River Skylan and Hadley Van Dyne face off week to week as they stalk the campaign trails of President Obama and his opponent, Mitt Romney. This week, River gets the first punch while Hadley gets the rebuttal. Tune in next week for more he said/she said of the left and right and to find out just where this debate will take us in time for Election 2012.

River Says:

Guns don’t kill people, people kill people. It’s one of the dumbest sayings around and we’ve heard it a lot this past week after James Holmes decided to open fire on innocent moviegoers in Aurora, CO, killing 12 and wounding 58.

Right-wingers say the government should stay out of the lives of its people; an interesting contradiction to their general stand on same-sex marriage and abortion, but those are arguments for a different day. Right-wingers, or Constitution Huggers, as I call them, also mutter things like the aforementioned dumb saying and “2nd amendment, 2nd amendment, 2nd amendment” whenever anyone questions their hunting habits.

But as much as I respect our Constitution and realize the line of its interpretation is blurry, I think we can all agree that when our founding fathers composed those amendments way back in 1791 (that’s 221 years ago for those of you whipping out your fingers), they weren’t suggesting we become a nation where one, sane or not, can legally obtain an arsenal of weaponry after a quick shopping spree at WalMart, regardless of what he or she planned to do with it; shoot up a movie theater or otherwise.  The world was different in the 1700s. These were men who wore white wigs and knickers and always seem to have been painted as though they wore a lot of  blush on their cheeks. Notice I said “painted” and not “photographed.” When the Bill of Rights were written Washington D.C. didn’t even have its name yet, the Cotton Gin wasn’t yet a thing and our 15th president was just being born. We’re up to pres #44 by now.

Does this mean we should pretend that particular amendment doesn’t exist? Ideally, yes. But I’m realistic. I understand the NRA needs to keep their firearms around for “protection” and a reckless, arrogant hobby of killing animals for fun because it’s a cool thing to do. I also understand that crazies like Holmes will figure something out even if it means going a little bit farther out of the way than the WalMart, but do we need to make it so easy? In the US gun dealers outnumber McDonald’s restaurants 9 to 1.  And this isn’t just about Holmes. It’s about other folks that could be slowed down in their assassination attempts, robberies, domestic attacks, nightclub accidents and so on and so on.

President Obama says he won’t use the Colorado Dark Knight tragedy to push for reformed gun laws. It could also be that he’s busy on the campaign trail trying to win four more years. But despite his current lack of interest in the subject, gun control debates are heating up from coast to coast with political figures stepping in left and right. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney thinks the solution is easier than changing gun laws:

Changing the heart of the American people may well be what’s essential, to improve the lots of the American people.

Is that the conservative way of saying “give peace a chance”? Mitt may think he can change the heart of the people, and if he can, I have no doubts he will use that power for evil. Meanwhile I say: now’s as good a time as any to crack down.

Hadley Says:

And I say that allowing guys like James Holmes to intrude on the rights of innocent citizens is exactly the kind of thing a domestic terrorist like him would be happy to see. You said it yourself, he’ll find the means necessary whether it’s legal for him to or not.  And why not let it be legal for him? Pre-shooting, no one had any idea he was up to anything, he had no criminal background.

I agree with President Obama on one thing which is that during such a heated political campaign especially, politicizing gun control laws immediately after a tragedy is wrong. But since you and a million other liberals have brought it up, let’s discuss it.

1. Whether you approve or not, the 2nd amendment still stands. A “different world” could be used as an excuse to nullify any amendment nowadays, and if we did that, where would we be? Just throwing out the Constitution because some things have changed? Those laws are the foundation of this country and ignoring them haphazardly because things are different now won’t get any of us very far.
2. James Holmes is an example of someone who should not only have limited access to firearms, and the internet for that matter, he should be locked away in a room with pads on the walls. He cannot be used as an example of an every day citizen that we need protection from. He’s a rare and isolated case and prevention of his atrocious crime goes well beyond gun control.
3. At the risk of making an awkward comparison, you lefties want to legalize marijuana in part because it will end drug wars. You say allowing people to get their hands on the stuff legally will remove the prohibition-like shady things that go on because they’ll get it anyway if they want it bad enough. Stricter gun control laws could end up just the same, with a dangerous black market full of people desperate to do whatever it takes to get the protection they once had the legal right to. At least this way it can be regulated.
4. Current gun laws could have saved the victims given the right crowd. If someone in that theater, or anywhere under attack for that matter, was concealing a weapon, they could have taken Holmes down before he had the chance to shoot as many rounds as he did.

You live in a world where gun control laws mean no one on earth has a weapon so we can all live peacefully, holding hands and singing Kumbaya around a bonfire. Not allowing Constitution-protected citizens their right to bear arms doesn’t make the country safer. If someone’s willing to kill a person, or twelve people, or more, logic would indicate that they’re not concerned with whatever laws they might be breaking to obtain their weapons. So why does threatening the rights of those who play by the rules seem like the way to combat it?

The libs are jumping on this debate trying to gain leverage from the tragedy and it’s pretty ridiculous.

River and Hadley send their thoughts and hopes to the loved ones of the victims of this heinous crime as we collectively put our trust towards a better future.

Photo credit: Francois Polito