Filibusted? Will There Really be a Vote on Gun Control?

I suspect that many gun owners see themselves
as Cable. Just a hunch.

If there's one thing I don't understand about American politics, it is why gun control can barely even be discussed. No doubt, we've come closer than just about ever, since the Sandy Hook shootings. And no doubt, there are lots of hot-button issues that make temperatures rise very quickly. But nothing like gun control makes people violently angry with little provocation.

Well, let me amend that. The holy right-wing trifecta of "Guns, God and Gays (and don't forget abortion!)" are all testy subjects, with the frothy foam coming mostly from that side of the aisle. Hey, right wing! Anger management! Look into it! Anyway, if you gently broach some of those subjects with some conservatives, you might at least have a reasonably civil discussion. But guns? Even with friends, it seems like the discussion spirals out of control barely ten words in. And it degenerates into silly arguments: "THAT'S not an assault rifle! It's not a CLIP, it's a MAGAZINE!!!"

From a liberal perspective--even me, never much of an anti-gun activist--many gun enthusiasts come off as slightly demented and a little scary. Some quite demented and a whole lot scary. To them, guns are the primary part of what they consider to be free, to be an American, to be (oddly enough) a Christian. Who would Jesus shoot? So, we're bewildered when even the most moderate, popular and non-obtrusive suggestions toward curbing gun violence are met with fierce blowback. When upwards of 90% of Americans are for universal background checks, the NRA and its fans go apeshit.

I'm including this meme only to point out its stupidity.
No, don't ban it. License it. Insure it. Make its owner
pass a test. Properly maintain it and have it inspected.
Make sure it's "street legal." Make its owner obey
all laws of its operation. Require registering it. Require
transfer documentation if sold. Etc., etc.

And then Congress cowers. Blue dog Democrats lapse into conserva-Demdom. Even with public support, and a very weakened NRA (who lost almost all of their electoral battles in 2012), the teeth have been taken out of every proposal. Ridiculous arguments like "criminals don't obey laws, so the only people punished are law-abiding citizens*," or "some people can change magazines in a second, so limiting their size won't make a difference," somehow gain credence. And Republicans threaten a filibuster of even the watered-down already modest proposals.

Well, at least that last part may not happen. Support for the filibuster seems to have waned (though by the time you read this, that may have changed). So the Senate will maybe be able to say they did something--however token--to answer Sandy Hook. I think they finally may have realized that that's all they need to do to make this all go away. Until the next mass shooting.

[Excerpt]

Threat to Block Debate on Guns Appears to Fade in Senate

Several Senate Republicans said Tuesday that they would not participate in a filibuster of the first major gun control bill since 1993, as Democrats appeared on the verge of overcoming a blockade threatened by a group of conservatives before a word of debate on the measure was uttered. . .
Read more at: New York Times

* No other arguments about laws work this way. We don't say that laws against murder or robbery or rape are worthless, because criminals won't obey them. It's perhaps the stupidest argument I've ever heard.

Senate Dems Still Scared of NRA

Yes, I voted for him. The alternative was Sharron Angle.
Image from source, TPM.

Even though the NRA's pull these days is anemic, and their backed candidates mostly lost. . . Even though the American electorate is heavily for background checks, and at least rudimentary gun control legislation. . . Even though Wayne LaPierre and the bulk of vocal pro-gun voices are coming off batshit crazy and hyper reactionary. . . Even though the Sandy Hook mass shooting of children struck more of a lasting chord with Americans. . . Democrats are apparently still terrified of the NRA. I think it's kind of Pavlovian. Sort of a Stockholm Syndrome thing. I mean, when the polls are in the 90+ percentile for background checks, and politicians are still skittish? I just don't get it.

[Excerpt]

Assault Weapons Ban Dead In Senate, Gun Background Checks In Critical Condition

The assault weapons ban is all but dead, and mandatory background checks are touch and go. Three months after the Newtown shooting, prospects of Congress passing a broad gun control package have dimmed considerably. . .

Read more at: Talking Points Memo

New Details About Newtown, 152 Bullets in Less Than 5 Minutes

Whatever your politics (if any) on gun control, this video is worth watching. For one, it will disabuse you of the notion that Rachel Maddow is a wild-eyed reactionary. Secondly, she gives an excellent account of the chain of events in the Sandy Hook Elementary mass shooting in  Newtown, Connecticut. It's easy to follow, and even handed (and comes with an advisory warning for people who'd rather not picture the events). Starting at about 1:45, she chronicles what happened, and only after about 6:30 is there any particular editorializing. And what editorializing there is, in my opinion, is hard to argue with.

152 bullets in under 5 minutes. Four reloads, with extended magazines. How different might it have been if the shooter had to reload 15 times, instead? It's a valid question, and a good one.

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Should Teachers Really Have Guns?

Image from source, ThinkProgress

It's so automatic now, that it's become a morbid joke: if there is a mass shooting--regardless of the circumstances--argument will be made that if only the victims/bystanders were armed, the shooter would have been stopped. The answer to gun violence is allegedly more guns, which seems like the old cold war "mutually assured destruction" to me, but what do I know?

So, it's not surprising that when there was a school shooting, many gun rights supporters responded by saying that teachers should be armed. Sounds kind of good on the surface, if you don't think about it much. I mean, you're adding a rather hefty job requirement onto teachers, aren't you? Not only are you asking them to be willing to carry a gun, but presumably to be trained in the art of using it. In a time where the same side of the political aisle are preaching austerity, and slashing government jobs (such as teachers), they want to also enlist those remaining teachers on the payroll to also be armed security?

But let's take a different tangent here. Think back to your school days. Think about the teachers you liked best, the ones with quirky eccentricities, the ones who seemed a bit "off," and the ones you downright hated. I don't know about you, but I had all sorts of teachers who I wouldn't trust with a firearm. Flighty airheads, short-tempered coaches, paranoid task-masters, alcoholic misfits. . .and those are just the bad examples. I also had wonderful teachers, from frail older ladies to wispy delicate beauties to kindly middle-aged bookish gentlemen. With rare exceptions, most of my teachers would have made horrifying choices to be playing Dirty Harry or John McClane through the school halls.

[Excerpt]

South Dakota Now Permits Teachers To Carry Guns In Classroom

On Friday, South Dakota become the first state to enact legislation, in the aftermath of the shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, explicitly authorizing teachers and staff in K-12 schools to carry firearms. The measure “leaves it up to school districts to decide whether to allow armed teachers” and requires those who wish to carry guns to “undergo training similar to what law enforcement officers receive. . .”

Read more at: Think Progress

Hero of Sandy Hook Being Harrassed by Conspiracy Theorists

Wow. A lot of conspiracy theories pop up around tragedies. But few of them are as ridiculous, as pointless, as stupid as the Sandy Hook "conspiracy." They actually think the massacre was staged so that Democrats--President Obama particularly--could pass gun control laws. It's brilliant really. The Dems sat out the gun rights issue for what? 20 years? Only to put this massive conspiracy into motion, to try to catch the NRA off guard? Did they just wait until after the 2012 election when the NRA's candidates lost so badly? What really happened to the kids? Were they actually "little people" actors?

I actually hate to get silly about such a serious tragedy. Rest assured, my mirth is aimed only at, and squarely at (forgive the gun-like terminology, it permeates our language) the NRA and its nuttier members.

[Excerpt]

Leave this guy alone, seriously.

This man helped save six children, is now getting harassed for it 

“I don’t know what to do,” sighed Gene Rosen. “I’m getting hang-up calls, I’m getting some calls, I’m getting emails with, not direct threats, but accusations that I’m lying, that I’m a crisis actor, ‘how much am I being paid?’” Someone posted a photo of his house online. There have been phony Google+ and YouTube accounts created in his name, messages on white supremacist message boards ridiculing the “emotional Jewish guy,” and dozens of blog posts and videos “exposing” him as a fraud. One email purporting to be a business inquiry taunted: “How are all those little students doing? You know, the ones that showed up at your house after the ‘shooting’. What is the going rate for getting involved in a gov’t sponsored hoax anyway? . .”

Read more at: Salon

Jon Stewart Takes on Gun Control

It's a question I've been asking for a few weeks now. Why is it that we as a country can overreact to any perceived threat, every imagined  calamity (albeit usually after the fact), except for anything to do with domestic guns? If it's a terrorist with guns, that's a whole different thing. In fact, I wonder when we'll have our first armed Islamic militia, and what the FOX "News" reaction to that will be. But I digress. Jon Stewart was off the air during the Sandy Hook massacre, so was slow to comment on it. But boy howdy did he do an awesome job. Took the words right out of my mouth, made them a whole lot better, and then managed to make them funny. Kudos, Mr. Stewart.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

Guns, The Bill of Rights, and Sensible Regulation

Image from source, DailyKos

I have found that it is nearly impossible to have a civil, rational and fully engaged conversation about guns with people who consider themselves gun enthusiasts (or gun fetishists, if you prefer). Their metaphoric defenses go up instantly if they feel that their literal defenses are threatened in any way. If any discussion about the potential limitation, regulation or registration of any element of the category "arms" are discussed, they come out. . .uh. . .guns a-blazing.  To the gun enthusiast, the 2nd amendment is akin to a holy commandment, and is separate and apart from the rest of the document it resides within.

I've never understood the passion gun owners have for either the 2nd amendment, or guns in general, but I've also never been against guns either for sport or protection. Increasingly, my stance has been difficult for me to square with the lunacy I hear coming from the far right on the subject. And when I see their hair trigger (sorry) reactions to any notion of "gun control," I find my instinctive defense (sorry) of their position harder to justify. Wayne LaPierre comes off as such an unreasonable douche, I find myself identifying much more with the counterargument.

Why must this be so? Why is there such hyper-defensiveness about the 2nd amendment? It isn't as though we don't regulate other devices, such as cars. And while it's true that car ownership isn't declared a "right" in the Constitution, it is also true that other Constitutional rights are subject to delineation, regulation and restriction. Check out this (much better written) article for an excellent deconstruction of the issue.

[Excerpt]

Driving, Drinking, Shooting

. . .So really, there's no comparison between cars and guns. Or guns and fatty foods, or guns and alcohol. There's no comparison at all. Because gun ownership is a right. . .

So, when it comes to regulating gun ownership, if anyone suggests that we should require the kind of safety, training, and personal responsibility that we demand of anyone getting behind the wheel of a car, we can say... Absolutely. Why not? . . .

Read more at: DailyKos

Gun Deaths in US Top 100 After Sandy Hook

This list was so long, I had to take two screen shots,
and stitch them together. Image from Huffington Post.
(Click to embiggen)

I keep saying that I didn't used to be particularly "anti gun." But I'm getting there.

[Excerpt]

U.S. Shooting Deaths Since Sandy Hook Top 100 

The night after Sandy Hook, a gunman pulled behind a car in Kansas City's east side and opened fire, striking 4-year-old Aydan Perea in the head. The boy had just gotten into his father's car.

“He was innocent and he was just lifeless,” said the first bystander to reach Aydan. “All my life I’ve never seen nothing so devastating. I’m unable to eat, I’m unable to sleep because I see this baby in my head. . ."



Read more at: Huffington Post

NRA Blames Movies, Video Games, Culture for Mass Shootings

Though I'm known as a liberal, loony, lefty, moon bat. . .the truth is, I used to be a Republican. I won't lie to you and say I was an arch conservative, but I voted for Reagan (1984) and Bush I (in 1988). And though my conservatism wasn't deep, it took me a long while after 1992 (when I voted for Clinton, after the hatefest RNC that year) before I officially became a Democrat.  And in the eight years or so since I officially switched, I've still held on to a few conservative "values":

- English as the default language
- Not anti- but not pro-union
- Gun rights

The older I get, the more neutral I've gotten on even those issues, and as we progress into the Obama era, I'm finding myself losing my Switzerland status on every last conservative issue. I find it impossible to hold on to values that are espoused by jackasses and idiots. It becomes increasingly clear--when you see the people who hold such values, and the meanness with which they present them--that I do not want to align myself with such individuals, even if I have a modicum of sympathy for their ideals. [Story continues below]

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Such is the case with the National Rifle Association. It has become clear that they are less about pro-2nd amendment rights for citizens, and more about unfettered sales opportunities for gun manufacturers.  The NRA was silent on our most recent shooting spree (before today in Pennsylvania, anyway) until Friday. Spokesman Wayne LaPierre finally gave a press conference (with no questions from the press, of course), a ridiculous laundry list of everything that was to blame. . .except for guns. He listed video games and movies from a generation ago, for crying out loud. American Psycho, for instance, is from 2000, and Natural Born Killers from freakin' 1994. The Newtown killer was born in 1992, dumbass!

So, the deeper we get into this, the more I'm on board with guns being on the table as we look for solutions to this problem. The retorts that a) guns don't kill people, people kill people*; b) gun laws only take the guns out of the hands of law abiding citizens; c) more guns are needed to protect us against guns; d) you can't fix this problem, don't even try all sound rather hollow and somewhat paranoid and whiny to me now. I've actually heard that access to guns is a "God given right" in recent days! Really! Chapter and verse, please?

[Excerpt]

NRA blames media, music and more for culture of violence

National Rifle Association executive vice president Wayne LaPierre blamed Hollywood, video games music, the courts and more on Friday for creating a culture of violence in the United States. “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” he said at a Washington press event, adding, “With all the money in the federal budget can’t we afford to put a police officer in every single school? . . .”

Read more at: NBC News


*Incidentally, every time I hear "Guns don't kill people, people kill people!", I think, "No, bullets kill people!"

In Case You Missed It: Joe Scarborough on Guns

Joe Scarborough was a US Congressman for four terms before he was a cable news personality. He was one of the NRA's favorite members of Congress at the time. He's changed his mind. Check it out.