INCREASINGLY UNHINGED commentary by Republican presidential candidates about the massacre last week at a community college in Oregon might not seem worth a second glance. Some of the statements have been contemptible and/or ignorant, it is true. But they are worthy of attention, if only for what they say about the poverty of the argument against regulation of gun ownership.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal prefaced a blog post on the shooting with a good deal of self-congratulation about his willingness to discuss what other politicians "are afraid to talk about. . . . I don't care at all if some people don't like it, the truth is important." It turns out that what took so much courage was Mr. Jindal's broadside against the father of the now-deceased Oregon shooter, for being divorced and insufficiently involved in his son's life. "He's a complete failure as a father, he should be embarrassed to even show his face in public," Mr. Jindal bravely wrote. "He's the problem here."
Candidate Ben Carson identified a different problem: the insufficient gumption of the students and faculty of Umpqua Community College. "Of course, you know, if everybody attacks that gunman, he's not going to be able to kill everybody," Mr. Carson told Fox News. "But if you sit there and let him shoot you one by one, you're all going to be dead." He made this argument without even realizing — here is where the ignorance comes in — that Army veteran Chris Mintz had tried to stop the shooter and been shot seven times in the process. He also said that kindergarten teachers should be armed; but, he later clarified, maybe not all kindergarten teachers; and they shouldn't leave the guns lying around but should lock them; but as a result they would have to be "trained in diversionary tactics and whatever needs to be done in order to get there and" — well, you get the idea. It's a mishmash of absurdity untroubled by contemplation.
We suppose that, in contrast, the nation should be grateful for the “stuff happens” reactions of former Florida governor Jeb Bush and Donald Trump; they both responded by saying, in essence, that there will always be some bad people who do bad things, so why don’t we just move on?
Up to a point they are right, of course; the government will never prevent all violence. But it's also perfectly obvious that the government could take steps that would reduce the incidence of mass shootings, suicides, domestic homicides, children shooting children and other gun violence. Bad people exist in other countries; mentally ill people exist in other countries; young, disturbed men play violent video games in other countries. Some of them even grow up without fathers. But countries that do not allow so many guns to circulate so freely lose many, many fewer of their citizens to gun crimes or accidents. Republican candidates are increasingly tying themselves in knots on this issue, because there's no logical way to refute that one, clear truth.
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