AP gives up on Disarmament... for the Midterms

The AP used to be a reliable disarmenter organization.  John Lott documented how an AP editor edited out of the story, armed students who helped subdue a university shooter, at the Appalachian Law School.    But this has been changing as the gun culture media has been able to document and challenge AP stories and procedures.   AP has been feeling the heat. 

It was with interest that I read this AP story, just before the election.   It starts with a usual disarmenter passive construction:

    The latest U.S. school shooting claimed the lives of two students and the teenage shooter less than two weeks before congressional and statewide elections. It barely made a ripple in the final days of campaigning.

But notice that the second sentence mentions that the shooting has almost no effect on the campaigns.   The article goes on to lament the inattention to "gun control", but it has significant balance.   It mentions that opinions are divided on the issue, that there are two sides, and that candidates may face a price if they push for more gun control.   This is an enormous change.  Allowing that second amendment supporters  have legitimate arguments is a death knell for disarmenters.   They rely on emotion because they do not have rational arguments.

This isn't to say that the AP has become an organization that respects the Constitution and limited government.   It has been forced to back away from a completely one sided position.   However, anything less than a one sided position, and disarmenters lose.   Notice how the passive voice is dropped, later in the article:

Gifford's latest appearance was in Seattle, just two days before a 15-year-old high school student shot and killed two people and himself in an attack north of the city.

It is weird to see AP put forward the mentally challenged Gabby Giffords as the expert on disarmament.   Giffords was not known as a disarmenter before she was shot in the head.   It was only after she was severely mentally disabled that she became a full blown disarmenter under her husbands close guidance.    I do not blame Gabby.   It would be hard to argue that she really understands what is going on.   The AP article not so subtly implies this by reporting on the difficulty that she has had in repeating a 64 word speech eight times in 10 days.

Giffords, who struggles with speech, stumbled as she delivered the same 64-word speech she had made eight times on her tour.

"Together, we can win elections," Giffords said before starting to stumble. After a moment of confused silence, an aide whispers the next line, and Giffords continued the broken sentence: "... change our laws."

AP probably feels that it is safe to use Gabby as an expert, as an attack on Gabby would be seen as an attack on a victim, a person who has already lost a great deal.

That would be true if second amendment activists were to attack Gabby.   But they have no need to do so when they can simply point out how Gabby is being used by the disarmenters to further their cause.   It is not an attractive position for the disarmenters to be in.

AP still attempts to smear the NRA as the big money machine, ignoring the millions spent by "progressive" billionaires such as former Mayor Bloomberg and Bill Gates.   But they give a quote to the NRA, who talks about their millions of members.

Some might cynically say that the article is an attempt to suppress second amendment support, just before the election.   Perhaps, but it can also be seen that the AP has been forced to move away from its historically harsh disarmenter stance.   That is a good sign.

Definition of a disarmenter 

 ©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
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