One of the great things about being a curmudgeonly blogger is that one can never run out of things to inspire new posts. Each new day dawns revealing new horizons of breathtaking stupidity at every level of life from the great and aristocratic to the humble and ordinary.
I call your attention to this news story from Sedalia, Missouri. The headline: "Man Installing Satellite TV Shoots, Kills Wife."
This is the story in brief: a fellow trying to install a satellite TV dish needed to drill a hole through the wall of his house. Either lacking a drill or being too mentally challenged to use one (in the words of the story, "after several unsuccessful efforts to punch a hole through the exterior wall using other means"), this mental giant decided to use a .22 caliber pistol to shoot a hole through the wall. The first shot didn't quite work; the second not only made the desired hole in the wall, it also made a hole in the chest of his wife, who was standing out in the yard.
As I have often admitted in this space, I'm not much of a handyman. In fact, I'm a terrible handyman. The only tool I'm adept at handling is a pen, and I've even been known to draw blood by accidentally stabbing my hand with a fountain pen. But that said, I have to yield primacy of place in the pantheon of ineptitude to someone who could shoot his wife while installing a TV.
Morons!
But there's a larger, more serious dimension to this tragically ridiculous tale, and it deals with our uniquely American fixation on the right to own firearms. Last week I wrote here about the gun control case now before the Supreme Court, which focuses on the constitutionality of the ban on handguns in Washington, DC, and - in a larger sense - attempts to determine the real meaning of the Second Amendment to the Constitution. What did the founders really mean by a right "to keep and bear arms?"
As I said in my earlier post, I have no problem with gun ownership. I don't have any guns myself, but I don't have a problem with anyone else having them for any legal purpose. I do, however, have a problem with stupid people having unlimited access to deadly firearms. If you're dumb enough to try to use a handgun to drill a hole in a wall, you're probably too stupid to own a deadly weapon in the first place.
My point remains as it's always been: reasonable people can have a reasonable discussion of practical and defensible limits on the possession of firearms. Rabid advocates of unlimited freedom to own weapons of all types are as silly as rabid advocates of a complete ban on guns. Where to draw the legal line is the hard part...but that line will never be established by people shouting at each other across a vast philosophical chasm.
So, let's have the discussion. The case now before the Supreme Court is a starting point, and the decision is expected in June.
Hopefully, before one of my neighbors shoots me while installing an appliance.
Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.
Bilbo
5 comments:
Bilbo, as usual, I couldn't agree more. BUT the sticky whicket is how you go about the assessment of those "too stupid to own guns" (or vote, or responsibly drive a car). For example, last year in Ohio, a 34 yr old killed three people in a huge car crash, where he was going an estimated 95 MPH. This is bad...especially when you consider this is the SECOND time this bozo commited vehicular homicide (last time in the 90's and it was 2 victims). I lament the fact that our concept of freedom results in an assumption of the right to do just about anything, until the collective can't stand it any more and, 5 months after killing, arrests someone like this guy (yes, it took 5 months to arrest him). I hope, at least, the idiot in Sedalia was arrested quickly and saved from his own complete stupidity.
Oh and you might not want crazy people to own guns either..but how do you tell if someone is truly off their noodle :(
While we can't tell who's on the level, it wouldn't be too difficult to require more thorough training before issuing firearms. Maryland's current training video is short and a joke. Similar to how a young driver has to go through driver's education and have supervised experience, I'd think forcing prospective gun purchasers to complete a similar program (through the NRA, perhaps) would be beneficial.
The second amendment starts off with the solution - "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State".
So if you want to own a gun you have to join a branch of the service or at least the reserves or national gaurd. I'd bet gun ownership would be way down right now.
Get a proper installer to fix a satellite system.
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