The Medium Is the Motive; Right to bear arms isn’t only freedom implicated in massacr

[Wehrwolfen]

The Medium Is the Motive; Right to bear arms isn’t only freedom implicated in massacres like last week’s.​

James Taranto @ The WSJ:


If hypocrisy were an intoxicating spirit, Andrew Rosenthal would be a master distiller. On Friday, we noticed this tweet from Rosenthal, the New York Times’s editorial page editor, which he posted at 1:42 p.m.: “Sickeningly quick. RT @BryanJFischer Shooters attack an elementary school in CT – another ‘gun-free zone.’ Makes children sitting ducks.”

We tended to agree with Rosenthal that Fischer, an official of the American Family Association who is a frequent contributor to this column, should have been more circumspect. The point about gun-free zones is a pertinent one, but the immediate aftermath of a horrific massacre is not the time to be picking arguments about divisive political issues. That’s why our Friday column was about other topics.

But there would be no such circumspection from Rosenthal and the Times. By 4:47 p.m., he was pounding the table: “Bloomberg wonders, Bloomberg On CT Shooting: Calling For Meaningful Action Is Not Enough | TPM LiveWire, and so do we, http://nyti.ms/U0QUkP, when it WILL be time to do something about gun violence.” The second link was to a Times editorial, which appeared in Saturday’s paper but was published earlier than usual on the Web–sickeningly quick, one might say–using the Connecticut massacre as a peg to argue for more-restrictive firearms laws.

David Frum was even quicker than the Times. Friday morning he tweeted: “Shooting at CT elementary school. Obviously, we need to lower the age limit for concealed carry so toddlers can defend themselves.” The sour sarcasm was especially out of place, and the comment was a bizarre non sequitur. We’ve never heard of a school without adults.


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The Medium Is the Motive - WSJ.com