Noah Lanard at Mother Jones reports Texas could become the 14th state to eliminate permits for handguns.
During a trip through Texas last month, I found myself waiting in the security line at the state capitol. In order to enter, I had to pass through a metal detector. But to my left there was a separate line: it allowed Texans with handgun permits to enter the building uninspected. Now, amidst yet another round of mass shootings, Texas is moving towards getting rid of those permits altogether.
This week, the Texas House of Representatives passed a bill that would allow adults to carry handguns without first getting a license to do so. If the bill became law, Texas would become the 14th state to pass a so-called “constitutional carry” bill. Texans over the age of 21 would no longer need to take a safety course and pass a test at a shooting range to carry open or concealed handguns.
The Texas House passed the bill on Thursday in a 84-56 vote. That evening, the NRA celebrated the news with a tweet that included a celebratory emoji. A few hours later, in the latest in a string of mass shootings, a man killed eight people at a FedEx facility in Indiana.
emphasis added — this is compounding the stupid.
The laws differ from state to state; concealed carry, open carry, the kinds of firearms allowed... The Giffords Law Center has an explainer. Here’s another set of numbers.
As noted above, fifteen states (Alaska, Arizona, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming) now allow the carrying of concealed weapons without a permit, although all but Vermont issue CCW permits.
* Meteor Blades has some updated numbers here.
Republicans are pushing these bills at the state level because it’s not enough to pass bills targeting trans people or abortion bans — they need all the culture war issues they can get to keep their voters angry and terrified. (They also need them because they have nothing else to offer. Tax cuts and racism are what the GOP runs on.)
Guns tie in with their embrace of White Supremacy and fears of replacement, the stuff that Tucker Carlson is promoting. The unstated assumption behind all of these gun bills is this: guns are for white people. They want to be ready to blow away the hordes of “those people” who are going to take away all their stuff and steal elections. They want to be able to overturn any election not won by “one of them” by violence if they can’t win any other way.
At the core, a big part of the appeal of these gun bills is that they are a giant racist dog whistle. A white guy with a gun is assumed to be a “good guy.” A black man with a gun is an imminent threat that cops are expected to terminate with extreme prejudice. (And a gun isn’t actually needed — the cop just needs to believe they might have a gun somewhere.)
Compare and contrast this with this. (It’s a miracle the second example did not end in a police shooting.)
The quickest way to stop these bills in their tracks is simple — but would likely result in a horrendous number of casualties. A mass march of black people on these red state legislatures with them all doing open carry would cause these GOP legislators to freak out. We’d get to see if they really believe the Second Amendment is for all Americans — or just ‘real’ Americans like them.
The police response to a peaceful but armed protest by black people would likely be immediate and brutal. Right wing media would go ballistic — even more than they already do. Tucker Carlson would need to be sedated. (Actually, that would be a good idea regardless.)
We’ve already seen the opposite is not true when it’s white guys with the assault rifles. The assault on the Capitol in DC is being ‘revised’ by the GOP who claim it was really Antifa and BLM protestors causing the violence — while the rest were merely peacefully protesting a “stolen election.”
If there was a black open carry march, who wants to bet the mainstream media would be ‘shocked’ and alarmed by black people with guns, calling it counterproductive, unhelpful, etc? So where’s the media pushback against Republicans doing their best to make life in America even more chaotic, dangerous, and divided? If you want to overthrow democracy, this is one way to do it.
It’s enough to make you root for the coronavirus.
UPDATE: Right on schedule — active shooter in Austin.
More here.
UPDATE AGAIN: Checking my AOL account (Yes, I still have one), the news feed had three separate shooting stories.
Shots fired at National Guardsmen.
Teen arrested in fatal Mall shooting.
Suspect apprehended in fatal bar shooting.
At this rate we’re going to need a news feed/cable channel just to track shootings in this country. Too bad we can’t all do what Wayne La Pierre does to feel safe.