Predictably in the wake of the recent Orlando mass shooting, there are calls for gun control and reinstating the Assault Weapons Ban. Here is one such call that landed on my Facebook feed.
And in 2013, they tried to get the Assault Weapons Ban back through the Senate as well, and it was knocked down 60 to 40. Think about that. 60 Senators voted against it in a Democrat-controlled Senate. 15 Democrats plus Angus King joined Republicans to vote down the AWB.
Most people who want to ban the AR-15 don’t even know what it is, only what it looks like. They can’t describe the firearm properly. They continuously label it as an “automatic” rifle. One friend of mine called it a “machine gun”. The AR-15 is no different from any other .223/5.56mm rifle on the market except for its body style, and the AR-15 isn’t the only rifle on the market that shoots the .223/5.56mm round. There are variants of the AR-15 that shoot the .22LR as well, which are functionally not any different from any other rifle that shoots .22LR.
Banning “assault weapons” won’t do jack for violence in this country. In fact, as Australia, the Middle East, and the United States have all demonstrated, those wanting to kill a large number of people will find alternate means of doing so. Arson, bombings, and suicide bombings to be specific.
Here’s a question. In 2009 and 2010, the Democrats had their trifecta — the House, the Senate, and the White House. They could’ve passed any gun control bill they wanted, but didn’t touch gun control at all. They didn’t introduce any gun control bills that made it out of committee, and Feinstein didn’t even consider reintroducing her assault weapon’s ban. It should’ve been a slam dunk in the 111th Congress, but they didn’t do jack. Why is that? Why did they wait until they had a divided Congress?
Two reasons. First, plenty of Democrats won’t touch gun control because it’ll end their political careers. Plenty of Democrat voters favor gun rights, and plenty of Democrat voters demonstrated to Democrats just how unfavorably they view gun control by handing the Senate and House back to Republicans in 1994. Even Feinstein barely held on to her Senate seat that year.
Second, they don’t care about protecting people or children. Only playing politics. And they can play politics left, right, and fucking center all day by playing up gun rights as meaning gun rights activists prefer to see dead kids, and that if we “only cared about the children”, or in the case of Orlando the gays, then we’d just see how morally superior the Democrats are and just give into their demands and turn in all our guns. That’s how this whole thing has played out since Aurora.
When even Democrats are voting against gun control, perhaps a rethink is in order.
