A Navy Vet's Case For Gun Control

Daily Beast ^ | 11.23.14 | Shawn VanDiver

[Second Amendment First]

How many shootings will it take before we adopt common sense gun control? A former Navy weapons instructor lays out the simple steps lawmakers can take to make us all safer.

Last week, there was yet another campus shooting. This time, it was at Florida State University. The exhaustingly predictable cycle of mass shooting, recycled talking points from all sides, proposed legislation, insider lobbying, stagnation, and loss of public interest is about to begin and has been repeated far too many times in recent memory. Face it: the gun rights debate in this country is stale. In May, I talked about how both sides are wrong and said that we need to have some common sense. Today, I am calling on lawmakers to have some damn courage.

If you feel, like the fringe gun lobby does, that my 6 year-old son's life is less important than your right to own whatever firearm and ammunition you want, then say that. Don't hide behind meaningless rhetoric or claim you're ready for action only to back off when the NRA comes knocking. That being said, if you believe—along with a clear majority of Americans of both parties—that modest regulation of weapons designed for the sole purpose of killing humans seems reasonable, that's a pretty easy public position to take.

And before you jump to assumptions, know that I'm no hippie. As a former weapons instructor in the U.S. Navy, I own guns myself—and I want to keep them. However, I believe that our society is overflowing with lethal weapons and that we must take action to prevent more dead kids. Mass shootings are on the rise. Children are dying. When will it be enough to actually do something? Who has the courage to do the right thing—money from special interest groups be damned?

If you feel, like the fringe gun lobby does, that my 6 year-old son's life is less important than your right to own whatever firearm and ammunition you want, then say that. I'll make it easy for lawmakers. Here is the first common sense step for what we need to do, at the state level, to maintain our constitutional right to bear arms while arming ourselves with the tools to be safer in public.

Licensing, to be renewed every five years with full background checks and mental health screenings, is the first step. Adding a checkbox to a driver's license and another form would make this easy to implement. My driver's license tells folks that I am a donor; it could very easily also indicate whether or not I am a gun owner or authorized to carry concealed firearms.

Before you tell me how I am violating your rights by proposing a record of gun owners, note that the constitution does not say that you have the right to bear arms and not tell anyone. We regulate chemicals, elevators, airplanes, and financial transactions—and none of those are specifically designed to kill anyone.

The next step is requiring 40 hours of training prior to license approval. I’m here to tell you that there is little value to having a firearm if one is cannot employ it tactically. I’m not saying we need owners to be trained to the level of Navy SEALs or SWAT teams, but if you claim to want these weapons to protect your home, then you should at least have a baseline knowledge. The training hours should jump to 80 hours for a concealed carry permit. This training should be done by the government to ensure consistency and quality control and should be covered by the tax on ammunition.

And finally, to pay for the licensing process and training as well as the background and mental health screenings, we can add a modest tax to ammunition sales (think five to ten cents per round—a manageable amount). This way, the costs are spread amongst those who wish to own guns.

My hometown city charter calls out public safety as the number one priority; many politicians around the country say the same thing, and I'd like to see them put their money where their mouths are. The question is pretty simple: do your lawmakers have the courage to protect you?

Call your state senators, your assembly members, your mayors, and your city councils. Tell them that you want to protect your kids. You want to protect your communities. Hell, you want to protect yourself. Tell them that, with the stroke of a pen, they can improve safety for their constituents and side with the clear majority of Americans.

And if they try to run you around or brush you off, remember to ask them if they think the right to own as many firearms as one wants without anyone else knowing about it is more important than the lives of America's children—including yours and theirs.

[Gaffer]

One source:

Shawn VanDiver is a recently separated Navy veteran and single parent. He is an emergency management and homeland security expert and is active in local and national politics. He’s an adjunct professor at two universities.

Another source:

Shawn VanDiver‎San Diego County Young Democrats August 10, 2013 · San Diego, CA ·

Another one:

http://voiceofsandiego.org/2014/09/08/from-a-battle-abroad-to-a-wage-battle-back-home/

[Steamburg]

“Navy Vet” should know that guns are mounted on platforms and carriages and are owned by governments. Another irrelevant opinion by a person claiming that their argument is special because they are the one making it.

[DesertRhino]

And 120 hours for a ccw permit is more of the typical military crap thinking. If it’s your hobby, fine. But it most assuredly doesn’t take that long to learn to shoot if you have the hand and eye coordination to shoot a water pistol out a blow drier.
I’m supposed to take a week of vacation for government training just to own a gun? 2 weeks at a government center to have a ccw?
Jackass...

[Lazamataz]

Too bad this guy didn’t serve on the USS Cole.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

***The next step is requiring 40 hours of training prior to license approval.***

Bunkum. The USAF only required us to have half a day’s training to be arms qualified. Good enough for them, good enough for me.

[VeniVidiVici]

If you feel, like the fringe gun lobby does, that my 6 year-old son's life is less important than your right to own whatever firearm and ammunition you want,

Ok. My right to own a firearm and ammunition is more important to me than your son's life.

Now, did that statement change anything? No, because you think since you have personified guns that all guns are after your son and thus all people that own guns are bad.

[JRandomFreeper]

He's an idiot, that is for sure.

/johnny

[Seruzawa]

Although not a majority there are still plenty of vets who are govt worshiping left wing loonies.

[outofsalt]

Prior to 1970 “child” deaths from guns was minimal. Most gun deaths in the 1-19 age group are gang or criminal activity related and result from people who are currently prohibited from owning guns. This will not change with additional laws.

The urban liberal culture is responsible for most of the lawless violence in our society.

[ChildOfThe60s]

John Kerry is a vet, never stopped him from being a liar and a coward.

[snappahead]

Precisely. Like being elected president does not make Obama a leader.
Sprinkling sugar on a turd doesn’t make it a powdered doughnut.

[Reverend Wright]

there does seem to be a element of self interest for a security expert/fire arms instructor to be advocating 40 hours of gov’t mandated training for all gun owners and 80 hrs for concealed carry.

i do think gun owners need to be properly trained. but putting gov’t in charge of that is likely to have the same results as “gov’t licensed” drivers

[VeniVidiVici]

From his Linkedin

Causes Shawn cares about:

Civil Rights and Social Action
Human Rights
Disaster and Humanitarian Relief
Politics

Organizations Shawn supports:

Clinton Foundation
Human Rights Campaign
PFLAG - Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays
ASIS International
International Association of Emergency Managers
California Young Democrats

[null and void]

False dichotomy, di=two tomy=cut/divide/segment.

[ChildOfThe60s]

Liberals are never honest.

*Real* gun crime is a demographic problem. The hard, cold fact is that if liberals really cared, they would advocate banning possession of guns by blacks and Hispanics. That would 80% of gun murders. 80%

http://gunwatch.blogspot.com/2013/01/european-murder-rates-compared-to.html

In 2006 the Department of Justice issued a report on violent felons in large urban counties. It covered the period from 1990 to 2002, and included the 75 most populous counties in the United States. The study accounted for over half of all the murders in the United States in the covered period.

Revealed in the study was a simple breakdown of the demographics of the murderers that is not commonly available. Murderers were divided into three groups. Blacks were the most numerous at 46%. Hispanics were next at 27 percent. Non-Hispanic whites were last at 23 percent.

While the study does not account for all murders in the period studied, it accounts for more than half and almost certainly slightly understates the percentages of Black murderers, because the latest FBI statistics (for 2010) show that when all the murders in the U.S are taken into account, the percentage of Black murderers is over 53 percent.

[Sicon]

We regulate chemicals, elevators, airplanes, and financial transactions—and none of those are specifically designed to kill anyone.

Riiiight. But none of those things is stated as a RIGHT in the Constitution, nor were any of those things considered by the Founding Fathers (oooh, so sorry, I mean "Framers"!) as being necessary for the People to protect themselves, both from other people, and/or tyrannical government.

This guy is almost as great a Constitutional "scholar" as Obola....

[PubliusMM]

The libtard wolf dressed up in SaranWrap clothes, IMO.

The Constitution’s Second Amendment is very clear and precise. It doesn’t this clown’s tweaking or interpretation.

[xrmusn]

Of course, when one is one ‘their side’ of an issue they become a ‘cause celeb’ much like when Nancy Reagan - whom the media had vilified for so many years - instantly became a ‘hero’ to the left because she opined that maybe one O North should not be the ‘next’ Senator from VA, representing the Republicans.

In this case the author is legitimatized because he lays claim to being a ‘Former Navy Gun Instructor’.

Used to have swim call in the South Pacific and the word would be passed...
“Swim Call - On duty Sharpshooters to their post”...

Since we normally carried Marines it was not a bad thing but when they changed the announcement to all Navy Sharpshooters etc I (we) sorta wondered who was in more trouble, US or the Sharks...(joking)

Everytime there is ANY kind of shooting, couple of wagsters inform ‘ALL’ that if we didn’t have guns, there would be no shootings.

I kind of used the comparison that if ‘they’ were to ‘chop my taliwacker off’, would sexual assaults and rapes go down, especially since in my 75 years I have NEVER sexually assaulted nor raped anyone, nor have I fired a weapon ‘angrily’ in other than a Military setting?

So I just asked how taking MY weapons away makes THEM safer.

[Georgia Girl 2]

I’ll take the 40 hours of weapons training when he takes 40 hours of Constitution 105.

Apparently this guy #1 has no clue that govt does not give us our rights and #2 weapons made to kill people are necessary in case we need to kill somebody or in the case of govt tyranny a whole lotta somebody’s.

[RC one]

So I guess he wants us to believe that by infringing on the second amendment rights of law abiding Americans, criminals and crazies will somehow be unable to obtain and/or use firearms. Right. FO dude.