Trump and the NRA

How many innocent children have to die like this before we embrace the need to control access to firearms to those stable and mature enough to use them responsibly?   Dominic Castro, three-year old stepson of his killer, was another in a long line of innocent victims of the policies of unfettered gun ownership in our country.  At present we know little about the family involved and of the background of the young man, George Wayman, who shot his stepson in the head apparently because he was irritated with him for jumping on his bed.

The report of this tragedy was published in this article in Salon: (http://tinyurl.com/z7zh39r) lifted from this Texas web site (http://tinyurl.com/grh8n8x) provides another tragic example of the danger of unfettered gun ownership.

These articles do not disclose much information about the 18-year old boy who possessed a gun that he had in his bedroom and which he used to threaten and then shoot his three-year old stepson while his Mother was away visiting a relative.    While we wait for more details on this tragic event, it’s clear that the Texas “shoot first and ask questions later” gun culture has claimed another innocent victim.

My first reaction was stupefaction, incredulity that an 18-year old boy in the photo to the left could have acquired a deadly firearm in the first place.  This tragedy claimed three victims, the child taken from his mother, his mother, and this young man who will have to live with the moral weight of his careless decision to kill a child whose only offense was playing on his stepfather’s bed.  The emotional toll of this terrible tragedy on the families of Dominic’s mother and his stepfather must be crushing.

The juxtaposition of this tragic event with the announcement yesterday that the National Rifle Association (NRA)  has endorsed the candidacy of Donald Trump  reminds us of the terrible consequences of our fanatical obsession with firearms and of the moral turpitude and the craven cowardice of so many politicians who lack the courage to risk the wrath of the NRA and its followers by passing legislation to prevent immature young men like George Wayman from acquiring deadly firearms in the first place.

The data are clear that gun ownership by individuals who lack the training and the necessary emotional maturity and psychological stability creates a much greater risk of claiming innocent victims like Dominic than of affording any real protection from home invasion and other forms of criminality.  Yet the gun lobby and its cowardly coterie of politicians who kowtow to it do not even allow the Center for Disease Control (CDC) to collect statistics on gun violence and gun deaths to help us to understand and evaluate the terrible problem we have with possession of deadly weapons by those lacking the training and maturity to use them responsibly.

Now we have a demagogue like Donald Trump adding his name to the roster of politicians who with craven political calculation and cowardice have sought the imprimatur of Wayne LaPierre, president of the NRA and extremist leader of the gun lobby.  How many more innocent victims like Dominic do we need to convince us of the need for responsible measures to control access to deadly weapons and assure as much as humanly possible that gun ownership is reserved for those who are capable of using their guns responsibly.