Dealer in Stupidity...The Toledo Blade and Guns on Campus

By Jeff Riley

The Editorial Board of the Toledo Blade has outdone themselves this time and has become hysterical to the point of incontinence. The subject: Internet sales of guns and gun related parts (a legal activity) and the responsible carry of handguns for self-protection by college students.

The editorial, entitled "Trading in death", begins by slandering Eric Thompson, president of TGSCOM Inc. by calling him a merchant of death. In reality, Eric operates one of the largest sites on the web for the purchase of aftermarket parts for Glock handguns. Blaming Mr. Thompson for the actions of others is like blaming your local car dealership for selling a car to someone who kills another in a drunken driving accident. It seems that just like college administrators, the Blade believes that ultimately, people are not responsible for their actions. In their make-believe world, everyone is a "victim" and the mere presence of a firearm can turn otherwise normal people into homicidal maniacs in an instant (one would hate to be at their editorial board meetings, I bet they have to lock up anything sharp).

The facts are these: both the VA Tech and NICU murderers were mentally ill and not served well by the mental health system. More than likely both of them would have been institutionalized (and added to the prohibited persons database) at some point except for the fact that our mental health system has been gutted and persons turned out into the streets in the name of "compassion". Systems fail, and people slip through the cracks. Yet we do not restrict the liberties of others just because some behave criminally. 'Innocent until proven guilty' is bedrock of our legal system. I know that 200 years is plenty of time to come to grips with that concept. Get used to it.

The Blade reserves the greater portion of their article describing college students thus:

Immature, alcohol and drug dependent, and sex addicted, as well as incapable of dealing with academic and economic pressures.

In other words, just like the staff at the Blade, if you substitute the word "deadlines" for "academic", the Blade would have you believe something more along the lines of "Colleges and universities are refuges from the realities of the outside world", where magical fairies patrol and nip crime in the bud, and everyone is safe.

This may be how they remember college in the Sixties, but even then the Richard Specks of the world were murdering unarmed students. It must have been all the drugs, alcohol, and sex that eclipsed those memories.

The one question that the Blade or any person/group opposed to self-defense by students is this:

Why is it that the same students who are licensed to carry a concealed handgun for protection are *NOT *engaging in off campus mass shootings, drunken brawls brandishing firearms, or the Blade's ultimate nightmare scenario, "imagine if hundreds of Ohio State University students who went on an alcohol-stoked rampage after the 2002 OSU-Michigan football game had been armed?"

The answer is obvious and has been born out in statistics in every State where concealed carry is legal. Those persons who take the time to attend training, undergo a background check, and apply for a concealed handgun license are some of the most law-abiding persons residing in their respective states. Contrary to the "blood in the street's" hue and cry that rang forth in each state prior to legalizing concealed carry, not one State has rescinded passage due to criminal behavior of CHL holders. This has been evident even in States like Utah and Colorado who currently allow licensed concealed carry by students.

College students are adults, they can drink, vote, get abortions, and serve (or have already) in our Armed Forces. Their lives are worth no less on campus than off-campus, and they have the inherent right to self-protection. Since college administrators, the police, and editorial boards cannot be there 24/7 to protect them, some of them have realized that they are responsible for or their own lives. Unlike the Blade, they are willing to accept the personal responsibility that goes with that, and they are to be commended, not condemned.

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. The editorial by the Blade is a rehash of the same old, tired arguments that we have heard since '68. Just one more law and crime will disappear, give up one more right and heaven on earth will descend. Yet history has is replete with societies that in trying to establish "heaven on earth" have instituted just the opposite.

The Blade's position on gun control is insane, they know that what they propose will have no real impact, and their thought process can be summarized with a quote by Lorne Gunter in the National Post regarding a call to ban handguns in Canada:

...So why do liberal-left politicians expend so much energy trying to restrict gun ownership or even ban guns outright?

The principal reason, of course, is that modern liberalism is the victory of symbolism over substance. A public policy or law is seldom designed mostly to solve an identified problem. Its primary purpose is to reflect well on the good intentions of the person or group proposing it.

So what if laws and social programs produce no tangible benefits? They remain on the statute books and retain full funding — complete with massive bureaucracies — because they enable liberals to convince themselves something is being done. Activity is confused with achievement.

Gun control is constantly put forward by intellectually lazy politicians and do-gooder activists because attempting to restrict gun ownership is easier than taking on real criminals. More importantly, anti-gun laws enable politicians and activists to claim they are doing something to cure a problem that concerns voters and donors, even though restricting gun ownership among law-abiding citizens has no mitigating effect on violent crime.

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