<div class="header">
<div class="left">
<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/"><img src="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/misc/nytlogo153x23.gif" alt="The New York Times" align="left" border="0" vspace="0" hspace="0"></a>
</div>
<div class="right">
<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/adx/bin/adx_click.html?type=goto&opzn&page=www.nytimes.com/printer-friendly&pos=Position1&sn2=336c557e/4f3dd5d2&sn1=4b883948/4c719511&camp=FSL2012_ArticleTools_120x60_1787508c_nyt5&ad=BEMH_120x60_May4_NoText&goto=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Efoxsearchlight%2Ecom%2Fthebestexoticmarigoldhotel" target="_blank">
<br></a>
</div>
</div>
<br clear="all"><hr align="left" size="1">
<div class="timestamp">August 24, 2012</div>
<h1>Arms and the Duck</h1>
<h6 class="byline">By
<span>
<a href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/opinion/editorialsandoped/oped/columnists/gailcollins/index.html" rel="author" title="More Articles by GAIL COLLINS"><span>GAIL COLLINS</span></a></span></h6>
<div id="articleBody">
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[WhaRtm]" title="Link to 1st paragraph">¶</a></span>
We had a shooting near the Empire State Building. An aggrieved
ex-employee of an apparel company killed his former co-worker, and was
himself killed by police. Except for the famous-landmark location, it
was not actually a very big story. Remember the mass shooting at the
lumberyard in North Carolina earlier this year, or the one last October
at the California cement plant? No? Neither does anybody else except the
grieving families. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[NpwIAB]" title="Link to 2nd paragraph">¶</a></span>
Nine passers-by were also wounded, and it seems almost certain that some
or all were accidentally hit by the police. This isn’t surprising; it’s
only in movies that people are good shots during a violent encounter.
In 2008, Al Baker reported in The Times that the accuracy rate for New
York City officers firing in the line of duty was 34 percent. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[AtaTmi]" title="Link to 3rd paragraph">¶</a></span>
And these are people trained for this kind of crisis. The moral is that
if a lunatic starts shooting, you will not be made safer if your fellow
average citizens are carrying concealed weapons. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[TinTch]" title="Link to 4th paragraph">¶</a></span>
This is not the accepted wisdom in many parts of the country. (Certainly
not in Congress, where safety was cited as a rationale for letting
vacationers take loaded pistols into federal parks.) Shortly after the
mass murder at the movie theater in Colorado, I was waiting for a plane
at a tiny airport in North Dakota, listening to a group of oil rig
workers discuss how many lives would have been saved if only the other
theater patrons had been armed. “They could have nipped it in the bud,”
one man told another confidently. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[PttOaa]" title="Link to 5th paragraph">¶</a></span>
People, try to imagine what would have happened if, instead of diving
for the floor, a bunch of those moviegoers had stood up and started
shooting into the dark. Or ask a cop. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[WanWan]" title="Link to 6th paragraph">¶</a></span>
We are never going to have a sane national policy on guns until the gun
advocates give up on the fantasy that the best protection against armed
psychopaths bent on random violence is regular people with loaded
pistols on their belts. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[ItaBit]" title="Link to 7th paragraph">¶</a></span>
Is there anything the other side can concede in return? Well, gun
control advocates have to be careful not to say anything that demeans
hunting. Virtually every politician in America has already gotten that
message. (See: Senator Chuck Schumer holding dead pheasants.) But it’s
true that some city-dwellers can be snotty on this point. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[YdmAlo]" title="Link to 8th paragraph">¶</a></span>
“You don’t mess with hunting and fishing because that’s part of who we
are,” says Kathy Cramer Walsh, a professor at the University of
Wisconsin who specializes in civic engagement. “A lot of times, talk
about regulating guns and ammunition is seen as the outside trying to
change who we are.” </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[IbtIbt]" title="Link to 9th paragraph">¶</a></span>
I’ve been thinking about guns and Wisconsin lately, especially since
Paul Ryan, a big fan of the arm-the-world theory of public safety, was
picked to be a vice-presidential nominee. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[WhsIwa]" title="Link to 10th paragraph">¶</a></span>
Wisconsin has some of the least restrictive gun laws in the country.
(The Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence gives it 3 points out of a
possible 100.) It was also, of course, the scene of a terrible mass
shooting this month by Wade Michael Page at a Sikh temple near
Milwaukee. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[PhaTCm]" title="Link to 11th paragraph">¶</a></span>
Page had a high-capacity magazine, which allowed him to shoot at least
17 bullets before reloading. Those magazines tend to be a common theme
in all our worst mass shooting incidents. The gunman at the shopping
center in Tucson where Representative Gabrielle Giffords was shot had
one that held more than 30 bullets. The Colorado movie theater shooter
had a 100-bullet magazine. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[TmuIfm]" title="Link to 12th paragraph">¶</a></span>
The magazines used to be illegal before Congress let the assault weapons
ban elapse. Getting rid of them again would not stop mass shootings,
but it would limit the number of victims. And you do not need a
high-capacity magazine for hunting. In fact, many states outlaw them for
hunting because they don’t want one person mowing down an entire flock
or herd. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[UflEtm]" title="Link to 13th paragraph">¶</a></span>
Under federal law, you only can use guns with a maximum three-bullet
capacity if you’re hunting migratory birds. Even the most completely
mindless faction in the National Rifle Association appears willing to
give that a pass. </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[HadTsi]" title="Link to 14th paragraph">¶</a></span>
“Hunting’s a different thing,” said Jeff Nass, the president of
Wisconsin Force, an N.R.A. affiliate. “The ducks and geese can’t shoot
back.” Mass shootings, Nass contended, do not occur because crazy people
have access to weapons that allow them to hit a large number of people
in seconds. “Mass shootings come into play because nobody’s there
defending themselves,” he said. “The solution is self-defense.” </p>
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[StgMto]" title="Link to 15th paragraph">¶</a></span>
So the guy driving toward the Sikh temple with the high-capacity
magazine on his gun was legal until he started shooting. The guy sitting
in the duck blind, no. Mull that one over the weekend. </p>
<div class="authorIdentification">
<p><span class="emInfo"><a class="emAnchor" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/25/opinion/collins-arms-and-the-duck.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120825&pagewanted=print#p[JNiJNi]" title="Link to 16th paragraph">¶</a></span>Joe Nocera is off today. </p>
</div>
<div class="articleCorrection">
</div>
</div>
<br>
<center>
</center>
<div id="upNextWrapper"><div style id="upNext"><div class="wrapper opposingFloatControl"><br style="clear:both"></div></div></div><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)<br><a href="mailto:art.deco.studios@gmail.com" target="_blank">art.deco.studios@gmail.com</a><br>
<br><img src="http://users.moscow.com/waf/WP%20Fox%2001.jpg"><br><br>