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http://www.herald.com/content/today/opinion/columnists/hiassen/digdocs/022865.htm
The gun was the seed of the crime
CARL HIAASEN
Nathaniel Brazill, who killed Barry Grunow, doesn't fit the NRA's profile of a fearless gun-toting thug.
Copyright 2000 Miami Herald
On Tuesday the community of Lake Worth said goodbye to Barry Grunow, the popular middle school teacher who was shot dead by a student on the last day of class.
Grunow was only 35, the father of two small children. He died for no other reason except that a 13-year-old boy had easy access to an unsecured pistol -- utter madness that repeats itself all over the country.
Lake Worth is reeling with sorrow and horror, and many people are calling for tougher gun laws. But this is Florida, where the National Rifle Association owns the Republican-controlled Legislature.
The NRA does not want new laws. It says the answer to gun violence is locking up hardened criminals and educating kids about firearms.
Nathaniel Brazill, the boy who killed Grunow, doesn't fit the NRA's pat profile of a fearless gun-toting thug. He was an honor-roll student who got suspended for chucking water balloons. As for a firearms education, he already knew how to aim and fire. There's probably not a teenager in America who doesn't.
The facts of Grunow's murder leave the NRA with no credible stance, just the same old reactionary rant. A kid flipped out, swiped his grandfather's Saturday-night special and shot a teacher. If that .25-caliber Raven hadn't been accessible, Grunow would be at school this week, working on his students' final report cards.
Opportunity is what gave birth to Nathaniel's awful plan -- knowing that gun was in the drawer, knowing he could get his hands on it. He wouldn't have plotted to kill anybody with a pocketknife or a rock. The gun was the seed of the crime.
Earlier this year, two Jacksonville Democrats, Rep. Tony Hill and Sen. Betty Holzendorf, introduced a modest proposal that would have required external locks on handguns in homes where children lived or visited. The goal was to help prevent accidental shootings and crimes of impulse.
The law was stridently opposed by the NRA, and it died without debate. In the House, it was ``buried'' by Rep. Howard Futch, R-Melbourne Beach. In the Senate, it was killed by John Grant, R-Tampa, who chairs the Judiciary Committee. These two fellows are proud lackeys of the NRA. Grant, for example, said he was delighted to hear of a poll showing firearms are present in 37 percent of Florida households with children.
There are many other polls that he and gun lobbyists conveniently choose to ignore, including a recent one by the Associated Press. The result: Mandatory trigger locks were favored by 76 percent of Americans -- and 70 percent of gun owners -- who were surveyed. This illustrates that the NRA leadership is radically and ridiculously out of touch, even with mainstream firearms owners.
Only a blithering paranoid would claim gun-safety features pose a threat to the Constitution. Both presidential candidates, George W. Bush and Al Gore, say they would sign a compulsory trigger-lock law if Congress passed one. Most manufacturers already offer the safeguards.
Two other states, Maryland and Massachusetts, recently defied the NRA and passed trigger-lock laws. Their legislators, unlike those in Florida, listened to the citizens and not to the money. It's true that you can't legislate against stupidity, but you can thwart it by making a safer product. Automakers fought mandatory seat belts for years, claiming nobody would use them. They were wrong.
Trigger locks won't end American's gun lunacy. They are but one small precaution that works only when properly used.
MANDATORY TRIGGER LOCKS
But if Nathaniel's grandfather had locked his pistol, a teacher would still be alive, and a 13-year-old boy wouldn't be facing an eternity behind bars. If such a simple device came with each gun, more parents would use them, and more tragedies would be prevented. One would be enough to justify a law -- one life saved.
No such sensible initiative will come from Tallahassee these days -- not from the governor, whose cliche-ridden response to Barry Grunow's death never acknowledged the issue that the community is most upset about. And not from politicians such as John Grant, who, as he scuttled the trigger-lock law, cheered the fact that nearly four out of 10 Florida families keep handguns.
Said Grant: ``It's good to know their safety is ensured by something other than 911.''
Too bad he wasn't there to answer the phone when the 911 call came in from Lake Worth Middle School.
------------------
The New World Order has a Third Reich odor.
http://www.herald.com/content/today/opinion/columnists/hiassen/digdocs/022865.htm
The gun was the seed of the crime
CARL HIAASEN
Nathaniel Brazill, who killed Barry Grunow, doesn't fit the NRA's profile of a fearless gun-toting thug.
Copyright 2000 Miami Herald
On Tuesday the community of Lake Worth said goodbye to Barry Grunow, the popular middle school teacher who was shot dead by a student on the last day of class.
Grunow was only 35, the father of two small children. He died for no other reason except that a 13-year-old boy had easy access to an unsecured pistol -- utter madness that repeats itself all over the country.
Lake Worth is reeling with sorrow and horror, and many people are calling for tougher gun laws. But this is Florida, where the National Rifle Association owns the Republican-controlled Legislature.
The NRA does not want new laws. It says the answer to gun violence is locking up hardened criminals and educating kids about firearms.
Nathaniel Brazill, the boy who killed Grunow, doesn't fit the NRA's pat profile of a fearless gun-toting thug. He was an honor-roll student who got suspended for chucking water balloons. As for a firearms education, he already knew how to aim and fire. There's probably not a teenager in America who doesn't.
The facts of Grunow's murder leave the NRA with no credible stance, just the same old reactionary rant. A kid flipped out, swiped his grandfather's Saturday-night special and shot a teacher. If that .25-caliber Raven hadn't been accessible, Grunow would be at school this week, working on his students' final report cards.
Opportunity is what gave birth to Nathaniel's awful plan -- knowing that gun was in the drawer, knowing he could get his hands on it. He wouldn't have plotted to kill anybody with a pocketknife or a rock. The gun was the seed of the crime.
Earlier this year, two Jacksonville Democrats, Rep. Tony Hill and Sen. Betty Holzendorf, introduced a modest proposal that would have required external locks on handguns in homes where children lived or visited. The goal was to help prevent accidental shootings and crimes of impulse.
The law was stridently opposed by the NRA, and it died without debate. In the House, it was ``buried'' by Rep. Howard Futch, R-Melbourne Beach. In the Senate, it was killed by John Grant, R-Tampa, who chairs the Judiciary Committee. These two fellows are proud lackeys of the NRA. Grant, for example, said he was delighted to hear of a poll showing firearms are present in 37 percent of Florida households with children.
There are many other polls that he and gun lobbyists conveniently choose to ignore, including a recent one by the Associated Press. The result: Mandatory trigger locks were favored by 76 percent of Americans -- and 70 percent of gun owners -- who were surveyed. This illustrates that the NRA leadership is radically and ridiculously out of touch, even with mainstream firearms owners.
Only a blithering paranoid would claim gun-safety features pose a threat to the Constitution. Both presidential candidates, George W. Bush and Al Gore, say they would sign a compulsory trigger-lock law if Congress passed one. Most manufacturers already offer the safeguards.
Two other states, Maryland and Massachusetts, recently defied the NRA and passed trigger-lock laws. Their legislators, unlike those in Florida, listened to the citizens and not to the money. It's true that you can't legislate against stupidity, but you can thwart it by making a safer product. Automakers fought mandatory seat belts for years, claiming nobody would use them. They were wrong.
Trigger locks won't end American's gun lunacy. They are but one small precaution that works only when properly used.
MANDATORY TRIGGER LOCKS
But if Nathaniel's grandfather had locked his pistol, a teacher would still be alive, and a 13-year-old boy wouldn't be facing an eternity behind bars. If such a simple device came with each gun, more parents would use them, and more tragedies would be prevented. One would be enough to justify a law -- one life saved.
No such sensible initiative will come from Tallahassee these days -- not from the governor, whose cliche-ridden response to Barry Grunow's death never acknowledged the issue that the community is most upset about. And not from politicians such as John Grant, who, as he scuttled the trigger-lock law, cheered the fact that nearly four out of 10 Florida families keep handguns.
Said Grant: ``It's good to know their safety is ensured by something other than 911.''
Too bad he wasn't there to answer the phone when the 911 call came in from Lake Worth Middle School.
------------------
The New World Order has a Third Reich odor.