Appeasing the Trigger Gods<br />In an interview at N. R.A.<br />headquarters — which proudly displayed a model of the pistol used to assassinate Lincoln — LaPierre explained<br />that AK semiautomatics were just uglier hunting guns and that he knew how to hunker down during periods of “hysteria” after shootings.<br />Trump wrote in his 2000 book, “The America We Deserve,”<br />that he was in favor of a ban on assault weapons and “a slightly longer waiting period to purchase a gun.” But then the N. R.A.<br />spent more than $30 million to get him elected.<br />The Orlando shooting also provided confirmation that the emotionally stunted Trump would not be a parental healer for the country, when he tweeted congratulations to himself<br />for predicting the shooter would have links to terrorism, rather than offering comforting words to the grieving families and friends, and to shaken Americans.<br />It was too hard-line even for the N. R.A.<br />“I don’t think you should have firearms where people are drinking,” N. R.A.<br />chief Wayne LaPierre demurred.<br />After 49 people were killed in a shooting at an Orlando nightclub in June 2016, he suggested<br />that it would have been “a beautiful, beautiful sight” if more people in the club had been armed and went “boom” at the “maniac” shooting at them.
