Memo to David Frum: Weimar German ‘gun control’ enabled Hitler to confiscate Jews’ guns

These nice people made Germany’s strict “gun control” laws during the Weimar Republic era, hoping to curb street violence between Nazis and Communists. Reichstag, 1925. (Image: Bundesarchiv, Bild 102-01154. 12 Mar 1925)

At Breitbart, John Nolte notices that David Frum is trying to school Ben Carson on “gun control.”  (The correct expression for the concept intended is gun restrictions, so I will use that here.)

What Nolte calls out is Frum’s remarkable assertion that a gun-restriction policy in Germany could have prevented the Holocaust.

Hold back the laughter for a moment.  You’re going to want the information below, so please follow along with me.  I promise, this is better than a meme image with a questionable “quote” from Hitler.

How Not to Prevent a Holocaust

I was almost inexpressibly saddened to read the comments made today by President Obama at a Holocaust Days of Remembrance ceremony, at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC.  In a mostly lyrical and affecting speech, I might have missed the significance of a key passage if not for the sharp ears of Commentary blogger Abe Greenwald, whose piece on the Obama appearance highlighted it, in the context of Obama’s willingness to engage with the national leaders of Venezuela, where Jews are under increasing attack from the major concentration of Hizballah in the Americas, and of Iran, where the elected leader advocates Holocaust denial.

The relevant passage reads as follows (my emphasis):

Today, and every day, we have an opportunity, as well as an obligation, to confront these scourges — to fight the impulse to turn the channel when we see images that disturb us, or wrap ourselves in the false comfort that others’ sufferings are not our own. Instead we have the opportunity to make a habit of empathy; to recognize ourselves in each other; to commit ourselves to resisting injustice and intolerance and indifference in whatever forms they may take…