Be not afraid of any man
No matter what his size
When danger threatens call on me
And I will equalize.
– 19th century ad for Colt revolvers

The word “peacemaker” has two meanings: (1) Someone who calms hostility. (2) The Colt .45 Single Action Army revolver. Some people understand that we need both kinds of peacemaker if we hope to maintain peace in the world. But some people don’t understand.

Whom we choose as our role models says a lot about us. Here are two Americans. One is rich and famous. The other is poor and little known. Which one do you admire and hope to emulate?

Harvey Weinstein.
Weinstein, age 60, is an Academy Award-winning movie producer. He has produced movies of high quality – for example, “Shakespeare in Love” – and also movies that glorify violence, such as “Pulp Fiction” and “Sin City.” But what is relevant here are his recent comments about his plan to make a film, starring Meryl Streep, about the evils of guns in general, and the evils of the National Rifle Association in particular:

We’re going to take this issue head on, and they’re going to wish they weren’t alive after I’m done with them…

I never want to have a gun. I don’t think we need guns in this country, and I hate it, and I think the NRA is a disaster area…

[It will be] a big movie, like “Mr. Smith goes to Washington,” that will hurt stocks of gun manufacturers. It’s going to be like crash and burn.

I don’t dispute Weinstein’s right to make a movie pushing his political opinions. I do dispute his opinions, and the probable result – a movie filled with phony statistics and false accusations. I expect the movie to contain at least one statement that America is the most violent nation, a leftist fabrication that is so far from accurate that it can fairly be called a lie.

Of course, if you are a multi-millionaire and a major donor to President Obama, life can be quite pleasant:

● You can live in mansions and penthouses in the “best” parts of town.

● You can afford expensive alarm services.

● You can travel in limousines with drivers trained as bodyguards.

● You donate large amounts to politicians, so you can get a license to carry a concealed firearm, while “ordinary” people cannot.

● You can have not the slightest shred of empathy for those – often the poor and minorities – who must live and work in high-crime areas, and may need to defend themselves and their families.

● You can have no understanding that the need for self-defense arises suddenly and unexpectedly.

● You can have no comprehension that when the lives of yourself and your family are being threatened, there is no time to run out and obtain a weapon. The weapon must be obtained before the need becomes acute.

Yes, great wealth insulates a person from many of the unpleasant realities of life. But this is no excuse to lack empathy for those who must face the unpleasant realities daily. Lack of empathy for those less fortunate is a poor qualification for one who fancies himself a liberal and an artist.

Sarah McKinley.
McKinley, age 18, was home with her three-month-old son on New Year’s Eve, 2012. She lived in a rural community where police response times tended to be long. Her husband was not with her. He had died of cancer on Christmas Day.

She saw two men attempting to break in. She recognized one as a man who had been stalking her since her husband’s funeral. He was looking for drugs in the cancer victim’s home. She gave the baby his bottle, then retrieved a shotgun and a handgun and barricaded the door. She phoned 911 and asked what to do. She was told she could not shoot unless they came through the door. But the 911 dispatcher, who was a woman, added, “You do what you have to do to protect your baby.”

As Sarah McKinley put it:

I knew that I was going to have to choose him or my son, and it wasn’t going to be my son, so I did what I had to do. There’s nothing more dangerous than a mother with a child.

And as firearms instructor Clint Smith put it:

When seconds count, the cops are just minutes away.

Sarah was on the phone with 911 for 21 minutes, and the police still had not arrived when the men broke down the door. The first man, the stalker, came at her with a 12-inch hunting knife. She fired the shotgun, killing the man. His companion fled, quite possibly breaking the Olympic 100-meter record. He later turned himself in to police.

Predictably, most comments were favorable to the young woman. But they noted with sadness that in some states and most European nations, Sarah would be jailed for murder, and her infant son would be taken from her. But equally predictably, other comments were opposed. One commenter referred to “loving our enemies.” How this was relevant to Sarah’s life-and-death problem was unclear.

What critics of Sarah McKinley were really saying was, “My beliefs on gun control and self-defense trump your right to remain alive. You should be dead, and your baby should be an orphan − if he’s lucky.”

It is utterly inexplicable that people with such beliefs consider themselves “liberal,” “tolerant,” “pro-woman,” and “for the little guy.” Isn’t Sarah a woman? Isn’t a three-month-old a little guy?

Only after conservative media and websites carried this story did the mainstream media pick it up. There are literally thousands of instances in which an armed citizen prevents a criminal attack, but they rarely appear in the liberal media. On the contrary, the much rarer cases of accidental shootings are reported prominently. Selective reporting of the news is the worst form of bias, because it dupes others into sharing that bias.

Many liberals believe that if they disarm themselves, eventually fewer weapons will be available to criminals and terrorists. But if they truly believed that weapons make them less safe, they would post signs in front of their houses declaring, “There are no guns in this home.” But no one, not even the staunchest advocate of gun confiscation, ever posts such a sign. How revealing.

At some subconscious level, liberals recognize that if even a minority of homeowners are armed, criminals will be deterred from entering any homes while people are there. And figures bear this out. In America, only about 13 percent of burglaries are “hot” − that is, home invasions. But in Britain, where homeowners are disarmed, 59 percent of burglaries occur when people are at home. About 30 percent of victims of these “hot” burglaries are assaulted, or worse. Of course, if a burglary occurs when no one is home, no one is injured. This is not complex. Disarming homeowners endangers them.

Many liberals remain intellectual and emotional children, despite their receding hairlines and increasing waistlines. Advancing years detracted from their appearance, but added nothing to their wisdom. In their own minds, they remain helpless children. But real children depend on adults to protect them. Who will protect childish adults?

If these people detest guns, let them refrain from owning one − but not stop me from owning one. If they don’t approve of missile defenses, let them move to a nation that lacks them − but not stop me from protecting my loved ones and myself from apocalyptic, paranoid fanatics who are armed with missiles and nuclear weapons. Their right to hold infantile, unrealistic, pacifistic beliefs stops where my safety begins.

Instead of the learned fools, let us emulate 18-year-old Sarah McKinley. She has more wisdom and guts than all of them put together. She has more understanding of the responsibilities of citizenship than do many liberal politicians. And she has more understanding of the responsibilities of a human being than do many liberal clergy.

She is the prototypical American: self-reliant, responsible, independent, willing to listen to advice and ask for help − but ready if necessary to act on her own and defend those dependent on her.

But it’s your choice. You pick your own role model. You can choose Harvey Weinstein or Sarah McKinley. But if you don’t choose, choices will be made for you by bureaucrats who are utterly unconcerned with your wishes, your well-being, or even your life. Freedom requires effort. The road to servitude seems easier – it’s downhill all the way – but the destination is a lot less pleasant.

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