Sensible center needs to reclaim gun debate
What's wrong with these people?
The two parties also have something else in common. Neither is above resorting to demagoguery -- some of it with a racial tinge -- to bolster their respective positions on gun control.
Appearing Sunday on CBS' "Face the Nation," Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said of Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock: "This is a well-to-do man. ... He wasn't a gang-banger." Later on the same show, NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre suggested that "a gang member in Chicago" won't wait for a background check before buying a gun.
What's wrong with these people?
The modern gun debate is a farce. Such a serious subject deserves a more serious discussion. We're not delivering.
The obstinate loudmouths at the extremes are running the gun dialogue. It's up to the folks in the sensible center to restore sanity to this issue, and do everything we can to save future generations from the scourge of gun violence.
At least, authorities need to keep track of the lunatics -- people like Paddock, who bought 33 guns in one year and spent well over $100,000 on his personal arsenal, which included a total of nearly 50 weapons. Can anyone argue that this is normal behavior? At most, we should limit the number of gun purchases by an individual in a given year. The Second Amendment protects the right to bear arms, not the right to amass a stockpile of weapons with the intent of using them to kill others.
After all, we don't want our children, and one day their children, to look back at our inaction at a time of crisis and ask:
"What was wrong with those people?"
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Ruben Navarrette's email address is ruben@rubennavarrette.com.
(c) 2017, The Washington Post Writers Group
