New Rule #11: If you have an opinion on gun control,
tell the truth: You like guns, and that's ok, but you must stop equating handguns,
assault weapons, Uzis, etc with hunting guns. A Corollary to this is: stop using bogus "studies" as proof
of the blatantly untrue. And while you're at it, if you want to criticize Bob
Costas on journalistic grounds, you have to be a journalist of equal stature!
Much
has been made, and is being made, by media outlets as I write, about several
issues peripheral to the central issue of gun control. They range from the
outrage of Fox News that a
"mere" sports caster would dare to use 90 seconds to comment about something
with political overtones to the equally vociferous Ted Nugent and his fan club,
the NRA, claiming that guns, guns and more guns will cure cancer; an exaggeration, true, but you get the point.
Along the way, some gun advocates will cite studies (and there are some, done
by places such as Harvard) that seem to prove that gun ownership decreases
violent crime.
Each
of these issues and points of view has at some point, feet of clay and lapses of
illogic taken to prove the point. It should also be noted that no studies "proving"
gun ownership decreases violent crime consider just the United States, but
include European and African nations with hugely different history and
demographics. I shall address the easiest canard first - the claim that Bob Costas was inappropriate and unqualified
in using his bully pulpit to speak about
the NFL tragic murder/suicide and gun control when he should have stuck to
sports.
The
only way this criticism can be even considered would be if similar outrage was
expressed by Fox news, when Rush Limbaugh used ESPN for his racial superiority
rant re: Donovan McNabb several years ago. Curiously, O'Reilly, Hannity, et al
had nothing to say. To criticize a journalist of
Costas stature on professional grounds is above the pay grade of anyone at Fox News.
First off, Costas is no stranger to political commentary, and has made no
attempt to back away from it. In spite of this, in the eyes of O'Reilly, Hannity,
Coulter and the rest, when the discussion turns to guns, all restraint is gone.
Never accuse Fox of not knowing how to pander to their demographic! Suddenly
the gloves come off, and O'Reilly slams Costas for political commentary on a
sports broadcast.
This,
from a man with two largely ghost written books, one of which, "Killing
Lincoln," was removed from shelves at Ford's Theater due to inaccuracies.
I assume, since O'Reilly has BA in history, he's qualified nonetheless. Not surprisingly, O'Reilly's name is in a huge
type face on the cover of his books, while the co-author is tiny. Costas, on
the other hand has co-authored 9 books and written two. On the co-authored
books, Costas name is in equal or smaller font than the co-author! Costas is also credited as a major contributor to Ken Burns' iconic "Baseball" series for PBS. Along the
way, Costas has had moderate success and acclaim for work inside and outside
sports broadcasting.
Costas
has won eight National Sportcaster of the Year awards from the National
Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association, and was inducted into that
organization's Hall of Fame in 2012. He has also won four Sportscaster of the
Year awards from the American Sportscasters Association, and nearly twenty
Sports Emmy Awards for outstanding sports announcing. Among a host of awards,
Costas has been awarded the Curt Gowdy Media Award from the Basketball Hall of
Fame, TV Guide Award for Favorite
Sportscaster, the Dick Schaap Award for
Outstanding Journalism, Doctorate in humane letters from Loyola College in
Maryland, and the Walter Cronkite Award
for Excellence in Journalism. I can't be sure, but I bet that Bill O'Reilly
fantasizes about the Cronkite award, which he'll never win, when he.....(you know.)!
Costas has also hosted numerous non-sports
related talk shows that have focused on
a wide variety of topics, and have not been limited to sports discussion. Costas
hosted Later with Bob Costas on NBC, featuring Costas and a single guest having
a conversation for the entire half hour, without a band, opening monologue or
studio audience. On several occasions, Costas held the guest over for multiple
nights, and these in-depth discussions won Costas much praise for his
interviewing skills. In June 2005, Costas was named regular substitute anchor
for Larry King's Larry King Live for one year. On August 18, 2005, Costas refused to host a
Larry King Live broadcast where the subject was missing Alabama teenager
Natalee Holloway. Costas said he had no hard feelings about the subject, but
that he was uncomfortable with it. Imagine that, a conscience, another concept
alien to Fox! Since October 2011, Costas is a correspondent for Rock Center
with Brian Williams. He gained acclaim for his November 2011 live interview of
former Pennsylvania State University assistant coach Jerry Sandusky concerning
charges of sexual abuse of minors, in which Sandusky called in by telephone to
deny the charges. So, no, Virginia, Bob Costas is much more than a "sportscaster"
and much more of a real journalist than most of the Fox staff can ever hope to
be. By Fox's standards, I suppose the late, great Jim McKay should have just
kept quiet about the Munich Olympic Tragedy, too?
Regarding
some of the claims made by Nugent and others both before and after the Costas
controversy, it seems sometimes people just "spew an opinion" and
think if they say it loud enough or often enough, others will believe it. No one proves this quite like the Motor City Madman,
Ted Nugent. I must issue a disclaimer here, I actually like some of Nugent's
music and his guitar work, I mean who doesn't love "Yank Me, Crank
Me" and "Whang Dang, Sweet Poontang"? Boy they don't write 'em like that anymore!
Ted sez: " Every study on crime and or
firearms proves time and time again, that 99.99999% of American gun owners
do not commit crimes or use our firearms in any dangerous or improper way."
The only problem with this is that in order for this statement to be valid, the
US would have to have a population of over 30,000,000,000 (thirty billion for the math challenged) persons
who own guns! Ted also posits that: "The
only misuse of guns comes in environments where there are drugs, alcohol, bad
parents, and undisciplined children. Period." That must be small comfort for Gabby Giffords,
the parents of the VA Tech students, the families of those killed in the Colorado
theater, and the two year old orphan of Jovan
Belcher. It also probably won't help the 13 year old who was shot by his young
friend in Lake County Fl. because his friend's father, the Lake County
Sheriff's Dept. firearms safety
instructor left his loaded Glock on top of the refrigerator. The shooting
was accidental, but surely not due to Nugent's pre requisites. This point of
view also means that a sober, drug free adult holdup man or sniper isn't misusing his
gun!%$#???
There
are some opposing points of view, by persons far saner and more rational than Ted
Nugent. " When a person has a gun, sometimes their mind clicks that this
thing will win arguments and straighten people out" ( Bill Cosby). Here's
another fun thing to do with your conservative friends: fondly mention Ronald Reagan,
that icon of conservatism, and just when
their tears are about to brim over
mention that he signed California's Mulford Act in 1967, 'prohibiting the carrying of
firearms on one's person or in a vehicle in any public place or on any public
street,' and his voicing of support for the Brady Bill and the enactment and
support of an 'assault' weapons ban in the 90's!" Who? Ron? Yep! (Nothing to make you favor gun control like
getting shot!)
Finally,
regarding all the studies "proving" that handgun possession lowers
crime rates: All these studies have one or more fatal flaws, usually (in my
humble opinion) built in by the person(s) doing the study. Like creationists,
these persons are usually either pro-gun and starting from the conclusion and
working backwards, or being paid by an organization such as the NRA to come to
the conclusions which they desire. These studies also take into consideration
all guns in the country of interest. In the USA, this skews the data from the
start, because of the relatively large number of sportsmen hunters, whose long
guns are rarely, if ever, the guns used in the violent instances we so fear. This
large number of recreational firearms is
lumped with handguns of all sorts, which
are, in fact the killers of the innocent and the loved one in a moment of
passion.
One
such study "proves" that Russia, which has a high violent crime death
rate, has a relatively low handgun ownership. Considering the history of Russia,
totally different from the USA, this isn't and shouldn't be, surprising. As recently as 70
years ago, essentially no Russian other than military or government persons had
handguns or guns period. The problem was
that Stalin and his ilk still were able
to order the "liquidation" of millions (at least 5 million, and
that's conservative) of his own people for political reasons. Since the fall of
communism, the guns are in the hands of Russian Mafia, and the demographic is little
changed. Those in power have guns and use them against those not. The reason for the crime rate is societal,
not related to ordnance.
Another,
the Harvard study, lumps the USA with the Scandinavian nations in an attempt to
show (and it does) that statistically, those nations have relatively low rates
of violent crime, and that the crime rate varies inversely with the percentage
of the population who own guns. Again,
taking several of these nations, Finland, Norway, Austria, Sweden, Denmark are of
traditionally low population density with a tradition of rural, hunting cultures.
Their long guns are not analogous to handguns for purposes of the study.
Another interesting factoid from this study is that Austria, with 17,000 guns
per 100,0000 persons, has the lowest violent gun related death rate per capita in Europe (.08 deaths per 100
thousand), while Finland, with more than 2 1/2 as many guns per capita, has, 2 1/2 times as many gun
related deaths. So much for statistics. Another factor that must be considered
is the nature of the governments in these nations, almost all of which are
Socialist. If one grants that much gun related crime is related to drugs and/or
poverty, then one must consider that drugs are decriminalized in most of these
nations and social welfare does much to feed and clothe the less fortunate, so
why use a gun to get what the government will give you? By the way, you will
not see many Socialists with National Rifle Association memberships!
The
other, even more egregious study interpretation comes from citing relatively
low gun ownership per capita in African nations with a high violent death rate
as statistically meaningful in other areas of the world. It is true that
Swaziland ranks a lowly 85th in the world in terms of gun ownership, but 5th in
terms of violent gun related deaths. This statistic is meaningless in the sense
that the deaths are either genocidal or government ordered, neither of which is
relevant to civilized nations.
Taking
either of these extreme "proofs" from these studies, therefore, if
you hate guns, move to
Swaziland, where your neighbors won't have them, (but 57 of each 100,000 will
die). If on the other hand, you think, as do the Nugents of the world, that
more guns is better, move to Serbia, number two in the world right after the
USA in gun ownership (3.9 homicides per 100,000). Or stay here (88 guns per
resident, #1 in the world, 10.97 deaths per 100,000, 10th in the world!) Another
example of how statistics lie is that Japan, Haiti and Rwanda have exactly the
same very small percentage of firearms ownership.( .6 guns per 100 persons.) So
obviously, all three have equal violent crime rates? If you are Ted Nugent, the
figures must be right. Me, however, I'm not going to Rwanda regardless!
.”The
right of the people to keep and bear…arms shall not be infringed. A well
regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the
best and most natural defense of a free country…”
~James Madison
The
modern equivalent of the "well regulated militia" is the National
Guard, not a bunch of loonies playing war in the woods. There are no hostile savages
except ourselves, Ndomakong Suh, and
some Canadian hockey players. And I do believe that's all I have to say about
that.
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