Gunfight at the Second Amendment Corral

Like it or not the Second Amendment exists and the Supreme Court has ruled that its language guarantees an individual right to bear arms.  Like it or  not , the best estimates are that 40% of US households have guns and there are perhaps 270 million guns privately owned in the country.  Like it or not, guns are not going away and even if the Supreme Court were to reverse itself and declare there is no individual right to bear arms, all the existing guns are not going away.  Like it or not, banning guns in a mass way will produce a firearms bootleg problem that will make alcohol smuggling during Prohibition look like child’s play.  Like it or not, for much of the country, guns are rooted in political culture of the United States–it’s God, guns, and the Constitution.
So what do we do after the Las Vegas killings?  There are no simple solutions even though there are the usual recitation of simple slogans that are more about political posturing in the next election than they are about real policy solutions.  We already are hearing talk from one side that we  need more gun control, with predictable opposition from the other side.  One side will say “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people” or the way to “stop a bad guy with a gun is with a good guy with a gun.”  The other side will embrace universal background checks to screen out criminals or those with mental illnesses, or will, as is now the solution de jour, a ban on bump stops for guns as a remedy.
The gun debate is complicated for two major reasons: the politics and the multifaceted nature of the problems surrounding the causes of gun violence.  The politics is about how the debate has been constitutionalized around the Second Amendment and weaving of guns within parts of the US into the very fabric of cultural identity.  Urbanites, northerners, and liberal-Democrats largely are clueless about this. Moreover, the gun debate has been defined by the NRA which has taken an absolutist position of the Second Amendment.  For many of its members, guns are the defining issue for them and they turn out to vote.  For the opposition, there is no equivalent.  The NRA has also captured the Republican Party, making guns, along with cutting taxes, the two defining issues for itself.  So long as the NRA and the Republican Party define their raison d’etat around guns, little will change in terms of the politics.
But even if the politics were to change, defining both what the problems with guns are and  what are the solutions is not easy.  Right now the media is hyperventilating over the NRA saying it could support a ban on bump stocks.  This is brilliant politics.  Banning the stocks will do little so long as assault weapons are available.  Gun manufactures no doubt love this proposal–instead of letting some people spend just a few dollars to modify a regular gun, make them spend more to buy a real assault weapon.  Moreover, the focus on bump stocks takes the political focus over other reforms, and the NRA looks outright reasonable in favoring the bump stock ban.  At best, a symbolic idea that solves nothing and which also plays well with some swing voters in 2018.
But what would actually work to curb gun violence?  This of course is complicated.  Part of the solution is understanding the underlying nature of the violence.  Yes, some of it is rooted simply in the availability of assault and other weapons and they do need regulation.  And regulation is constitutionally possible.  At no point has the Supreme Court said that reasonable regulation of some weapons is not possible.  Lower courts have upheld some regulations.  Not even in the case of the First Amendment has the Supreme Court said that free speech is absolute–time, manner, and place restrictions are possible, and not all utterances qualify as constitutionally protected speech.  There is nothing inconsistent in saying that possession of bazookas (which are arms) is unconstitutional, and the same is true for assault or automatic and semi-automatic weapons.  Such regulation might solve some problems but certainly not all.
Increased penalties for weapons use is not a solution.   There is little evidence, as I and others have show several times, that many people who commit crimes are rational actors deterred by the calculation of prison time.  Moreover, the experience and failure of mandatory minimum and three strikes laws demonstrates the futility of this approach.
The call for background checks, especially if instant and without some waiting periods, will solve only a small part of the problem, if at all. Do we screen for mental illness and past criminal behavior, for example?  When it comes to mental illness, are all who have a mental illness dangerous?   The American Psychology Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) lists hundreds of conditions that count as mental illness, with estimates that more than 42 million qualify.  To say that everyone with a mental illness is dangerous is a gross stereotype and demeaning.  Moreover, what is a mental illness?  Remember at one time the DSM listed being gay as a mental disorder.  Additionally, are all those with felony records dangerous, and what about the idea of people having paid their debt to society?  Finally, keep in mind that the Las Vegas shooter had no record of mental illness and no criminal record.  A background check would have done little to deter him.
Finally, what do we do about all the guns that are used in cases of domestic abuse, suicide,  crime, and street fights?  Yes guns make such killings and violence easier, but the underlying roots are located in alcohol and substance abuse, in problems surrounding poverty, or in cultural values about manhood, masculinity, and honor.    Decreasing the supply of guns will help, but there are underlying  socio-cultural problems at play. One hypothesis worth testing is the connection between areas that have high levels of alcohol dependency or poverty and gun violence. There may be other  correlations, but more research is needed and the NRA and the politics of guns has prevented that.
The point that is being made here is that the problems of guns are complex. The politics of guns makes solving the problem of guns impossible.  The problem of guns is in part availability of  some types of weapons and where, but it also about regulation of human behavior.  Guns do kill people, but people also kill people, and any viable solutions must disaggregate the variety of problems surrounding gun violence into viable policies that have identified problems and solutions.

Why Orlando Will Not Change the Politics on Gun Control (Okay, Maybe a slight chance)

After Representative Giffords was shot they said it would change the politics on gun control in

America.  The same was said after Aurora, Colorado.  Sandy Hook.  Charleston.  And Waco. It’s too unlikely that Orlando will change the politics on gun regulation.  The reason is simple:   The political forces and incentives to change the laws just do not exist as a result of the political geography in the United States.
This year I have already given several dozen talks on the 2016 elections, seeking to make sense of the politics this year.  To do that I have drawn a contrast, examining how American politics  has changed since 1976 compared to today.  My discussion begins with drawing a bell curve.  The curve  represents the distribution of American public opinion in 1976. If one were to look at a series of survey s or polls we would find that the vast majority of public opinion converged toward the center.  Yes there were some far right and left voters, but a large percentage of the public shared a powerful consensus on a range of social, economic, and foreign policy issues.
With the majority of the public sharing similar views, it also made sense for the Republican  and Democratic Parties to nominate centrist candidates.  After all, that it were most voters were and if you want to win nominate candidate centrist candidates.  In many ways, in 1976, Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford were good examples of that; two candidates who ideologically were not that far apart.
Additionally, we know back in 1976 that both the Democrat and Republican Parties were more coalitional and less ideological than today.  There were liberal Republicans in NY and New England and conservative Democrats in the South.  The two major parties had liberal, moderates, and conservatives among their ranks.  Such ideological diversity made bipartisanship possible and in 1976 the percentage of straight party-line votes was quite small compared to today.  Additionally, in 1976 political scientists estimated that about one-third of the 435 US House of Representative  seats came from swing districts–those where either a Democrat or a Republican could be elected.  It was these swing districts too which helped drive bipartisanship.  Representatives there had an incentive to work across the aisle–become too partisan on one side and you would lose an election to someone on the other side.
But 40 years later politics has changed.  Today the state of public opinion looks more like a camel’s back–a double  hump curve.  The percentage of voters describing themselves as moderate has decreased and the percentage saying they a liberal or conservative has increased (although those who say they are very conservative has increased far more than those who say extremely liberal).   This means that the center of the Republican and Democratic parties is moving apart from one another and that within each party candidates who wish to win their nomination must increasingly appeal to where their shifting bases have moved.
Why the electorate has bifuricated and sorted itself out in such a way that partisanship and ideology overlap is a product of many factors.  These include the embracing of civil rights by the Democrats, social issues such as abortion and LGBT rights, generational shifts, and economics. All this has contributed to a sorting.  But another sorting is occurring–geography.
At the same time that America has become more conservative and liberal it has also become more segregated many ways, including politically.  We now politically sort ourselves out with Democrats choosing to live in the cities and inner-ring suburbs, Republicans in outer-ring suburbs and rural areas.  The Red and Blue states the media describes really are red and blue cities, regions, even streets and blocks.  We wish to live near others who share our political views and avoid those with whom we disagree.
We have created overwhelming Republican and Democratic areas.  Nationally now the best estimates are that barely 20-25 House seats are swing.  Instead 95% are securely one party.  Candidates from these safe seats have no incentive to compromise politically and if they do they will get primaried from the right if a Republican or from the left if a Democrat.  Geography reinforces  and exacerbates partisanship and extremism.
The result is that now there are fewer bipartisan bills and a greater percentage of straight party-line votes than in 1976.  Evidence suggests that the most conservative Democrat now is still more liberal than the most liberal Republican.  Fewer swing districts and more safe seats mean polarization.
One result is that there is a cluster of core issues over which there is manor disagreement.  One example is guns.  There are some regions of the US where there is strong support for gun control and some where there is not.  These are areas where guns are and are not part of its culture.  Representatives from the gun regions in so many ways are actually representing their constituents  interests in the same way were those from the non-gun regions represent their voters.
Simply put, representatives in areas such as the south or rural areas have little political incentive to support gun control.   If they do they face political reprisals from within their party.  On  top of that, the NRA supports these candidates, occupying a powerful interest group role to reinforcing Republican, rural, and outer ring-suburban opposition to gun control.
Those who favor gun control include urban dwellers, people of color, women, and Democrats.  They do not live in the Republican areas or at least in sufficient numbers to matter politically, or they do not vote sufficiently Republican to move Republican voters.
Now consider Orlando.  It is perhaps an issue about LGBT phobia and how someone targeted  a gay night club.  This issue might move some but think about it–how many in the LGBT community  are voting Republican, identify Republican, or even live in Republican areas in sufficient numbers to move Republican Congressional members?  To be blunt: LGBT issues are not the kind that receive support from the Republican community and casting Orlando as such will not change the political debate or vote .  In addition, because the killer was Muslim it implicates another set of wedge issues, terrorism and Islamaphobia, there too is little indication that it will alter the political debate and forces within many pro-gun districts to support ne gun regulations.
Overall, the simple point here is that there is little chance that Orlando will change the debate and politics on gun control.  The one slight chance is that if the LGBT community can unite with other gun regulation forces, creating a powerful bloc of voters to challenge the NRA.  But even them it will require this new bloc to leverage political power in areas where there is little support for LGBT issues and a lot for guns.  Until and unless this happens, do not look to Orlando to change the politics of gun control.

The Second Amendment is not a Bar to Reasonable Gun Regulation (The American people are the problem)

Yet again another mass murder in the US and yet again another round of calls for gun control

regulation followed by yet again claims that the Second Amendment bars any legislative action. This has led some to call for a constitutional amendment repealing or modifying the Second Amendment.  The reality is that there is no need to amend the Constitution.  Congress and the states have sufficient constitutional power to act if they want.  The issue is not the Constitution, or even the NRA.  Instead it is political will and resolve...among the American people.
Some thought the debate and public opinion on guns would have changed after 20 young children and six adults were slaughtered at Sandy Hook Elementary School.  A few states acted but little changed. The NRA in typical fashion said the solution was more guns.  Now a terrorist attack in San Bernardino kills 14 and the NRA is in the position of defending policies that make it easy for terrorists to get assault rifles.  The ludicrousness of their positions should be enough to discredit them and their lobbying power. But it will not be.
The NRA has argued that the solution to gun violence is to prevent the mentally ill from getting guns.  This assumes all mentally ill people are violent and those who are sane are not.  Our prisons are full of lots of people who use guns and commit  crimes and the law has deemed them sane.  There are millions of people in America will mental illness problems and few are violent. But even is preventing the mentally ill from obtaining guns were the solution, without universal background checks that policy is impossible to enforce.  But this fact does not really matter.
Claiming that everyone should be armed and that we can defend ourselves is false.  It reeks of images of the shootout at the OK Corral or it assumes abilities to respond that few people have.  Go talk to the police or those in the military about how much training it takes to use a gun.  And think about also how much criticism there is even now regarding police use of deadly force and it should be obvious that more guns are not going to make us safer.  But this fact does not really matter.
It would perhaps be easier to refute the NRA’s claims but it bullied Congress yet again in July 2015 into preventing the Center for Disease Control from researching gun violence.  But there is research from outside the US that examines gun violence that challenges claims that guns make us safer.  But the facts from this research do not really matter.
And of course the NRA can bring out its biggest weapon–invoking the Second Amendment. Advocates of gun control can whine to their hearts content about the Second Amendment but the reality is that it exists.  Moreover, while many might argue the Supreme Court was wrong in its 2008 D.C. v. Heller opinion where a majority ruled that the Amendment protected an individual right to bear arms, the reality is that this is what the Court said.  But it is also important to recognize something else about that opinion–the Court did not rule that all gun regulations are unconstitutional.  As the Court declared:

Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited. From Blackstone through the 19th-century cases, commentators and courts routinely explained that the right was not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose.

Even in Heller the Court recognized that limits on who could own a gun, where and when, and the types of guns permitted could all be enforced.  Case law before and after Heller have upheld bans on guns in schools, religious institutions, and public buildings.  Regulations banning specific types of guns are permitted, and rules governing sales have too been upheld.  Probably the only law that would not be constitutional would be a flat ban on personal possession of a gun for personal safety in the home.  Beyond that, most regulations are constitutional.  Otherwise, no one has a constitutional right to own an atomic bomb.
The point is that the Second Amendment is not a legal bar to gun regulation.  The problem is political will.  There is simply not enough political will in this country to act.   Calling for a constitutional amendment is foolish.  If there was enough political will to pass a constitutional amendment there would be enough political will to enact meaningful legislation to control gun violence.
Whatever the facts are about guns, they really do not matter.  Facts are not issue here.  It is even more than the pure lobbying power and intimidation of the NRA that is at issue.  Yes they hide behind the Second Amendment and cowboy myths of American rugged individualism to prevent the regulation of guns.  They use fear of crime, political imagery, and the power of money, lobbying, and influence to prevent politicians from acting. But the NRA has millions of members.  The NRA and its supports are geniuses–they have figured out how to mobilize divided public opinion, gerrymandered safe political districts, and other tools of influence to prevent meaningful gun regulation.  Our gun policies are a symptom of a grid locked political system and public opinion which is simply divided.  Until such time as the public is act all the facts in the world will not matter.

Safety in Schools, Embassies, and Prisons: What do we know what works

Safety is on our minds as we receive two reports this week.  The first is the NRA long-awaited press conference on how to promote school safety in light of the Newtown shooting, while the other is the final report regarding the attack at Benghazi.  But what actually works in terms of promoting safety?  We have some good information that addresses question.

School Safety and the NRA
Not surprise the NRA found that the problem regarding school safety was anything but guns.  It was video games, mental illness, and perhaps who knows, gun-chewing.   But it certainly was not that there were guns in school that caused the problem.  Their proposal  was for at least one armed guard to be located in every school in the United States.  First, let’s think about the cost issue.

According to the Financial Times, there are approximately 140,000 schools and colleges in the United States.   The average salary for a police officer in the U.S. is $51,000.  Assume one armed guard per school at a cost of approximately $51,000 per guard.    Now no school is going to hire only one guard.  One has to factor in vacations, sick time, before and after school events. Additionally, most schools may need more than one guard since many have more than one building or you need more than one guard for a very large building.  Plus also assume logistics or support services for the guard. 

Let us assume a minimum of about three guards per school.  Thus, $150,000 per year per school is an approximate.  Now multiply this by 140,000 and the total bill for the NRA idea is $21 billion dollars per year.   I am sure with Fiscal Cliffs and tight budgets, coming up with an additional $21 billion per year will be a snap for the federal, state, and local governments.

Hiring an additional 280,000 to 420,000 guards is more than the 100,000 Clinton cops hired in the 1990s. Keep in mind that there are currently 800,000 individuals already working in law enforcement.  We are talking about nearly increasing by 50% the number of gun carrying law enforcement officials in the country.  Yes gun carrying, and that is the beauty of the NRA proposal–more guns.  Think of how many more guns that will need to be sold to supply all these armed guards.  This is an amazing boom to the gun industry.

Of course, it will not just be handguns sold to these guards.  No armed guard with a side piece will be able to take on someone with semi-automatic guns.  They too will need these kind of toys.  Additionally, image the shootout in schools between guards and killers.  It will look like the O.K. Corral.  Even more, assume someone enters a school to kill, the guards still may not be able to respond in an instant.  There is no guarantee that they will be able to intervene immediately.  On top of which, school shooters may target them first in schools, thus escalating the violence.  Finally, believe it or not, schools are actually safer now than 30 years ago.  Schools are not safer now because of more guns.  Other factors such as screening out weapons, less violence in society in general, and other factors are making schools more safe. Spending all this money on more guards and guns makes little sense when perhaps lost costly alternatives exist.

What amazes me is the transparency of the NRA position.  It is not about a principled position for the Second Amendment or advocacy for the rights of individuals.  It is shilling for the gun industry.  The NRA has to be the only special interest group that I know that is captured by a special interest.

But beyond the fact that the NRA proposal is pricy, it is simply a dumb idea.  What made me think about how dumb it was, was to contrast security in schools, prisons, and embassies.  I have been in all three institutions.  I have toured prisons for research and taught undergraduate criminal justice for nearly a decade.  I have been in several US embassies around the world on assignment for the State Department.  I have taught in or attended many schools.

Embassy and Prison Safety
First, do we really want to turn schools and embassies into prisons?  Prisons are expense to maintain, costing more per capita to incarcerate an inmate than we presently spend to educate students, at least at t he K-12 level.  Second, few people realize that guards in prisons do not carry guns.  The absolutely last thing you want a guard to do is carry a gun.  There is no way armed guards could ever subdue a mob of prisoners.  You would literally need such a high ratio of guards to prisoners that the current prison costs would fly through the roof.  Prisons maintain security by keeping guns out, not bring them in.  Perhaps we should learn from that.

Second, in a post-9/11 world the State Department has moved to redesign embassies to be more secure.  They are more prison-like, but their size and populations compared to schools is very small.  They are easier to defend but even then, there is no way we can protect them against a massive mob or attack unless we have a massive military presence at them.  Again, an impossibility. Security for our embassies is provided by good diplomatic relations, cooperation with a host country, and ultimately, we close facilities if we do not believe them to be safe.  Moreover,  Congress, in its infinite wisdom last year. Dramatically cut back on the State Department budget for security.  If Congress was unwilling to spend a few hundred million for embassy security, what makes the NRA think that Congress will come up with $21 billion for schools.

What is my point?  We have a lot of research on how to promote safety and security and the answer is not more guns.  Even on the streets we know that it is impossible to place an armed police officer on every street and that the reality is that this tactic does not prevent domestic in the home or other crimes that take place off the streets.  Additionally, we know that a gun in the house is far more likely to be used against another member of the household than an intruder.  We can cite more facts, but the reality is that more guns is hardly the solution to safety in most situations.

The NRA position is thus either a fantasy that the world is safer with the threat of shootouts or it is merely a shield for the gun industry. But it is not a viable plan for security.  The NRA solution to everything is more guns.  This is just like some arguing that tax cuts are the cure for everything.  Tax cuts to help when the economy is doing well, or badly.  One idea cannot be the same answer to every problem and the same is true with guns.  There are no one size fits all answers.


Quick Thoughts on the Fiscal Cliff
    When it came to Congress and the president acting to solve the fiscal cliff issue, I was always an optimist and pessimist.  Optimistic that an agreement would occur, a pessimist in thinking the deal would be lousy or simply be no more than kicking the problem down the road.  I may be half right.  The deals being discussed was bad.  It would hurt the poor and damage America’s long term  investments.  It would still damage job production at a time when unemployment is high.  The possible deal was bad and deserved to die.