Another “Bloomberg Idea” That is SURE to be Condemned

Mayor Mike Bloomberg on his anti-Big Gulp Campaign

Say what you will about Mike Bloomberg, who took a LOT of flak over his proposed “large soda” ban in New York, while he was Mayor, he does genuinely THINK about the root causes of problems.

Obesity IS running rampant and most people have no idea how many empty calories they’re ingesting with HUGE (“Big Gulp”-styled) sodas and sweet drinks.

BUT bans run counter to the American spirit and they don’t play well politically...EVER!

Still, at least Mike Bloomberg was thinking about the root cause of a specific problem, OBESITY, and looking at ways to combat it.

He’s done much the SAME with guns and that has been even more problematic with a majority of Americans.

Yes, major urban areas are awash with gun violence and all the gun bans in places like New York City, Chicago, Baltimore and D.C. just don’t seem to work.

When he was Mayor, Mike Bloomberg blamed that on “the too easy access to guns in places like Virginia.”

The real problem is that America is suffering from a “gang problem,” that it insists on mislabeling a “gun problem.”

Mike Bloomberg’s latest idea sort of addresses that issue in a direct and very politically incorrect way.

“While speaking at an overwhelmingly wealthy, white audience at the Aspen Institute, former New York City mayor and leading gun control advocate Michael Bloomberg expressed his desire to see young minorities stripped of their gun rights. The Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Everytown USA funder reportedly believes male minorities between the ages of 15 and 25 are responsible for most murders. That’s why, he argued, cities need to take guns away from that group.

“These kids think they’re going to get killed anyway because all their friends are getting killed,” the Aspen Times reported Bloomberg said to the audience. “They just don’t have any long-term focus or anything.”

(http://freebeacon.com/politics/bloomberg-wants-to-strip-young-minorities-of-gun-rights/)

There are a number of very serious flaws with that proposed “solution,” the first being that we generally DO NOT pass laws that target ONLY one group of people for specific treatment, no matter how practical such a law might be.

For another, guns are quite simply just too easy to make! The HBO program Vice did an excellent report on “Backyard gun shops” that operate in the Philippines (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67PYuGQM9Fg)

Guns, like drugs and alcohol will thrive so long as there is a demand for them. So long as the demand exists, there are people who’ll take the risks in order to respond to that demand for a profit. It’s an ineluctable part of human nature.

BUT at least Mike Bloomberg is looking at the root cause of gun violence. Yes, black males (appx. 6% of the population) have committed at least 50% of the murders nationwide since 1976. Much of that is fueled by gang activity. (http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-2011/tables/table-43)

Mike Bloomberg becomes, to my knowledge, the first “left-of-Center” political figure to acknowledge that America’s root problem is a “GANG problem” and NOT a “GUN problem.”

Even though this idea looks doomed to abject failure, hopefully it may get more people looking honestly at the reality of violence in America.