Score one more for the gun lobby

By Max J. Castro
majcastro@gmail.com

The power of the gun lobby in the United States — and the determination of Republican politicians to coddle the National Rifle Association (NRA) and other Second Amendment fundamentalists even in the face of tragedy — was never more in evidence than two weeks ago when the brand-new chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Texas Republican Representative Lamar Smith, rejected a unanimous call by the 16 Democrats on the committee to hold hearings on gun safety issues.

The Democratic members wanted the committee to look into the sale of high-capacity ammunition magazines and the system of background checks in place to prevent mentally ill persons from acquiring firearms. The request by the Democratic minority to convene hearings on the sale of high-capacity magazines and on ways to prevent mentally ill individuals from acquiring guns could not have been more timely or compelling. About two weeks before, one of Mr. Smith’s own colleagues, Arizona Democrat Gabrielle Giffords, was gravely wounded in an assassination attempt that left six people dead and 13 wounded.

The attack, which took place on January 8, outside a Tucson supermarket during an event organized by Giffords as an opportunity to meet with constituents, was perpetrated by a lone gunman. The lone killer, allegedly Jared Lee Loughner, was able to inflict such carnage only because he was armed with a gun equipped with a special magazine capable of firing 33 bullets without reloading.

The sale of such magazines was prohibited in the United States until 2004 as part of general ban on assault weapons. That year, a Republican-controlled Congress allowed the ban to expire, paving the way for the legal sale not only of extended ammunition magazines, but also such military weapons as AK-47s and M16s.

These arms, widely used by infantry soldiers as well as guerrilla fighters the world over, serve no legitimate purpose for hunting or self defense. Instead, they increasingly have found their way into the hands of criminal gangs in this country. In addition, high-powered guns purchased in the United States and smuggled into Mexico have been a major factor in fueling the bloody drug wars pitting rival cartels, Mexican police, and the Mexican army. More than 30,000 have died in that conflict during the last five years.

But it’s not only transnational gangs such as the Mara Salvatrucha (active in the United States and Central America) and Mexican narcotics traffickers and their hired goons who have found it ridiculously easy to buy weapons in the United States capable of killing or wounding many people in a few seconds. So have a string of seriously disturbed individuals, including Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold (the Columbine killers), Seung-Hui Cho (the perpetrator of the Virginia Tech massacre), and Jared Loughner, the alleged culprit in the murderous attack in Tucson.

Loughner, like many other seriously disturbed persons, was able to pass a background check despite having been rejected by the U.S. Army and exhibiting bizarre ideas and behavior. Moreover, even if a felon or mentally incapacitated person is caught by the porous system of background checks, he or she can always buy a weapon, including an assault rifle, at a gun show where purchases do not require a background check.

So far the tragedy in Tucson has made no dent in the thinking of the gun lovers nor has it affected public policy one iota. The Republicans, who now control the House of Representatives, are unwilling to even consider holding hearings on gun-related issues, much less enacting any serious gun control legislation. Meanwhile, rather than considering restricting guns, some state legislatures want to loosen the rules on bearing firearms in public.

The news from the judicial branch of government is even grimmer. In 2008 and 2010, the right-wing Supreme Court, a legacy of various Republican presidents, threw out tough gun control laws in Washington, D.C. and Detroit, respectively. Worse, in a close (5-4) decision, the Court for the first time ruled that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to gun ownership independent of the “well ordered militia” concept found in the language of the amendment.

The executive branch has offered no counterpoint against these disturbing trends. President Obama, in his State of the Union address, which came on the heels of the massacre in Tucson, failed to raise the issue of guns and violence.

Although polls show the majority of Americans favor stricter gun control, the lobbying power of the NRA, the support for loose gun laws by almost all Republican politicians and more than a few Democrats, and the mobilized zealotry of the most extreme Second Amendment advocates all conspire to prevent a rational policy on guns being instituted in the United States in the foreseeable future.

The result is tragically predictable. In a recent year, gun homicides totaled 17 in Finland, 35 in Australia, 39 in England and Wales, 60 in Spain, 194 in Germany, 200 in Canada, and 9,484 in the United States. Now how is that for American exceptionalism!