The Case Against Background Checks

Last month the Senate wisely rejected Senators Manchin and Toomey's amendment that would have expanded background checks on all firearm sales. Although the vote was clearly along party lines, four Democratic Senators — Mark Pryor (Ark.), Max Baucus (Mont.), Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.) and Mark Begich (Alaska) — all heroically joined with Republicans to defeat this un-American and dangerously discriminatory legislation.

Discriminatory you ask? Absolutely! This legislation would have targeted three specific groups of people, all of which are already underrepresented in Congress and openly discriminated against in daily life: the dangerously mentally ill, the criminal and the terrorist.

Imagine, if you will, that you are a person with severe mental illness and a tendency towards extreme violence and the many voices in your head are demanding that you immediately purchase an AR-15 and 2,000 rounds of ammunition. Now you have to tell those voices, one of which is of course God, that, sorry, you just can't do it. This would lead to severe depression and feelings of inadequacy and shame. If we care about the homicidally mentally ill, do we really want to further upset and frustrate them? I think not.

Then there is the criminal. It's hard enough to be a criminal, but it's terribly hard to be a really good criminal without a gun of some sort. Try robbing a bank with a hammer. Not easy. And even the average convicted wife-beater deserves some sort of protection. There are some tough wives out there! And anyway, which is better? Getting beaten up time after time or just getting it over with quickly?

That leaves the terrorist, the most misunderstood of the three groups. Imagine coming all the way to this country to stock up on state-of-the-art weaponry and being told "No." Talk about inhospitality! I wouldn't come back, would you? Of course not! And just imagine if the Tsarnaev brothers were unable to arm themselves with hundreds of rounds of ammo and several high-powered weapons. We wouldn't have had such exciting TV coverage of their standoff with the police. It would have been over in a minute. Then what would the media talk about? Women's health? Please.

Americans owe the NRA, Wayne LaPierre and the Republican party a very large "thank you" for sticking up for the God-given rights of the dangerously insane, the criminal and the terrorist. The Democrats, who pretend to care about the rights of all, would not do this, except for the four previously noted. I think we've all had enough hypocrisy.

©2013 Kona Lowell