Guns; As American As Apple Pie

In Switzerland, I saw Lying on the ground heavy machine guns, light machine guns, anti-tank weapons. I asked a Swiss citizen if a Swiss had ever killed people with a machine gun. He replied in perfect English: “Of course not. This is not America.”

[Policing Wall Street]

Contrary to the position expressed in an editorial of this very newspaper yesterday, I personally don’t oppose the right to bear arms.

Many people believe the Second Amendment to the Constitution gives individuals the right to bear arms. 

Many prominent Americans own guns.

Many editorials in The New York Times support the limiting of the sale of assault rifles and handguns.  This is self-serving.  Arthur Sulzberger Jr. has a pistol permit to carry a handgun.  Yet, Sulzberger has not had someone attempt to put a murder contract out on him as far as I know.

Senator Charles Schumer has a pistol permit to carry a handgun.  Yet no one has attempted to put a murder contract out on the senator as a far as I know.

Yet, unlike both Sulzberger and Schumer, I have had a prominent Wall Street financier, a member of the Board of the American Stock Exchange, approach a karate instructor and promise him several inducements, cash, a specialist unit, a promise to make him a member of the Board, and so forth, in return for murdering me.

I have also been threatened with death by a “headshot” by a member of the AMEX who was a front man for the Italian Mafia. My only response to the death threat was to tell the Mafia front man that from then on I would wear a baseball cap- so that his friends did not shoot the wrong individual.

It must be here noted that the Federal Bureau of Investigation picked up the Mafia front man and threatened to arrest him if he should threaten me again.  That FBI intervention occurred before Mary Jo White, former United States Attorney, dropped her investigation into money laundering and drug smuggling by members of the Board of the American Stock Exchange.  I reported the death threat to the New York City Police Department, which did not even investigate the incident.

I have also had a steroid and cocaine abusing member of the American Stock Exchange, a weightlifter, tell me that he would get me “when you’re alone.”  I replied:  “I am alone and I’m really scared.”  The incident occurred on Greenwich Street when no one was around- to assist this individual, who outweighed me by perhaps 70 pounds.

I have also been threatened by a member of the American Stock Exchange, who did own a pistol, and who stated to me that he would shoot me.  (No, I knew that he would not and I did not even bother to report him.)

And perhaps most appalling, I have written about the murders of Al Chalem and Maier Lehmann by the Russian Mob and I am currently investigating the cover up of their murders. 

Why do I bring all this up?

I do not have a permit to carry a weapon.  Nor have I applied for a pistol permit to carry a handgun.  Nor would I apply for a pistol permit.  Nor do I have a gun in my friend’s apartment.

Handguns have one purpose and one purpose only; to kill a man or woman; and I do not believe that someone would be so stupid that they would attempt to kill me.
There are individuals, who need a gun.  But they never receive a pistol permit because they do not have political influence.  In a previous article I wrote about an employee on Wall Street who fired 14 shots from a pistol at potential assailant.  He did not have a pistol permit in New York City but had legally obtained his gun in Florida. 

He was later arrested in South Carolina for having an unregistered pistol.  No prison sentence for him- he was a white boy from Wall Street, whose father was a millionaire.

It is simply too easy to obtain a pistol permit for target practice- even in New York City.  Thus, we have deranged individuals committing mass murder with a pistol in an immigration center in Binghamton, New York and the mayhem at Virginia Tech; and in the 1980s, when I was a member of the AMEX, a deranged individual killed many children at a McDonald’s in California with an assault rifle.

We could examine the man who in 2006, armed with a 9 millimeter pistol, murdered children at an Amish school precisely because he knew that the school had no telephone and the Amish do not carry weapons.

Let us examine our British cousins and how they reacted when an individual used a 9 millimeter to kill children and teachers at a grammar school.  The country was appalled.  So a law was passed that no individual could own a pistol larger than 22 caliber.  The size of the magazine was also limited.

I am not against the right to bear arms.  After all, many people believe the Second Amendment guarantees the right of the people to bear arms.  The Second Amendment mentions a militia and a militia is not a standing army.  The framers of the Constitution did not look favorably upon a large standing army.
If someone wishes to carry a pistol or even for target shooting and they can obtain a permit, limit the caliber to 32 caliber and a clip of 6 rounds.  After all Wyatt Earp could tame Dodge City with a six-gun.  

If someone wishes to own an AK 47- let him or her have it.  But the magazine can only hold 6 shots- like the old Winchester repeating rifle that tamed the Wild West.  
But also have the NRA be responsible for affirming that the individual is properly qualified to use a gun; rifle or pistol.  I do not want somebody firing an AK 47 at a burglar in an apartment in New York City when only wallboard separates the next apartment.

Our American mass produced weaponry is finding its way into the hands of Mexican drug dealers so that they can kill Mexican policemen, who are attempting to limit the manufacture and sale of drugs.  

Under the guise of the Second Amendment, Americans clamor for the right to bear arms; even though the right to bear arms means that drug dealers can obtain high-powered weaponry.

In the 1970s I visited Switzerland.  I was at a train station in a small city.  Lying on the ground were heavy machine guns, light machine guns, anti-tank weapons.  I was amazed.  I asked a Swiss citizen about this incongruous sight.  He informed me that all Swiss citizens of a certain age were members of the Army and they were reporting for their summer duty.  The weaponry belonged to them.

When I asked him if a Swiss citizen had ever killed people with a machine gun, he replied in perfect English:  “Of course not. This is not America.”
So there seems to be some sanity in Switzerland.  Oh yes.  He informed me that it was almost impossible to be able to purchase and carry a pistol for protection in Switzerland.  

His reason:  That is why the Swiss have police.

In Switzerland there is a sense that all citizens must work together to ensure the survival of Switzerland. In America, and proof of this is in the rapacious financial debacle, Americans are more interested in obtaining rewards for themselves.

America always stresses the right of the individual; even when it becomes absurd as in the right to own assault rifles with large magazines. 
After all, what are these people hunting?  Herds of buffalo on the Great Plains?  Or children?

Black Star News columnist Manfredonia was once a Wall Street trader.

 

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