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Opinion

Tuesday, December 14, 1999

Sage
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By Smokey Briggs

Sam Colt made

men equal

The suit accuses gun manufacturers of selling defective products and marketing them in ways that increase the likelihood they will be used to commit crimes.

Nothing contained in this suit is anything more than garbled double-speak. It is a perverted attempt to accomplish through the civil justice system what was not accomplished through the legislative system.

The judge should levy charges for filing a frivolous lawsuit at every attorney working for the government on this thing.

First of all, the government is not complaining that the guns do not work, despite the fact that it is a "defective products" case. The actual complaint is that guns work very well. Somehow, this is bad.

Lets face it, guns are for killing things.

Yes, you can have great fun shooting targets, and I highly recommend it as a means of sharpening your skills, but a gun's sole function in the world is to end something's life. It is a tool. A tool used to kill things.

This is one point the Second Amendment crowd has missed the boat on. In a misguided attempt to make guns more acceptable they have downplayed the true nature of a firearm.

Second, how would you market a machine meant to kill things in a way that makes it LESS likely to be used in a crime by a criminal?

I can see the advertisement now, "This isn't your dad's firearm _ because it's not nearly as effective as the one we sold back then."

Yeah, you'll sell a bunch of that model.

So, it is a Catch 22. You can't market a firearm as being effective without subjecting your company to claims by the federal government that your product is defective _ because it is effective.

Somehow, after seven years of Clinton, I can say that and barely blink.

The problem with all of this, other than the mind-bending logic required to arrive at the above conclusion, is the underlying, yet unspoken foundation _ the concept that somehow we can end crime if criminals can't get a firearm.

Of course, to prevent this, our friendly neighbors and governors will need to prevent law-abiding citizens from owning firearms too.

What no one has explained to me, is how this prevents crime.

It seems to me, all we have managed to do is take a big step backward toward jungle-law.

First, every disarmament scheme ever concocted has failed to get guns out of the hands of the criminals. (Although, each scheme has been very effective in getting guns out of the hands of the law-abiding).

Second, just suppose that you could take up all of the guns. Then what?

Then your friendly neighborhood rapist/murderer/thug will go get the next best weapon _ a club, hammer, knife, axe, etc…

Then he selects his victim. Probably, he won't select the biggest, meanest, toughest, club-carrying guy on the street.

No, he's going to come after some guy like me. Somebody he is stronger than, faster than, and more coordinated than. All these years I was learning how to spell (trying) he was practicing with his club.

So, now I try to defend myself against Mr. Thug-with-the-club.

Guess the probable result?

No thanks. I'll stick with my firearm. It takes some practice, but physical stature, health, strength etc… are a lot less important with a firearm.

As the old western adage goes, "God may have created all men, but Sam Colt made them equal."

There is a lot of truth to that, and the less physical of a person you are, the more it holds true.

Making all of the guns disappear (which you can't) won't put a dent in crime or even the murder rate. It will give criminals a new advantage though and make crime a lot more attractive.

It will be one more step away from civilization and back toward the jungle.

I won't even get into the necessity of armed citizens when the people find it necessary to revolt against their government's oppression and tyranny.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Smokey Briggs is the Editor and Publisher of the Pecos Enterprise whose column appears on each Tuesdays. He can be e-mailed at: smokey@pecos.net

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