Guns and the Lesson Of Pandora's Box

I understand that some Senators have been asking Mitch McConnell,  Senate Majority Leader, to reconvene the Senate so they can pass more gun control.  As stated yesterday, I do not believe gun control is the answer.  For more on that today, please read Paul Curry's article at Townhall.com entitled Pandora's Box Has Been Opened And The 2nd Amendment Is Not Negotiable. Here's the money quote:

A government cannot dictate morality. To say or imply otherwise would ignore the realties of back ally abortions, drug trafficking and the current opioid crisis. When humans have a desire coupled with the knowledge and ability to achieve such an end, inevitably, they will achieve such an end. Now, the gun debate and the Second Amendment debate rages on in defiance of this well-established principle.

Humans have the knowledge and ability to make and obtain firearms. A simple internet search can teach someone to make their own. China, Russia, Italy, and countless other countries produce guns. Are we to assume, in defiance of the lessons of prohibition, abortion, and the drug trade, that the simple criminalizing of self defense will somehow prevent the natural human desire for such? All that would ensue would be an international arms circuit, run by cartels, serving only to arm the very criminals that defy our laws to begin with.

And how would any such prohibition be enforced? By the politicians that run, say, sanctuary cities and states? By local law enforcement that passionately refuse to work with federal officers and agencies to enforce existing laws with which they disagree? Such a proposition is ludicrous on its face. One could fairly submit that, in such an environment, the government would choose to enforce firearm prohibitions on some while tacitly ignoring it on others. Prohibition taught us that.

This is a point I made yesterday, though not as forcefully. It is estimated that the criminal element in society is around 2 percent of the population. They simply don't need too many guns, and what they do need can be supplied by smuggling in guns along with drugs. And any machine shop that was so inclined can manufacture guns for the right price. Making ammunition for those guns is not rocket science either. Truly, Pandora's Box has been opened, and to quote another cliche`, you can't stuff the toothpaste back in the tube. Please go read Curry's piece.

Scott Morefield, also at Townhall.com wants to try something that seemed to work in the past: deterrence. He writes in an article today that we should Punish Mass Shooters 1776 Style. Morefield has a point. All too often the calls of the "do something" crowd would punish the millions of others who did NOT do the crime, while seeming glorifying the criminal by spreading his name far and wide.  But that does not do anything to deter the next mass shooter.  Perhaps making his life a hell on earth might at least make the next one think.