Sean Hannity’s Plan to Solve Gun Violence Involves Guns Literally Everywhere – By Ryan Bort (Rolling Stone) / Aug 6 2019
The Fox News host took some time on Monday to indulge a police state fantasy
As is the case after every mass shooting, America is fighting over what to do about gun violence following massacres in El Paso and Dayton that left at least 31 dead over the weekend. Sean Hannity sees himself as a beacon of common sense solutions. On Monday night’s edition of Hannity, the first since the attacks, the Fox News host unveiled what he believes to be an ingenious plan to solve the gun violence epidemic in the United States once and for all: create a police state.
Here are the details of Hannity’s vision for change:
- Position armed guards around the perimeter and on every floor of every school in America.
- The armed guards would be retired police and military who would donate 15 hours a week of service.
- They would be compensated for their time by not having to pay any taxes. “No income taxes, state, federal — at all!” says Hannity.
- This would not be limited to schools: “We could do this in stores, we could do this in malls, pretty much anywhere the public is. Courthouses. We could expand it out everywhere.”
- Somehow, despite the loss of tax revenue, the cost of arming volunteers, the cost of insurance, and whatever other expenditures it would take to organize such a massive initiative, the plan “won’t cost us a penny.”
- As a bonus, Hannity seems to suggest that the preponderance of guns would inevitably solve the homicide crises in cities like Chicago and Baltimore.
Sean Hannity is just rambling like a complete mad man right now, I just honestly have no clue wtf he's even going on about this is just verbal diarrhea pic.twitter.com/r5MhIEOahd
— Andrew Lawrence (@ndrew_lawrence) August 6, 2019
This isn’t the first time Hannity has argued the solution to the gun violence epidemic is more guns. Following the Parkland massacre in February 2018, he similarly proposed hiring “trained, armed” former or retired police officers and military veterans to protect schools. “We need enough people to protect every single building, every single point of entry, and the entire perimeter,” he said.
Unlike the plan he laid out on Monday, which he claimed “won’t cost us a penny,” he acknowledged in 2018 that his plan would indeed cost at least one, and quite possibly several, pennies. “Some of you will argue that this is going to cost money,” he said. “You’re right. My answer is yes. But is it not worth every penny so that we never, ever have to turn on our TVs like yesterday?”
In Dayton on Sunday, it took police only 32 seconds after the first shot was fired to neutralize the attacker. Despite the swift response, he was still able to kill 9 people and injure 27 others. The attack also took place at a bar. Does Hannity want an armed retired service member in every bar in America? The attack in El Paso took place at a Walmart. Should volunteer guards with guns be positioned inside of and around the perimeter of every retail store in America? Hannity seems to think so.
Now is probably a good time to remind readers that Hannity is one of Trump’s de facto advisers, and speaks regularly with the president.
Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity doing his show from the floor of a campaign rally in Cape Girardeau, Mo. Hannity crushed Rachel Maddow of MSNBC last week, with the Fox News Channel personality averaging 3.78 million viewers. The Nielsen company said Maddow had 2.46 million viewers. That represented the biggest gap between the two since last October
Nielsens, Cape Girardeau, USA – 05 Nov 2018
