GunFails: A Nasty Laugh a Minute

I mentioned  "GunFails" the other day, in Celebrating the Right to Bear Arms. It's a wonderful collection of "Firearm Follies", by David Waldman. Today Waldman reports that this has been "Just your basic, routine, 40+ GunFAIL events week".

There are 14 hunting "accidents", and four "accidents" occurring while someone was cleaning a still-loaded gun.

David Waldman has a wonderfully laconic style as he recounts this gruesome madness and mayhem. He tells us,

"Five "home invasion" shootings are among the entries this week, plus one that fell from the owner's pocket and shot his wife, one that shot its brand new owner immediately following its purchase, and one used to shoot yet another suspected "intruder" who turned out to be the gun owner's caretaker who'd come to check on him.
Continuing the Christmas shopping season's hottest trend, another gun carrier has accidentally discharged his weapon while out at the stores, this time shooting himself in the parking lot outside a Lowe's home improvement store in Pocatello, ID."

Then things get nasty.

"The child victims of GunFAIL were mercifully few last week. Just five were found, ages 5, 15, 15, 16 and 17. Many of you have, no doubt, by now become aware of the story of the 3-year-old killed in Indianapolis on Saturday. That particular tragedy does not go unrecognized, but it won't be included until our next installment."

I invite you to contemplate that for a moment. (Making a couple of assumptions here.) Imagine you're the parent of a 3-year-old, the bright-eyed, gurgling, apple of your eye. Your gunloving, right-to-bear-arms-believing spouse causes the "accidental" death of your baby. Do you forgive them? "Understand"? AGREE with them?

Or do you shoot the stupid cretin?

Gawd help us!

David Waldman is to be congratulated on an excellent, useful job.  You can get the details of each incident, well written-up, here.

As I, and no doubt millions of other sane people, have pointed out, you need a test, a license and regular checks, to drive a car, a machine that might, if things go horribly awry, kill someone. In God's chosen country, you can be a felon, an addict, a repeat offender, an idiot or a nutcase, and you can go right ahead and obtain a device whose only purpose is to kill people.

Duh!

Celebrating the Right to Bear Arms

1. FLOWOOD, MS, 11/24/13: Churchgoers got quite a scare at Pinelake Church in Rankin County Sunday morning. Flowood Police say a man's gun accidentally discharged as he was sitting down. Officers took Joseph Edgar Ray into custody. He was in possession of a 9mm handgun. According to police, Ray's gun was in his front right pocket and went off as he sat down. He's been charged with Discharging a Firearm in the City. Ray will appear in Flowood Municipal Court Jan. 9. MORE: Authorities tell us Ray has an enhanced carry gun permit, which gives him the right to carry a concealed weapon in public. Pinelake has posted signs prohibiting weapons on church property. The signs are not clearly visible so Ray may not have seen them, officials say. There were no injuries. But one woman was hit on the leg by the bullet after it ricocheted off the floor. [Ed. note: What?]

And this, boys and girls, is just story No. 18 in this week's wonderful crop of "Firearm Follies" collected by a writer called David Waldman under the heading "GunFails", and published by the Daily Kos - enjoy the rest of the madness here, including "the story from Chickamauga, GA, where a man who thought he was shooting at a home intruder killed a wandering, 72-year-old Alzheimer's patient. Or the story from Nashville, TN, where "outlaw country" singer Wayne Mills was shot and killed in a bar fight."