The Secret

Something is going unsaid in the flurry of stories about guns in America, and the justifications, the real and important need, for unfettered access to them, for "protection."

But first, let me readily acknowledge that if I lived on a farm in central Nebraska, I would consider it only sensible that I have a firearm: the nearest law enforcement authority, even perhaps the nearest neighbor, would likely be a long way away, and the response to an emergency that I am used to in Hyde Park --often a matter of 5 minutes or less--, would not be forthcoming. That does not necessarily mean I would require a 30- or 100-round clip for my "semi-" automatic weapon. let alone that I would need 20 or more guns. But perhaps an absolute ban of the type we have had, until recent Court rulings, in cities such as Chicago might not be proper.

Those arguments are not heard, though. We hear undifferentiated claims of need for protection, at all times and everywhere. Indeed, there have been laments that the kindergarten teachers at Sandy Hook were not packing heat. The people making those kinds of statements would seem to envision a school full of Diamond Lil-type gals, Glocks tucked into their garters; because, after all, if it were in the desk drawer, or the purse, way across the room or down the hall it would not likely do the job, would it?

The real argument isn't being made: it is that a significant number of people in this country believe that they must protect themselves from the government.

They believe Obama will attempt to drive them into the salt mines of socialism; or that black helicopters will descend to enforce martial law on Happy Valley; or, like the Texas sheriff recently, that the U.N. will attempt to take over his county by force. And if they are too rational to buy into any of these widely-held fears, they believe that the government will simply attempt to ban all weapons and confiscate all those now in the hands of the populace.

They won't say this, at least not many of them. But there are deeply-held fears that the always-at-hand "they" are coming to get "us." The fact that the president is a Negro has exacerbated these fears, no matter that Obama is not Malcolm X; hell, he isn't even Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson. But once you have such a fear, any attempt at any kind of regulation is viewed as confirmation of the belief.

And so the primary response, across the country, to the killing of a couple dozen six year-olds in a school in Connecticut has been a run on large-capacity magazines and rapid-fire weapons.