Gun Control: ‘Liberal’ TV Anchors Alter Stance On Second Amendment

Gun control advocacy groups are pushing stores and businesses to enact policies which prohibit concealed carry and open carry even in states where such self-defensive measures are legal. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz penned an open letter to customers encouraging them to no longer carry firearms into his restaurants. Staples was targeted by Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, a group formed in the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting over concealed carry policy.

Although some television journalists keep their political views to themselves, others are very vocal about their gun control stance when on-air.Are liberal members of the mainstream media changing their stance on gun control? Some recent comments by popular and allegedly liberal tv personalities appears to indicate their stance on Second Amendment laws has evolved – at least somewhat.

CNN’s Don Lemon’s gun control views have reportedly been evolving since reading a Centers for Disease Control (CDC) report on the topic. The news host sharply criticized Second Amendment supporters in the weeks following the tragic school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut. Don Lemon recently announced publicly that he is “rethinking” his gun control position. During an appearance on The Tom Joyner Radio Show, Lemon pondered the logic of gun control policies and noted the recent CDC study which forced him to alter his stance on gun rights. President Barack Obama instructed the CDC to study gun violence after the Sandy Hook shooting.

Don Lemon had this to say about how the CDC gun violence study impacted his beliefs:

“It just might make you rethink your stance, your view, on the issue, It did for me. It’s making me rethink it.”

The summary of the CDC gun violence report stated that most gun deaths are actually the result of suicide and not violent crime. The report went on to note that armed Americans are not as likely to be harmed by an attacker. Statistics cited in the student revealed that there are between 500,000 to three million defensive gun uses annually in the United States. As horrific as they area, the CDC study also affirmed that mass shootings comprise just a small portion of gun related deaths in America, and such incidents are on the decline. Another report statistic which caused Lemon to reconsider his stance on gun control relates to fact which gun rights advocates already knew, and had been shouting to the heavens – most criminals get their guns illegally, making increased laws an illogical remedy to thwart violent crime.

Ed Schultz, an openly liberal commentator on MSNBC, shocked his audience when he too announced he was rethinking his stance on gun control laws.

An excerpt from Ed Schultz’s radio show about his evolving Second Amendment rights stance reads:

“I guess I’m going to give some audio that might be a little bit tough for liberals. But as a gun owner myself, I pose the question to our audience — why should there be restriction on people who are law-abiding citizens that don’t have mental health issues? That are law-abiding citizens? That pay their taxes? That do everything they’re supposed to do? But then every time there’s a mass shooting we’re going to have a conversation about what I can own in this country. This is freedom, isn’t it? I’m going to infuriate some of you, I don’t mean to, I’m pushing the conversation that, it’s almost as if we don’t dive into the conversation the way we should. And what is at the crux of all of this is freedom.”

The MSNBC host went on to question exactly what the term freedom means, if some “groups out there” want to decrease the types of weapons which can be legally purchased simply because “some crazy guy went in and shot up a workplace.” Even though Ed Schultz comes outs for gun rights to a certain degree, he stopped short of fully embracing the traditional mantra of gun owners: “The only thing that can protect you from a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” Schultz stated that if he thought such a theory were true, he would have a concealed carry permit, or at least a firearm which could be concealed and he does not.

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