We shouldn't let the year end without recalling the voice of Rep. Jim Renacci, Wadsworth, Oh., Republican, who found a way to join gun control, which he opposes, with 9/11. Although the logic leaps, it at least shows you the evasive ways of the pro-gun politicians who object to the calls for even modest controls following the Newtown tragedy while pretending to be responsibly thoughtful about the issue.
In a statement reported by the Beacon Journal, Renacci argued that although 9/11 was carried out by religious extremists, there was no outcry to "erase our First Amendment right to free exercise of religion". Funny that no one thought about it that way at the time.
You can see where this is going.
The same Constitutional standard, he says, should be applied to the Second Amendment. In other words, don't tinker with the right to bear arms. Rather, he opines, the nation's collective mental health should be the No. 1 priority because the massacres of 9/11 and Newtown's kids were carried out by "madmen, not by our Founding Fathers or our Constitution."
The comparison was invidious, but we're getting used to such high-minded obscurities by the Renaccis on Capitol Hill.
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3 comments:
The first Iesson I learned in Philosophy 101 was to beware of specious analogies. Mr. Renacci managed in one breath to recite two of them on the same subject. Such breath-taking illogic is the coin of politicians bent on defending indefensible premises. The trouble is, this kind of cockeyed rhetoric makes it hard to carry on a rational debate.
He had not yet memorized the script. He'll get better at it with time.
Don't count on it. Not much you can do with another GOP Norquist hack.
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