The mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg, actually suggested during a CNN interview on Monday that police officers should abandon their duties and go on strike, nationwide, until gun control laws are passed:
???I don???t understand why the police officers across this country don???t stand up, collectively, and say: ???We???re gonna go on strike. We???re not gonna protect you unless you, the public, through your legislature, do what???s required to keep us safe.??? After all, police officers want to go home to their families, and we???re doing everything we can to make their job more difficult ??? and more importantly, more dangerous ??? by leaving guns in the hands of people who shouldn???t have them, and letting people who have those guns, and letting people who have those guns buy things like armor-piercing bullets,??? Bloomberg complained.
So it???s either submission to Bloomberg???s agenda, or national anarchy? One of the many reasons I find the arguments of gun-control zealots unpersuasive is that they slip so easily into lunacy, idiocy, and hypocrisy. Rest assured that Mayor Bloomberg???s personal security detail would not be joining that massive police strike. How many innocent people would be killed if every cop in the country walked off the beat?
Bloomberg???s comments represent the apex of the mini-boomlet in gun-control mania following the ???Dark Knight Rises??? shooting in Colorado. As it happens, another somewhat superhero-related shooting took place the following night, in which a ???wild shootout??? erupted at a basketball court in the Bronx ??? which is, curiously enough, located in the gun-free utopia of Mayor Bloomberg???s jurisdiction.
According to an eyewitness quoted by the New York Daily News, ???mothers began searching the courts for their children when the guns finally silenced.??? A 14-year-old boy was shot in the head, and later died at the hospital. The shooter reportedly goes by the nickname ???Spidey.??? Perhaps Mayor Bloomberg should pay a little more attention to his actual duties, and spend less time micro-managing his constituents??? soft drinks, or telling the legislatures of other states how they should address crime by leveling more sanctions against law-abiding citizens.
???Can we at least get through the initial grief and tragedy for these families before we start making them political pawns???? New Jersey Governor Chris Christie asked, in remarks widely viewed as thinly-veiled criticism of Bloomberg???s gun-control grandstanding. Christie pronounced himself ???a little bit disturbed by the politicians who in the immediate aftermath of this type of tragedy try to grandstand on it, and I???m not going to be one of those people.??? It???s a pity more politicians didn???t follow his example.
