Columnist Who Inspired Costas Gun Control Lecture Now Claims 'NRA Is the New KKK

(Photo via Fox Sports)

NBC sportcaster Bob Costas made headlines yesterday after interrupting Sunday Night Football with a lecture on gun control, following the horrifying murder-suicide of NFL player Jovan Belcher over the weekend.

However, most of his speech was just paraphrasing a recent article by Kansas City columnist Jason Whitlock, who Costas claimed "said it so well" that additional commentary was unnecessary.

Now, with national media attention turned his way, Whitlock is taking his argument for gun control to an entirely new level.  Apparently he thinks the National Rifle Association is the "new" Ku Klux Klan.

Newsbusters has the transcript from Whitlock's interview with Roland Martin:

WHITLOCK: Sports gets so much attention, and people tune out the real world, that I try to take advantage of the opportunity to talk about the real world when sports lends itself to that and try to open people’s eyes. You know, I did not go as far as I’d like to go because my thoughts on the NRA and America’s gun culture – I believe the NRA is the new KKK. And that the arming of so many black youths, uh, and loading up our community with drugs, and then just having an open shooting gallery, is the work of people who obviously don’t have our best interests [at heart].

I think it’s obvious if you’ve traveled abroad, and traveled to countries where they actually have legitimate gun laws, that we don’t have to have what we have here in America, where people somehow think a gun enhances their liberty, and that people somehow think a gun makes them safer. It just doesn’t. A gun turns some kids listening to music into a murder scene. And uh, you know, if you don’t have a gun, you drive home. You know, kids listening to some loud music, you don’t like it... you go home and complain to your wife. But when you have a gun, you open fire, potentially, and take the life of a child.

Obviously, Jovan Belcher was disturbed. Obviously, you know, there were problems between he and his girlfriend. But if there’s no gun, potentially, it’s a domestic-violence issue that doesn’t end in death. Maybe it ends in someone getting hurt, and Jovan going to jail and getting some help. But, you know, any time you add a gun to a situation, you just enhance the consequences.  [Emphasis added]

​Here is the audio:

Updates will be added.

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Related:

• NBC's Bob Costas Interrupts Sunday Night Football With Gun Control Lecture
• Sportscaster Jim Gray Agrees With Bob Costas' Gun Control Argument During Fox Appearance -- Then Almost Immediately Backtracks