Gail Collins: Bret, you and I live in a state with some of the harshest gun laws in the country. But that didn’t stop a teenager with a history of intimidation from getting his hands on a semi-automatic rifle and killing 10 people at a supermarket in Buffalo’s Black neighborhood on Saturday.
Bret Stephens: It is sick. And part of the grotesque stereotype: the racist massacre in Charleston in 2015, the anti-Hispanic massacre in Pittsburgh in 2018, the anti-Hispanic massacre in El Paso in 2019. and many other cases. There is a bloody crossroads where easy access to weapons and increasingly popular conspiracy theories meet.
I’m fading from faith that calls for more conventional gun control can be beneficial in a country with more than 300 million guns in private hands. Please tell me I’m wrong.
Gail: Sane gun control won’t solve the problem, but it will help turn things around – criminals and people with mental illness will have a harder time using weapons. And the fact that we could enact restrictions on gun purchases would be a sign that attitudes across the nation are becoming healthier.
Bret: Wish I could share your optimism, but I think meaningful gun control in the United States is the ultimate Sisyphean mission. Gun control at the state level doesn’t work because guns can move easily across state lines. Gun control at the federal level doesn’t work because the votes in Congress will never be. Personally, I support repeal of the Second Amendment, but politically it’s another no-brainer. And the very Republicans who oppose gun control are also flashing, if not espousing, the Sin Substitute conspiracy theory – the idea that liberals/Jewish/deep state are plot to replace whites with non-white immigrants – apparently motivated the defendant to shoot in Buffalo.
Bottom line: I am heartbroken for the victims of this massacre. And I grieve for a country that seems increasingly powerless to tackle this problem. And that’s just one item in our accumulating inventory of crippling problems.
Gail: You know, we thought the country was going to be obsessed with nothing but inflation this election year. But instead, it’s about social issues that are as hot as guns, and of course we’ve spent the past few weeks reacting to the Supreme Court’s upcoming abortion decision, which probably won’t really be. released for several weeks.
Bret Stephens: And it’s possible the ending isn’t what we were expecting by the leaked draft of Justice Alito’s opinion piece. I’m still holding on to hope – hope is fading, because I fear that leaking the decision will make conservative judges, including Judge Gorsuch and Chief Justice Roberts less open to finding a judge. decided to compromise not to overthrow Roe.
Gail: Maybe things will get more intense when it’s announced? And will you take in what we’ve seen so far?
Bret Stephens: Much more intense and mostly for the reasons you presented your awesome column last week: The right to abortion is not just the right to have an abortion. They are also concerned with sex and all that comes with it: pleasure, autonomy, repression, men’s responsibility for the children they father, and the big questions of “who” decision” of modern democracy. The judges will have to protest more protests outside their homes.
Will Democrats face a midterm wipeout?
What do you think? And is there any chance of drafting an abortion rights bill that could get more than 50 votes in the Senate?
Gail: Well, maybe if everyone tried to come up with something that might get some Republicans to say they’re as pro-abortion-rights as Susan Collins. Many Democrats don’t want to devalue their bill and really don’t have much point to put in the effort because they’ll immediately get entangled in the dreaded trash rule.
Bret: It doesn’t help if Democrats come up with a bill that the majority can support, instead of a bill with no chance of winning because it’s far ahead of Roe v. Wade by banning almost all restrictions on abortion?
Gail: Given the harsh realities of Senate life – 60 votes, Joe Manchin, etc. – I can see why Chuck Schumer has given up pretty much every fight to change anything on that front and just focus into drawing attention to the whole abortion issue in this year’s election.
Bret: Shortsighted. Democrats need to secure their moderate force, which includes many voters who want to defend abortion rights but have moral reservations about late abortion. It just makes the party appear to be seeing its most progressive, least pragmatic wing, which is at the heart of Democratic Party politics.
Gail: Now, whatever happens won’t directly affect people living in states like New York. But when I look at the states that have already passed abortion bans before the court ruling, I worry this won’t be the end of the story – that the legislatures could also go further to ban less. at least some type of contraceptive.
Am I being overly paranoid?
Bret: It’s hard for me to imagine that happening, unless Republicans also intend to repeal the 19th Amendment to keep women from throwing them out of political office. Even most conservative women in America today probably don’t want to go back to the fingertip birth control method.
Can I go back to what we talked about earlier? How do you feel about the protests outside the judges’ homes?
Gail: Pretty much in all the details. Supreme Court members have lifetime appointments, and they are not bound by the usual constraints for public officials to run for re-election or those who work for an executive to be re-elected. nominate.
So I support everyone’s right to make their feelings public in the very few ways that they are available. As long as the protesters are restrained, of course, and the judges and their families are provided with very good security.
Friend?
Bret: It seems like a really bad idea for a lot of reasons.
If the protesters’ hope is to get the judges to change their votes by making their home lives uncomfortable, it could be the opposite: People often don’t react. good with what they perceive as harassment. Those homes are also occupied by spouses and children, who should be entitled to be private people. It’s also a pretty obvious temptation to some fanatics who might think he can “save Roe” through an act of violence. And, of course, the two can play the game: What happens when the fearsome far-right groups decide to hold protests outside the home of Justices Kagan and Sotomayor and soon-to-be Justice Jackson?
Gail: Well, I guess we’ll have this fight again. In the meantime, let me move on to something even more, um, divisive.
Baby powdered milk!
Bret: I wish I could joke about it, but it’s a really unhappy story.
Gail: A factory making brands like Similac was closed after concerns about possible contamination. Things will eventually return to normal, at least I hope so, but in the meantime supply has dropped by about half.
A lot to consider how this happened. But there’s a reminder that parents must depend on four companies to supply nearly all of the nation’s formula supply. This would then remind us of the virtue of the antitrust actions that have disrupted large corporations.
Bret: One lesson here is that when the FDA decides to call for a “voluntary recall” of something as important as infant formula, as it did in February, it’s better to be certain of the reason for the recall. themselves and think through the full range of potential consequences for the public. Health. Another lesson is that when our regulations are so strict that we don’t allow European-made formulas to be sold here for commercial purposes, something is seriously wrong. with those regulations.
Gail: I will join you in learning about imports from Europe, after noting that imports from Canada have been restricted by the Trump administration.
Bret: We’ll be ticking that off to an ever-expanding list of things we hate about Trump.
Gail: However, recalling formula contaminated with bacteria – some fatal – to infants doesn’t seem all that radical to me.
Bret: I agree, of course, but it’s not clear where the bacteria come from from the plant in question and there must be a way to solve the problem without creating a bigger problem.
I think the broader point is that our zero-tolerance approach to many types of risks – whether it’s the potential for formula contamination or school closures due to the Covid response – is sometimes the way to go. closest to risk. How is it that the most advanced capitalist country in the world is incapable of weighing risk? Is it the ever fear of lawsuits or something else?
Gail: Part of the problem is a general – and bipartisan – desire to limit imports of things American companies make.
Bret: Do I perceive your openness to the US-EU free trade agreement? That would solve a lot of problems in our supply chain and upset protectionists on both sides.
Gail: Yes, but the last thing we have to do is respond to an event like a recipe shortage by saying, “Oh my, no more federal oversight of imports!” Really, there are dangerous things out there and we need to be protected from it.
Bret: Of course.
Gail: Let’s move on to the upcoming election. Really hooked by the Pennsylvania Senate primaries. Especially on the Republican side, where we are seeing a sharp rise from Kathy Barnette, a black activist, very conservative to reactionary. Other leaders remain Trump’s favorites, Mehmet Oz, and David McCormick, the former head of the world’s largest hedge fund.
Bret: Nice to see a real competitive race.
Gail: Barnette is doing well despite – or maybe because of – her record of anti-Muslim rhetoric.
A pretty horrible trio in my light, but do you love it?
Bret: I support the least insane candidate on the ballot.
Gail: Excellent standards.
Bret: The problem the GOP has had for a while is that in many states and counties, not to mention running for president, the candidate most likely to win the primaries is less likely to win a general election. . The Republican primaries are like holding an air metal guitar heavyweight contest for a spot in a jazz ensemble, if that makes any sense.
Gail: Yes, that particular music contest sounds appealing though.
Bret: Question for you, Gail: Do you really think President Biden will run for re-election? Really, honestly? And can you see Kamala Harris as his successor?
Gail: Well, I’m of the school that says Biden shouldn’t announce he’s not running and embrace lame duckism too soon. But lately, I’ve been wondering if he’s really going to try to move on through another term.
That would be a bad thing. Time issues aside, the country has passed the point where all people want in a CEO is someone who isn’t crazy to cool things down.
Bret: If Biden decides to run, he will lose to anyone not named Trump. Then again, if he decides to run, he will also lure Trump into seeking the Republican nomination.
Gail: If Kamala Harris runs, we’ll have to… see what the options are.
Bret: I always thought Harris would be a great secretary-general of the United Nations. When will that job reopen?
