Gun Control

When you buy a gun you may have a background check, depending on where you buy it from. Go to a local gun show and buy one from some fellow enthusiast there and chances are you won’t receive a background check, unless that person is registered as a federal dealer. That’s the extent of it.

So I am sitting here wondering why all these Republicans are screaming for profiling of darker skin men before they get on the airplane. Why didn’t we hear this after  Major Nidal Malik Hasan took his personal weapons into a building on a United States Army base and killed 13 people while wounding 30 others? Why didn’t one of these Republicans call for better “profiling” on potential gun owners? If you would even bring this up to a Republican they would yell and scream about you taking away their 2nd amendment rights, but profiling also violates our Constitution, and no where in the Constitution does it say one right trumps the other.

Take this picture:

That is the view of Newark airport today after the terminal was reopened. Bob points out how easy of a target it would be for a suicide bomber, which it would be, but imagine a Major Hassan going in there and opening fire. This is before any security checks and sneaking a gun, or 20 in would be very simple. If that happened I can guarantee that Republicans still wouldn’t talk about profiling potential gun buyers. They would rather see a law requiring everyone to be naked before that.

So the next time some Republican is on the television going on about profiling people who don’t look like them, then would the host of that show please ask them if they would support profiling potential gun buyers. It’s time to put them on the spot to see exactly how serious they are about terrorism.

Given the Ft. Hood tragedy, a bill authored by Richard Burr (R-NC) is coming into light:

Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) says his "Veterans 2nd Amendment Protection Act" will protect veterans' gun rights. But the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence calls it a "dangerous" proposal that could allow "over 100,000 mentally incapacitated or incompetent persons" to buy guns—people who would previously have been barred from doing so by the Veterans Administration (VA).

Absolutely amazing. That’s what we need – more unstable people with guns. And here is the real irony. Burr opposes healthcare reform, something that could have saved the lives of over 2,200 veterans last year. If he was truly concerned about veterans rights then he would work to protect their right to affordable healthcare. As matter of fact we should all take a moment and tell Burr to do exactly that:

Sen. Richard M. Burr (R) Website http://burr.senate.gov/public/ Phone 202-224-3154 Fax 202-228-2981 Contact http://burr.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.Conta Additional Information

A soldier shoots a bunch of people on a military base where the people are allowed to carry guns. It took a civilian police officer to finally take him down. Does that mean the argument of allowing teachers and anyone else to carry guns would reduce the number of school shootings or casualties?

The AP has taken a closer look at the recent rampage of gun violence in this country:

They had more in common than unleashing carnage _ nearly every gunman in this monthlong series of mass killings was legally entitled to fire his weapons.

So what does that say about the state of gun control laws in this country? One thing appears certain: the regulations aren't getting stricter. Many recent efforts to change weapons laws have been about easing them.

Despite eight rampages that have claimed 57 lives since March 10, "it hasn't sparked any national goal to deal with this epidemic. In fact, it's going the other way," said Scott Vogel of the Freedom States Alliance, a gun control activist group.

And yet Washington is mum on this. Well mum except to say “we are scared to do anything”:

Even President Barack Obama has felt that sway. Last month, 65 House Democrats said they would block any attempt to resurrect an expired federal ban against assault weapons.

The pro-gun Democrats, led by Rep. Mike Ross of Arkansas, wrote Attorney General Eric Holder saying they opposed not only a ban on military-style guns, but also efforts "to pass any similar law."

The claim they are worried about a “long and divisive fight”, or in other words “we might lose votes”.

So how do we address what can only be described as an increase in domestic terrorism? Our leaders are vowing to not keep us safe. They are too scared of their political futures to do anything. The police are going to have more troubles keeping us save, especially when they are being targeted.

So what can keep us safer? To some the answer is – MORE GUNS:

few states are trying to loosen gun restrictions. In the Texas Capitol _ where legislators can carry guns _ bills easily passed the Senate in recent weeks that would allow employees to bring weapons to work as long as they leave them locked in their cars, and let those packing heat off the legal hook if they walked into a bar that didn't have signs saying guns weren't allowed inside.

The state also is considering allowing students licensed to carry a concealed weapon _ there are about 300,000 such adults in Texas _ to bring guns on campus.

Welcome back to the OK Corral. Instead of our country moving forward, we are moving back to the 1800’s.

This country has sat there and shredded the constitution following the 9/11 attacks. Everyone was scared to death. We saw 3,000 lives lost on that September day. From 2002-2005 we saw 116,780 lives lost from gun violence, and yet we are complacent in doing nothing.

What’s it going to take to get change? Before it took a Republican president being shot, and one of his aides being paralyzed from a gun. So what will it take now – some politicians kids being killed, god forbid? Are their lives more important than ours?

Just think about it. We have been involved in a national debate on our constitutional rights when it comes to terrorism for the past several years. We can debate getting rid of Habeas Corpus because of the theory that some terrorist might have a weapon that could destroy an American city – the Jack Bauer theory. This gun violence isn’t some wild theory – it is reality. It is a deadly reality, and our leaders are mum.

Washington has a duty to act. They are sworn to protect this nation, something we heard time and time again during the Bush year, and their fear (silence) can only be classified as a negligence of duty.

So many of us on the left have said that we will see the crazies come back out now that we got a Democratic President. I’m talking the real whack jobs, the ones that make you think of Timothy McVeigh, or Richard Poplawski:

A gunman wearing a bulletproof vest and "lying in wait" opened fire on officers responding to a domestic disturbance call Saturday, killing three of them and turning a quiet Pittsburgh street into a battlefield, police said.

Police Chief Nate Harper said the motive for the shooting isn't clear, but friends said the gunman recently had been upset about losing his job and feared the Obama administration was poised to ban guns.

I’m sure everyone has already read about it, and seen the very interesting connections being made between people like Beck and Bachmann with this guy. If not, then I suggest you stop right here and go on over to Crooks and Liars, where Dave Neiwert has an excellent piece up. Interesting enough, Dave has a book getting ready to be released which is on this very subject.

Of course this has put the right into full defense. Here’s Malkin:

You killed all the innocent people at the Binghamton immigration center.

You killed these police officers.

It’s all your fault.

And it doesn’t stop with her. “Jammie Wearing Fool” has really put the “fool” in their name:

At Balloon Juice, John Cole offers this subtle analysis, calling it Glenn Beck's America. I suppose when those four cops were murdered in Oakland we should have called it what, Jesse Jackson's America? Barack Obama's America? Ron Dellums' America?

What a way to inject some racism into this tragedy.

This is the exact point I want to touch on. Remember last year when that loon went into a Tennessee church and started shooting up people? Turns out the church was rather liberal, and the guy was a big reader of O’Reilly and Hannity.

Or how about the guy who was sending those fake anthrax letters to big name liberals, like Keith Olbermann and the New York Times? He was a “huge” fan of people like Coulter and Malkin. He admitted it! But that put the right into this same defense mode.

What gets me is how the wingnuts feel they can’t take any blame for this. In an ideal world, that would be true, but this world is far from ideal. And let’s take a second and think of how many times we hear of our words having “bad effects”. For example – when we held debates on the Iraq war and people on the left called for an end to the war, somehow our words were used as "recruiting tools for the terrorists”.  Isn’t that interesting how some blog or politician saying something here, can influence people to do bad things half a world away, yet, people saying things here on our airwaves and in our media have no effect on people here at home.

There’s are far more examples of this. Kind of like the old wingnut notion that “if we teach sex education to our children, then they will be out doing it like rabbits”, even if the kids are only a couple of years from being able to serve in the military.

My whole point is that words do have effects, especially when you have people like Poplawski out there. And you got people like Glenn Beck, whose main goal is to instill fear into these people. I posted perfect proof of that just a few days ago, when Beck was saying that Obama was leading us to fascism (a liberal fascist?), while playing Nazi footage in the background. His little head sticking up in front of the big screen, leaving you with an awesome sense of an Orwellian time.

People love to be scared. That’s no secret. Think of roller coasters, horror movies and extreme sports. So the right has become vampires feeding on that fear, or the adrenaline rush associated with it. They do it all in the name of the sacred rating, even if that rating means votes.

“BARACK OBAMA’S COMING TO TAKE YOUR GUNS”

I have been bringing up the deafening silence on the campaign trail about the increased gun violence in our country. Obama addressed the problem this weekend by showing how close to home it hit for him:

At a town hall last night, Obama revealed that one of his top volunteers in Iowa was gunned down in the Omaha Mall shooting several months ago.

John McDonald, 65, was a precinct captain for Obama in Council Bluffs, Iowa (just across the border from Omaha). McDonald was Christmas shopping with his wife when he was gunned down.

Obama then offered some solutions, and they are solutions I also believe in:

Obama added that when shootings like these are "occurring every three months," it was indicative of a larger problem. He called for "common sense" gun laws including: stronger background checks to prevent the mentally ill from obtaining guns, said the COPS program, closing the gun show loophole and using new technology to better trace guns used in drug crimes.

He was quick to say that he believed in the 2nd Amendment, but he said the right had to be used responsibly. He compared restrictions on gun ownership to how one curbs free speech, saying yelling "Fire!" in a crowded town hall like this one violated that right.

I have never been one to say "get rid of all the guns". It would be impossible to do and cause many problems. I believe Americans do have the right to own guns. The problem lies in how easily they can get them. The shooters at Virginia Tech last year and Chicago a few weeks ago both bought their guns from the same place - the internet. Guns shouldn't be as easy to come by as collectibles on EBay. We need stronger background checks and to close the loopholes in the laws.

I can't say how glad I am that a candidate finally addressed this problem. Now if we can get them to address the growing problem of police brutality then America might be a little bit better.

Five women killed in what is being described as a store robbery in Illinois. As our economy continues to tank I am sure we can plan on seeing more of these crimes. It's just a simple fact - when people are down and out they will turn to extreme measures. What can be more down and out then losing your home?

When they talk about warantless wiretapping, Republicans are quick to say that the constitution should take a back seat to security. Well if we follow that login and apply it to the following news headlines this week, perhaps other rights should take a back seat:

Columbus mall shooting injures man in leg

Shooting occurred in two Christian places in US

9 Dead in Nebraska Mall Shooting

So let's take the Republican logic on our freedom of privacy and apply it to the second amendment. Perhaps it is time that we suspend it in the name of safety. Of course the Republicans and NRA will quickly denounce such a move, but we can easily call what is happening in our country terrorism.

When children draw posters that talk about the assassination of George Bush, they are questioned by the Secret Service. When someone makes a movie fictionalizing George Bush getting assassinated, that movie is blocked from this country. So then how can a rock star like Ted Nugent get on stage and make threats against two Democratic presidential candidates, who are already under Secret Service protection?

I think Nugent should be hauled in by the Secret Service and questioned about this behavior. The problem with this little display is that there could be that one person in the audience he is provoking to take thought to action.

I also think the NRA should come out and denounce what Nugent did and tell him they have no room for members like that. If someone does take Nugent's stunt to action then there will be another entire debate on gun control. Does the NRA want to have their position compromised by the ramblings of an idiot like Nugent?

If Nugent is scheduled to appear in your town, I recommend taking action to get his show canceled. Upcoming tour dates can be seen here. Also if there are any corporate sponsors of his concerts, they should also be contacted and asked if they support the promotion of assassination of our political figures. His actions are appalling and must be met with consequence.

UPDATE:

It seems the people who visit Power Line enjoy watching threats made against our presidential candidates. Maybe someone should ask Bill O'Reilly if he will go off on their hate filled rhetoric.

Also - Rolling Stone has picked up on the story.

Perhaps this is an example of how well the current system actually works:

A Virginia district court found Virginia Tech killer Seung-Hui Cho to be "mentally ill" and an imminent danger to others," according to a 2005 temporary detention order obtained by ABC News.

Virginia Tech police say Cho was taken to a nearby psychiatric hospital for evaluation in December 2005, after two female schoolmates said they received threatening messages from him and police and school officials became concerned that he might be suicidal.

So a court found Cho "mentally ill" and an imminent danger to other's, yet less than a year and a half later the same state allowed him to own a gun? Don't write a book critical of Bush or you won't be able to fly, but become a danger to other citizens and you can own a gun!

This new revelation has just really put the gun control argument into a new light. The laws need to change and need changed NOW! We have perfect reason fresh in our memory to make the changes and can not afford another tragedy like this. We always talk about change when something happens, but no change ever occurs. Any politician (Republican or Democrat) who refuses to address this situation and spark life into the debate on Capital Hill does not deserve support in 2008.

And all other drugs for that matter.

With the debate over gun control front and center again, we are constantly hearing that we can not ban guns because so many would be here illegally. Well isn't that the same thing that happens with drugs? Why are we wasting billions of dollars fighting a loss cause?

After you answer those questions then answer this one - how many people die from pot as compared to guns?

My blood boiled yesterday as I started reading right-wing blogs immediately jump on the "give everyone guns" mentality following the shooting at Virginia Tech. Details will still emerging on the deadliest mass shooting in our country's history, yet the wingnuts figured they had a political card to play here. Michelle Malkin had a post immediately following the breaking news, which linked to another post and said this:

Just imagine if students were armed. We no longer need to imag[in]e what will happen when they are not armed.

Ok - I'll play along. Let me imagine that. If we had students armed, there is a chance so many would not have died on April 16, 2007 on Virginia Tech, but how many would die on other days? How may boyfriends would get pissed at their girlfriends, or find them cheating and decide to use that "justice maker" they have under their coat?

Let's look at that another way. The descriptions show the gunman barging into classes and opening fire. If students had guns, chances are they wouldn't have time to react. Who says they even know how to shoot the damn thing or a good aim? Instead we could see a higher fatality rate yesterday. Another question remains unanswered - did the shooter use all his ammo? Did he take his life when he had only 1 bullet left to do so? If the students had guns, that could have given the shooter much more ammo to continue his rampage and we might be looking at a higher number of fatalities today.

As typical for the right, history teaches nothing. Sure there were no mass shootings like this back in the 1800's, but there was a lot more killings. Why? Everyone had guns. They were very easy to come by and people needed them just to hunt so they could eat.

Shortly after the news of this tragedy, White House spokesperson, Dana Perino, also took to the podium. At that time she offered the President's deepest sympathy's, but also this little line:

The president believes that there is a right for people to bear arms, but that all laws must be followed