By: John William Johnson
“You know,” Silas McMarner says, “I think I have a solution to the whole thing.”
This morning’s ‘whole thing’ turns out to be two things with McMarner saying he has a solution to both health care reform, and deaths caused by guns.
The Breakfast Club pauses, leans forward…..because this is going to be a
good one: two ideas with one argument.
“I think I have a solution to the whole thing,” McMarner repeats, adding quickly: “instead of eliminating the guns, let’s tax the bullets.”
He waits five seconds for effect. “And then let’s use the money from that tax to help pay for health care reform, because……..”. He smiles that sly fox smile of his, pausing even longer now for the rhetorical coup-de -grace.
“Well,” Roscoe Bismark asks finally. “Because what?”
“Well, guns kill people, and killing is a sin, so we can make a tax on bullets another sin tax.”
McMarner is serious – and perhaps he’s right because without bullets, guns are simply clubs from which even slow people can run.
“Yeah,” Roscoe says, finally warming to the argument (you can tell he’s done so because his newspaper is now folded). “Yeah,” he repeats, “and then let’s sell those bullets only in towns with populations of 5,000 or less.”
“Only 5,000 or less?” I ask.
“Right…..look,” he says in his best parent to child voice, “the problem with people using guns to kill other people is primarily in the big cities.
Let’s first tax them, and then sell only the bullets in small towns because persons in the cities couldn’t find their way there to buy them.”
Whether Silas’ plan has merit requires more space than available
here — but the United States is, by far, the world leader is citizen deaths by handgun.
As well, and according to the Violence Policy Center, “Gun violence places a tremendous burden on America’s health-care system. Direct medical costs for gunshot wounds total more than $6 million a day. Nonfatal gunshot wounds are the leading cause of uninsured hospital stays in the United States, with an estimated half of such costs borne directly by the public.”
At the same time, the much cited Second Amendment says:
“A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
“That amendment,” says Roscoe, is his best lawlerly voice, “insures a collective right (the right of more than one) rather than an individual
right. During the debate over the Bills of Rights, Elbridge
Gerry argued that a state militia was necessary….” ‘to prevent the establishment of a standing army, the bane of liberty….whenever governments mean to invade the rights and liberties of the people, they always attempt to destroy the militia in order to raise an army upon the ruins.’ ”
In short, the Second Amendment was to allay fears about a federal army usurping state authority – and wasn’t about guaranteeing an individual’s right to gun ownership. Nonetheless, the amendment’s goal has been confused and blurred by the gun lobby over the last two centuries to where we now lead the world in annual deaths by handgun.
“And the solution is tax the bullets,” McMarner smiles.
Spike Opchinsky then shoots a link sausage bullet at McMarner using an elastic band stretched across his wide hand.
“Tax that,” he laughs.
culimnist@aol.com
Next Time: The Breakfast Club Debates Obamacare.