Obama must get tough on the NRA
Re A nation’s sad, brutal obsession with guns, Jan. 9
After watching U.S. President Barack Obama’s emotional and poignant speech announcing new plans to strengthen weak U.S. gun laws, a couple of thoughts came to mind.
First, Obama mentioned that there are more than 30,000 gun deaths a year in the United States. Given this horrid statistic, I’ve often wondered why the National Rifle Association isn’t considered a terrorist organization. After all, their advocacy for firearms and their attempts to weaken gun laws have certainly helped fuel the relentless inferno of gun violence in the U.S.
Secondly, why can’t the Second Amendment be changed? The right to bear arms was placed in the U.S. constitution when the fledgling nation was threatened by the British Empire. But it’s 2016, not 1791.
As Canadians know, constitutions aren’t written in stone. Many countries alter their constitutions to adapt to an everchanging world. But the U.S. abhors change, whether it’s refusing to move to the metric system, clinging to paper money, or treating a constitution written in the wake of a revolution nearly 225 years ago as if it was handed down by God, carved in granite and never to be altered, on pain of eternal damnation.
It’s past time for constitutional change. Gun violence is epidemic in America; only a major rethink can stop the carnage. Andrew van Velzen, Toronto President Obama’s tearful plea to the United States and suggested executive actions on gun control were far too modest. Even if they were adopted they would have little effect on the murderous criminal rampages taking the lives of so many innocents across the U.S. on an almost monthly basis now.
At the crux of the problem is the Second Amendment of the Constitution of the U.S. adopted on Dec. 15, 1791. As outdated as many may consider it in today’s terms, it remains “bulletproof” and seems destined to stay that way.
Marty Fruchtman, Toronto
Re U.S. gun culture barrels past Obama, Jan. 10
While I generally agree with Rosie DiManno’s take on U.S. gun culture, I take issue with a couple of her statements.
First, she repeats the assertion that Obama wants to take away everybody’s guns, which is inflammatory rhetoric regularly dispensed by the NRA and their supporters, intended to fuel the paranoia on the right. Obama wants to prevent only those who should not have a gun from acquiring one, by expanding background checks and closing gun-show loopholes, common sense action supported by most Americans, but ignored by Congress. If he was coming to get 300- million plus guns in 65 million places, I would love to know how he intends to do it. And why wait eight years?
As to Kimberly Corban, and the “restrictions” she alludes to, it appears that her idea of “difficult” is being inconvenienced by needing to submit to a background check. Ken Traves, Fort Erie The Star’s extended coverage of guns in the U.S. paints a disturbing picture of an obsessive gun culture. Understanding the prevalence of gun violence also requires attention to the enormous arms industry in that country. It is not only first among providers of weapons for international use but also fuels domestic arms availability.
Annual revenue from the small arms gun and ammunition manufacturing industry has run at about $16 billion a year derived from sales of more than 10 million guns, 96 per cent of which are for the domestic market.
As a powerful lobbyist and well-known backer of the NRA, this industry is key to the provision of private arms and, arguably, guilty of willful negligence in the unending gun deaths in the United States. It merits at least as much attention as the “American gun culture” in understanding and eradicating what President Obama called the mass violence in his country.
Frank Cunningham, Toronto
Guns are a religion to many citizens in the U.S. They have been
“It’s past time for constitutional change. Gun violence is epidemic in America; only a major rethink can stop the carnage.” ANDREW VAN VELZEN TORONTO
insufferable about their rights to bear this type of evolving weapon despite positive evidence for gun control coming in from Australia’s gun policy reversal and the low homicide rates in societies like Japan.
Fortunately, the right to bear arms is only in their constitution and not part of any actual religious texts requiring proselytising to other nations. I can only imagine what it would be like to have someone knocking on my door to ask me if I am “armed for the Lord” from a cult that was funded by U.S. gun manufacturers and the NRA. Russell Pangborn, Keswick
While the thought of a fully-armed populace is daunting at best, there are always two sides to a coin. The other side: no foreign power would ever seek to conquer the U.S. Imagine even trying to occupy a country where the vast majority of citizens are fully armed. You can’t even risk annoying another patron at a movie theatre for fear of being shot. Bill Soles, Oro-Medonte
Re Want to promote gun control? Appeal to parents, Opinion Jan. 8
“The argument from parenting” is indeed the best reply to gun lobbyists. It tugs at the heart strings and may well persuade sensible Americans to demand the gun control President Obama seeks.
From Irvin Studin’s eloquent description of parental devotion and sacrifice, it is obvious that parenthood is close to sainthood – which may explain why some couples go childless.
If, indeed, American parenting is “a miraculous marathon,” then one must ask: How much more challenging must it be for the parents of children with disabilities? Blessed with these children, they may parent until they die, constantly worrying about what will happen next.
Yes, Americans and Canadians alike need gun control for the sake of loving parents. They also need to provide better care and support for parents whose marathons last an entire lifetime. Sal Amenta, Stouffville Irvin Studin’s suggestion that U.S. gun control can be mitigated with an emotive appeal to parents is profoundly and woefully naive. Many Americans, indeed much of the country, exist in a state of cognitive dissonance. Examples abound and there are far too many to enumerate in a letter to the editor.
However, one such example demonstrates that most Americans can be fooled most of the time: Despite an annual U.S. gun-related death toll of 30,000, states such as Texas, with a population of 26 million people, are more concerned with the “influx” of six Syrian refugees than they are with the carnage of mutilated corpses of children riddled with the holes of rounds from military assault weapons.
Studin gives American parents far too much credit, certainly much more than they deserve or are willing to demonstrate.
Louis MacPherson, Bowmanville
A recent study from the American Journal of Public Health revealed that gun-related homicides increased proportionately to gun ownership. In other words, if gun ownership increases by 1 per cent, gun-related murders increase proportionately. Three out of every 100,000 Americans will die from gunshots each year, compared to 0.2 per every 100,000 citizens of 22 other industrialized nations.
Why is it that gun-related murders are 15 times higher in the U.S. than any other large wealthy nation? The reason is the sheer number of guns. There are roughly 89 guns per every 100 U.S. citizens, and that number – driven by the fear of terror and crime – continues to grow. (For the record, Canada has 31 guns per 100 citizens, France has 31 guns per 100 citizens while Britain has six guns for every 100 citizens.)
Americans are buying weapons more ever than before, arming for self-protection. That’s a myth. Studies tend to reveal people who carry a weapon for self-protection are more likely to increase violence than reduce it; the weapon is also more likely to be used against the victims than by them.
A U.S. study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that guns kept in the home were 22 per cent more likely to kill a family member or an acquaintance than they were to kill an intruder. A 1988 study of gun fatalities in King County, Wash. between 1978 to 1983, found that for every time a gun was used in a self-protection homicide, 37 lives were lost in gun suicides, 4.6 in gun homicides, and 1.3 via unintentional gun deaths – 43 deaths for every self-defense homicide.
There are nearly 300 million privately owned firearms in the U.S., of which some 100 million are handguns. Since 1980, some 44 states have passed laws that allow gun owners to carry concealed weapons for personal protection. In an average year, about 100,000 Americans are killed or injured with guns.
FBI data reveals that only 245 alleged criminals were killed by armed civilians in 2008, far fewer than were killed by police.
Arming for self-protection? A reckless, irresponsible myth!
Emile Therien, Public Health & Safety Advocate, Ottawa