Stop the insufferable ‘now is the time’ gun talking point

On Monday morning, the last thing I expected was to do a three-hour morning drive show talking through the horrendous aftermath of a mass murder. The last thing you wanted to hear was an increase in the death and injury count.

Needless to say, it was an emotional morning for victims, their families, and the entire country. Many in the media opted to be compassionate and respectful; anti-gun activists in and out of the media had another agenda.

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After any gun-related tragedy, some start a wholly contrived, insufferably self-righteous concern-rant about how “now is the time for a serious conversation about gun control.” MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow and Chris Hayes complained that conservatives never want to have this conversation after shootings. Q13’s resident progressive activist and Twitter troll replied to one of my tweets saying we should wait before diving into policy: “Can you send out an iCal request or a Google Hangout time of when would be appropriate to have the discussion as a country? When is good?”

While Maddow and Hayes and a hack journalist at Q13 might want to exploit a mass shooting for political gain, the reasons why we generally wait to start discussing policy changes is out of respect to the victims. And it’s to make sure we craft policy that is at least effective in trying to prevent the tragedy we say we don’t want to see happen again from actually happening again.

While bodies were still being identified and families being notified that their loved ones won’t be coming home again, we were hearing calls to ban silencers from Hillary Clinton. Her argument? Imagine if the mass murderer had a silencer!

Well, he didn’t use a silencer and apparently Clinton doesn’t understand what a silencer is actually capable of. But, in her call for a policy change, you realize what this is all about. It’s about taking advantage of a tragedy for political gain even when it wouldn’t have stopped the event you claim to be so outraged about. They see this as an opportunity for a political win while everyday Americans see this as a time to stand with the victims.

You wait because you should want your policy discussion to be informed by actual facts. We didn’t have them Monday morning so I’m not sure the value in callously starting a policy debate. Only now do we have more facts and we should start a conversation.

We know bump stocks were used. OK. Let’s have the conversation about that specifically and before you call for a ban, maybe let’s figure out why someone might want one. Maybe we hear the arguments for and against them? Let’s actually inform our position so we don’t ban something because it gets misused from time-to-time. We don’t ban cars when misused. Let’s have that conversation about bump stocks before you actually call for a total ban since, you know, you claim to want to have the conversation.

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And that also means the pro-gun side should have a meaningful look at this. Just because we’re rightfully suspicious of Progressive activists wanting to slowly make gun ownership such a burden that we can’t enjoy our rights, doesn’t mean a ban is wrong. Progressives may be doing it for the wrong reasons, but we can ban something for the right ones. I’m not going to claim any meaningful knowledge on bump stocks. On the surface, I’m OK with a ban, though it will have limited effect on gun murders. But I’m open to the conversation. Let’s have one if you’d like.

Of course, this isn’t really about conversations for many. It’s about virtue signaling. And the implication from many is that because we might disagree on the timing of the conversation, that we somehow either support mass murder or don’t care. Shameful.

No doubt, the holier-than-thou attitude is epitomized in a comment by late-night host James Corden who said, “Some say it’s too early to talk about gun control. For those victims last night, it’s far too late.” Likewise, the Q13 troll wonders when the appropriate time would be. Here’s a simple answer for them: last week.

If they’re going to use the 59 dead as pawns for a cheap political shot, here’s a question: why didn’t they talk about the silencer and bump stock bans last week, before the mass murder? Why have they been absent from meaningful conversations about gun control between the last two mass murders?

I get that they’re busy, but they clearly care (they make sure we know that they care because they reject prayer and well wishes and demand action, though seldom follow through with what actions they want). So why do they wait until a mass shooting to speak up? Maddow and Hayes and the like have an hour a night to talk about topics of their choosing. Clinton has all the time in the world now that this country has given her career a pause. Why weren’t they talking about this topic that’s so close to their hearts? Surely, they can take a moment to pause their incessant President Trump bashing, right?

Zak Burns: Not anti-gun, but anti-mass shootings

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