Michael Moore on Maddow: Why Are We So Violent?

It was Bowling for Columbine revisited on The Rachel Maddow Show last night. Maddow has been covering the increased debate on gun control in the wake of the Tuscon massacre, and her guest was activist filmmaker Michael Moore, who asked the same difficult question that perplexed him in his smash hit 2002 documentary (which won an Academy Award): Why are Americans so trigger happy? The interview began with that stunning segment from Moore's film wherein K-Mart reps meet with two Columbine High massacre victims, whose presence persuades the company to stop selling handgun ammunition.

"What's the cost of a life of a federal judge?" Moore asked last night. "If you've got 17 cents in America, you can take the life of a federal judge and a 9-year-old child, and just about anybody else... Only the pundits say we [can't change gun laws]. They do it in other countries, like in Canada. They have strict gun laws in Canada, and of course they don't even have a tenth of the murders that we have... There's something like over 7 million firearms in people's homes in Canada, and maybe 10-11 million homes. That's a lot of guns!

"But they only kill a couple hundred people in Canada a year. Gun murders... Why is that? What do they do up there? Here's what they do. Very simple. To own a gun, it has to be licensed and registered. You have to go through a safety course. After you've gone through the safety course, you then have to go through a 28 day waiting period. During that waiting period, if you're married or have been married, you have to bring in a permission slip signed by your spouse or your ex-spouse, saying it's okay for him to have a gun... Plus, you can't have magazines with 30 bullets. That gun that was used in Tuscon is illegal in Canada."

A federal law that expired in 2004 had banned magazines holding more than 10 rounds; the Glock Loughner used in Tuscon had a magazine with at least 30 rounds, and has the capacity to fire all those rounds in 10 seconds. New York Democratic Representative Carolyn McCarthy—whose husband was killed and son seriously wounded by a gunman with a high capacity magazine on the LIRR 17 years ago— is calling for the ban to be reinstated.

"What I'm trying to do is not take away the right of someone to own a gun, but just basically look at the large-capacity clips," McCarthy says. "People have to remember that the gun that they use can still have a clip in it. Ten bullets and one in the chamber, that's 11 bullets, so if you're using it for self-defense at home, there's plenty of ammo there for them." Texas Republican Kevin Brady has vowed to fight the bill, remarking, "I'm not supportive of it, and I don't think it will gain much traction in the House." Maybe Michael Moore needs to bring some cameras and Tuscon survivors to Washington.