Mock her naiveté or respect her honest pursuit of a story.

Something odd going on here in this article, I tried to buy a gun at Walmart twice, and roadblocks left me empty-handed both times by Hayley Peterson. Second Amendment and conservative bloggers are mocking the reporter as a know nothing Ben Rhodes reporter; someone who is so inside the liberal bubble of cities that she is reporting the equivalent of "water is wet" as if it were a major discovery.

And I see how it can be read that way. Gun control advocates rarely are well-versed in the function and use of guns, rarely know many people who are gun owners, have little exposure to the role of personal guns in history or society, etc. Critics of Peterson are making fun of her discovering that the existing gun control regulations are indeed strong and effective.

In gun control circles, there is a common claim that i t is easier to buy a gun than it is to purchase cold medicine. Given the high correlation between Second Amendment Enthusiasts, Cultural Conservatives, and Libertarians, this is not as compelling an argument as the gun-control advocates think. Most people would just as soon loosen regulations on cold medicine.

Walmart has been a particular target for gun-control advocates. They really want Walmart to not serve their customer base by eliminating gun sales.

Peterson tests both these suppositions. Is it easier to buy cold medicine than a gun? Is Walmart irresponsible or non-compliant with its legal obligations in selling guns? No and No.

I suspect that Peterson is owed kudos rather than mockery. Her article is filled with data. It is a detailed step-by-step description of what goes into purchasing a gun. And indeed, it is a burden and it is effective within its limits. Madmen still commit crimes with weapons because we have no reliable red flags for mental illness or terrorism beyond the most obvious.

I suspect the mockery is perhaps in part owing to the seeming breathlessness of the writing. It is as if the reporter had never been into a Walmart before. But again, I wonder, perhaps the apparent breathlessness is just a function of writing to the level of detail necessary to communicate to her readers. Perhaps she has been in a Walmart but her readers haven't.

Kudos to Ms. Peterson who, instead of accepting the ungrounded narrative, went and checked it out to find whether it was true or not.