Guns for Sale

This is a picture of the Sacramento Armory, a place where you can buy guns. It's on J street, across the street from a camera store, a florist, a yoga studio and a See's Candy store. J street is the main drag in Sacto, about 10 years or so the homos moved in and started making cute little boutiques and now it pretends to be a "Destination" in the same way that you'd pop down to SoHo to shop or hit the stores on Montana Ave in LA. But here in the state capitol we can also buy guns until 6:00 pm on Friday.

On Friday we drove down to San Francisco and the Freeway notice boards were flashing information about a CHP officer being shot to death by some guy in a Nissan Maxima and informed us that if we saw the Nissan Maxima we were to call 911. This is the 5th officer shot to death at a traffic stop in California this year.

Last week's Sunday NYTimes reported that there has been an increase in homicides in certain, mid sized cities. So while overall, the national crime rate has gone down in the past ten years, homicides by gun shot are going up, particularly in places like Washington DC, Detroit and Philly. Meanwhile, gun laws have been relaxed. IN fact the number of licensed gun owners in Philly has gone up enormously in the past twenty years, from something like 700 to something like 200,000. People are getting shot for "looking at me the wrong way," "disrespecting me," "looking at my girlfriend." Stuff that used to just get you in a fist fight.

Not to mention the complete assholes in the world. Recently a group of men paid a 14 year old to shoot one of their pregnant wives by giving the kid a gun and promising him 500 bucks.

Dick Chenney's recent "accident" points out how easy it is, even for experienced gun owners to make mistakes. I'm reminded of the scene in "His Girl Friday" where Roz Russell says "What's a gun for, but to use? You had the gun in your hand, what's it for but to use?"

If everyone's got a gun, then they're going to be used. You can't tell me that more police officers wouldn't be alive today if guns were harder to beg, borrow or steal.