Our View: Debate ‘launched,’ or stifled?

Speaking of mindless violence and equally inchoate responses to it, we see that former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords has stepped to the forefront of a new anti-gun coalition calling itself Americans for Responsible Solutions. Of course, its idea of a “responsible solution” is a bevy of new federal laws, to be piled atop the current lode of statutes which apparently has proved ineffective. Is this counterintuitive or what?

In any event, Ms. Giffords, who nearly died at the hands of a deranged gun-wielding assailant two years ago, is the group’s primary spokesman. Writing in USA Today, she noted the coalition’s raison d’etre— that is, to “launch a national dialogue” on gun violence in America. We wonder if her very presence in such an effort might serve to stifle authentic debate on this complex topic, rather than encourage it.

As Charlie Hurt of The Washington Times wrote Tuesday, “No matter how right you are that banning guns or ammunition or creating massive new government lists will not fix the problem, most mannerly people don’t much want to disagree with a woman who just keeps pointing to the bullet wound on her head.”