Facts over a barrel

Study: If you take 10 random people and let nine in on a scam, the 10th person will wind up not only thinking like the other nine, but perceiving reality like the other nine. So, 10 people, two lines on a piece of paper. Nine say Line A is longer, when it is obviously, measurably shorter. But Person 10 can’t stand up to the pressure and actually begins to “see” what the other nine see.

It’s kind of like the National Rifle Association. They claim guns make you safer, yet you are four times more likely to be shot than a person without a gun, a measurable difference. Yet certain people believe it and possibly are not lying when they say so.

How about this one: “An armed society is a polite society.” Like open carry in Texas is civil? Sorry, but scaring the daylights out of your fellow Americans is the very opposite of civil. Unsurprisingly, perceptions became so warped by the combination of NRA baloney and peer pressure from creepy weirdo gun nuts, weak-minded domestic terrorists wound up assassinating policemen and messing up Wal-Mart.

But it’s the NRA. Black is white. Up is down. Gun rights trump dead children.

Whatever.

Nancy Runyan

Spokane Valley