A Curious Irony

As Isaac rumbles onward, threatening to bring a biblical wrath down upon Tampa and the GOP convention, there are a few items on the Party Platform that I think bear looking closely at. In view of the three mass shootings of the past month or so, there seems to be very little actual debate on gun control laws on the platform there, in soggy Tampa, which strikes me as odd - if not criminal. And I'm someone with more than my share of guns, including (but not limited to) two pistols, several hunting rifles and shotguns, and at least one assault rifle bought when they were dirt cheap because the Eastern Bloc was collapsing. I mean, hell, my assault rifle came with a retractable bayonet! How about yours? If the deer I'm hunting tries to climb into my stand with a weapon I can stab him in the jugular.

I'm being tongue-in-cheek, of course. My assault rifle was bought purely and simply as a hedge against the coming zombie apocalypse, which is not to be taken lightly.

But let's take a look at these statistics, shall we? From the coalition for gun-control - no doubt skewed by their gay, brie eating desire to socialize Amerika . . . these are the number for intentional gun deaths per 100, 000.

1. United States - 13.47
2. Finland - 6.65
3. Switzerland - 6.2
4. France - 5.48
5. Northern Ireland - 4.72
6. Austria - 4.48
7. Norway - 4.23
8. Canada - 3.95
9. Belgium - 3.32
10. Australia - 2.94

Or you could look at nations overall, per capita.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_wit_fir_perca...
#1 South Africa: 0.719782 per 1,000 people
#2 Colombia: 0.509801 per 1,000 people
#3 Thailand: 0.312093 per 1,000 people
#4 Zimbabwe: 0.0491736 per 1,000 people
#5 Mexico: 0.0337938 per 1,000 people
#6 Belarus: 0.0321359 per 1,000 people
#7 Costa Rica: 0.0313745 per 1,000 people
#8 United States: 0.0279271 per 1,000 people
#9 Uruguay: 0.0245902 per 1,000 people
#10 Lithuania: 0.0230748 per 1,000 people

In the first chart we rank number one when compared to our peers in the Western Industrialized World. Thinks look different when we open up the comparison to all kinds of other places, some without household plumbing and democracy and reality TV.  America's number eight in that second chart, but that's hardly comforting when you look at the countries who push us down that far - do we really want to be up there with Colombia and Mexico and Zimbabwe? No offense to South Africa, also, but those are not places that rank high in terms of stability. Are these the countries we want to see ourselves peers with?

Maybe, maybe not. But perhaps our gun freedom is a indicator that we are a more Free society - though most of my friends in Western Europe would scoff at that entirely subjective and jingoistic statement.

According the GOP's party platform, however, they remain adamantly opposed to "Federal licensing of law-abiding gun owners & national gun registration as a violation of the 2nd Amendment and an invasion of privacy of honest citizens."

 Which is a curious statement when compared to their stance on voter ID, in which they seem to turn a 180 degrees and go the other way altogether: "We support state laws that require proof of citizenship at the time of voter registration to protect our electoral system against a significant and growing form of voter fraud. Every time that a fraudulent vote is cast, it effectively cancels out the vote of a legitimate voter," according to Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach (R), who submitted an amendment calling for the addition of language to the draft GOP platform expressing support for state legislation that requires voters to show proof of citizenship when registering to vote. The amendment would build on a prior backing of "true, robust photo ID laws," Kobach said.

So no obtrusive licensing for buying/owning guns which is seen as a violation of the 2nd Ammendment, but a resounding yes to laws that would require a form of "licensing" that would allow people to vote.

In the past month alone we have seen nearly one hundred people killed by guns. However, experts have yet to show that we are troubled by dense hordes of sweaty illegal yard workers voting in insect like masses to push a certain liberal agenda. 

What stunning irony!