None of us should be surprised that U.S. News follows the lead of other media outlets this week in using the Virginia Tech shooting as an excuse to trot out gun control arguments.
Will Sullivan’s article conveys disappointment because “experts are skeptical that gun control is primed for a reversal of its dismal fortunes.”
But the following passage is the one that sent me to the keyboard:
Even the horrors of Colorado’s Columbine High School shootings, in which two students killed 12 classmates and a teacher before committing suicide, failed to generate changes in federal policy, though Coloradans did pass a measure requiring background checks at gun shows.
Why would anyone assume that the Columbine case (or the Blacksburg case, for that matter) should prompt a change in federal law? Why is the absence of a federal power grab a “failure”? Law enforcement is a local and state government responsibility, and we should be wary any time we consider the possibility of new law enforcement regulations coming from Washington.
While I’m at it, another piece of the coverage caused me to grimace. Alex Kingsbury uses the 1966 Austin, Texas, campus tower shooting to make the following observation:
Since Texas there have been scores of such horrifying incidents at colleges and other schools.
Scores? Really? That means at least 40 similar incidents in the past 40 years. Good luck trying to find them. The chart that accompanies Kingsbury’s story lists 14 other incidents. Other than the Austin and Blacksburg cases, not one listed incident had half as many killings. Three of the 14 incidents were Vietnam-era events in which law enforcement officers killed campus protesters; I would treat those deaths as qualitatively different from the campus violence exemplified in Austin and Blacksburg.
Last week’s event raises legitimate safety questions. Hype only muddies the picture.
