or murder each other ruthlessly. Ghengis Khan didn't have guns, the Romans didn't have guns, The Crusaders didn't, etc etc. People kill people. In the hands of a rational sane person, any weapon or gun is safe. In the hands of irrational, emotional, violent people, every weapon from a stick, to a bat to a knife and gun is dangerous. How about banning people from breeding who have these traits, instead of restricting honest people's rights and freedoms?

Unknown said...

"That's what gun advocates think. But we're betting that's not what gun supporters think. Is it?"

Again... whoever wrote the article needs to go back to English101.

Advocate = a person who speaks or writes in support or defense of a person, cause, etc.

Isn't a supporter the same thing?

So the summation at the end of your article says...

"That's what gun supporters think. But we're betting that's not what gun supporters think. Is it?"

Guess you're too busy writing about something else you know NOTHING about to proofread.

StarKing said...

“Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” Henigan says: “If that’s the case, why do we give people guns when they go to war? Why not just send the people?”

OK Henigan. If your position is correct, why don't we just send the guns?

John Lofton, Recovering Republican said...

Hope you'll listen to my interview of Dennis Henigan here:

http://www.iotconline.com/radio/aview/TAV%20Hennegan_Nov13.mp3

I think he has undoubtedly set a new Guinness World Indoor Record for saying the most idiotic, unConstitutional things on a one-hour radio show, mine. In fact, I think he has retired the title. Comments welcome.

John Lofton, Editor TheAmericanView.com
Communications Director, Institute on the Constitution
Recovering Republican
JLof@aol.com