We are coming for your guns.
And you can do nothing to stop us. For if you do, you will be rightly and justly characterized as the defenders of the murder of children. You will accept common sense regulations, limitations and restrictions on your oh so precious right to bear arms. And you will do so without complaint, just as you have been mostly silent over the last few days. And we all know you have been silent because you have nothing to say. You can’t defend this. You cannot defend yourselves. Really, your silence is an admission of guilt. You, and we, saw this coming. Really, you had to know, eventually, our most vulnerable would fall prey. It was only a matter of time.
And now that time is here.
Take a cue from a fellow NRA 100% approved Conservative Republican, and follow his lead.
While Joe Scarborough and I are ideological and partisan opposites, his righteous anger matches mine. And as a liberal, I take his warning to heart that there is no quick and easy solution that might have prevented this tragedy, or might have prevented this tragedy. But there are easy first steps, and complexity is never an excuse for inaction, and inaction and protecting the status quo makes us all cowards, if not complicit in the next massacre.
So that first step, we are banning semi automatic assault weapons. We are reinstating that ban that you gun fetishists let expire in 2004 when you were in complete control of the government. Then we are banning high capacity magazines.
The only possible use for both is to kill as many people as possible as quickly as possible. You don’t use them for hunting or for self defense, and if you do, you are a fucking idiot so mentally incompetent that it is, or should be, illegal for you to own a gun in the first place.
Which leads me to the next step. You have been to your last gun show. Gun shows are banned. Only licensed dealers will be allowed to sell guns and hunting rifles from now on. And before you buy a gun or a rifle, you will be subjected to a 7 day waiting period while a full 50 state and federal mental health and criminal background check is completed. If you have just one single warrant on your record, let alone a conviction for anything, then you are forbidden from ever buying or owning a gun for life. Yes, for life. Maybe that will persuade you to live a non-criminal life.
Next, federal law on the gun issue will trump all state laws. If a state has a more lenient law (i.e. Florida and most of the South), those laws will be nullified in favor of these new federal restrictions.
Next step, anyone caught with an illegally purchased gun or a banned gun is sentenced to life in prison, or permanent deportation from the United States. Your choice.
And now we will turn to public funding for mental illness treatment. President Ronald Reagan, upon taking office in the early 1980’s, drastically cut funding to state mental hospitals and institutions, causing many to close, and putting their patients on the streets. We are going to reestablish mental hospitals and institutions where those who are a danger to others or themselves due to a mental illness can seek treatment or, at the very least, be kept secure so that they do not harm others. It is no accident that crime and homelessness skyrocketed when Reagan closed these facilities. Perhaps with renewed funding of mental health treatment and treatment centers, with commitment of the most dangerously mentally ill, those with mental illness will no longer be a danger to others, and with these new gun restrictions, and new background checks, they will not be able to kill 20 first graders again.
You know, gun fetishists like NRA Executive Director Wayne LaPierre screamed loudly, with no evidence mind you, that Barack Obama had a secret plan to take your guns. He didn’t. He still doesn’t really. In fact, the only ones who had a secret plan to take your guns were people like you. Yes, that’s right. People like you gun lovers who decried any and all restrictions on your absolute Second Amendment right to own whatever weapon you pleased in any amount possible. You made it impossible to prevent tragedies like Columbine, Tuscon, Aurora, Oregon and Sandy Hook. And in making it impossible, you made it possible for a monster to take a military machine gun, a gun that not even armies of small nations possess, and use it to tear apart the bodies of first graders with 3 to 11 bullet wounds per child.
You had to know this would eventually happen. You had to know that one day, your fervent opposition to any gun control at all would eventually lead to a tragedy like this. You feared it. Because you knew that once it happened it would turn public opinion violently against you. And yet you refused common sense gun control. And now 20 babies are dead, so torn apart by a machine gun that they all have to have closed caskets.
Do you really think we are going to do nothing now?
So yes, you were the ones with the “plan” to take your guns, because of what you allowed to happen, we will now be taking your semi automatic assault weapons from you. Since we know these guns are more precious to you than your own family, we will allow you a moment to kiss them goodbye, a pleasure denied to the mothers and fathers in Sandy Hook.
And if you so much as put up a whiff of a complaint about this, then we will go farther. I am told that conservatives interpret the Constitution not a living document, but a dead one etched in stone and unchangeable through time and change in society. And I am told conservatives interpret its passages through the Framer’s knowledge and intentions at the time the constitutional provision or amendment was written. It is that principle that provides conservatives the legal basis to change privacy rights, since there is no explicit words “right to privacy” in the constitution, yet alone references to reproductive freedom, etc. Using that constitutional interpretation, and looking at the Framer’s intentions, the Second Amendment might not mean what you think it means. At the very least, we might be able to restrict your right to bear arms to only the arms then existing at the time of the ratification of the Bill of Rights. Yes, you can have all the muskets you want, but nothing else.
That is, if you complain about the common sense restrictions on the weapons of mass destruction known as the Bushmaster .223 assault rifle and other military style assault weapons like it.
Funding mental health treatment, YES. Funding treatment through renewed funding for institutions, no. The closing of mental health hospitals didn’t just come from a perceived demand for smaller government, it was also from advocates who rejected the idea that institutions are the only way to treat someone. People were being warehoused. Unfortunately the funding was simply cut, rather than redirected into community treatment- outpatient clinics, outpatient commitment, supported living, better payments to providers to make it worth the considerable investment in training psychiatry requires, etc. The law is very clear that government cannot keep people who have committed no crime locked up if they can be and want to be safely served in the community. A complete spectrum of those options, from early symptoms to full-onset illness, must be realized. Hospitals must be available for mental health in the way they are provided for physical health- when there is no other safer or healthier option. But they cannot be the only option.
And while we’re at it, ending the stigmatization of mental illness (“nutjobs”, “crazies”, “psychos”), respecting those who need and seek help, and learning to recognize symptoms will also go a long way toward getting people the treatment they need.
And if someone cannot be helped, or someone who will not stay on his or her meds, what then? Committment has to be one of your options. Sorry, sometimes dangerous people do need to be locked away.
That’s why I said the full spectrum-hospitals for when there is no safer or healthier option (options we should always be looking at strengthening) to keep someone from being a danger to themselves or others with at least as robust a due process system as if they were locked up for committing a crime.
And very often you don’t know how dangerous someone is until they actually break. Reminder that Jared Loughner did not get his diagnosis until after he was in jail.
Maybe we should also take a look at the influence of certain cultural aspects that add to the frequency of these horrible shootings. Take for instance the gratuitous violence in video games and other entertainment mediums. Kids get their jollies from killing everything in sight in these ultra realistic looking games. You also have people like ass clown Qwentin Tarantino who gets his jollies killing little kids in his movies. Combine these sort of things with the rampant over prescribing of psychotropic drugs and some shitty parenting and you have a recipe for things that aren’t good.
Sure we need gun regulations, but to just ignore other aspects that contribute to these horrendous acts falls short of a solution to the problem.
One of the cultural influences we need to take a hard look at is a society that values its guns more than it does its children. And how it is that citizens of the United States of America can be so very easily motivated by manufactured fear.
Jared Loughner was diagnosed well before his act. The University health system was excoriated fof its behavior. The system across the country for adjudicating “danger to self or others” is all over the place and needs to be standardized.
Last time I checked people in europe, canada, and around the world watched our movies and played our video games.
Hell someone I know taught english in France and the ONLY reason one of his high school students was taking the class was because he wanted to be able to watch Prison Break without subtitles.
When I think of America’s greatest cultural exports, I think, ‘Prison Break’.
The Aurora shooter was diagnosed by his University’s system, however, Jared Loughner is not the Aurora shooter.
I agree with you about banning assault weapons. There should be a thorough background check for all guns, even hunting rifles. For non–hunting guns (handguns included) there should be a criminal background check as well as a mandatory psych evaluation. If that means someone has to wait months before they get a gun, oh well. Tough shit. A license to carry a gun should have to be renewed every few years complete with background checks and psych evaluations. I disagree that warrant alone should exclude someone from gun ownership since warrants can be filed in error (happened to me) and a warrant isn’t a disposition of guilt.
I really, REALLY like the idea of mandatory psych evals and background checks for all gun purchases with required renewal periods. There are nations around the world who impose these regulations/restrictions on those who wish to own firearms. I don’t see why we can’t do that here. It doesn’t infringe on the right to own guns so everyone hiding behind the 2nd amendment may safely remain hidden there.
My brother is mentally ill and has been for years,I’d like nothing better than that he be “locked away” for his own good. The truth is that unless your homicidal or suicidal they turn you back to the street. When I went to clean up where he lived I found guns, ammo and a bunch of NRA literature. At this point he’s crossed the line and may well be in the custody of the state, I say maybe as they won’t confirm where he is. I’d like nothing better than to see effective gun control in America and the power of the NRA smashed, but I’d also like to see the return of days past when people who are a potential danger to themselves are kept safely away from the rest of us.
See Open Thread post.
Make sure you get Joe biden in for evaluation, then we can look for a compatant vp.
Gun control is just the face of an oppressive government. we need to deal with the root of violence which is as Dr. Glasser put it is a public mental health issue of unhappiness. This attempt to not waste a tragedy will put the gun control folks back another decade in the wilderness. No law proposed would have prevented this tragedy. It is yet another distraction from what we need, a public mental health strategy and a renewal of faith. The first is a governmental mindset change. The second of course has little to do with government except it getting out of the way and stop discriminating against people of faith in the public sphere and with program funding.
The real problem is that we do not teach relationship building and the power of individual choice over one’s life. When we do focus on mental health, we instead focus on mental illness not mental wellness. Even in the few cases of real mental illness, we seem intent on pushing them out on to the streets. People like this mom couldn’t get the help she needed and innocent people paid for it.
We do not need to reduce liberty. We need to look out for our fellow man.
The answer to David, is A) Eliminate every single gun. B) Focus on fixing mental health. C) Pray a prayer of Thanksgiving for finally putting a dent in the problem…
No matter how much praying you do. If the mental patient had access to NO guns, a lot less funerals would be taking place this week.
In otherwords, to believe David’s argument, one must accept the premise that “fairness” being applied to him triumphs the lives of 20 cute, adorable 6 year olds.
“No law proposed would have prevented this tragedy.” Simply not true, but saying it over and over again has worked well for the NRA and their blood covered lackeys.
And how ironic is it to hear an elected official call the government tyrannical? What a piece of work.
The problem with the proposed gun control (large clips, semi-automatic) legislation is that it’s just window dressing.
Over 90% of all gun deaths in the US are family and friends of the gun owner, and these people are NOT being killed by exotic weapons.
Getting rid of all large gun clips and semi-automatic weapons will scarcely make a dent in the problem. It won’t save the vast majority of those who suffer and die quietly, ignored by the press and passing largely unnoticed by the rest of us.
True, but it does address the mass murders. Addressing overall gun crime will require different responses. In addition to gun-specific laws, the best thing we can do is create a broadly shared prosperity. Look at each situation that might make a man (or woman) reach the end of their rope, and see what can be done to stop forcing people down those ropes, or to help them once they are there.
People supporting a gun ban must be a special kind of stupid. Criminals don’t obey laws. By banning guns, all you’re doing is leaving law-abiding citizens vulnerable to the bad guys. If school officials were allowed to carry guns, this recent tragedy would most likely not have happened. Guns don’t kill people, people do. Why don’t you ban cars, since more drunk drivers kill people with them than guns kill people? But I suppose that if you ban guns, the criminals won’t obtain them because they love to obey the law. Maybe we should make cocaine and heroine illegal as well. Marijuana is illegal, and you bleeding-heart liberals seem to have no problem getting your entitlement-grubbing hands on that whenever you can.
Speaking of stupid:
People supporting a gun ban must be a special kind of stupid. Criminals don’t obey laws.
The assault rifle ban is a manufacturing ban. If a gun maker decides to break the law and manufacture assault rifles they will be quickly identified and shut down.
It remains to be seen how possession of existing ARs will be dealt with in the law. The 1990s ban let you keep existing assault rifles:
There are an estimated 270,000,000 guns in the US. Similar to the argument of trying to deport those who are in this country illegally, there is no way to eliminate all guns. It’s just not possible. The focus must be on nonproliferation, high capacity magazines, registration of all firearms, closing all loopholes in selling without a background check and eliminating access to weapons to those who fit a profile that suggests they have difficulty coping with life. This last one is the most troubling in context of civil liberties because it requires limiting the rights of someone based on a profile, which is essentially the same as stereotyping. Additionally, it could result in those who have a need to forego getting help because there are real consequences and if you limit their civil liberties in one thing, what’s to stop you from expanding it as you perceive the need?
If spouting empty-headed cliches was a sport – we’d have discovered a potential champion.
He’d be competing against this guy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68xSoecsoq0
“By banning guns, all you’re doing is leaving law-abiding citizens vulnerable to the bad guys.”
Sounds logical, but that’s not what happened in Australia. Look it up.
“If school officials were allowed to carry guns, this recent tragedy would most likely not have happened.”
But lots of other tragedies most likely would happen instead.
“Guns don’t kill people, people do.”
And people with guns kill the most, because that’s what guns are for.
“Why don’t you ban cars, since more drunk drivers kill people with them than guns kill people?”
Because unlike guns, cars are not designed to kill people. If I were going to ban something, I’d ban morons, which would put you in a lot of trouble. BTW, guns now kill more people than vehicles do in 10 of the 50 states. Why? Because we have put many, many restrictions on auto makers to make their product safer.
“But I suppose that if you ban guns, the criminals won’t obtain them because they love to obey the law.”
The largest group of people killed by gunshots each year are the owners of the guns that kill them — they are suicides. When Australia enacted its new gun laws in 1996, suicides dropped 65%.
“Marijuana is illegal, and you bleeding-heart liberals seem to have no problem getting your entitlement-grubbing hands on that whenever you can.”
Which explains our lapses in judgment. What can we blame for yours?
I choose life; I don’t own a gun, I oppose the death penalty, and I support universal healthcare.
Conservatives have some weird hippy ideas about gun freedoms being more important than safe schools. They are soft on massacres.
ATTENTION ‘LAWMAKERS’:
Who exactly are they, who have enabled the un regulated proliferation of WMDs?
Just because the elections over, it’s not time to forget the tea party 2%ers, gun wars, oil wars and all things republican, greedy and politically corrupt.
Along with guns, fossil fuels would be on top of the list of deadly things republicans lie about – to promote.
And if there were a list of things republicans have no interest in(besides 47%) it would include any number of conditions of public health, public safety and public welfare for others. ‘Others’ don’t deserve the same Rights, and somehow, it’s OK that other people’s children live with flying bullets. Some may want to believe, guns, pristine living areas, gates, alarms, cameras, security systems, will provide what republican children need; and that ‘their’ children will flourish ‘outside’ of what is the declining American condition, dictated by the wealthy interests to their politicians.
One should never start believing what republicans or the NRA say. Republicans are still the tea party of deniers (liars) and obstructionists. Republicans haven’t suddenly changed there ways. Never trust a republican. That much hasn’t changed.
WMDs are the loose, uncontrolled factor in the mass murder equation. Any unregistered John Q psych can buy guns ..or get a hold of someone else’s. Innocents are continually being shot but the point the media made over and over is, what an upscale, lovely community the Connecticut town is. Was, it is a different place today.Towns from one end of Delaware to the other, are a different place. Around the nation, hundreds if not thousands of children must make their way passed ‘armed’ drug corners and sometimes flying bullets. And be real, thousands of people won’t even drive passed certain areas; since the latest threat became stray flying bullets. Or consider that one’s stressed suburban neighbor may have a weapon of mass destruction, on his dresser. While at the end of the day, the more fortunate are picked up, driven to god’s country, down the private and ‘private security patrolled’ roadways, into the stone garages of chateau country, into nanny’s paid care. Others make do in various conditions of suburbia, where children now rarely come out to play and must be guarded every moment, from what is now ‘America.’
Parents ‘adapt’ to unsafe conditions for their kids. ‘Adapt’ is a world a fossil fuel CEO has used, Americans must ‘adapt’ to climate changes, rather than reduce the WMD CO2, to bring the levels down for a safer future for kids.Adapt to the damages.. Predators walk the streets, while children are locked up inside. Adapt. So parents ‘adapt’ to worsening child safety conditions permitted by lawmakers; taxi-ing their child to play dates, the pool, Y, classes, theater, or practice. Parents line up outside schools across Delaware, their gas engines running, their hearts lifted as their darling steps out the school door to be shuttled to his front door. Except, except.. who’s monitoring the daily disposition of the bus driver, one might ask? Or the soccer dad cursing the coach; the browser at public library, the armed guy at the theater? No one; of course it’s impossible. The latch key boy,whose exercise recreation and world is to shut himself in his room, sits at his computer until someone shows up. Haven forbid, he should come out to play.
A previous generation grew up when there were zero fears of gunmen, when kids could safely walk from schools and many places, and they played safely in their neighborhoods and even in parks with other kids. (Had to mention that going outdoors, ‘used’ to be daily, safe fun and exercise; just as the present generation will have to tell their kids, what a ‘normal’ climate was.)
When thinking of republicans and their monied supporters, one must always consider climate change as another deadly thing republican politicians lie about. . Another thing republicans choose to ignore, is that war zone style weaponry and clips are made for slaughtering many humans in seconds with extreme deadly force. No other reason.
What are the lawmakers’ level of ‘security,’ one might ask? How about the public theaters, malls, ferries, stadiums, streets?
An Unstable Personality (whether sudden or ongoing,) and a WMD, can result in Mass Slaughter. UP + WMD = MS.
The WMDs need to be eliminated from the above equation. 40% of guns are sold without background checks.The illegal ones, who knows the numbers.? WMDs equals social chaos as you are seeing; just as anthropogenic CO2, equals climate chaos, which we’re also seeing. Everyone knows the truth .. guns kill, climate change kills. Special interests are the liars who want to sell more WMDs, whether it’s weaponry or fossil fuel/CO2. Legislators know what’s true, but legislate to suit special interest lies, to improve special interests’ bottom lines. To hell with the public.
The latest incident only underscores, that people need to be monitored more than ever, WMDs need to be removed from our mist by our ‘lawmakers.’
The public now says, keep tabs on the known mentally ill. That should be done anyway, and the reality is, some mental states are sudden onset, . But just as important, keep tabs on republican liars The liars must be exposed and held accountable for damages, as should anyone who harms children and their futures with their products. Manufactures can recall a car seat, cans of peas; they can recall WMDs. First on list , those sold with zero background checks and those of war zone extreme damages.
See that all legal fire arms are covered by insurance for the damages they could potentially cause. Just as a driver must have a set amount of liability coverage. If a gun owner won’t pay to cover insurance? – then he/she can’t own a gun. Also insurance requirement is good way to tract guns, – vin number, registered, updated registration fees, tags, insurance coverage and cards to prove it, updated background check.plus current mental check up. (Ins. companies do a good job of tracking.) Want to buy ammo? Ammo must match registered gun only.
Legislators don’t want John Q Psych with guns, loose in their buildings? Well neither does the public.
Did that very mother believe “guns don’t kill, people kill” or did she believe, people don’t kill, guns kill? No difference. The wrong person and a WMD = mass slaughter. The government can’t monitor the day to day relationships of every mother/son, scorned lover, fired employee or the hate filled. But the government must do everything it can, to protect every citizen from unregistered guns, unqualified owners, uninsured weapons and WMDS that don’t belong in society.
And then there is the question of “too much” destructive capabilities, the shots per clip, the destructive power, that’s not even being discussed. Are bombs allowed? No. Then what about a person with military style weapons and endless clips used in war zones, to maim and kill with MAXIMUM damages, such as used on the children. (For example, today all large magazines are being bought up. This shouldn’t be happening.)
Background searches won’t solve the terrorist problem. They’re a history.
No government agent,(counselor, therapist) can always detect (the unknown human variable in the equation –
Unstable Personality + WMD = Mass Slaughter.
Is an unstable personality with a murder plan, going to call a therapist to talk about his plan? No.
There is no reason war weapons should even be allowed in society.
The public should examine the security the public provides for lawmakers, at ‘our’ halls of government.. Are WMDs banned where politicians gather? One guesses, they are. Are lawmakers, using the same efforts used to protect themselves to protect the public? No, one would guess the ‘lawmakers’ are better protected. Correct me if wrong.
If the above is the case, why are ‘lawless’ lawmakers, better protected than the citizenry?
And why is it current lack of laws protect the “Right” of just about any adult to own WMDs, instead of having laws that protect the public’s “Right” to live free from WMDs? Legislators please explain.
The solution may be easy.
Equality for legislators and citizens!
If legislators are sure ‘public spaces are safe enough from all war zone weaponry then – so is legislative hall.
Tear down the metal detectors legislators.
Let the public enter and walk freely about. No weapons check.
QUESTION:
Who exactly are the incompetents at their jobs, who have enabled the unrestricted proliferation of WMDs, and war weaponry to accelerate unchecked to terrorist capabilities of extreme physical damages and certain deaths, unregulated, unmonitored, unsearched and uninsured?
Special interests will keep denying and lying, while making their demands for WMDs known, but it is the negligent ‘lawmakers’ who are the irresponsible parties for the present ‘lawless’ environment.
Twenty, 5 and 6 years olds slaughtered, 7 adults – and ‘lawless’ politicians have made all too easy.
PS One more thing. Why is it gun lawless addvocates always suggest, the good citizens won’t be able to defend themselves, when gun lawlessness further encourages criminal types to easily have more weapons to attack good citizens with?
“Why is it gun lawless addvocates always suggest, the good citizens won’t be able to defend themselves, when gun lawlessness further encourages criminal types to easily have more weapons to attack good citizens with?”
Because fear mongering is the only tool in their toolbox.
The NRA aims its message at cowards and fools.
I am a gun owner, have a concealed carry permit, am a Vietnam vet, and by the most awful coincidence was at a range when those beautiful children were being slaughtered. I have never understood why any civilian needed an assault rifle. Think about it. What does “assault” mean? My proposal is simple – an immediate ban on the manufacture and sale of assault weapons. Within two years, all owners of such weapons have to surrender them and they will be paid exactly what they paid for them. After that, you own one,you go to jail without passing go and collecting $200 for ten years (3650 days). Is that likely? Please. Increase regulations and put people in jail for serious time for violations. Require every shrink of whatever degree to turn in the names of anybody who is the slightest bit suspect. Privacy? Versus the lives of children? You vote. Full disclosure – my youngest granddaughter is the same age as many of those who were massacred.
“But I suppose that if you ban guns, the criminals won’t obtain them because they love to obey the law.”
Ever wonder where the criminals get their guns? If law abiding companies won’t sell the guns to them and neither do law abiding gun owners, just where are the guns coming from? Criminals don’t make their own guns do they?
If you come for the arms of free people, you will be rightly and justly characterized as tyrants.
You can take away Tyrant’s right to sound like an empty-headed, bump sticker quoting idiot when you pry it from his cold dead mouth.
Clichés don’t kill people, guns do.
I can see now that the absolute right to kill people with guns is going to be central to the GOP platform in 2 years.
Every single democratic country with sensible gun laws is ruled by tyrants.
Great post.
Here are clear facts:
1. The assault weapons ban will save lives. It will prohibit the sale or trade of high-capacity magazines which enable nutjobs to create massacres.
2. Putting armed people in schools will not only be dangerous and expensive,, but it may not work anyway. At Columbine, there was an armed police officer in the school, when the two boys walked in and started shooting.
All of us need to apply lots of pressure on our elected officials. Have you sent a letter to our federal delegation yet? Why not?
“The people who are attracted to the idea of volunteering to stand around all day with a gun at your third grader’s school probably shouldn’t be doing it.”
duncan black
True Jason. I would never allow my children to attend a school that has an armed “volunteer” roaming the halls.
There are a lot places where children gather other than schools; playgrounds, atheletic games, county fairs, malls and shopping centers.
The NRA’s next proposal will probably be to arm all the kids.
That is coming, Dave. They basically said… the only way for anyone to be safe in the USA is to be armed at all times.
The only way you are comming for our guns
is if its in a Civil War. Really thats what
will happen if you try to take away our
second amendment.
I have no problem with a civil war against rebellious and unrepentant child-murderers.
We absolutely have to close the gun show loophole, because gun shows are rapidly transforming into terrorist conventions.