Gun control fears, not Colorado shooting, spook gun buyers

[n2doc]

By David Horsey
July 26, 2012, 5:00 a.m.
In the days following the Aurora theater massacre, gun sales in Colorado shot through the roof. But all the arms and ammo moving across gun shop counters are not being purchased in anticipation of another anonymous misfit springing out of nowhere with guns blazing. Instead, people are stocking their home armories to get ahead of new gun control laws that might restrict access to firearms.

It seems not to make any difference to these people that there is zero chance that any new restrictions will be imposed, or that none are being seriously pondered by anyone who could make it happen, or that any law that might conceivably get through the solid bulwark of the gun lobby would not do anything significant to inhibit the right to keep and bear arms.

Nevertheless, Colorado guns sales jumped by 43% over last week. From the time of the Friday shooting to the end of the weekend, 2,887 people were approved to buy firearms through state background checks. This gun rush was not happening in Colorado alone. From Connecticut to Washington state, gun sellers were as busy as elves at Christmas. And everywhere, buyers were giving the same reason for their purchases: fear of gun control.

This bizarre disconnect from reality defies rational thought. Passage of new laws sharply curtailing gun ownership is far less likely than lightning striking Paris Hilton as she gets out of a Chrysler minivan wearing long underwear. That is a combination that is unimaginable, and so is gun control.

more
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/topoftheticket/la-na-tt-gun-buyers-20120725,0,7997741.story

[gejohnston]

1. bizarre is not the word I would use

perception and reality are often two different things.

[HALO141]

2. I assume that most of these purchases

are by people who had planned to buy one (or another one) anyway. Something like this happens, the media and douche bags like Bloomberg start squawking about more gun control and they figure, "probably won't happen but now's as good a time as any anyway."