To paraphrase something from one of my son's favorite cartoons growing up, "If I had a nickel for every time someone tried to assassinate Trump, I'd have two nickels, which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice."

It's especially weird that this latest attempt--the less successful attempt, to be fair--comes so soon after the last one. I suppose the Secret Service breakdowns uncovered in that case inspired Ryan Routh to give it a shot, pun fully intended.

It only worked out better for him because he didn't get killed in the process.

Yet while there's a lot of things we could be discussing about why there was a second attempt on Trump's life, a lot of people are quick to try and push gun control as the answer.

Over at the Daily Signal, Amy Swearer has a piece debunking some of the dumbest arguments being pushed.

1. This happened because of “weak” gun laws.

Right on cue, many major gun control organizations insinuated that “weak gun laws” were to blame not only for the assassination attempt but basically for all social ills.

As with the first assassination attempt on Trump, these groups made no effort to explain which of their much-touted “stronger” gun laws, specifically, would’ve prevented this individual from committing this specific criminal act, or how.

Since he is 58 years old, the second gunman’s actions certainly wouldn’t have been hindered by age-based restrictions on gun sales.

Nor was the gunman’s attempt to kill Trump facilitated by Florida’s recent change to its permitless public carry law, which (to the chagrin of gun control activists hoping to place as many barriers as possible between ordinary Americans and their rights) authorizes all non-prohibited adults to carry concealed handguns in public after first obtaining special licenses.

Not only was the gunman a convicted felon who couldn’t lawfully possess any firearm, much less carry one in public, but Florida law continues to prohibit the open carrying of long guns in public places.

Moreover, no reasonable person believes that a highly motivated criminal willing to commit premeditated murder with an illegally possessed rifle would have been dissuaded from doing so just because of public carry restrictions.

Honestly, this is probably the most popular point of discussion and the dumbest of them all, as Swearer points out here.

Let's also remember that the reports indicate that the gun in question had the serial number destroyed. That suggests it was a stolen gun sold on the black market. It wasn't sold in a lawful gun shop like that and while we can argue about whether laws requiring serial numbers are constitutional or not, law-abiding citizens' guns have them.

So that alone makes it clear that the Routh went outside of the legal mechanisms for obtaining a gun in the state of Florida.

Oh, and then there's the argument that this is another example of needing an assault weapon ban. As Swearer points out, the would-be assassin didn't use a so-called assault weapon.

The differences between an SKS platform and AK platform are more than just technical specifics or mere semantics.

For purposes of the “assault weapons” debate, the differences are inherently legal.

Typically, the statutory distinction between a prohibited “assault weapon” and its “non-assault counterpart” is the presence of one or more specific “military-style” features, such as a collapsing stock, barrel shroud, pistol grip, or vertical foregrip. Although an AK platform utilizes a pistol grip (rendering it, for statutory and “visual” purposes, an “assault weapon”), the gunman’s SKS-platform bears none of these prohibited features.

To the extent the rifle qualifies as an “assault weapon” under any current state law, it’s only because some states (such as California and Illinois) also prohibit hundreds of specific semiautomatic rifle models for seemingly arbitrary reasons, regardless of whether they otherwise meet the quasi-objective “feature-based” definition.

Even in those states, the SKS is considered a perfectly lawful “nonassault” weapon as long as it utilizes a “fixed magazine” instead of a detachable one, even though internal box magazines may be reloaded with stripper clips just as easily as empty detachable magazines may be replaced with fully loaded ones.

Exactly.

Now, under a proposal like the GOSAFE Act, an SKS might be restricted, but under every assault weapon ban on the books right now, it's not. It's a simple semi-auto rifle with an internal 10-round magazine. It's also held like a traditional hunting rifle. In fact, a lot of people used to buy these cheaply as hunting weapons. 

Yes, it's chambered in the same round as the AK-47 and there are some superficial similarities if you squint while looking at the two weapons, they're very different firearms.

And only one fell under the 1994 Assault Weapon Ban.

In fact, the SKS is functionally more similar to the M1 Garand in a lot of ways than the AK-47 or AK-74.

There's more over at the Daily Signal, and I recommend you go and read the whole thing. Swearer understands gun laws very well and also understands firearms, which means she can see the stupidity in these arguments like they're the beacons of Minas Tirith.