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Double Action: Two NY Times Columnists Embarrass Themselves on Guns in Sunday Review
Newsbusters.org ^ | 4-8-2013 | Clay Waters

Posted on 04/09/2013 5:54:34 AM PDT by servo1969

Two New York Times columnists embarrassed themselves over the weekend, betraying anti-gun ignorance in the paper's Sunday Review.

Frank Bruni went hunting for the first time (with the chef of a ritzy Manhattan restaurant), and remarked "what an unfair fight" hunting is, as if he was the first person to think that up. After lamenting "how thoroughly a weapon can be romanticized and fetishized," he pivoted to easy access to guns in "this country of ours."

"I could forget, when not aiming at a bird, to keep the gun pointed toward the sky or the ground. Or my pivot as I followed a bird’s flight could bring one of my companions, so perilously near me, into my sights. I was haunted by this and by the fact that although I was a first-timer, I needed no background check, no training, no proof of any dexterity to hold this shotgun and squeeze its trigger, not on the kind of regulated hunting grounds (called a preserve) that we went to. This country of ours makes it astonishingly easy for people to arm themselves and take aim. Is it any wonder that we have an exceptional harvest of gun-related injuries and deaths, many accidental?"

Bruni acted convinced that the Second Amendment is wholly concerned with hunting rights, then used that false argument to undermine gun rights in general.

"....Opponents of such basic gun-control measures as universal background checks and an assault-weapons ban talk of slippery slopes and raise the specter of parents’ being unable to lend shotguns to their children for a wholesome duck or deer hunt. They assert the importance to hunters of certain semiautomatics that might be prohibited....And it’s hooey. Let’s take the broadly beloved part first. The popularity of hunting has generally declined over the last four decades

According to a survey by the Fish and Wildlife Service, only 13.7 million Americans 16 or older hunted in 2011, the most recent year for which figures are available. That’s in a country of more than 313 million people."

Times business columnist Joe Nocera, who has made daily blog entries on gun violence since January 30, devoted his Sunday column to a semi-heated Q&A with liberal gun enthusiast Dan Baum.

"Nocera: But assault rifles were used in Aurora and Newtown. And here is my larger point. When I talk to gun absolutists, they claim that we shouldn’t make such a big deal out of mass shootings because they are statistically insignificant. But so what? We have turned this society upside down because 3,000 people died on 9/11. In the scheme of things, that number is also statistically insignificant. Yet we take extraordinary measures, limiting people’s personal freedoms, to prevent another act of terrorism on our soil. Besides, we enact regulations all the time designed to keep people safe, even when the number of people who have been harmed is small. Why are guns different?"

Nocera, who once likened the Tea Party to terrorists, accused Baum of making an "absurd, extremist argument" by suggesting armed civilians might actually be able to prevent massacres.

"Nocera: After Newtown, Wayne LaPierre said, “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” Do you believe that?

Baum: As much as I dislike the N.R.A., there’s a cold logic to it. It’s the reason we have armed guards in airports and shopping malls. When you see an armed guard someplace, what you’re hoping is, if somebody pulls out a gun and does something bad, that the guard will use his gun to protect you.

Nocera: Actually, what the N.R.A. means by that statement is that if somebody attempts a mass shooting in a movie theater, someone else in the theater will have a gun and shoot the shooter. Which seems crazy to me.

Baum: I can’t imagine anything worse than one guy with a gun bent on mass murder in a room full of unarmed people. Anything is better than that.

Nocera: The idea that some heroic figure is going to be able to get up and actually be able to shoot them...

Baum: Then why do cops carry guns? Disarm the police.

Nocera: That’s an absurd, extremist argument.

Baum: Why? I carried a concealed weapon...

Nocera: And did you think you were going to save somebody?"


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: banglist; guncontrol; hunting; new; secondamendment; times; york
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Jeez.

1. Did Frank Bruni remember to get his testicles out of the freezer before he went hunting? 'Cause that's apparently where he keeps them.

2. "Hi, I'm Joe Nocera. I'm just know I wouldn't be capable of defending myself in a bad situation. And since I can't stand the idea that someone might be less of a wuss than I am I believe everyone should be wussified by law. It just makes me feel more comfortable. And isn't that what life's all about? My comfort?"

1 posted on 04/09/2013 5:54:35 AM PDT by servo1969
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To: servo1969

2 posted on 04/09/2013 5:56:01 AM PDT by Travis McGee (www.EnemiesForeignAndDomestic.com)
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To: servo1969

His description of his worries are exactly what any first time hunter is nervous about, in fact experienced hunters as well. This is what leads to good gun safety practices.

It’s a good illustration of modern liberal sensibilities. They want to be delivered from all responsibility for their actions.

But they support countless high risk and harmful liberal practices. Abortion, drug use, illegals everywhere, poor education and thus poor life skills, single motherhood, weak national defense, stupid presidents. The list goes on.


3 posted on 04/09/2013 6:04:18 AM PDT by Andrei Bulba (No Obama, no way!)
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To: servo1969

Yeah, hunting is an unfair sport. It’s much more fair down at the slaughter house.


4 posted on 04/09/2013 6:07:00 AM PDT by muir_redwoods (Don't fire until you see the blue of their helmets)
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To: servo1969

So the NYT writers (one should not call them journalists) are metrosexuals. Who’d a thunk it?

They should just go buy their meat at the grocery store where no animals were harmed making it...


5 posted on 04/09/2013 6:07:40 AM PDT by 43north (BHO: 50% black, 50% white, 100% RED)
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To: Travis McGee

My, how things have changed. The Washington Post employed a full time outdoor writer during the 1970s-1990s who actually did outdoor things. He hunted and shot real loads. I know because I hunted with him on many occasions. He even put sharp hooks in fish mouths and the paper never apologized about it.

In recent years I have seen shotguns misidentified as rifles in many Magazine and Newspaper articles. If the media can’t get it right, it probably means they don’t want to get it right. They seem to have decided which teams’ jersey they want to wear.


6 posted on 04/09/2013 6:08:19 AM PDT by billhilly
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To: Travis McGee

The time has come, I think, to stop trying to reason with these people. It is a pointless exercise to a question that really isn’t the real motive here.


7 posted on 04/09/2013 6:10:42 AM PDT by Gaffer
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To: Andrei Bulba

They crap their pants,

and demand that the rest of us wear diapers.


8 posted on 04/09/2013 6:10:56 AM PDT by MrB (The difference between a Humanist and a Satanist - the latter admits whom he's working for)
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To: servo1969

They’re not ‘embarrassed’. They are feted and fetid............


9 posted on 04/09/2013 6:12:26 AM PDT by Red Badger (Want to be surprised? Google your own name......Want to have fun? Google your friend's names........)
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To: servo1969
Is it any wonder that we have an exceptional harvest of gun-related injuries and deaths, many accidental?"

How many accidents are there compared to the number of young minorities shooting other young minorities on purpose?

Seems to me, if you examine this logically, that the most effect could be achieved by outlawing minority possession of firearms.
Wouldn't support it, but I'm just going with their logic.

10 posted on 04/09/2013 6:13:04 AM PDT by MrB (The difference between a Humanist and a Satanist - the latter admits whom he's working for)
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To: Travis McGee

Why does a “peace officer” who has a readily seen badge, police unit patch, etc. need to be wearing (improperly, I’d add) a balaclava?


11 posted on 04/09/2013 6:13:09 AM PDT by Gaffer
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To: muir_redwoods

I’ll never forget my first visit to a slaughter house. Fascinating for a seven year old.........


12 posted on 04/09/2013 6:13:31 AM PDT by Red Badger (Want to be surprised? Google your own name......Want to have fun? Google your friend's names........)
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To: Gaffer

You cannot have a meeting of the minds with a mindless person......


13 posted on 04/09/2013 6:14:40 AM PDT by Red Badger (Want to be surprised? Google your own name......Want to have fun? Google your friend's names........)
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To: servo1969
Two New York Times columnists embarrassed themselves over the weekend, betraying anti-gun ignorance in the paper's Sunday Review.

They're New Yorkers. They're incapable of being embarassed by ignorance of firearms. 90% of their readers are even more ignorant than they are, and are proud of their ignorance about firearms. It is NOT a coincidence that NY is one of the most anti-gun anti-freedom states in the country. New Yorkers WANT it that way. The problem with NY isn't Schumer, Mccarthy and the rest ot eh NY congressional delegation. The problem is the people who elect them.

14 posted on 04/09/2013 6:14:45 AM PDT by from occupied ga (Your government is your most dangerous enemy)
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To: MrB

They crap their pantsand demand that the rest of us supply them with new diapers.


15 posted on 04/09/2013 6:15:27 AM PDT by Red Badger (Want to be surprised? Google your own name......Want to have fun? Google your friend's names........)
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To: Gaffer

...to hide the donut frosting on his lips?.......


16 posted on 04/09/2013 6:16:49 AM PDT by Red Badger (Want to be surprised? Google your own name......Want to have fun? Google your friend's names........)
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Please help Finish This
FReepathon THIS Month!!

17 posted on 04/09/2013 6:16:52 AM PDT by RedMDer (May we always be happy and may our enemies always know it. - Sarah Palin, 10-18-2010)
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To: servo1969

yeah my dad said something about some weird study that in war a bunch of the soldiers were “found” to have shot above the heads of the opposition rather than at them “because there is something in the human makeup that doesn’t want to kill another human.” I just listened to his claptrap, he is over 80, it wasn’t going to work if I tried to tell him the human desire to live is greater than the human desire to not kill another human, esp one who is trying to kill you. These liberals twist the truth to suit themselves.

Oh then he said they were “getting mowed down by the artillery” and I had to turn away so he wouldn’t see me roll my eyes.


18 posted on 04/09/2013 6:19:42 AM PDT by yldstrk (My heroes have always been cowboys)
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To: servo1969
“I was haunted by this and by the fact that although I was a first-timer, I needed no background check, no training, no proof of any dexterity to hold this shotgun and squeeze its trigger, “

I am haunted by the fact that this loon, with no background check, no training, no I.Q. test, no demonstration of the slightest knowledge of American history, can cast a ballot in an election or masquerade as a news columnist.

19 posted on 04/09/2013 6:20:59 AM PDT by ZULU (See: http://gatesofvienna.net/)
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To: from occupied ga

Frankly, I think this is another “madeup” story. Doesn’t have the smell of an actual experience. Contains all the liberal so-called arguments/points.


20 posted on 04/09/2013 6:26:30 AM PDT by WVNan
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