One of the grimmest aspects of the Orlando slaughter is that it is just the bloodiest and most recent of many acts of armed terrorism. Those arguing that now is the moment for reform should realize that odds are with the opposite. After past rampages, gun laws were liberalized, not tightened.
Despite this trend toward profusion, not restriction, gun owners and gun stores like to complain about how the media is set against them. The truth is, it's the facts that are against them, not that many care. Gun supporters barely need try to make their case. This story ran in 2013, during the last spate of public attention over the profusion of guns in this country. I guess it's easier to bitch about being mistreated than to try to defend the undefendable.
The mainstream media gets blasted for ignoring the truth by those who think they have a monopoly on it. But should the media come knocking to hear their version of that truth, well, that's no good either...
With guns and ammo flying out of stores, supposedly, sparked by talk of gun control in Washington and Springfield — bound to go nowhere but good for sales nonetheless — I figured that rather than opine more myself, I would talk to those who have something different to say on this topic, maybe something about the vital need to protect our cherished 2nd Amendment rights, even after the unpleasant incident in Newtown. You'd think, with all this negative publicity, gun advocates would be hot to tell their side of the story.
You'd think wrong.
"We're not really big on talking to the media," said a guy at Maxon Shooters Supplies in Des Plaines, which I called first because I have been there, twice, firing guns, which you'd think would earn me points, as a regular customer. "Business is brisk," he said, "like everywhere else."
Click.
"No comment ..." said a clerk at Jack's Gun Shop in Riverdale.
Click.
"No, we're not doing any comment at this time," said a lady at Midwest Guns in Lyons.
I didn't want to let her off that easily.
"What time will you comment?" I asked.
"It's our right..." she said, defensively.
"...not to talk to the media? Of course it is." I cooed. "But why not? Are you ashamed?"
"Have a good day," she said. Click.
When all else fails, go for the big dog — GAT Guns Firearms Superstore ("If We Don't Have it, We Can Get It") in East Dundee, 3,000 guns on display in what will, when they're done expanding, be a 30,000-square-foot showroom. They seem to be the eye of the storm. "SOME AR'S" - assault rifles - "ARE OUT OF STOCK" its website warns, offering a ray of hope with a reassuring, "WE ARE TAKING ORDERS." I bet.
Owner Greg Tropino came on the line.
Busy?
Laughter. "Exactly. It is very, very brisk."
"Is there a specific reason?" I wondered.
"Are you serious?" he said. "Are you not aware what's going on in Springfield? They're worried people are going to take away..." He was skittish talking to a reporter. "I've been in gun industry since 1968," Tropino continued. "I have been burned by more reporters..." But I worked my charm, and he did not hang up but explained that the problem is not guns, but mental illness.
"When Quinn took office there were 11 mental institutions — he's closed four," he said. "The key factor in so many of these shootings is mental health." I asked him what one thing he wished people understood about this issue and he mentioned a story in the Sun-Times, where a father burned his children with gasoline. "That's what I wish people understand, if somebody's going to do something bad, they're going to do something bad, if they have to go to the corner store and buy five gallons of gas. There are evil people out there and we have to take care of these people. That's my one thing. My heart aches when I think about those kids getting killed ... but banning something is not going to solve anything. You can't wave a magic wand and it's all better. We've got to do something about mental health."
In that regard, I agree with him. It would be ironic if mental health services, the first baby to go out the window when times are tight, found an unexpected ally in gun fans. To reward Greg for talking, I'll make the quick, one-paragraph case for guns. Ready?
Given there are some 270 million guns in the United States — nearly one for every person — if they were the source of extreme peril that gun control types suggest, we'd all be dead. Not only is owning a gun a hobby— hunting, shooting, collecting — but guns give countless Americans a sense of security. Perhaps false but real to them — that they're ready to face whatever zombie apocalypse, social breakdown or bad guy coming through the window that they all dread. Yes, people are killed by guns but most are suicides who, arguably, might find other means. And the number of gun deaths is far below deaths from other tolerated habits, such as cigarettes, which harm far more than guns do. Sure, getting rid of guns would save lives but so would setting the speed limit at 40 mph.
I don't quite buy that, and here's why: machine guns are illegal. Silencers too. Yet the gun folk still have lots of ordnance to stockpile and adore. As much as they claim it's a slippery slope, and though unrelated events like President Barack Obama's election make them load up more, there's zero chance of true reform. Guns are partly about fearing our government, yet to many they are also a sacred icon of our country, like apple pie, mom and baseball. But like baseball, occasionally the rules can be tweaked and still the game goes on.
— Originally published in the Sun-Times, Jan. 6, 2013
It's summer.
Okay, not officially.
Get all technical on me, why don't you.
But close enough.
The weather's certainly fine, which means outdoor dining.
This is one of my favorite places to eat under the sky in Chicago, for the food, for its urban industrial vibe. For those party lights and giant hooks.
And not to forget the food. Oh ... my ... God.
I almost didn't use it because I figured someone would ID it immediately.
But someone will ID it immediately anyway, and I figure using the picture will send a few people there, so my duty to spread the word is fulfilled.
Where IS this place?
The winner will receive one of my completely undesirable 2015 blog posters, assuming they send me their address, which last week's winner didn't, to my disappointment.
When the newspaper sent a photographer to take a picture of the Maxon sign, the gun shop called the police. Who came, reminded them that this still is America, despite their best efforts. This was that kind of story.
There’s something soothing about buying a gun.
Driving to Maxon Shooter’s Supplies in Des Plaines Wednesday to purchase my first assault rifle, I admit, I was nervous. I’d never owned a gun before. And with the horror of Sunday’s Orlando massacre still echoing, even the most pleasant summer day—the lush green trees, the fluffy clouds, blue sky–took on a grim aspect, the sweetness of fragile life flashing by as I headed into the Valley of Death.
Earlier, in my editor’s office, I had ticked off the reasons for me not to buy a gun: this was a journalistic stunt; done repeatedly; supporting an industry I despise. But as I tell people, I just work here, I don’t own the place. And my qualms melted as I dug into the issue. I couldn’t even figure whether bringing an assault rifle into Chicago is legal. The Internet was contradictory. The Chicago corporation consul’s office punted me on to that black hole of silence, Bill McCaffrey. I found that Illinois has a 24-hour waiting period between buying and taking possession of a gun. Unearthing that fact alone made the exercise seem worthwhile. I was learning stuff.
Reluctance melted when I walked into the large, well-lit store. Maxon’s looked like a meeting of the Mid-50ish Guy Club. A dozen grizzled men in ball caps , milling around. More on the glassed in shooting range. Imagine a steady, muffled pop-pop…pop going on behind the rest of this column.
I eyed the cases of weapons. Ooo. Big revolvers, matte steel. Despite the run on weaponry that happens after these shootings—Smith & Wesson stock went up 6.9 percent Monday—as gun fans guard against restrictions that never come, there were a few dozen assault rifles (a vague term, yes, I know) including a Sig Sauer like the one used in Orlando.
"I'm interested in one of the ARs," I said, trying to project an air of manly ease. "What's the difference between the cheap ones and the expensive ones?"
"Not much," said Rob, a clerk with a winged death's head with a dagger tattooed on his right forearm. "Mostly it's manufacturing tolerances, different sights and stuff."
He immediately asked for my FOID card—Firearm Owner's Identification Card—no gun purchase without it.
He showed me a Smith & Wesson M & P 15 Sport II, a lean black weapon, 6.5 pounds.
We talked barrel profiles.
"Assault rifle" a misnomer. Despite what another clerk called the "black, evil-looking" appearance of the guns, the only aspect relevant to the national debate is the "standard issue 30-round magazine" which holds a nightclub-clearing 30 bullets. Eight states and the District of Columbia ban selling them. But not, of course, Florida. Or Illinois.
"I'll take it," I said.
A few months earlier, a friend's life is dissolving into alcoholism and divorce. I try to just listen—no point putting in my two cents anymore. Bewailing his fate, he mentions that his soon-to-be ex-wife is insisting he hand his guns over to a neighbor for safekeeping.
"Good," I say, slipping.
"Fuck you," he replies, with sincerity. I don't know if I say this or just think it: "Your father shot himself. Your grandfather shot himself. Maybe guns are not a good idea in your life right now." Whether I say it or not, we both already knew it's true. But wants the guns anyway. For protection.
Driving to Maxon's, the whole gun debate clarified in bold relief. There is the danger of the gun. itself. And there is the danger the gun protects you from. Another divide. Which danger you feel is greater decides which side of the divide you live on.
Being fact-based I know, you buy a gun, the person you are most likely to shoot, statistically, is yourself. And your family. More pre-schoolers are killed by guns than are police officers. Nor do I need the sense of security, false though it may be, that guns bring. I live in Northbrook, where criminal danger is remote. My boys laugh at us for locking the doors. I don't plan on keeping this gun a second longer than I have to for this column.
Not everyone feels that way. A house on the next block has a high fence and an electric gate across the driveway. The blinds are drawn and in 15 years of walking by, I've never seen a person there. I would guess the owner is afraid. Maybe just shy. But he sees a hazard requiring that fence, gate and security service that I do not. I imagine he owns a gun. Or many guns.
When it came time to make the purchase, Rob, the clerk with the tattoos, handed me over to Mike, who gave his name shaking my hand, I gave mine. "The writer?" he said. If I wanted to lie as part of my job, I'd have gone into public relations. "Yes," I said, explaining that I plan to buy the gun, shoot at their range, then give it to the police. He suggested I sell it back to them instead and I heartily agreed. Economical. If they would let me photograph myself with it there, the gun need never leave the store.
A reporter in Philadelphia bought an assault rifle in seven minutes; 40 percent of gun transactions in the U.S. have no background checks. Here, I had paperwork. A federal form asking, was I an illegal alien? No. Was I a fugitive? Again no? Had I ever been convicted on charges of domestic abuse? No. Handed over my credit card: $842.50. Another $40 for the instructor to acquaint me with the gun the next day.
Our transaction took nearly an hour because we chatted. Mike used to read newspapers but doesn't anymore because of opinion writers like me. He knew whether it was legal to bring the gun to Chicago—it's not. He was friendly, candid, so I asked difficult questions. Did he ever feel guilty about the people killed by the guns he sells? No, he said, that's like asking a car dealer if he felt guilty if someone gets drunk and kills somebody in a car he sold. It seemed a fair answer. I asked him if I could quote him in the newspaper, and he said no, I couldn't, so I'm not quoting him.
Back home later Wednesday, a neighbor asks how my day is going. "I just bought an assault rifle," I say. Her eyes widen. She mentions that her brother-in-law owns 100 guns.
"A hundred guns!" I marvel. "That's a lot. Why does he own 100 guns?"
"He's afraid," she replies.
I was looking forward to shooting my new rifle the next day. I've shot guns. It's fun. I was worried though, about having fun with guns in the current environment of outrage and horror. Had I been co-opted by the purchase process? By the friendly staff at Maxon's? Heck, there is a whole world of hobbyists, of hunters, of people who love guns for a variety of reasons that are not crazy. Three hundred million guns in America. If the vast majority weren't handled safely, we'd all be dead. Oh well, I thought, no harm in a gun story reflecting the gun owner's perspective.
At 5:13 Sarah from Maxon called. They were canceling my sale and refunding my money. No gun for you. I called back. Why? "I don't have to tell you," she said. I knew that, but was curious. I wasn't rejected by the government? No. So what is it? "I'm not at liberty," she said.
Gun dealers do have the right to refuse sales to anyone, usually exercised for people who seem to be straw purchasers. I told her I assume they wouldn't sell me a gun because I'm a reporter. She denied it. But hating the media is right behind hating the government as a pastime for many gun owners. They damn you for being ignorant then hide when you try to find out.
A few hours later, Maxon sent the newspaper a lengthy statement, the key part being: "it was uncovered that Mr. Steinberg has an admitted history of alcohol abuse, and a charge for domestic battery involving his wife."
Well, didn't see that coming. Were that same standard applied to the American public, there would be a whole lot fewer guns sold. Beside, they knew I planned to immediately sell it back to them.
Okay, Maxon has had its chance to offer their reason.
Now I'll state what I believe the real reason is: Gun manufacturers and the stores that sell them make their money in the dark. Congress, which has so much trouble passing the most basic gun laws, passed a law making it illegal for the federal government to fund research into gun violence. Except for the week or two after massacres, the public covers its eyes. Would-be terrorists can buy guns. Insane people can buy guns. But reporters ... that's a different story. Gun makers avoid publicity because the truth is this: they sell tools of death to frightened people and make a fortune doing so. They shun attention because they know, if we saw clearly what is happening in our country, we'd demand change.
"What's your brother in-law afraid of?" I ask my neighbor.
"Other people with guns," she says.
I was driving back from Des Plaines, having purchased my first assault rifle (more about that in the Sun-Times on Friday) when I heard the general manager of Six Flags Great America talking about their new roller coaster feature: virtual reality goggles on their popular 20-story, 73 mph Raging Bull. In talking about the experience, he used the term "twists and turns." I had to smile. The virtual technology might be new, but that particular word pairing, "twists and turns" is no less than 2500 years old, featured in one of the most famous opening sentences in literature, the first line of The Odyssey, here as translated by Robert Fagles:
"Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns..."
Homer isn't suggesting that his hero, Odysseus is jarring around curves and dips like someone a roller coaster, though there is plenty of that in the story, particularly in the cave of Polyphemus, the cyclops.
But rather that Odysseus is clever, complicated, a man of genius and ideas, complexities and stratagems. I was pleased to hear it on the radio, even though I strongly doubt it was a conscious homage. Unintended though it was, it was nice to hear the classical allusion.
Otherwise, language is often mangled. Look at this line of natural frozen goods, I noticed a few days ago at Marianno's. You might think you're looking at a reversed photo, but the stuff is "elov," the brainchild of a Boulder, Colorado frozen foods company. The word is "love" spelled backward, of course, with all the groaning half-wittery of backwards spelled words, a realm of half-cleverness somewhere below puns and above farting sounds. What's the least clever thing in Harry Potter? "The Mirror of Erised" ("desire" spelled backward!) I tried to think of this kind of backward spelling that wasn't lame and the best I could do is "redrum" in The Shining and even that is a little iffy.
(A different story are words and sentences that are spelled the same forward and backward, such as found in Carol Weston's recent series of young adult novels. Palindromes can be fun, and, I should point out, include today's date: 6-16-16).
Back to "Evol," It not only seems a typo of "evolve" but also hints at "evil" which the company cheerfully admits, with all kinds of puns. Its slogan is the nearly Orwellian "Good is evol" and staffers with black t-shirts reading "evol minion."
Lest we judge the company too harshly, a few cases away was this product, the even-more grating "udi's," also lowercase. It seems e.e. cummings is running marketing in the frozen food industry.
That screams for explanation. Udi Baron is an Israeli baker who moved to Colorado, started a sandwich cart (two Colorado companies, in a store in Northbrook; for a moment I thought I was transported to King Soopers) got into gluten-free baking, and sold his brand to Boulder Brands for $125 million in 2012. So clearly, I am not the judge of these things.
That reminds me. When I first heard of the Harry Potter books, I shook my head at the name of the school. "Hogwarts?!? Really?" That'll go over well....
Turns out, you get used to it.
My fear is that a mob of armed evildoers will rush at my home, guns blazing.
Sure, I could fend them off with the substantial firepower of an assault rifle. But returning fire would expose me to their attack; it would be better, tactically, if I crouch on the second floor and lob grenades out the window instead.
An M67 fragmentation grenade would do the job nicely—pull the pin, count to two, out the window, hit the deck. Bad guys neutralized.
There is a problem with this plan. Civilian ownership of grenades is illegal under the National Firearms Act of 1934, which bans "destructive devices"such as grenades.
Now might be the moment to change that. In the wake of 49 people being murdered at a gay nightclub in Orlando last Sunday, Americans are crying for curtailing availability of so-called assault rifles like the weapon used in the shooting, as the minimum reaction of a once proud nation to these mass killings.
It'll never happen. If gun violence is an American folk illness—and no other industrial country comes close to our rate of armed carnage—than calls for gun control are the fever that breaks out in the post-massacre stage of the disease.....
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"Confirmation bias" is the inclination we all have toward believing things that mesh with our preconceptions. I saw a textbook example of that in my reporting Sunday morning, in the wake of the massacre at Pulse nightclub in Orlando a few hours earlier.
Sifting through the Twitter cross-talk, I noticed some of the outrage directed against Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick for tweeting a Biblical verse, Galatians 6:7: "Do not be deceived. God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows."
While that seemed a particularly jaw-dropping example of Bible-based inhumanity, to blame the victims for calling their own deaths upon themselves by being gay, it was not out of keeping with my understanding of how religious zealots behave in general. As well as how elected officials behave in Texas in particular, the state that gave the world Ted Cruz.
Hiding behind the Bible, using it as a ventriloquist's dummy to express their seething hatreds, is sort of what some fundamentalists do. Didn't a Georgia state senator just use Psalms 108 to practically pray for Obama's death, asking that "his days be few," leaving out the part about his children being fatherless?
I mentioned the tweet in the draft of my Monday column that I turned into the paper.
My sharp-eyed editor, Bill Ruminski, however, flagged it, as he couldn't find the tweet. I went online and grabbed a story explaining that Patrick had deleted the tweet. But I noticed, at the bottom, that Patrick claimed the quote was scheduled days in advance and was more a case of what his spokesman called "unfortunate timing" than a joyous slide through the blood of the fallen.
That gave me pause. It was a plausible excuse. The power of coincidence is vastly underestimated, and given the unquestionable cruelties that can be laid at the feet of religious extremism, better to give them the benefit of the doubt, and not blame them when they happen to be innocent. The quote wasn't a hastily fired off tweet, but nicely laid out against the azure sky and wheat fields. The thought of Lt. Gov. Patrick getting the grim news, then hurrying to cite chapter and verse, well, it seemed excessive, even for the flinty spite of fundamentalists—Pat Roberston certainly gloried in the murders on the 700 Club, but then he always does that.
So I removed the quote, instead referring generically to the celebrations among neo-Nazi sorts which I am 100 percent certain were pin-balling around Twitter, if history is any judge.
Patrick posted a sincere explanation on his Facebook page, saying the Sunday quotes are set up on Thursdays. He went on at length, explaining that we all are sinners, straight and gay, making him one of the few Republican officials to mention that these victims were, largely, gay Americans, and quoting the entirety of the passage, which includes the phrase, "Bear one another's burdens."
See, that the thing about religion. There is good stuff in it, and some people focus on the good stuff, and do good things and that's, well, good. But there's also bad stuff, as Omar Mateen demonstrated in such horrific fashion, and those who embrace the awful, who use faith to try to justify their acts, neither justify those acts nor corrupt the faith, which is such a sprawling mess you can find rationalization for anything. Sure, you can pitch all religion out, and people do. But then they try to justify their misdeeds in other ways—for the good of the state!—and you're denied the poetry and the power that resides in all faiths.
Readers lined up to blame Islam and the Koran, for containing the same calls to violence that the Bible is stuffed with, and which Christians acted on with great gusto for a thousand years. But they got with modernism, mostly, Texas notwithstanding, at least the don't-kill-the-non-believers part. Muslims will get with the program too, and largely have. I truly believe that someday, ahead of automobiles or televisions or computers, the prying of religion's fingers off the public throat will be seen as the signal accomplishment of the modern age. But that day tarries, and much blood will be shed by the faithful before then.
Soon you'll be able to put a filter on your newsfeed to screen out these mass shootings. Then you won't be forced to feel the queasy chill of reading horrific news — such as 50 partiers slaughtered at a gay nightclub in Florida. The worst mass shooting in U.S. history. Your attention won't be wrenched away on a beautiful Sunday, the hot weather breaking into a delightful cool. You won't be left tapping your finger on your watch, waiting for officials to figure out exactly what — overwhelming hatred, religious insanity or just regular old psychosis? — motivated someone to throw away 50 innocent lives and his own poisoned existence.
As if the reason mattered.
Such a filter would certainly save me the discomfort of having to set aside a promising topic — how Donald Trump's pathological lying and Tourette's syndrome insults are not separate character flaws, as typically presented, but two sides of a coin, the latter an essential raspberry to blow off anyone who dares point out the former. I woke up eager to get at it.
Not today. Today we stare at the carnage in Orlando.
Or should I say, we stare at more carnage in Orlando. One day and four miles away from where a mope gunned down 22-year-old "The Voice" singer Christina Grimmie — no official reason for that yet, but I'll put my chips on what Hamlet calls "the pangs of disprized love" — a better-armed shooter walked into Pulse, a "high-energy gay dance club" and shot about 100 people, killing more than 50, as if in rebuke for our focusing on just one death.
Crying over one young person? Here's 50 more. Cry about that.
Hmmm, let's see . . . futility of even talking about sane gun control? Done it. Inhumanity of using other people's horrific tragedy for political ends? Been there. The day fast arriving when such atrocities become such a quotidian part of American life that we don't even....
