Larry King, who hosted his own eponymous CNN show for 25 years and is the anchor for the Russian propaganda channel RT's PoliticKING and Larry King Now, stated on Wednesday that the Second Amendment to the Constitution should be repealed because it’s “poorly written” and was passed by Southerners in the U.S. Senate to fend off slave uprisings.
A video reporter for the TMZ celebrity news website approached King in Beverly Hills, California, and asked if the long-time interviewer supported the call by retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens to undo the measure giving Americans the right to bear arms.
“I favor changing the Second Amendment,” the TV anchor replied before being reminded that the New York Times op-ed called for that measure to be repealed.
“Yeah, repeal it,” King said. “It’s poorly written.”
The reporter then asked: “So you’d like to just rewrite it?”
The former CNN host responded by asking: “What do they mean by “militia?'”
He continued by asserting: “The amendment was passed by Southern senators so they could ward off slaves’ uprisings. … Read the history.”
“I don’t have time right now,” the reporter responded. “Can you just give me a brief background?”
“Eventually, it went to other areas,” King noted, “but Southern senators started it so they could repel slave uprisings.”
“Let the Second Amendment go,” he added before claiming that the National Rifle Association “is the worst.”
However, that wasn’t the first time King slammed the gun-rights organization in front of a TMZ camera.
On the previous Saturday evening, another video reporter asked the TV anchor: “Now what do you get the man who has everything?”
“Well, I don’t have everything,” King replied before suggesting: “I tell you what you can get me. Donate to these kids marching” in the March for Our Lives events that took place earlier that day. “Donate to the Florida kids.”
“That’s a great idea,” the reporter responded before asking: “Another question off that: Do you have any answer to how we’re gonna stop these school massacres?”
“Is there an answer?” he continued.
“Don’t support the NRA,” King replied. “Don’t let them buy congressmen and senators. The NRA is a menace to America. ... Stop taking the money.”
On Thursday, King’s comment about repealing the Second Amendment drew a sharp rebuke from Chicago journalist Nick Kangadis on the MRCTV.org website.
“The ol' bag-o-bones is at it again,” the blogger stated before noting: “King’s dumbest claim ... was that the Second Amendment was written in order to protect from slave uprisings. That couldn’t be further from the truth.”
“Although we wouldn’t expect a ‘journalist’ like King to know what the word ‘truth’ means,” Kangadis added. “Heck, he doesn’t even understand the word ‘militia.’”
“King’s whole theory is based on a thoroughly debunked 2013 essay by Thom Hartmann from the Left-leaning website called truth-out.org,” in which the liberal radio talk-show host “argued that the term ‘militia’ meant ‘slave patrol militias.’ Slave patrols were groups of men tasked with enforcing discipline on slaves.”
However, Kangadis asserted: “The term ‘militia’ means the people.”
“The essay has since been debunked piece by piece,” he continued. “Paul Finkelman of The Root took Hartmann’s essay to task less than a week after it had been published in 2013.”
Finkelman is then quoted as saying:
But, sadly, good public policy will not be helped by constructing a factually incorrect and misleading history of the Second Amendment that does not exist, writing about slave rebellions that never happened and totally misunderstanding the nature of the ratification of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
“King would be best served to educate himself -- just a little -- before making himself look like an ass,” Kangadis also stated. “I guess it’s not that difficult to do when you’ve been making looking dumb so easy for decades.”
“Just go away, Larry,” he continued. “Oh, and take Stevens with you.”
As NewsBusters previously reported, King isn’t the only CNN host to venture an opinion about repealing the Second Amendment.
On Wednesday morning, New Day co-host Chris Cuomo ranted that President Donald Trump tweeted: “The Second Amendment will never be repealed, we must have more [Republicans].”
“Who’s calling for a repeal of the Second Amendment?” Cuomo asked increduously. “Who’s calling for it?”
Rick Santorum, a guest that morning and a former U.S. Senator, replied: “Well, Justice Stevens did.”
So did Larry King, who apparently believes that he can now tell everyone what he really believes about the issue of gun control, regardless of whether history agrees with him or not.
