People say you can’t put a price on life, but Republicans certainly have.
Ted Cruz (R-TX) thinks 100 human lives are worth about $159,800.
Marco Rubio (R) doesn’t put as high a value on people, selling out the public for just $44,480.
But at least he’s holding out for more than Mike Crapo (R-ID) whose vote can be bought for the bargain price of $5,300!
In June, when Republican senators voted down Democrat-drafted common sense gun control measures, and instead opted to align with the NRA-led gun lobby, they sent a message about exactly how much they value human life — and it’s shockingly little.
When I say Ted Cruz sold out America for $159,800, I mean that’s how much the gun lobby has donated to his campaign so far in 2016, according to OpenSecrets.org, a nonprofit dedicated to laying bare money in politics.
Northeastern University’s James Alan Fox, a leading researcher on mass murder, estimates that over the past 30 years, 100 Americans have died annually due to mass shootings. That averages out to Cruz — the top Congressional recipient of gun lobby money — taking about $1,600 per life lost during a massacre.
Republicans are selling American lives on the cheap.
In response to the worst mass shooting in American history — the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando that left 49 people dead — politicians drafted four measures meant to help prevent more mass shootings and reduce gun violence overall. Democrats called for background checks and to stop people on the terrorist watch list from purchasing firearms. Republicans showed their true colors and pushed for a new stipulation that would require the government to prove probable cause within three days to block a gun sale to a suspected terrorist and increased funding for established background checks. All of the measures failed, mostly along party lines.
When 80-90 percent of Americans are calling for universal background checks, it is unconscionable to vote against this safety measure. A politician votes against his constituents and the will of the nation for two reasons: Either he believes he knows better than all of us, or he is beholden to some other interest.
As votes went along party lines, my bet is that “other interests” were at play in this shameful vote. After all, the gun lobby this year has made donations to 237 Congressional Republicans — providing them with more than $1.5 million — and 12 Democrats, who took in a total of $15,500, according to OpenSecrets. Of note: None of that money has gone to Massachusetts’ Congressional elected officials.
And if Cruz and other Republicans think they know better when it comes to gun control than Americans, they’re wrong. A March Boston University study that looked at the effectiveness of 25 laws designed to reduce gun violence found that federal-level policy is the most effective, and that background checks would significantly decrease gun mortality rates.
The study, led by Bindu Kalesan, found universal background checks for all gun purchases — like the one proposed by Democrats — would reduce the rate of firearm death in America — which is 10.1 deaths per 100,000 people — by 61 percent.
Without universal background checks, people who shouldn’t have guns can purchase them legally. Paul Heintz, a reporter for Seven Days, wrote an article on June 15 about how, with no license to carry and no ID, he was able to find and purchase an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle in a Burlington, Vermont, Five Guys parking lot within 14 hours.
Cruz and company, with a host of publicly-funded Congressional staffers to do research for them, should have been able to figure this out — and more. Maybe Cruz already knows, but dismisses the data? It’s possible that Cruz has reached levels of stubbornness on par with a jackass, but it seems more likely that he’s a smart man who’s made a calculated decision to protect his cash and stick with the gun lobby — American lives be damned.
So, how much do Republicans think American lives are worth? That figure changes year to year depending on how scared the gun lobby is about losing out on sales. So far this year, the lobby has spent $2.9 million to curry favor in D.C. Last year, the total spent was more than $11 million. Primarily backed by the NRA, National Shooting Sports Foundation, the National Association for Gun Rights, and Gun Owners of America, much of the money is spent on hiring strategists and lobbying firms to push the gun rights agenda, while a smaller portion goes directly to political campaigns and PACS.
It’s undeniable that $159,800 is a lot of money to a lot of people — including, apparently, Ted Cruz — but it pales in comparison to the value of lives lost. I wish Congressional Republicans would acknowledge this.
Contact Kristin Palpini at editor@valleyadvocate.com.
