And after a crazed lunatic walked into one of the company’s stores in El Paso, Texas, earlier this month on a shooting rampage, it’s time for the retail giant to virtue signal by voicing support for non-sensical new “gun control” legislation that wouldn’t have prevented the attack and won’t prevent the next one.
As CNN Business reports:
Walmart CEO Doug McMillon said Thursday the company supports strengthening some gun measures in the United States after more than 20 people were killed in an attack on a Walmart in El Paso, Texas.
Although McMillon stopped short of endorsing a specific bill or plan, he said Walmart is encouraged that consensus is building for "common sense" legislation to prevent mass shootings.
There’s that Left-wing gun control talking point and buzz phrase again: “Common sense” legislation.
“We're encouraged that broad support is emerging to strengthen background checks and to remove weapons from those who have been determined to pose an imminent danger," McMillon said in a statement last week. "We believe the reauthorization of the Assault Weapons ban should be debated to determine its effectiveness in keeping weapons made for war out of the hands of mass murderers.”
One source even claims you can’t buy a gun over Walmart Wi-Fi.
McMillon said that while his company sells about 2 percent of all U.S.-purchased firearms, Walmart isn’t in the top three in the country. He did say that Walmart sells about 20 percent of all ammunition, however.
As for the “assault weapons” ban, it’s already been ‘debated.’ And studied. The 1994 ban of military-style look-alike rifles did not reduce gun violence. It had no appreciable effect on gun crime. And yet, here we are again — ‘debating’ a failed policy when we should be looking at other societal factors that are leading mostly young men to throw away their lives to engage in a mass shooting. (Related: 2016 Study claiming U.S. ranks at top of the world in mass shootings was based on junk science; America is actually below the global average.)
“The studies, data, and examination of the available evidence by scholars suggest that assault weapon bans or buybacks will have little if any effect on rates of violent crime and gun violence,” notes the Foundation for Economic Education in a post this week.
So many things kill — how come only guns are targeted for ‘control’?
Using available data from the FBI and other sources, FEE noted that homicides involving an ‘assault weapon’ actually amount to less than 0.17 percent of all homicides and 0.24 percent of all gun-related killings:
To further illuminate the relative infrequency of mass shootings with “assault weapons,” consider the fact that in 2017, some 1,590 people were murdered using knives or sharp instruments.
But no matter. We have to do something — even if it’s really…nothing.
Virtue signaling has become more important in policymaking than actually adopting policies and laws that work. Saying you ‘care’ is all that matters. Showing compassion, not a willingness to address fundamental issues of mental illness and societal sickness, is easier so that’s what we’re going to do.
Even if, in the end, not a single mass shooting is thwarted.
Over the past five years, FEE notes further, 261 people were murdered with military-style semi-automatic rifles, or about 52, on average, per year. That many people are killed per month in places like Chicago, and with handguns — in a city that tightly regulates handguns (and bans so-called “assault” rifles).
Knives are also used a lot to kill but we’re not talking about banning “assault knives.” Yet.
How about vehicles? Motor vehicle deaths have been rising and they topped 40,000 again in 2017; no discussion about banning cars and trucks, though.
Walmart is a private business and can do what it wants. But if you’re like most Americans, you’re sick of the virtue signaling and hungry for some real policymaking that will actually have a positive effect regarding firearm deaths.
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