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NYT Front-page Editorial: “End the Gun Epidemic in America”
For the first time since 1920, the New York Times has posted an editorial on its front page. Back then, it was to inveigh against the presidential nomination of Warren G. Harding to replace Woodrow Wilson. (Harding went on to win the general election with more than 60 percent of the popular vote.)
This time, the Gray Lady inveighs against guns. We reprint it here in full and ask Ricochet members to respond to it.
All decent people feel sorrow and righteous fury about the latest slaughter of innocents, in California. Law enforcement and intelligence agencies are searching for motivations, including the vital question of how the murderers might have been connected to international terrorism. That is right and proper.
But motives do not matter to the dead in California, nor did they in Colorado, Oregon, South Carolina, Virginia, Connecticut and far too many other places. The attention and anger of Americans should also be directed at the elected leaders whose job is to keep us safe but who place a higher premium on the money and political power of an industry dedicated to profiting from the unfettered spread of ever more powerful firearms.
It is a moral outrage and a national disgrace that civilians can legally purchase weapons designed specifically to kill people with brutal speed and efficiency. These are weapons of war, barely modified and deliberately marketed as tools of macho vigilantism and even insurrection. America’s elected leaders offer prayers for gun victims and then, callously and without fear of consequence, reject the most basic restrictions on weapons of mass killing, as they did on Thursday. They distract us with arguments about the word terrorism. Let’s be clear: These spree killings are all, in their own ways, acts of terrorism.
Opponents of gun control are saying, as they do after every killing, that no law can unfailingly forestall a specific criminal. That is true. They are talking, many with sincerity, about the constitutional challenges to effective gun regulation. Those challenges exist. They point out that determined killers obtained weapons illegally in places like France, England and Norway that have strict gun laws. Yes, they did.
But at least those countries are trying. The United States is not. Worse, politicians abet would-be killers by creating gun markets for them, and voters allow those politicians to keep their jobs. It is past time to stop talking about halting the spread of firearms, and instead to reduce their number drastically — eliminating some large categories of weapons and ammunition.
It is not necessary to debate the peculiar wording of the Second Amendment. No right is unlimited and immune from reasonable regulation.
Certain kinds of weapons, like the slightly modified combat rifles used in California, and certain kinds of ammunition, must be outlawed for civilian ownership. It is possible to define those guns in a clear and effective way and, yes, it would require Americans who own those kinds of weapons to give them up for the good of their fellow citizens.
What better time than during a presidential election to show, at long last, that our nation has retained its sense of decency?
Have at it, Ricochetti.
Published in Guns
Therefore, we should ban words as the instruments of hate speech.
Molon labe.
I wouldn’t insult a dog I didn’t like by lining its crate with the NYT
If it is true that government can not adequately protect me,
then don’t tell me I’m not allowed to protect myself.
Forgive me, I’m going to post in bunches.
I’ve always thought of fury as something uncontrolled and irrational. I’m not sure that righteous fury isn’t a contradiction of terms.
Note that investigating motives is deemed “right and proper”
Don’t tell me what matters to the dead. Motive is, in fact, important in forestalling or preventing future attacks by going after causes of radicalism rather than symptoms.
This charge is unsubstantiated and spurious. Furthermore, it delegitimizes opposition as ideologically dishonest. There is no attempt here to come to terms with the argument that spread of more powerful firearms can and does make people safer. The use of “Unfettered” here is a problem as well, it obfuscates the reality that guns are already heavily regulated.
Immoral how, exactly? It is unclear from the article why civilians should not wield a power the state already wields. Presumably, some agents of the state are citizens as well and choose to wield these weapons in a civilian capacity. What makes their “official” usage different than a civilian use?
This completely sidesteps the issue of defense. “Vigilantism” implies seeking out and using force in an illegal way. Vigilantism is fundamentally different than protecting yourself or your rights, which is dubbed “insurrection”, again implying an extra-legal usage of the firearm.
The juxtaposition of prayer with rejection is not hypocritical if the basic point is granted that there is a fundamental difference in how are elected leaders wish to act in order to keep their constituents safe. “Callous” implies that the NYT editorial staff does not assume good faith in any opposition to gun control. In not meeting the obligation of meeting their opponents best argument they lose a significant amount of “punching power” for their piece.
Some killings are designed to provoke fear and unease, maybe even panic, like 9/11 others are expressions of personal pain or helplessness imposed upon the world, as in Newtown. There is a fundamental difference between the two that the NYT has trouble grasping.
These laws already didn’t work and how much easier is it for England to control it’s borders than the U.S.?
“Trying” doesn’t mean anything if its not effective.
Which weapons? what ammunition? and how do you plan to seize them?
Again, this assumes guns are not heavily regulated. And a whopping monster of an assumption that no right is “unlimited” or “immune” from regulation should certainly be substantiated.
The guns used in California were already illegal in California, no? What makes the editors think that outlawing “combat rifles” nationwide would make them unobtainable?
Here might be the single biggest weakness of the piece. The assumption that it confiscation would be “for the good of fellow citizens” has not been proven and yet action is urged that requires, not suggests, not advises, requires Americans to give up a constitutional right.
If the Times had any sense of decency it wouldn’t be leveraging an American tragedy to make a political point.
There is a fundamental disagreement as to how Americans should be kept safe by the government and what role they should play in their own defense. The Times sidesteps reality exchanging it for grandstanding in an attempt to administer a political bludgeoning using the corpses of American citizens as cudgels, and then has the temerity and gall to end the piece with a call to decency.
Now I think I’m starting to see what they mean by righteous fury.
The moral outrage of these God-less heathens is precious. They will use Percival’s molon labe cry against any attempt to stall their slaughter of ~3000 babies per day and yet puff up in righteous indignation against us bitter clingers when we exercise our first and second amendment rights.
The ones who wrote this editorial have raised moral relativism to an art form and have tossed reason out the window to be replaced by feelings and pablum.
With this editorial and the threat from Loretta Lynch’s DOJ against “anti-muslim rhetoric”, Obama and his sycophants have “a wonderful opportunity and a wonderful moment to really make significant change”.
Fundamentally change America indeed. Hillary said it best in the first debate: we really are their enemies.
We need first to ban editorial pages of newspapers. Yes, even of newspapers you like. No one needs them in the age of 10 million blogs.
We need to know who radicalized those guns. Most guns are peace loving. What went wrong?
There’s a gun show next weekend in my town. If it’s like the last time they ginned up the ban narrative, the line will be way way out the door.
We have to live the ones here already. That cake is baked. Fortunately, there are not enough here now to do more then commit some acts of terror, bad as that is we can overcome that.
We don’t need to bring another one here to make the problem worse.
That’s where we need to start.
Oh I’ve been assured by a member here on Ricochet that will never happen. The vast majority of gun owners will meekly go along with the confiscation, and the rest will be taken down by their local LEO’s as any other criminal would be.
It has long been clear that stated intentions are what matter, and any effort to measure results is forbidden.
If he does, we need a Million Man March on Washington.
Picture 1 million, peaceful, concerned, energized patriots surrounding the White House.
Oh contraire. The Left is convinced they have all the Big Guns. That the Police, ATF, Military will all be on their side in this.
It’s not rare for the NYTimes to put an editorial on the front page. What is rare is for the NYTimes to label something on its front page as an editorial.
I find it interesting that the last time the NYTimes chose to label a front page item as an editorial it was to preserve the legacy of Woodrow Wilson, lead implementer of “trust the professionals of the administrative state.” Here we have the NYTimes again using the “rare” event to tell us to “trust the professionals of the administrative state to provide all the personal defense you need.”
I keep wanting to know from the gun control advocates, “what is your objective for gun control? Prevent mass shootings? Reduce murder by gun? Are you willing to accept increases in other crimes (such as rape of women who are less effective at defending themselves, or home invasions by gangs, or plain old street robbery)? Your objective and the trade-offs you’re willing to make affect what what you should advocate for “gun control.” Even accepting the mantra that there should be more “gun control” still requires defining some objectives so that the “gun control” might have a chance of meeting the objective. Of course, as soon as the advocates start thinking about that, they realize that the issue is a lot harder than they like to think it is. And, as I noted above, many are only after the “feel good” intention, not any actual results.
Maybe. Here in the more rural parts of western New York State, many Sheriffs refused to implement parts of the horrible gun control law that Governor Cuomo rammed through in the dead of night after the Newtown shooting. Outside the large urban areas, I’m not sure The Left will be able to control the police. And, I suspect a lot of military personnel will resist orders to storm the homes of their fellow citizens.
Discussing this with my son, he’s had conversations with his Millennial friends, they are convinced that once the Boomers etc are gone from the body politic we will have Australian level gun control.
Would that be the same Woodrow Wilson all correct thinking Progressives want to throw down the memory hole as a racist? That WW?
I love this sentence, “It is not necessary to debate the peculiar wording of the Second Amendment”. It summarizes the way the NYT, and all liberals, feeling toward the entire Constitution. The written words on the document just don’t matter to them.
They want to live in a country ruled by men, not laws.
Oh I know. Over 16 state Sheriff associations signed a pledge not to enforce an unconstitutional ban on guns. In New York it’s estimated 1 million gun owners are in violation of that law, refusing to register their “assault weapons”. In Bluest of Blue NY.
But the Left have convinced themselves they have the Government Guns on their side.
In the end this is the typical Liberal/Progressive emotional approach to an issue that they are concerned about.
It is not the result that matters…
…but that by golly you stomped around, and rendered your garments, and then legislated something. Anything!
As they say, it takes a village to take away another village’s rights.