Gun Control Debate Over Dark Knight Rises Shooting

Gun control has become a political debate due to the shooting in Aurora Colorado during the midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises. As rhetoric flies and emotions rule the day, we would like to add some facts and information to the debate.

The massacre took between sixteen and twenty minutes to unfold.  That is enough time for a killer to use a bolt action rifle or a machete to kill a large number of people. In terms of conflict, twenty minutes is nearly as long as the four months it took to organize the attack with NIH funds.

There was a church shooting four months ago in Aurora Colorado. The earlier shooting was stopped by a concealed-carry, armed church service attendee. This may explain the level of protection worn by James Holmes.

"Police said two vehicles ended up in the church parking lot after some sort of argument between the drivers. Police said one vehicle was chasing the other. The man who was being chased got out of his vehicle and entered the church and told people to take cover. A woman came out of the church to see what was happening in the parking lot and got shot.

Police said an off-duty officer was at a service and went outside and shot the man who shot the woman"

The new media has reported this fact, but ABC, NBC and CBS have been silent so far.

Many of the arguments for gun control center upon stopping crazies from acquiring weapons. As this blog has explained, the Dark Knight Rising attack was not motivated by insanity.

Another argument by Bill O'Reilly on Fox News has centered around restricting "heavy weapons." Ted Nugent explains the O'Reilly argument humorously, "walk into the florist and buy a bazooka." It is a bad argument, but it allows an opportunity to tread the line next to revealing top secret weapons currently deployed.

Research has uncovered that our government has a sniper rifle with 1000 meters range that does not use projectiles.  A photograph of the rifle reveals a weapon that looks like a toy. It is NOT a phaser, laser or E.M.P. weapon. It was developed as a weapon to be used by our new hypersonic fighters.

***insert conspiracy theory here***

What if it were a phaser, or ray gun like in science fiction?  On one episode of Star Trek, a single phaser was credited with killing 5,000 opponents armed with bows and arrows. Regardless, at some point traditional guns will become obsolete. The weapons that replace them will be much more deadly.

Are phasers covered by the second amendment? They would definitely be classified "heavy weapons" by Mr. O'Reilly. Without them the civilian population would offer no real resistance to a tyrannical government. The right to free speech and representative government would quickly be intimidated into a dim memory. No person would dare oppose rule by those who could vaporize a home and entire family and leave no evidence. The last line of defense against tyranny would be erased without the second amendment.

A phaser type weapon would make a modern .50 caliber machine gun look like a sling-shot. A phaser weapon used in a massacre would be unimaginably destructive. Yet, governments are run my fallible, power hungry, ambitious people who yearn for control. Tipping the balance of power drastically to the wrong side is more dangerous than a balance of power, or even a balance of terror.

In Switzerland everyone is required to own an automatic weapon. Everyone is part of the militia. This is similar to our founding documents in America. Yet, the Swiss gun crime rate is so low that it no longer kept.

John Cassidy of the New Yorker chimes in with some revealing perspective on the mind of the left. Mr Cassidy wonders, "Is America Crazy? Ten Reasons It Might Be. "  Consider his answer if asked what he believes in contrast to these beliefs "in the category of irrationality, flakiness, nonsense, nuttiness, absurdity, craziness…"

1. Gun laws and gun deaths are unconnected.
2. Private enterprise is good; public enterprise is bad.
3. God created America and gave it a special purpose.
4. Our health-care system is the best there is.
5. The Founding Fathers were saintly figures who established liberty and democracy for everyone.
6. America is the greatest country in the world.
7. Tax rates are too high.
8. America is a peace-loving nation: the reason it gets involved in so many wars is that foreigners keep attacking us.
9. Cheap energy, gasoline especially, is our birthright.
10. Everybody else wishes they were American.

Translated into English, Mr. Cassidy is saying something like: (apologies for inaccurate translations)

1. Guns cause crime. 
2. Government is good; free markets are bad.
3. God does not exist and America is not exceptional
4. Research, cures, new technology and other advancements are too expensive for an over-populated planet?
5. The Founding Fathers were racists who wanted freedom only for themselves.
6. America is NOT the greatest country in the world.
7. No tax rates is too high, even the highest in the world.
8. America is a war-mongering nation: the reason it gets involved in so many wars is for empire.
9. Cheap energy, gasoline especially, is destroying the earth.
10. Everybody else should hate Americans.

The moral to the story is that no matter the dark side of freedom, it is preferable to the alternative. If an armed citizen had been at the theater, the attack would have ended more like the previous Aurora shooting. Even a short gun battle would have been preferable. Twenty minutes of being trapped defenseless is what led to the massacre. Armed people cannot be massacred.