By Ali Hassan Massoud
The following news story caught my eye when I read it in the New York Daily News’ online edition. The headline and introduction I have excerpted here:
“Gun control advocate may have violated gun laws"
By TIMOTHY J. BURGER
New York Daily News
WASHINGTON - Gun-control advocate Sarah Brady bought her son a powerful rifle for Christmas in 2000 - and may have skirted Delaware state background-check requirements, the New York Daily News has learned.
Brady reveals in a new memoir that she bought James Brady Jr. a Remington .30-06, complete with scope and safety lock, at a Lewes, Del., gun shop.
"I can't describe how I felt when I picked up that rifle, loaded it into my little car and drove home," she writes. "It seemed so incredibly strange: Sarah Brady, of all people, packing heat."
Hey, Mrs. Brady, those laws you helped ram down everyone else’s throat mean you too! This never fails to amaze me. Whether they are Democrats, Republicans, “liberal”, “conservative”, America’s over-zealous do-gooders really don’t believe that the laws they so passionately wish to impose on others include them too.
Those background checks, fingerprints, taxes, fees, waiting periods, storage requirements, permits, licenses, and the rest of that stuff apply to you as well Sarah. All those “common sense” laws and regulations you pushed and continue to push for. You just waved them away didn’t you? Those laws are to keep the riff raff away from firearms, (or cigars, SUV’s, or any of the other of things the political elite don’t think people should be able to have.) Not good people like Sarah Brady, (or Rosie O’Donnell or Sen. Diane Feinstein, among others). I wonder if the blatant hypocrisy of their actions in arming themselves or in arranging for others to be armed in order to protect them, (in Ms. O’Donnell’s case) ever really occurs to them? I imagine not. The sad fact about the imposition of all these new rules, laws, and regulations, is that these people either don’t care about the freedoms being permanently lost, or don’t feel that they are really losing anything.
In my vision of utopia, the decision to arm one’s self would be a personal one based solely on the individuals’ perception of the danger they face in any given place or situation. That is really the only morally pure way to have it. The risks and liabilities of being armed or not should also apply as well. (i.e. Don’t bring a knife to a gunfight.) The risk of over reacting, such as shooting your neighbor believing her to be a prowler is something to consider too. In the end though, the sovereign individual should get to make the decision and accept the consequences of their actions. Mrs. Brady, Sen. Feinstein, or Rosie O'Donnell do not agree with this view, however. They think they should decide for you.
In my view, the reason these types of people don’t see the wrong in pushing for laws that they don’t intend to obey is their elitist point of view. They see themselves as set apart from and above the ordinary person. ”This law doesn’t mean me,” they think, and that thought process guides their actions. I’ll not engage in an amateur psychoanalysis of why this is so. As psychologist B.F. Skinner observed, one can never really know the interior thoughts and motivations of human beings. Only observable criteria such as behavior can be assessed, or in my opinion, judged.
That brings to mind the cliche that “the difference between free people and subjects is that the free people can bear arms and subjects can’t”. Like most cliches, this one contains more than just a grain of truth. In this particular case though it is absolutely true.
The larger point that it illustrates is more ominous. If we sovereign individuals can’t be “allowed” arms, (just to name one thing) without the nanny state’s approval or permission, then are we truly free any more? What can we decide for ourselves without the immoral impositions of those that consider themselves our naturally superior philosopher-kings?
“Oh no,” they reply, “this is just common sense, for the good of all”.
However, note how they feel perfectly free to ignore their own “common sense” dictates when it suits them to do so.
What makes an individuals’ decision to disobey the morality and laws of the rest of the herd different from Mrs. Brady and her ilk is that they have no wish or desire to impose whatever decisions of personal conduct they have made for themselves upon others. They make their choices, and they abide by the consequences. Not so with the Sarah Bradys of the world. They get to pick their choices and yours and mine as well if they can.
The most obnoxious aspect of this whole Sarah Brady news story to me, is her total obliviousness of the hypocrisy of her conduct in buying the rifle for her son. That in making a “strawman purchase”, (that is, obtaining a firearm for another persons and so allowing them to skip the background check), she broke the laws of the United States and apparently the state of Delaware as well. Laws she advocated with such passion that the Brady Law was in part named for her. (Just as a side note imagine what the popular press and BATF’s reaction would have been if Charlton Heston or Tom Selleck had admitted to the same breach?).
In the end, Mrs. Brady can get away with all this, because she knows full well that she will never be prosecuted for breaking her own namesake law. She knows full well that she will be held to different standard than rest of the common herd. In this case, she appears to be right too.
However, it begs this question: if Sarah Brady, Sen. Feinstein, Rosie O’Donnell, and all the other hypocrites out there hate guns so much then why would they wish to possess them? Is it because as Mao Tse-Tung observed that political power emanates from their barrels? Or is it as Clint Eastwood’s character observed in The Good, the Bad & the Ugly that there are two kinds of people in the world: Those with loaded guns and those that dig (graves?).
"Chemical Ali" Massoud is a father, political theorist, apostate Muslim, small business owner, college graduate, crack rifle marksman, a compulsiveblogger, cat lover, shrewd investor, US Army veteran, and currently single. He lives in Michigan. To see what he means by "Anarchy," and other ideas he has click here