Exploiting Mass Murder

October 2002 gave the battered anti-gun lobby what it desperately needed: a high-profile mass murderer who used a firearm. It has been over three years since the lobby's last big public relations victory at Columbine, but time has not changed the way these rare incidents are covered and exploited.

There is an old saying that journalists know nothing about guns and don't want to learn. This was reaffirmed by last week's saturation coverage from the Washington suburbs that was loaded with firearms myths and misinformation.

I used to enjoy a derisive laugh at reporters like the CNN anchor who used the nonsense term "high-powered assault hunting-type weapon," but now I just feel embarrassed for them and quickly change the channel.

Many news outlets exposed their anti-gun roots when their initial slant on the story focused on the type of rifle and ammunition used by the killer. In their rush to instill fear in the audience, they implied that the rifle was some kind of super weapon, when in reality it is much less powerful than most common hunting rifles. Close-ups and graphics invariably left viewers with the impression that the .223 cartridges are much larger than they actually are. A real sniper would not be interested in such an anemic cartridge.

Some news organizations blindly echoed inflammatory press releases from anti-gun organizations like the unashamedly biased fringe group, the Violence Policy Center. The VPC attributed the killings to an imaginary, but sinister, "sniper subculture." A bizarre editorial in the Philadelphia Daily News even blamed the NRA for the murders.

The inbred cultural bias of the large news organizations has also resulted in a tendency to minimize the likelihood that the crimes are the work of an organized terrorist cell. The elite media want to believe in a single killer, preferably a deranged gun nut hopped up on video games and propaganda from the evil NRA.

Anti-gun politicians and lobbyists moved quickly to exploit the killings, labeling ordinary firearms as "sniper weapons" that must be registered or banned. They also proposed legislation they claim will magically prevent similar crimes by creating a "national ballistic database" to record data about every new gun sold in America.

The idea is to collect a fired bullet to show the rifling marks and an expended brass cartridge case to show marks from the extractor and firing pin. This kind of forensic evidence has sometimes been helpful in cases where a gun is recovered immediately after a crime is committed, but is useless as a way of permanently tagging new guns. The distinctive marks are not like human fingerprints that remain unchanged. They change as a gun is used and they can easily be modified in many ways.

It is important to note that shotguns do not have rifled barrels and many guns don't eject a spent case. There is also no way to test the 230 million guns that already exist. It is unlikely that a single criminal would ever be caught.

Balance this against a very high cost, partly due to the need for secure storage to preserve the legal chain of evidence. Defense attorneys would exploit the smallest errors to discredit the entire system.

In short, the whole idea of a ballistic database is bogus and simply highlights the ignorance or duplicity of those who support it.

But facts don't matter to the anti-gun lobby. They know their ideological movement will die if they don't find a way to regain their lost political momentum. They have no choice but to tell big lies as they dance in the blood of innocent victims.

The anti-gun nuts are well aware that a ballistic database won't reduce crime, but they take comfort in the thought that it might reduce gun ownership by increasing the expense and the delays associated with gun purchases. Fewer gun owners, obviously, means less opposition to the gun ban agenda.

Political analysts say there is no chance Congress will pass any new anti-gun legislation, so perhaps this debate is meaningless and will pass as quickly as the fear-mongering media coverage.

Unfortunately, a more permanent kind of damage has been done to a special and important group of Americans, the police and military snipers who risk their lives to protect us. These men use their skill, and real sniper rifles, to save countless lives by shooting individual hostage takers or enemy combatants without any collateral damage.

By awarding the title of sniper to whoever is committing these shocking crimes, the media have damaged the reputations of brave men in an honorable profession. Calling him a killer or mass murderer would surely be adequate and probably more accurate.

Dr. Michael S. Brown is an optometrist and member of Doctors for Sensible Gun Laws, www.dsgl.org.

These men use their skill, and real sniper rifles, to save countless lives...

Countless is a little overwrought; maybe ten per year... and some years it's Randy Weaver's wife and kid on the receiving end.

Just watched Chucky Schumer and Wayne debating this (ballistic database) on Tim Russert's show. What a bunch of liberal B.S. Although I did miss some of the show, I think the NRA could have had somebody with much better debating skills on there.

I think this editorial made a much better case against it than he did.

The California Department of Justice has just come out with a report, available on the Net and noted yesterday on FR. Even though this Department is under the Democrats including Governor Gray ("high public official") Davis and Attorney General Bill ("I own the law") Lockyear, the report was negative.
Ballistic "fingerprinting" would fail, it concludes, even if restricted to just automatic pistols, .25 calliber and over, just in California. Since the failures increase as the size of the data base goes up, a national data base of all weapons would be as useful as a Polish mission to land astronauts on the Sun (at night, of course).
See also the first link below.

Congressman Billybob

This column is based on the fine work by FReepers in a thread on FR. Click for "Ballistics and Bullsh*t"

Click for "Til Death Do Us Part."

Click for "to Restore Trust in America"

Dithering over what is or isn't a sniper rifle seems a bit misguided to me. The SEALs use the SR-25 as their "sniper rifle", and it's basically a high-quality AR-type in .308. Hathcock recommends a Remmington 700, which you can buy at a sporting goods store. Most clear-cut sniper rifles are just accurized hunting rifles with synthetic stocks.

As for the caliber, the .223 isn't too "anemic" to have killed 10 people, and larger caliber rifles would make more noise and be harder to conceal.

Pointing out Crocodile Dundee style, "That's not a sniper rifle, *this* is a sniper rifle" is just going to get all the 1/2 MOA guns banned.

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