BTW, we reached out to ALL 31 pro-gun rights Sens in the new Congress to invite them to share their views on @meetthepress - NO takers.Here is more from Politicususa:
— Betsy Fischer Martin (@BetsyMTP) December 16, 2012
David Gregory also addressed the no-show, saying, “A note here this morning. We reached out to all 31 pro-gun rights senators in the new congress to invite them on the program to share their views on the subject this morning. We had no takers.”
If you have a real argument to make for gun rights extending to assault weapons, why wouldn’t you make it now? They make their arguments all year long, but suddenly, in the wake of the results of those arguments, they refuse to appear on TV to discuss.
This should highlight the fact that the pro-gun arguments crafted by the NRA and Republican strategists do not hold up when brought to stand next to the results of the arguments. Yes, this is a sensitive time, but if you’re going to argue for assault weapons to stay legal, you need to be able to do it now.
You know I don't think i could say it any better than my good friend Sarah Jones just did.
I was watching MTP yesterday and heard David Gregory make that remark, and my first response was to snort derisively "Of course!"
Here's the part that blisters my ass. If you had asked these same Senators to show up and discuss Roe VS Wade their mad rush to the studio would have caused traffic jams,
But ask them to defend their conservative positions when actual CHILDREN, not just fetuses, are involved, and suddenly you can't get even ONE of them on the phone.
That's because the Right Wing ONLY cares about unborn children, but once they are born, well they better hurry up and arm themselves, because freedom means that sometimes you may be expected to return fire.
It was a similar thing for Face the Nation. Bob Schieffer said on air Dec. 16, 2012 that the NRA was contacted, but declined to appear for the discussion on Sunday's show. Typical loud-mouthed sniveling cowards. Gee, it felt good to say that here.
ReplyDeleteJust discovered the entire transcript of the December 16, 2012 Face the Nation is online. ""Face the Nation" transcripts December 16, 2012: Newtown tragedy" Well worth reading.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cbsnews.com/8301-3460_162-57559465/face-the-nation-transcripts-december-16-2012-newtown-tragedy/
Here are the reasons why they have held their tongues, I found this on a raw Story post:
ReplyDeleteI already wrote about this in another thread, but I'll sum it up here. This case in particular is going to be a hard one for the NRA to come to terms with because:
1) Louie Gomert's argument is obscenity on steroids and takes the "if only somebody were armed" defense -- previously the standard knee-jerk talking point -- to its furthest logical extreme, reducing it to absurdity in the process. You could just hear the NRA lobbyists cringing at the image of a armed, terrified principal in a crossfire-spewing kindergarten shootout with a determined assailant in a bulletproof vest with multiple ammo clips.
2) The victims were white, privileged and between six and seven years old, making any sort of implicit disparagement or criticism of their behavior impossible, while guaranteeing the kind of riveted national heartbreak that only that sort of victim is capable of provoking.
3) Mom was independently wealthy and divorced three years ago, which nullifies the "single mom" argument and also the argument that other social factors are to blame.
4) Mom was not only a gun enthusiast and assault weapons collector, but also an anti-government survivalist, which makes her ideology uncomfortably close to many members of the NRA. She also tried to home school her son. So the very kind of household that the GOP would consider ideal -- wealthy, skeptical of government, pro gun, perhaps also religious (don't know about that one yet) -- incubated the tragedy.
5) The guns were all duly registered, so the "we should enforce the existing gun laws" argument is rendered useless.
6) The main weapon was a Bushmaster assault rifle with large-size clips, similar to ones used in Iraq and Afghanistan, and their legality points directly to why it was wrong to let the assault weapons ban expire.
7) While the son had emotional problems, the argument that this is really a mental health issue is weakened by the abundant resources the family had to provide Adam with the counseling he no doubt needed. The family simply chose not to do so. This once again weakens any potential "bad environment" arguments that could be used to deflect.
It's just not a very good time right now to be an NRA lobbyist. Let's hope this persists.
Very good points.
DeleteA FB "friend" pointed out to me that "of course none of them would go on the Sunday shows, the liberal media is just exploiting all of this to make money".
If anything needs to be exploited, this does.
THE NRA and the gunmakers have the GOP by the balls, that's for sure. Today will be interesting, as self-appointed King Rick Snyder has SB 59 on his desk. That bill will allow concealed carry in MI schools, libraries, parks..anywhere that is currently a no-carry zone. Of course, those people with guns would need a special permit, etc etc etc, but they have taken away the responsibility for issuing that from the counties, and given it to the Sec. of State. How special. Are they really trying to drive us all OUT of MI schools and parks? Do they figure if enougn sane people leave this once-beautiful state, the remaining jobs will go to the morons who wil always vote GOP no matter how insane they act? Or does ALEC (who wrote the bill) plan to host regular 'high noon; events, where people bring their guns and shoot at each other, you know, just for fun? If Snyder wants to continue in his job past New Year's, he'd better have spent the weekend figuring out how to tell ALEC NO! But I think he's a coward as well.
ReplyDeleteWhy would anyone even want to take a gun to a library or a school or anywhere for that matter? Until we get realistic in this country and give up our love of firearms, people who are going to trot around everywhere with their guns should have to have them in plain view, unloaded and padlocked into day- and night-glow holsters. That way those of us who are sane will know whom we want to avoid at all costs.
DeleteBeaglemom
There's an additional love that's involved here, in addition to the love of firearms. And that's the love of fear, pure and simple. Because it just 'feels so good' and provides such a rush to the adrenals of the people who unconsciously use it as their high. As does hate, I might add. On an unspoken level, they seem to be saying: "I'm afraid, really afraid . . . . And I want YOU to play 'be afraid' with me. In fact, I insist (and will do everything in my power to manipulate) that you play 'be really afraid' WITH me." Seriously, we have a huge group of mostly all white, almost exclusively male, people who are scared-witness sissies and ninnies, and who think that guns are just the solution to all their unspoken (and undealt-with) fears. It's just that simple. They ALL need 'head work', not just the ones who appear to be more obviously mentally ill.
DeleteHow many children
ReplyDeletedo these NRA-bought Republican Congressmen need
to see killed
to see the light?
One.
Of their own?
Right-wing conservative theory of total non-regulation of banks, of big-business, of guns
ReplyDelete-- similar to Marxism, works perfectly -- on paper.
But neither philosophy works in actual practice.
Bullies and cowards, they go hand in hand.
ReplyDeleteAnd by the way...
ReplyDeleteThis nonsense being spewed around Fox News and elsewhere about how video games show the use of assault weapons and that's why people use assault weapons in real life..."
is bullshit!
That's totally ass-backwards...
The folks that make the video games put assault weapons in them because the bad guys use assault weapons in real-life! NOT the other way around.
SHEESH
...idiots
We must, as a nation, decide that this is our moment. We must commit to seeing it through all the way. All of our pent up emotion must be tapped, not only for rage about gun laws, but to create a long-term paradigm shift.
ReplyDeleteJust as with the election, the change we want won’t come easily. It won’t come tomorrow. The results won’t come next year even. But the dawn of change could be just around the corner. We have to stay engaged until the results are manifested. We’ll be fighting against one of the biggest lobby groups out there. Our humanity is on the line.
We have to be vigilant. That means that in this process, we don’t buy into the corporate water carried by dark money and clever Republican propagandists, who seem to be able to fool at least half of the sane people in this country when they really set their mind to it.
http://www.politicususa.com/hope-collective-grief-beginning-paradigm-shift.html
Geraldo's (on Fox) solution to random crazy shooters is to have one armed employee at every school, who has been trained to use a weapon, per the show last night on Fox.
ReplyDeleteIt's easy to find solutions after the fact, but these guys just will not talk about a 'real' solution, which wouldn't require a school principal or a school janitor to conceal a weapon, in case of an incident. The real solution is to ban these weapons and to charge family members with criminal charges if their weapons get in the wrong hands.
Overseas, when suicide bombers go into a busy civilian area and trigger their bombs, and people die, they know there won't be any punishment for their crimes. Besides the tragedy to the dead, the other tragedy is that no one can be held responsible. The one who perpetrates the act kills himself. For the families, there is no sense of closure for their family members death, and no one can try to understand what was behind the insidious crime. The same applies here; no one will ever know why this young man did what he did. And, so we'll always speculate.
But the one thing that would end all, if not at least some carnage, is to ban any automatic weapons and re-evaluate the whole gun-craze in this society. These senators sit back in the shadows and know this is true, but power is more important to them than innocent children. The light has been shed on them and the truth is revealed to who and what they really are.
The boy, I’ll call him Dylan, had run a few steps in front of his family as they strolled down a Bronx sidewalk one early evening in late November, a couple days before Thanksgiving. It was a few short blocks to Dylan’s grandmother’s house, but as Dylan reached the intersection, he walked directly into the crossfire of a gunfight. A bullet hit him square in the back. He was 5 years old.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/12/17/doctor-describes-the-reality-when-a-child-is-shot.html
I Could Have Been Adam Lanza - An Open Letter to the World
ReplyDeletehttp://operationincreasequalityoflife.blogspot.com/2012/12/i-could-have-been-adam-lanza-open.html
I'm not at all surprised that none of the pro-gun legislators would go on Sunday morning talk shows. The NRA and GOP strategists haven't had enough time to prepare talking points for all of them to use. None of the elected officials that vote pro-gun have minds of their own. They just want to make sure they will have continued monetary support for their next campaign to retain their positions in Congress. When they do start to "speak out", you can be sure they will all be using identical talking points.
ReplyDeleteAnother Day, More Deaths: Two Police Officers Shot And Killed In Kansas... Three-Year-Old Dies In Accidental Shooting... Gunman At Large After Shooting Victim 4 Times... Man Shoots Wife, Keeps Cops In Stand-Off For Hours... One Person Shot In San Antonio, Gunman Later Shot By Cops... Woman Shot At Campground... Woman Shot To Death, Son 'Thought She Was Sleeping'
ReplyDeletehttp://newsok.com/3-year-old-dies-after-accidental-shooting-near-guthrie/article/3738015
http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2012/12/morning_review_woman_found_sho.html
http://fox13now.com/2012/12/16/roy-man-shoots-wife-keeps-police-in-stand-off-for-2-hours-2/
http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/2012/dec/16/woman-shot-bradley-campground/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/17/jeff-atherly-david-gogian_n_2315107.html
http://detroit.cbslocal.com/2012/12/16/man-shoots-victim-4-times-then-heads-to-dialysis-appointment/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/17/gun-control-sandy-hook_n_2315304.html
The 20 children and six adults gunned down at Sandy Hook Elementary School included a boisterous 6-year-old who liked to think up pranks and a school psychologist who rushed in when help was needed. Here are brief portraits, in the memories of friends and family, of some of those killed.
ReplyDeletehttp://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424127887324481204578181244231543014-lMyQjAxMTAyMDEwNjExNDYyWj.html?mod=wsj_valettop_email
Did you see this? Victoria Jackson is probably the only conservative woman worse than Palin (as long as the latter stays out of office and without influence).
ReplyDeletehttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/14/victoria-jackson-connecticut-school-shooting_n_2303518.html
But if you listen carefully to what he’s saying, he’s still making the same argument: That “morality” is strict adherence to a fundamentalist-defined Biblical law, and his god is punishing us for not doing that by killing children. There’s no other way to understand the claim that we’ve “given up” having morality. He believes there is only one morality, and that’s strict adherence to his definition of Biblical law. We have plenty of moral laws in this country that have nothing to do with his narrow version of morality. For instance, many of us think it’s morally wrong to exploit the deaths of schoolchildren to push your faith that you chose largely because it justifies your misogyny, which is what Huckabee did.
ReplyDeleteAnd make no mistake: Huckabee is specifically thinking of women’s rights when he’s thinking of the “immorality” that brings his god’s vengeance in the form of an angry young man shooting up a school. This isn’t speculation; he specifically singled out the sale of contraception (which he calls “abortion”, but we now he’s talking about contraception because abortion pills are not sold in pharmacies) as the sin that offends God so much he has to send murderers to kill children:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/12/17/huckabee-doubles-down-blaming-contraception-now-for-sandy-hook-massacre/
Gun Control Legislation From Frank Lautenberg Would Ban High-Capacity Magazines Post-Sandy Hook
ReplyDeleteSen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) will introduce legislation in the next Congress to ban the sale of high-capacity magazines, his office told The Huffington Post on Monday.
A longtime advocate for gun control legislation, the New Jersey Democrat has pushed similar bills in the past, most notably following the shooting of former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and others in Tucson in 2010. They have failed to gather the necessary support to become law, though Lautenberg's office, like others on the Hill, feels that the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School on Friday has altered the political dynamics of the debate.
The legislation would simply reintroduce the prohibition of high-capacity magazines that existed under the federal Assault Weapons Ban from 1994 to 2004. In Tucson, the shooter Jared Loughner was able to fire 30-plus shots without having to reload. During the shooting at a movie theater in Aurora, Colo., the alleged shooter reportedly had a 100-round magazine drum. At Sandy Hook Elementary School, the alleged shooter also had high-capacity magazines.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/17/gun-control-legislation-frank-lautenberg_n_2315618.html
Could someone please define "assault weapon" for me?
ReplyDeleteWhat's the difference between these and all the semi-automatic hunting rifles (which are commonly owned) other than the shape of the stock?
I understand the NRA has shelved the Christmas campaign to encourage the gift giving of rocket launchers.
ReplyDelete