New York Times: Microstamping is a Minority Issue

As we’ve documented here, the New York Times has been on quite the anti-gun roll in recent days. First was the gun rights for felons horror. Then there was snarky Joe Sharkey’s lament over the stupidity of people bringing their pieces to the airport. Which brings us to Monday’s broadside, which was much was more subtle (not to mention shorter), if equally egregious…

The article by Thomas Kaplan wasn’t – strictly speaking – about guns per se. No, the subject at hand was New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s newly found interest in certain key minority constituencies. And what better way to signal that interest than by flying down to Puerto Rico? In November. I’m sure the gubernatorial schedule was just too full to accommodate a trip like this in July.

The enthusiasm that greeted Mr. Cuomo almost, but not quite, obscured the underlying reason he chose this conference, called Somos el Futuro, for his first official out-of-state trip since his inauguration.

Over the last several weeks, the governor has been lavishing attention on minority communities amid signs that some were growing impatient with what they perceived as a lack of attention to their concerns.

Yeah, the Gov just woke up one morning last week and had the shining epiphany that he’d somehow been shockingly remiss in addressing the needs of some of his constituents. All this new-found interest and attention has nothing to do with the fact that we’re rolling into an election year.

But be that as it may, this was buried near the end of the article:

Many minority lawmakers are looking toward the next legislative session, which begins in January, as they seek to enlist Mr. Cuomo’s support on a range of issues.

For example, State Senator José R. Peralta, a Queens Democrat, wants Mr. Cuomo to promote legislation that would require microstamping, a form of ballistics identification, on all new semiautomatic handguns, and to provide money to keep foreclosure prevention programs up and running.

So microstamping is a minority issue. Who knew?

Regular NYT readers will, of course, be familiar with the fact that no issue is exempt from being seen through its distorted prism of race, gender, power, or environmental politics. Any light (and there’s precious little these days) that makes it through to the other side always seems to present itself on the left side of the spectrum. Despite the laws of physics. Observers will see plenty of ROY and maybe a little G. BI and V seem to be permanently MIA, though.

OK, so Kaplan doesn’t make a big issue of it in this piece, but this is just the kind of crap that gave rise to the old “world ends tomorrow, women and minorities hardest hit” joke. Microstamping is a dumb idea whose time, we hope, will never come. It’s a thinly veiled way to raise the price of guns and ensure that there are even fewer gun owners both in New York and elsewhere. But playing it straight and acknowledging that it’s part of a larger gun control agenda – not a minority issue – doesn’t seem to be in the cards for the Times.