Idiot of the Week: Wayne LaPierre

Declaring the National Rifle Association's absolutely predictable opposition to a proposed United Nations treaty regulating personal firearms, the NRA president informed the world body that "We reject the notion that American gun owners must accept any lesser amount of freedom in order to be accepted among the international community."

Well, call me un-American, but if you want to be part of a larger group, it's the larger group that gets to set the terms for membership. And now that I think about it, this isn't such an un-American idea at all. For in order to be part of the United States, the individual states had to accept a lesser amount of freedom as dictated by the Constitution. They could no longer coin or print their own money or make treaties with other countries. And to be readmitted into the Union after the Civil War, Southerners had to accept a lesser amount of freedom for themselves by renouncing their right to buy, own or sell human beings. So Mr. LaPierre's real problem is that someone other than his people are setting the terms, however vague, for membership in an international community.

For some reason LaPierre's tirade reminds me of Groucho Marx's famous remark that he wouldn't want to be in any club that would have him as a member. I can imagine a rejoinder from Chico that would express my feeling toward the NRA on this issue: "Atsa right, boss! I no wanna join a club that's got you for a member too."