![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/4575208799_e7c6e34c94.jpg\" "\\"4575208799_e7c6e34c94\\"")
<\/a><\/p>\nWhich is just fine. \u00a0They have that right.<\/p>\n
But Rosenberg, with all due respect, would seem to be proof of Dennis Prager’s dictum, which I’ll paraphrase; it takes a university education to be this ignorant.<\/p>\n
In the wake of Sandy Hook, Rosenberg has “taken a pledge”<\/a>. \u00a0Like most pledges made in public (or at least on\u00a0MinnPost<\/em>), it’s smug, self-righteous and…<\/p>\n …and betrays what on the surface might seem like a brick-thick ignorance about how a representative republic works – but, when looking at Macalester’s record, might be better viewed as\u00a0contempt<\/em>\u00a0for it.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Rosenberg:<\/p>\n Shame, for me, because I have through my indifference allowed the legalized possession of assault weapons capable of inflicting massive destruction to become \u201cnormal.\u201d Shame because I have taken as an unchangeable fact of life the enormous influence on our political processes of the National Rifle Association. Shame because I recognize that inaction is a form of action and silence is a form of tacit acceptance.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n So let’s mark this for later: \u00a0the NRA is the Boogeyman. \u00a0We’ll come back to that.<\/p>\n What you do \u2014 what I now do \u2014 is resolve to act according to a single, simple principle: I will give no money to any candidate for local, state, or national political office who does not openly and actively support a ban on the legal possession of military-style assault weapons.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n So in other words, you’ll get together with other, like-minded people to try to enact your will on the broader public.<\/p>\n Again, we’ll come back to that.<\/p>\n This should not be a Democratic or a Republican issue. One can be for or against smaller government, for or against higher tax rates for the wealthy, for or against single-payer health care, for or against the legalization of same-sex marriage. One can believe or not in the reality of human-generated climate change.<\/p>\n None of this should prevent our coming together to declare that there is no conceivable reason for the mother of Adam Lanza to be in legal possession of the .223 caliber, semi-automatic Bushmaster rifle that was used in the Newtown, Conn., massacre…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Well, no. \u00a0Leaving aside that there are many practical, pragmatic, non-partisan reasons to own large-capacity magazines<\/a>, the differences in world-view do indeed\u00a0precisely\u00a0<\/em>say a lot about finding the justification for civilians owning ugly guns built to military specs. \u00a0People who favor smaller government, lower taxes and a less-interventionist government (which would lead to appropriate beliefs on single-payer healthcare, among other issues) likely\u00a0do\u00a0<\/em>believe in the originalist view of the Second Amendment – that the government and its standing armies and police forces\u00a0should not\u00a0<\/em>have a monopoly on force.<\/p>\n I understand that banning such weapons is not the sole answer to the profound questions raised by the Sandy Hook killings.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Indeed, it’s no answer at all.<\/p>\n The data is out there. \u00a0All long arms\u00a0<\/em>– hunting rifles, fowling shotguns, .22 varmint guns, sawed-off scatterguns, and “assault rifles” – are involved in a little under 400 homicides a year<\/a>. \u00a0“Assault rifles” are, in a normal year, a small part of that number. \u00a0Legally-purchased ones, fewer still – and even that rate’s been dropping for two decades \u00a0That’s as compared to 500 people murdered by clubs, hammers and 2x4s, 400 or so by bare hands and fists, and 1,700 by knives just like the ones found in the Macalester kitchen.<\/p>\n So no. \u00a0Banning “assault rifles” will not “solve” the problem.<\/p>\n But we also need to begin somewhere, and I will allow no preposterous arguments about slippery slopes or government plots to steal our liberties to prevent my beginning here.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Always beware of arguments that start “we have to begin somewhere”. \u00a0They are usually followed with “so I’ll pick the knee-jerk reaction that fits my agenda, regardless of its affect on whatever the problem is”.<\/p>\n