Not the NRA way
Three Florida Republicans who once may have dared the public to pry NRA membership cards from their cold, dead hands are tiptoeing out of the absolutist let-anyonecarry-any-weapon-anywhere camp. The movement is minimal and begrudging and may well be motivated by simple fear of a coming Democratic wave. Nonetheless, give Gov. Rick Scott, Sen. Marco Rubio and Rep. Brian Mast credit for exhibiting the beginnings of common sense.
Mast, the least powerful of the three, made the largest jump — announcing in a New York Times Op-Ed Friday that he will back a ban on assault weapons, as well as universal background checks for all gun sales.
As he wrote: “I am a longtime member of the National Rifle Association. My grandfather bought me my first NRA membership when I was young, and I have the same pride he and many Americans feel at being responsible gun owners, becoming excellent marksmen and joining in the camaraderie of hunting . . . .
“The AR-15 is an excellent platform for recreational shooters to learn to be outstanding marksmen. Unfortunately, it is also an excellent platform for those who wish to kill the innocent.”
Mast does not fall for the folly of Rubio, who claimed in a CNN forum earlier this week that there’s no sane way to ban assault rifles simply because their common characteristics can be tricky to classify.
Tell that to the Food and Drug Administration, which regularly classifies and regulates complex chemical compounds.
As Mast, who lost both legs and a finger serving his country in Afghanistan, puts it: “The exact definition of assault weapon will need to be determined. But we should all be able to agree that the civilian version of the very deadly weapon that the Army issued to me should certainly qualify.”
While Rubio is comparatively timid, the recent holder of an A+ rating from the National Rifle Association is in other meaningful ways breaking with NRA dogma.
He rightly rejects the insane idea, peddled by the President, that the path to safer schools is by arming up to 20% of teachers.
More significantly, he signals openness to banning the high-capacity magazines that give mass murderers the ability to kill people by the dozens in mere minutes without even having to bother to reload.
Based on not-yet-public information Rubio has learned from law enforcement, he said, he now believes “three or four people might be alive today” were it not for the Parkland killer’s access to a virtually unlimited stream of ammo.
Last and least: Scott announced he too will back raising the age on all gun purchases in his free-for-all state to 21, a step Rubio also backs.
The limitation, which would finally put assault rifles and handguns in the same legal category, is overdue. Nikolas Cruz, who murdered 17 people in Parkland, legally bought his weapon of war at age 19.
But many mass shooters are older, and still gravitate to assault rifles as especially efficient killing machines.
Now that Republicans have begun admitting that access to extremely powerful weapons matters, they must take aim at their ubiquitous availability to Americans writ large.