Dispatches from Skip Gorman’s AudioBlog: Hearts and minds and guns

Here’s another weekly potpourri of thoughts and observations about breaking news and Valley things both great and small ...

Problems worthy

Of attack,

Prove their worth

By shooting back.

— with apologies to Piet Hein

There are moments when one’s brain seems to just shut down. I suppose they’re innocent moments and we may not even be aware of them when they happen. We might even be driving or perhaps feigning to listen to someone drone on about their health or how the world is going to hell in a hand basket. These momentary cranial shutdowns only last for short times and are usually accompanied by unfocused eyes and followed by a slightly distracted forgetfulness. See, this means that your mind is simply churning away in the background, working on a problem it’s trying to solve. This happens to me all the time. Typically this is when I lose things.

The problem that my mind has been off struggling with lately is that perennial moving target cultural tradeoff we currently face between “freedom” and “security.” This problem is a knotty one, and a viable solution is crying out be found soon.

Benjamin Franklin’s timeless quote frames the issue. “Those who surrender essential freedom for temporary security will not have, nor do they deserve, either one.”

OK. I’m convinced that, respecting the quote’s context, Ben Franklin was referring to arming the distressed settlers of the western frontier of Pennsylvania against skulking marauders by relying on the “strings attached” protection of His Majesty’s redcoats. I feel, however, that the quote has actually gained currency into modern times, transcending its provincial underpinnings. Indeed, it has broadened in scope and meaning.

I guess we could explore the range endpoints here and discuss the relative merits of anarchy or enslavement, but who has the time? Obviously somewhere in the middle is that ideal balance between freedom and security that the founders sought when they penned the U. S. Constitution. So the granularity of the details might help us determine that “happy spot” which, when scratched, will cause America’s dogleg to quiver. And we might as well zero in on the main unresolved issue. How do we keep unstable nutcases from getting their hands on guns and doing mass killings in schools?

This is the question whose solution will surely have a historic judicial impact on everything that follows. So, what constitutes a “nutcase”? I’ll take a shot at that: For purposes of this discussion, a “nut case” may be defined as any lone-wolf nerdy young gun enthusiast on psychoactive drugs living with his doting mother in a liberal fatherless environment. Gee, that works for me. OK, round up all these acne-faced basement dwellers and let’s disarm them, quit feeding them crazy pills and counsel them on how to get a social life. We’ll first need to legislate enough HIPAA relief so the psychoactive drug prescribers can send in a list of likely candidates to the local constabularies. Sure, it’s kind of Orwellian, but tough times call for tough measures.

And tough measures should include scrapping all the idiotic “Gun Free Zone” crap that has been making schools so very attractive to the scramble-brained cowards who don’t want anybody shooting back. Indeed, every school should sanction and encourage approved teachers to get all the training needed for a concealed carry certification/license. Those teachers would then be “packing” and willing to immediately engage any shooter on campus at any time. Tough times indeed!

And while we’re at it, let’s consider passing those common sense gun control measures that even the NRA can get behind. This means implementing quick, thorough, point-of-sale background checks and banning military-style semiautomatic weapons and high capacity ammunition magazines. Yes, the NRA has and will support this. I think, though, the gun control laws that implement these measures would stand a much better chance of passage if they were shepherded through congress by politicians that we trusted. Good luck with that!

That has been this week’s AudioBlogColumn. I’m Skip Gorman, whose e-mail address is skippergorman@gmail.com, returning you all now back to a quieter and gentler place ...