Milwaukee Columnist's Anti-Gun Screed Unintentionally Funny

June 4th, 2007 9:30 PM

Barbara Miner of the Milwaukee Journal, Sentinel has written one of the funniest anti-gun screeds I've seen in a long, long time. Oh, she didn't MEAN to be funny, of course. But, her article gave the effect of seeing a 40-year-old white guy trying to chant the lyrics to a popular rap music tune to look cool to his eye rolling kids. Her rambling little column was so filled with unintentionally funny moments, was so clueless in its lack of introspection and so completely absurd that one would have thought the link at the Milwaukee Journal, Sentinel website had accidentally taken you to the satirical website, "The Onion".

Now, I have always been somewhat confused when leftists are being unintentionally funny. Do we laugh and be mean at their utter cluelessness, or do we feel sorrow and pity instead of mirth? How should we feel, for instance, when Keith Olbermann pretends that he is giving pertinent commentary, or when Babs Streisand acts as if she is to be taken seriously... or anytime we even see Cindy Sheehan doing, well, anything. So, when I read this anti-gun piece so chock full of absurdity, I was torn as to how to feel about it.

Ah, who am I kidding? I laughed like a hyena at how foolish this liberal chick is. I mean, what planet is this woman from?

I'm sitting at my desk, staring at my new Glock 19 semiautomatic 9mm handgun. The kind that Seung-hui Cho used in his rampage at Virginia Tech.

I am scared of the gun.

But I am also fascinated.

I allow the fascination to run free, and I conjure up Hollywood fantasies of revenge and respect. A small, gray-haired woman, I imagine myself walking city streets and saying to any hulking guy who gets in my way, "Don't mess with me, I have a gun."

“Run free”? She "allows the fascination" to run amok, she means! She acts as if she is an immature fourteen-year-old boy with a head full of comic books and action movies. In fact, I know many such boys who are far more mature than she than to go waving a gun about in emulation of a bad Summer movie, even if just in their imaginations.

"Fascination" or no, she doesn't let her leftist assumptions fade into the background when she makes the simple-minded claim that "...there's little reason to own a Glock unless you intend to kill people."

I have a Glock and have never once assumed I was purchasing it to "kill people". More than likely, not a one of my 25 firearms will be used to "kill people" while in my possession. And, for that matter, I truly hope none of them ever have to be used for that purpose. But, more to the point, who do you dream of killing, Ms. Miner? After all, that is all it was “made for”, right?

Miner's main point... should there be one besides hilarity... is to chronicle how "easy" it is to get a gun in Milwaukee. And it would, indeed, seem quite "easy" to do so if one were to just take her word for it as she completely downplays the actual process involved in purchasing a firearm. Her entire argument is filled with so many false arguments, knowing asides and strawman claims that it boggles the mind.

She starts by picking a store she considers notorious, as if her going there will "prove" something in and of itself.

I knew that Badger Outdoors in West Milwaukee was a good place to buy a gun. Among its claims to fame, federal authorities cited Badger Outdoors as the top store in the country in 2005 for selling guns recovered by police after being used in a crime.

So? Is she a criminal who should not be sold a gun? Is this store selling them illegally? Is she buying a type of gun that is not sanctioned by law? Is she buying a nuclear warhead or something?

No would be the answer to all those questions in case you’re wondering. Next, after saying she brought a "friend who looks like a cop", what ever that is supposed to mean, she claims she expected the third degree for her purchase.

My fears were groundless. Badger Outdoors is in business to sell guns, not to quiz customers on their motives or competency.

The sales rep, who wore a loaded Glock and proudly showed it to us, asked a few questions about what I wanted.

Again, so what? Is there a law that forces a gun shop to ask such questions? Why should we expect a gun shop owner to give a third degree to a legally constituted customer exercising a right that is contained in the Constitution -- a document that is the law of the land?

In fact the store clerk showed the good conscience to issue a safety warning that if the gun were to be stored in a home with children in it, the clip should be stored separately. Last time I checked, no law forced such warnings.

Then, Miner decided to try her new toy out on the range in the shop. She picked a human shaped target because she thought it would be more dramatic for her story and claims to have shot very well.

Once in the range, I loaded the bullets into the clip, put in my earplugs and shot 13 rounds. Unexpectedly, I hit the chest or head on all but a couple of shots.

I felt cool. I was proud.

So, because she is easily overwhelmed with juvenile emotions, she imagines that all gun owners are? But, let's be honest, shall we? She had no such emotions but felt saying so made for better copy, of course.

Fortunately, Miner's metero-sexual hubby brought her "to her senses" with the absurd claim that her paper target meant that she was a killer. "Oh, great. You killed somebody", he supposedly said employing the best whiney, liberal hyperbole. (No wonder she needs a gun in the house. It seems her hubby is too much the wimp to be of use in a pinch)

Last time I checked, a piece of paper was not a "somebody." Though, I have met quite a few liberals that are as one dimensional as that sheet of paper Miner peppered with 9MM holes.

Now, Miner regales us about how "easy" it was to take ownership of her dreaded handgun.

To buy a handgun, one has to pass a cursory background check that mostly involves whether one is a felon. That and a 48-hour waiting period are the only requirements in Wisconsin. No license, no registration, no gun safety course.

After the two days, I returned to pick up my Glock.

Easy? Filling out paperwork, waiting for a check into your background and undergoing a two-day waiting period is easy? Sounds rather more involved than “easy”.

You want easy? Go to a bar in Milwaukee, drink all you want, then drive home drunk. See how easy THAT is. But has Wisconsin made buying a drink hard to do? After all, drunk driving kills many thousands more people a year than do firearms. As the saying goes, "Teddy Kennedy's car has killed more people than my gun has."

No more direct statement of truth was ever uttered.

Then she went on with more hyperbole.

I also took a closer look at the submachine guns on the wall behind the counter, realizing that I probably could have bought one of those if I had wanted.

Does she even have a clue what a "submachine gun" is? I'd bet not.

In any case, Miner goes on to make the same illogical leap that all anti-gun nuts do; assuming legal guns is what causes "gun violence".

The sad reality is that it remains outrageously simple to buy a semiautomatic handgun in this city. Even sadder, the youth of Milwaukee are paying with their lives for our refusal to legislate gun control.

Gang members are not walking into gun shops and legally buying guns, Ms. Miner. The guns used by gang members are overwhelmingly illegally purchased and held. Gang members do not put up with paperwork and waiting periods. Law abiding citizens, however, do.

Miner ends with her last stab at hyperbole on full display with her misleading end line.

I know how easy it is to buy a handgun. I just did it.

And, again. A big "so what?" is the proper reaction to this breathless proclamation.

Is Ms. Miner a gang member? Does she have a record? Is there a reason her buying a gun should be cause for concern? To this she makes not one logical answer. She merely states the fact that she bought a gun presenting it as if it were somehow shocking.

Naturally, her piece is built on emotion empty of any real thought and it certainly didn't mention that bad word, "Constitution." Like all liberals, the supreme law of the land does not feature into her conversation unless it can be used to blanket some sort of tearing down of our society and culture. But, since the 2nd Amendment is part of the Constitution, the actual law does not factor into her considerations.

In any case, this is what passes for serious thinking in liberal circles. The shame of it is that many of her leftist pals (as if the gun store clerk wasn't the only normal American she ever met) will pat her on the back with that faux concerned look on their countenances and congratulate her for her Pulitzer worthy work.

Real Americans, on the other hand, will just point and laugh at her unintentional comedy.