Within hours of the news of the Virginia Tech massacre, some pro-gun activists were proclaiming the cause: not enough guns. If students and teachers had been allowed to carry weapons to class, perhaps Seung-Hui Cho wouldn’t have killed so many.
Last week, former House Speaker and possible 2008 presidential aspirant Newt Gingrich (R-Georgia) seemed to agree, saying that one way to avert future tragedies is to make it easier for people to carry concealed weapons.
Such is the pathetic state of the gun debate in America. No gun control at all, save for the good intentions of gun owners, is acceptable to an industry-dominated lobby that long ago threw aside the last vestige of moderation.
And such is the pathetic state of our political leadership that even before the Virginia Tech victims were buried, Republican and Democratic leaders alike signaled that nothing much will be done to make it harder for others to imitate Cho’s grisly deed.
Two-thirds of Americans, according to a recent New York Times poll, favor tougher laws on handgun sales — but Congress won’t hear of it.
Once, Jewish groups were in the forefront of the drive for sensible, moderate gun control. But they, too, have been beaten, intimidated, bullied and just plain worn down by the gun lobby.
Maybe that will change in the wake of the Blacksburg tragedy. But don’t count on it. Until political leaders start showing some backbone, Jewish groups, too, will fight the gun glut with pious press releases and little more.
Varied reasons
Queried last week, leaders of several groups admitted that they haven’t made the issue a lobbying priority in recent years even though their groups continue to nominally support tougher gun laws.
The reasons are varied. They start with fatigue about an issue that seems to be dominated by groups whose political clout is exceeded only by their extremism.
Attempts to pass the mildest gun laws are met with all-out assaults by the gun lobby. Supporters of gun control legislation, no matter how mild, are vilified.
Politicians are warned that they risk a catastrophic backlash for supporting any gun control, even no-brainers like keeping weapons out of schools or doing deeper background checks before selling weapons.
With rising challenges on a number of domestic fronts, liberal Jewish groups have turned to battles that seem more winnable, including the fight to keep sectarian religion out of schools and government, and the fight for abortion rights.
There is also the sapping effect of Israel. Some Jewish groups with a traditional domestic focus are shifting more resources to the defense of an embattled Jewish state. This shift plays better with big givers than domestic hot potatoes like gun control.
And many Jewish leaders are simply fearful of an issue that seems to bring out the worst in America society, including a strain of anti-Semitism that has been a persistent undertone in the pro-gun movement.
Still, the Jewish community has strong and diverse interests in more effective gun control.
Jews live mostly in urban areas. The glut of guns and their growing lethality is obviously a particular threat to the communities we live in.
Jewish institutions remain vulnerable because of the number of deranged haters who, as Seung-Hui Cho demonstrated, have no trouble buying sophisticated weapons. Last year, one such hater did a shooting at the Seattle Jewish Federation offices that killed one and injured five.
Leaders in both parties say fighting terrorists is a top priority. But they refuse to consider new laws that would fix a system that allows almost anyone to buy handguns with the kind of rapid-kill capacity that ravaged Virginia Tech or assault weapons built only to kill people, not game.
Isn’t it interesting how so many politicians readily accept limits on civil liberties as part of the war on terrorism, but won’t take even the most basic steps to limit access to advanced weapons because they quake in fear before the specter of the National Rifle Association?
Jews have always seen their security tied to a just and orderly society. A nation awash in guns, its leaders fearful of an all-powerful extremist lobby, is hardly consistent with that goal.
But the absence of political backbone on the part of so many politicians in both parties has taken the steam out of Jewish advocacy on the issue.
“The fact Congress couldn’t get its act together to reauthorize the assault weapons ban last year was so shocking to so many of us that it’s going to be a real challenge to keep up the pressure,” said an official with the Reform movement, which still supports stronger gun control.
But that may be a self-reinforcing cycle. As groups that advocate sensible restrictions on deadly weapons shift their attention to more achievable goals, politicians have less reason than ever to stand up to groups that say they represent the American heartland — but which, in fact, represent only a radical fringe that has elevated gun ownership into a right that trumps all other rights.
Former Madisonian James D. Besser has been Washington correspondent for the New York Jewish Week and Baltimore Jewish Times since 1987.
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