Gun rights advocates have been understandably quiet as the nation obsesses over the horror of Friday night’s movie theatre massacre in Aurora, Colorado. Yet another whack-o from out of the blue, this one clad in SWAT team gear and armed with a Glock pistol, a shotgun and a semi-automatic rifle, has indiscriminately killed or injured scores of innocent people. With 12 dead and another 58 hurt, the episode is destined for historical notoriety, even if the gruesome details are forgotten in a year or two. When was the last time something like this happened? How many were killed? We’ve begun to lose track because so many of these horrific incidents have occurred in recent years. Meanwhile, those who would reflect nostalgically on earlier times as having been less troubled will have forgotten Charlie Starkweather. Imagine the damage he could have done if he’d been armed with an assault rifle instead of a revolver.
As it happens, James Holmes, 24, the man charged with the Dark Knight Massacre, didn’t have an automatic weapon, but rather a ‘semi’ with a 100-round magazine that reportedly jammed early in the assault. He also had no police record, only a speeding violation. This means he could probably have bought a gun even in states where weapons permits are tightly controlled. None of this will matter to political liberals in the weeks and months ahead as they use Holmes’ rampage to press their case for a total ban on, for starters, handguns. Their chances of prevailing, fortunately, are nil. It’s not going to happen. Although a total ban would undoubtedly make it harder for Holmes and other crazies to acquire murderous firepower, it would never to stop them. Nor will any liberal remedies mitigate the culture of violence that increasingly coaxes psychopaths like Holmes to act out their fantasies. The malignancy that produced Holmes has metastasized so deeply within America’s psyche that it is no more curable than cancer itself.
Pistol Permits for All
We would not go so far as to assail liberals, however, for thinking that a ban on handguns is the answer. Their position is both conscionable and logical. But so is the pro-gun argument that when guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns. For my part, I’m going to seek a Colorado license to carry a concealed weapon and encourage my wife and sons to do likewise. If more people did this, Holmes would probably have been shot dead before he’d fired even a dozen rounds. For that matter, so would any gunman attempting to murder the 300 or so people (pictured above) enjoying the sun and aquatic pleasures of the local athletic club’s swimming pool on this hot Sunday afternoon. A crazed gunman could have a field day here, since the only escape route away from the killer is over the spike-tipped, six-foot-high steel fence that surrounds the pool area. As long as there is even a chance in a thousand that this patio could become the scene of yet another massacre – and no political liberal can argue otherwise — I want to be ready for it rather than risk being a pigeon in some whack-jobs’ crosshairs.
“Holmes would probably have been shot dead before he’d fired even a dozen rounds.”
Supposedly the theater owner disallowed guns. Private property, so the owner can prohibit your concealed carry.