How delightful to hear Jones and Baez sing those iconic civil rights songs together, passing on the torch from one generation to another. On the same plane? John Lewis must be smiling in heaven.
I grew up on Joan Baez’s music, protests etc. I’ve seen her in concert more than any other singer. It was great to see the videos on FB & T today. Maybe JL arranged it…good trouble!!!
We need to turn TN BLUE AS POSSIBLE. Hell I'd even settle for purple. Then maybe other Red states would fall into place. " HOPE is the last thing to die ".
I would be happy with purple. That is what we were until 2010. 4 out of 9 of our national reps were Democrats. We had a Democratic governor in the 2000’s. I want an end to gerrymandering and voter suppression nationwide. And yes, it needs to happen in blue states, too. It is an artificial state that leads to toxicity in the state, which we are seeing the manifestation of in Tennessee as the latest example.
I am so, so happy that this harsh light is shining on my state. I have been screaming for this to happen, but thinking it never would. This is the first step to governmental healing for my state. I pray now we take the next steps. But until we get national voting rights through, to deal with our district maps and voter suppression, I think the best we can see is inroads into margins by which the GOP wins by.
2024 will be seminal in terms of national voting rights. Dems have to take back the House and keep the Senate. In Wisconsin we are hoping to finally see some light regarding our extreme gerrymander. Dems and independents just want fair maps!
The current splitting up of Nashville's solid Democrat vote into minorities among 3 mainly Republican and rural constituent assemblies is a glaring example of ongoing gerrymandering. Republicans euphemize the elimination of Nashville as a Democratic electoral stronghold. 62% white, 27% African American.
Protecting the "Youth Vote" is nationally important as well. On Wisconsin ... Beau both at Eau Claire (up 232% since 2019) & Madison (up 240%). Thank you HCR for re-posting Victor Shi's Voters Tomorrow data to help focus voters in 2024. All ages --- vote in 2024.
This was more than just a start! Republican lawmakers at every level better recognize this as the alarm klaxon it was! We citizens have had ENOUGH of this nonsense and those who perpetrate it!
Those in the Tennessee Statehouse took advantage of the protest to punish members they don't like. Their little pizzing contest backfired big time. What would have been an invisible protest became front page national news! Tennessee is under the microscope in a way it never would have been. We are watching.
I am confident that the rash and racist move of the Tennessee House to eject Reps. Pearson and Jones marked the beginning of the end for the Racist Republican Party in that state. It won’t happen overnight, and Republicans will still win some fights, but the course is now set.
" THE FALL OF THE REPUBLICAN EMPIRE ". About damn time ! I'm sure that the Romans thought that their empire was the dog's bollocks, until it collapsed, & the " Holy " Roman Empire was a marginal improvement.
They'd have Gladiatorial games - Humanists, atheists, Jews, Hindus, Moslems, Latin Americans, gays, lesbians, Transsexuals, maybe Native Americans, any non - Evangelicals facing trained AMERICAN GLADIATORS or lions.
My eyes are still blurry from reading that last paragraph. The “coincidence” of Baez on same plane and then them singing together those particular songs sounds like a Hollywood ending...or Divine intervention. Alleluia!
As my wife since the 60s says, we need a new generation of protest songs. Of course, to go along with and add to our many great historical songs of protest.
What a joke. There are two forms of justice in America. One for Democrats and one for republicans. Enter a capitol building as a republican and you are terrorist, enter a capitol
as leftist and you are are beautiful and moral. Its disgraceful and people in America can see it everyday. There is different justice for Biden/Clinton then there is for Trump.
There is an America civil coming if the left thinks it can continue to criminalize politics.
As for Tennessee, I applaud the legislators kicking out the representatives.
I agree, James A! Joe Biden tried to coerce a foreign leader into finding dirt on a political opponent, paid off a porn star to hush up before an election, misled the FBI about classified documents in his possession, pushed a lie that an election had been stolen, incited an attempted coup - and he's walking around scot-free!
Those that entered the US Capitol on Jan 6 did so by force at a time when it was closed in order to disrupt the counting of the electoral vote. They were violent and attempted to obstruct an official proceeding. Hence why many are now in jail. The people who entered the TN Capitol did so peacefully, they were protesting, they did not forcefully attempt to stop legislation. People are allowed to watch TN Capitol legislation from the balcony. This is not nearly equivalent. Republicans wish to have authoritarian rule and to return us to the ugly days of overt racism. They have turned against democracy and as we have witnessed in TN overrule the majority voice. Democrats are attempting to strengthen democracy, protect the right for everyone to vote and overturning gerrymandering as per the Voting Rights Act which was voted against by every Republican. Eventually democracy will win. It is inevitable as more young people and women vote. They will not remain silent as rights are being stripped away, books are being banned and people seeking asylum are trafficked across state borders. The majority of the people will have their voices heard and lawfully enacted as they should in a democracy.
James A-The people in Nashville were NOT there to support a murderer. They were protesting the omnipresence of guns and the murder of the people/children in Covenent School and the ongoing killing of school children and others. Justin Jones was muzzled by the Speaker of the House and NOT allowed to speak. As far as the bullhorn, if he hadn't been muzzled, he wouldn't have used it. Did you know that since January first, over ELEVEN THOUSAND have died of gun violence in the U.S.? https://abcnews.go.com/US/116-people-died-gun-violence-day-us-year/story?id=97382759
Yes, but... Even when the Tennessee Three are all back in their seats in the legislature, what comes next for democracy? They will be marginalized, the two young Black men will be forced to run again, and marginalized again when they win. Can the Tennessee legislature welcome back two young Black men and one white supportive woman? Is the Tennessee legislature ready to listen to the voices of the constituents of the Tennessee Three? Is there any hope in the foreseeable future for any gun legislation to be debated, let alone pass? Yes, I believe that democracy can work, but I'm not sure how many decades it will take for districts to be redrawn so that voters' voices can actually be heard in in the legislature in Tennessee.
I respectfully disagree; the leadership they will provide will not be defeated for this country and these young people have had more than enough fear and violence! They are ready to vote the friends of the killers out of office. My foundation Inspire2Vote has registered "nonpartisan" 105,000 young high school seniors all across the country to vote and I assure you they are ready for leadership in 2024. We have just merged with a fabulous group of Harvard students who are working to register young voters in 2,700 high schools; please click on www.turnup.us and support this optimistic leadership going forward. It's time!
Agreed! And thank you for your efforts ! Young voters are fed up. And they are showing up. And TN is not so red - they are gerrymandered. Republicans cracked Nashville to gain this super majority. They had to cheat. The majority are not being heard. And they are speaking out. Things are changing. And as women are nearly dying without the ability to make healthcare decisions regarding their pregnancy they are joining the young people. There will be a tidal wave. It is already happening.
The speaker, Cameron Sexton, May be in some trouble for fraudulently claiming to be living in Crossville and collecting a much higher per diem when he actually lives in Nashville. Courtesy of Judd Legum and the TN Holler
Respectful disagreement is good. : ) So is registering people to vote. The League of Women Voters has, for years, been registering high school students to vote. In addition to voting, though, we need to encourage young people to run for office. Maxwell Frost is in his 20s, as are the two Justins, so we know that when they run, they can win. Maybe some of your Harvard students can challenge our current state reps and state senators and turn the MA legislature blue.
In my local school board election coming up, we have a young woman Haley Taylor Schiltz running. She’s the youngest graduate from SMU law school and she’s amazing! At 20 years old she is our best hope. There are only two seats open and we’re getting out the word to vote for her and one other reasonable candidate. The young voters are here and I hope more run for office. We have to overcome the christo fascist wave!
We have a legislature in MA that votes the way the leadership does, in both the House and the Senate. Check out Act On Mass to see how resistant our leadership is to letting us know how committees vote. Why are progressive bills (e.g., Medicare for All, the Safe Communities Act) reintroduced year after year without any hope of passage? Yes, Warren and Markey are on the the progressive side, but read some of what Healey says and does. Pretty centrist. Are our legislators Dems? Yeah. Blue? Maybe pale blue. Progressive? Not very much.
Thank you for your civic engagement and for getting young people registered to vote. I'm great at knocking on doors but terrible at registering voters because I'm super partisan and can't keep my mouth shut. Lol
I don't know many hs age kids, but I do know a few hs teachers, so I send the link to them. I see that they pay hs kids $100 for 2-4 hours of work and that could be very appealing to them. Thanks, ira!
Love this. Please post about it on PACEsConnection.com. Democracy is the anti-trauma. People need and deserve voice and choice. Political subterfuge in the form of gerrymandering and trying to keep the people silent is the true Damndemic. Thank you for your amazing work. Please do post about it! Join (it’s free) and post and please connect with me on LinkedIn. Carey Sipp
Betsy, I would note, because state legislatures are subject to regulations of Congress, were the Freedom to Vote Act—that, among other provisions, mandates fair voting maps—to pass, we’d see an end to votes being diluted through partisan gerrymandering. You might recall, in January, 22, the legislation passed in the House, but was blocked in the Senate by Manchin and Sinema, who, along with the 50 Republican Senators, filibustered the bill.
Accordingly, were Democrats, in 24, to retake the House, pick up 1 Senate seat, and hold the Presidency, the federal regulations, from which states would not be exempt, would become law.
Kathy, Aside from working for Arizona Democratic Senate candidate Ruben Gallego, whose campaign is focused on representing the interests of a wide range of voters, I am banking on two factors: 1) Sinema has grown increasingly unpopular among all Arizona voters and 2) She’s not sufficiently conservative, given the demographics of Arizona’s mostly far-right Republican voters.
Jeri, Because the 24 Senate map favors Republicans, we’re seriously going to have to mobilize to hold onto our incumbents. Additionally, we need to get behind Arizona Democrat Ruben Gallego if we’re to have 50 Democratic Senators receptive to modifying, if not abolishing, the Senate filibuster, ultimately, to move legislation to the floor for debate and an up or down majority vote.
Frank, Considering the 24 Senate map favors Republicans, we’re going to have to seriously mobilize just to retain our incumbents. Beyond that, we need to get to work to insure Arizona Democrat Ruben Gallego wins Arizona’s Senate seat. Only then will we have 50 Senators (Harris being the 51st vote) receptive to modifying, if not abolishing, the Senate filibuster to allow legislation to move to the floor for debate and an up or down majority vote.
Maria-Elena, In my view, re-taking the House and holding the Presidency will be a less formidable challenge than retaining the Senate, whose map, in 24, favors Republicans. Rather than repeat myself, I would note my reply to Frank Loomer, part of this thread, establishes a plan for seating 50 Senators receptive to modifying, if not abolishing, the filibuster to move legislation to the floor for debate and an up or down majority vote.
It will be up to all the Americans who decide to leave their comfort zone and become visible. Whether you were visible in the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, the fight for democracy has no time stamp. Across the Nation, there needs to be voices heard and people seen demonstrating ¨enough is enough¨ . We need gun reform. We need Roe v Wade back in place. We need Acts that penalize those who lie to the public (like the Fairness Doctrine). We need stricter guidelines for running for office. You need to at least know how the government operates, know the names of all the states, know the branches of government and who is responsible for what, ....
I fear that you are right, Betsy. Tennessee is a deeply red state and the redistricting has made it difficult for any Democrat to win anything. But, it is good to see that they will be back and have the people behind them!
The city of Knoxville is blue but the surrounding county not so much. Shelby County is largely dem. The city of Nashville was also. Now the legislature is punishing Nashville by getting in the city’s business to break it. I think there may be hope that this time the legislature went too far. To see a blatantly demeaning “speech,” Google “Andrew Farmer Justin Pearson” and watch. It made me cringe.
People like me who live where this would and could never happen should see this video to understand where parts of this country are politically, socially. They should listen to the difference in quality of mind between one representative who *thinks* he has the power and thus entitled to his hubris, and another who does not only have the real power, the moral power, but the right and the duty to stand and fight and the duty to fight regardless. Without people like Justin Pearson this is one way democracy gets stamped out.
Well said, Potter. Thanks for posting the full speeches by both Farmer and Pearson. Farmer's demeaning and disparaging remarks made me cringe, too. But Justin Pearson handed it right back to him brilliantly and with clarity. As has been said, therein lies our hope — with our youth.
Yes, what Farmer did unknowingly ( stupidly) was to hand Pearson an opportunity. He was more than ready. These people,Farmer and those who who bolster him, should be shamed. With awareness and shame, hopefully they will be unseated.
I hope you are right. My husband's sister lives in Chattanooga (we almost moved there too many years ago). She and her husband always despair how red their city is. In retrospect, I'm happy that we stayed in Michigan, bad weather and all!
The good weather's coming! And Michigan people worked very, Very, VERY hard to get into place an independent redistricting committee. It worked...and now for the first time in decades Dems control the legislature (not by much, but enough) and the offices of the governor, attorney general, and secretary of state. We will have no-reason absentee voting, extended days to vote....and the abortion ban was overturned. Gun safety legislation is coming.
Yes, we Michiganders have worked hard for many years to make positive changes in our state and we finally have a leadership team in Whitmer, Nessell, and Benson (plus the House and Senate majorities) to really enact these positive changes. It has been a LONG time coming! We LOVE "Big Gretch"! Plus, I-94 is getting fixed!
Twenty-seven years we lived in Livingston County duking it out with the Repub hierarchy. They had votes coming from 60% of the county population. Intelligence, they were shy on and a few of us backed them up with our commentary.
Of course, we move south to AZ and the state changes. It must be because of something I said. I had to be the instigator. I love reading about Mallory McMorrow putting Lana Theis in her place. It was great theater. The latter and I had gone a few rounds in dialogue along with her forerunner Hune.
I have seen the evil up close, where Beto got creamed by the cheating bastards. This time, I hope (hope not yet dead in Texas), that the evil has jumped the shark this time. May 2024 give us back our humanity. Deport Rupert, dump chump, resurrect the real Jesus, and call the cult MAGAts what Ike proved to the Germans that they had been worshipping - the devil and his disciples. The civil war needs to be won for real this time…
To hear the the republicans sat silent is heartbreaking. It is so indicative of a mindset unwilling to even consider change. The lack of gun laws of almost any kind is unconscionable.
Nobody says it will be easy. The USA has been slipping toward oligarchy for quite some time. Corporate powers are deeply entrenched. We are in rough seas, but we are not drowning. Not yet. Young men like the Justin's and strong women like Gloria. And millions of young people coming up are our captains and we are their crew. We have, some of us at least, fought and led. Now we support them and speak and sing and work with them to reach the promise of America that has never yet happened: Equality and Justice for All.
I was distressed by the “both sides-ism” of the, I assume, official, comment from Shelby County. It can be paraphrased as, “He lost his head in the heat of the moment”. That is to say, it was a grievous error. The rest was weak sauce.
No, no, no. More, not fewer of these “transgressions” are needed. Each one is the blow of an axe chopping down a rotting tree. Civility is not the response that is needed when there are horrors stalking the land, one of them obviously being the current American fetish to strip away any and all gun restrictions. Legislators need to fear when the next bitter protest will erupt and what boundaries of decorum it will cross.
North of Tennessee four unsuspecting people were shot to death in a bank yesterday, probably within a few hours of Justin Johnson reclaiming his seat while being ignored by the Legislature’s troglodytes. Maybe more people will feel the urgency of this moment.
It is now after 1:00 p.m. here in the west and already some things are happening for good in Tennessee. There may be a breakthrough in gun laws being changed there.
Glad the fascists lost a round, but they'll be back to trash democracy again soon enough. Democrats must learn to fight better, longer, harder, and with more desired results, or we will be out of power again soon.
Hahaaahaaa.. Craig..and those fascist-dickheads are 'our' fascists, elected by all of 'us' the American people(s) and those of TN. So let's call em "R"-fascists.... RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR..RRRRRR..RrrrRRR%&$rrrrrRRgaggRR##^}rrrrrrghh.ahhh FASssshits. There!! Whew.., finally got it out Craig.. whew! I feel better now.
One of the two expelled senators from Tennessee was reinstated today to his seat. Senator Justin Jones (D-Nashville) was sent back to the Tennessee Senate today with a resounding unanimous vote by the Nashville local officials. The vote was 36-0, and immediately afterward, they marched him to the state capital to be sworn in and retake his seat.
This was extremely exhilarating to watch. It made me feel really proud this black man, this man of color, had the opportunity to ‘stick it’ to the Tennessee Republican Party.
Hopefully, in a day or so, the other senator will be returning to the Tennessee Senate Chamber.
Now, I want to turn to the sad news of yesterday.
More souls taken from us in Louisville, Kentucky in two mass shootings that happened almost simultaneously only a few miles apart. Two mass shooters in one city at the same time. Just exactly how many people have to die in mass shooting involving weapons of mass destruction. Two more people get their hands on weapons that have no sense with a gun, of any kind.
There’s absolutely no excuse why we can’t get reasonable gun restriction laws passed across this country.
There’s absolutely no excuse why we can’t raise the age to purchase a weapon to 21 across this country, change the process to buy a gun of any type. We need to make it near impossible for a person to purchase a weapon. Change age limit, waiting periods. Make the waiting period thirty days, if that’s what it takes to do a thorough medical, psychological, and criminal background checks. Make it mandatory that every person that purchases a weapon undergo psychological examinations during the waiting period prior to being authorized to pick up that firearm. Every person that purchases a weapon must get a seal of excellent mental health from a psychologist assigned by the law enforcement agency to do these assessments.
Make it where a person can only purchase a firearm, but must wait an additional amount of time to buy ammunition for that firearm. Then they can only purchase a certain amount at a time over a period of time.
Make a national database accessible by all gun shops so every purchase is immediately entered into it, and it be mandatory for every gun shop to check the database to assure that person isn’t going to several gun shops to purchase weapons or ammunition.
Have the same laws enforced for gun shows as they are for gun shops. No weapons may be purchased and delivered at the show. The same 30 day waiting period, same background checks, same psychological assessment. Everything. And especially the same access to the data base that must be checked.
Maybe, just maybe, we can slow down these mass shootings where our loved ones, friends, neighbors, are being gunned down by a lunatic with a damn gun!
AR-15 weapons are marketed to make it look cool to own one. What on earth is an ordinary person going to do with a combat weapon that obliterates its target?
The heart of the issue is vulnerability. The gun industry has succeeded in persuading many citizens to own multiple guns/more lethal guns/a wall of ammo how? By appealing to their sense of vulnerability. They will resist their guns being taken away. We will have to “pry them out of my cold dead hands”, yada,yada,yada. Vulnerability. Who gets to be protected from the feeling of vulnerability? People who love guns and the “cool” factor they represent. Yet the rest of society gets to sit uncomfortably / precariously / dangerously with their vulnerability. Disenfranchised voters? “Just suck it up.” Children without enough food? “Quit your whining!” Children of undocumented workers brought here when they could barely walk? “Hit the road back to the Sh*thole country you came from!” The working poor who need healthcare? “You’re probably poor because Jesus is displeased with you!” A woman bleeding out from a pregnancy complication? “You should not have had sex in the first place!!!!!” Children wanting to go to school and know they will return home at the end of the day? “Arm the teachers, the lunch-helper, the recess-helper, the Hall-monitor, the Custodian like a super-max prison!” Vulnerability. Who has to just “suck it up?” Apparently the majority of us because we don’t deserve it as much as gun lovers.
I have never, never been able to understand why compulsory insurance should apply to driving a motor vehicle but not the ownership of guns, especially weapons more powerful than those used by infantrymen in both world wars.
America's firearms regime shames mankind and brands the country with the mark of Cain.
At least there was a purpose to human sacrifice in the Aztec empire. A purpose. America's haphazard random sacrificial practice is beyond savagery. It demonstrates that, for all the talk of religious values, all the claims of being "Christian", the only cult that counts is the idolatrous worship of Mammon and Moloch. Money and murder.
They've given " Christianity " 2 black eyes, a number of bruises & scrapes, at minimum.
If my cousin the Evangelical read what I'm writing she'd come over here, rip my head off of my shoulders, eat it, then c--p it out. Then she'd justify it.
Hell, I sent her something about Jimmy Carter working with Habitat for Humanity in his NINETIES, & she acted like I had endorsed Satan.
Daniel, I am a believer in Christ and I have not and will not succumb to the propagana and indoctrination coming from many .....I will not even call them pastors.
They are also using the pro-life movement......which I at one time supported. I knew nothing about the plight of women's suffering or the horrors of bringing a child into this world to be abused, used, sold....even here in the USA much less the women left alone to take the blame for everything and the responsibility for everything.
There is no other commonsense response but to support the rights of women. Women have had to bear the burden while the sperm looks for another host!!! It is reality!
Emily Pfaff "Daniel, I am a believer in Christ and I have not and will not succumb to the propagana and indoctrination coming from many .....I will not even call them pastors."
Have you ever felt like your religion just wasn’t enough? Like the values you were taught and the beliefs you held dear somehow fell short? If so, you’re not alone. From broken promises to harsh realities, these 15 things have left countless people feeling disillusioned and spiritually bankrupt.
Greedy Megachurches
“They received over 1 mil in donations every week and spent it on elaborate props, rather than helping the community.” One Reddit user said.
“My husband, who went to school for music production, said the soundboards they had were minimum $1mil each and they had like 7 of them.”
Unnecessary Showiness
“The first thing I saw upon entering was a life-size bronze statue of the pastor.”
“There’s a megachurch in Florida that has a Starbucks in it.”
“2 bands, a stage, not an altar. They had a commercial break for expo erasable markers in the middle of it.”
Lack of Gratitude
“When I was 6, the pastor gave a letter to my mom saying that we were not donating enough money to the church.”
Another user had a similar experience: “The church wrote a letter saying they knew how much money he was making and that he should be giving more to the church.”
Entitlement
“When I was in middle school a pastor created this chart showing what everyone should be donating each week/month based on your household’s income. I stopped going after and my parents largely have too, that was a real blow to them to see something so asinine.”
Religious People
“Only God has the right to judge, yet religious people are the most judgemental people you can meet.”
“Also, if you’ve ever been to a church, they all gossip about each other.”
“My mom was a church organist/choir director for a long time, and I got to know many of the members. Some of the fakest people I’ve ever met.”
Abuse
“Being told that being SA was good as God needed to teach me a lesson. I was seven.”
“When my SIL got her Masters in counseling, one of her professors said that many predators ‘hide behind’ the facade of Big Church Guy. He said they will purposely seek out a board position or similar so that people won’t question what he’s doing.”
Empty Advice
“The non-answers to all my questions as a kid. “You just have to have faith” is a dumb way to respond to an inquisitive mind.”
We Don’t Ask Questions Like That
“When I was a kid, I asked my grandmother where God came from, and she smacked me across the face and said, ‘We don’t ask questions like that’. I was just being curious, and her reaction shocked me.”
Contradictions
“In school, we learnt about the Greek gods, and I was like, wait, hold on there are other gods??
“It was explained that ‘oh no it was a long time ago and they just didn’t understand how the world worked, so they made those gods up as explanations’. That led to a lot of questions about how we know God is real then.”
Religious Complex
“Some people believe that being religious makes them better than non-religious. When I left the church, I was persona non grata. None of the members will even look at me now.”
“There is this Christian radio my parents listened to, and when the hosts were talking about some gathering, they referred to non-believers as ‘icky people.’
Religious Leaders
“Religious leaders ruined religion for me.”
“I never met a single priest who could tell me about heaven, but they all knew every square inch of hell. They should. They built it.”
Misogyny
“When the pastor started ranting about the evils of women, saying that Satan walks among us in the body of every female, and men must take measures against them. I don’t think everyone in the faith is like that, but it was the one moment that ruined religion for me. Especially seeing his wife react to the sermon with such support of the message. It was one of those defining moments in my life, a very negative one.”
Control
“It became evident that many people who call themselves religious only do so to feel morally superior to others, and then use that superiority to try to control everything.”
Power-Hungry
“Seeing how people use religion as an excuse to be bad people.”
Lack of Empathy
“I was 15. My father had been diagnosed with ALS. I had gone to a youth group, and they had a circle of teenagers talking about things going on in their lives. When it was my turn, I shared that my father was dying. I was angry and said something like I doubted there was a God if this was happening. I got chewed out for questioning God, and the kids refused to talk to me the rest of the night. You would think I had killed someone. It was THAT strong of a reaction.”
How not to endorse this catalogue of human frailty and hypocrisy?
It's miserable and, for the Nth time, I fail to see how any organization, any community, can so thoroughly pervert the Christian gospel. After all, what's the point of all this make-believe? Why pretend? Why use religion as a vehicle for escaping truth and responsibility? What's the point of living as a complete fake?
What is, however, clear as daylight is the way in which totally failed would-be politicians on the loony far-right SAW THE LIGHT and turned to "religion", i.e. Godbiz, found "SUCCESS"! sheared the flock! made loadsamoolah! directed voting! Etcetera etcetera etceteraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrghhh. . . . .
After all that, is it surprising if they take a Coney Island sideshow barker for their savior?
Poor thing, your cousin. It's not nice being forced to pity fellow-citizens, let alone to protect ourselves from them...
All of us are too prone to to built-in habits of judging others, the better to avoid our own mirror. All of us, very much including those who see themselves as atheists, have been deeply conditioned by monotheism and even more so, regardless of anti-clericalism, manipulated by habitual mental patterns inherited from domination by churches. Influence all the more powerful for being unconscious. Regardless, then, of our belief or unbelief, we need to bear constantly in mind the guidance in Matthew 7:1-3.
Peter, I've said this before (maybe even on this forum? not sure) but I've had this argument with people: if you don't believe in God or a higher power of any sort, can you at least be a Jesus-fan, no different than say the "Deadheads" or a "Chicago Cubs" fan? By this, I mean, can you admire the Jesus that walked the Earth, who proclaimed love and forgiveness, who stood up for the weak, the poor, the downtrodden, the sinners? Can you admire Jesus enough to consider Him a role model? Someone to emulate? I've had a few people truly stop to think about that. I feel like sometimes religions, esp the radical right, have forgotten God.
This is why when I mention " Christians ", I bring out the " ". The " Christians " would have Jesus committed if not crucified or shot if he was here today.
I also believe that she might have Asperger's Syndrome, because she seems to lack BOTH empathy & she has a distinct lack of curiosity re the world beyond metro Nashville. When she asked about Buddhism, I was stunned almost beyond words. the only genuine emotion that she seems really fully capable of is ANGER when her faith is questioned.
Monotheism is immensely demanding, it calls for real humility. Otherwise, there's such a great risk of getting it all wrong because we are so ill-equipped to believe in what is beyond our understanding that, instead of nurturing simple faith and self-confidence, we can easily develop a crippled and crippling wreck of a belief in something we like to imagine we understand but don't... some shard of what once was whole.
So we're scared, behind the bluster we feel defenseless, then grasp that shard and use it as a weapon.
I should send this to my cousin, but I'm reasonably sure that she'd come out from behind the bluster to beat me about the head & shoulders " 'cause she's a Chriss - CHUN " ( Christian, natch ).
None so blind as those who will not see. A cult, me thinks. Like those who have no ears. But the cult mantle requires that you see in others the evil that you project. Took Ike to break the mold in Germany…. Reason won’t do it.
Daniel, I work with Habitat for Humanity and I’m 76. Next up is a return to Portugal with Fuller-Habitat this coming September. Gratitude to Jimmy Carter for Habitat and for leaving Southern Baptists because of the church’s stance on equality for women. https://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=95311&page=1
Peter, I agree. I think requiring that gun owners be insured could be an important step. And making gun sellers and manufacturers liable for what their guns do could be another. And if one couldn’t get insurance without first undergoing weapons training, including safe storage, even better. And get rid of assault weapons. It’s been done before; we can do it again.
Little Switzerland with its citizens' army manages fairly well to exemplify how the Second Amendment should have worked. Except... Except that America now has the largest, most over-equipped armed forces the planet has ever (to my knowledge) seen, plus National Guardsmen, plus a plethora of not-always-very-well-regulated (but heavily armed) police forces, so that the discombobulated citizens with their vast military arsenals can make only for insecurity in a free State.
All that this proves is that millions of Americans are more afraid of their neighbors... and their shadow... than of any conceivable invader. Justifiably, perhaps, given mass psychosis and all those millions of itchy trigger fingers.
Heaven forbid that those millions -- or even a tiny fraction of them -- ever turn come out firing at each other; but there are already far too many who have are doing just that.
From American amok, Good Lord, deliver us.
[I am not, of course, referring to innocent marksmen or to dwellers in the wilderness with a genuine need for weapons with which to discourage bears or marauders, etc.]
What we really need are laws relegating sports weapons ONLY to the general public. Hunting rifles and shotguns. Target pistols. Only members of the military while on active duty need weapons of war. They should not be allowed under any circumstance to have military weapons after they leave service. I know of no one who shoots deer, bears, wild pigs, water birds, pheasants, or turkeys with an AR15 or any other automated type weapon, All these weapons are designed to kill one animal and one animal only....Homo sapiens (human beings)
I'm sorry that authoritarians find it necessary to attack peaceful sovereign nations; but that seems to be a characteristic of tyrants (including those who fancy themselves as 'royalty).
Police and Sheriffs need weapons to protect themselves and the general public from persons intent on killing. My only problem there is training. Shoot first and question later may be a good line in entertainment but it does not apply to real life. Police must be trained to deescalate first and shoot only when that fails. Police do not have the right to be prosecutor, juror, judge, and executioner. Killing should be the last unavoidable resort.
I have no problem with people who hunt animals for food, they actually do a service to the deer since our not too distant ancestors saw fit to eliminate predators. I have no problem with persons who compete in skeet, or target practice and competition.
Personally I dislike guns, I also dislike boxing and commercial wrestling. but that is personal and not something that applies to other people. I also dislike auto racing and motor cycle racing for the same reason I dislike guns. They are noisy, dirty, and smelly, but I also recognize that it is me and does not apply to anyone else.
I must disagree with one point you make Fay; ie., "I know of no one who shoots.... etc., wild pigs..." I distinctly recall video opps of at least 2 doing just that out of *a helicopter. Two ugly azz dudes; one was Ted Nugent the other was that other guy Marjorie T. G. (lol).
My cousin thought that she'd make a good president. Her answer ? " 'cause she's a good Christian ". These pathetic people would only support people who waved a flag & held a Bible.
What is the saying ? " When tyranny comes, it will come holding a cross wrapped in a flag ", IIRC.
"What we really need are laws relegating sports weapons ONLY to the general public. Hunting rifles and shotguns."
I completely agree and also will offer: In the 1970's when I was living in East Texas, hunting rifles and shotguns were the ONLY guns offered for sale. In gun stores all over Texas you could find Winchester and Remington rifles and shotguns and not a single AR-15 would be found anywhere.
In fact, because I never saw an AR15 for sale, I did not even know what they looked like until in the last 10 years.
I’ve heard hunters claim they hunt with their AR15s. That and the sport-exception won’t work. Too easy to work around. I would like to see the gun industry not able to advertise their lethal products. Also, mandatory insurance for each gun owned. And a thirty day waiting period. I would also like the definition of “Well-regulated militia” to be revisited. If they were well-regulated we could have stats on them to show if they provide no-adverse harm to the greater society. If their members are involved in a disruptive or rogue situation, it is noted and weighed against their “well-regulated” standing.
Perhaps those "Constitutional originalists" in the Supreme Court would have a hard time overturning gun laws if they were written to state that only members of well regulated militias could carry certain weapons. The passage of a national law defining well regulated militias might be helpful.
There was a Federal licensing law imposed on all weapons back in 1968 on individuals who dealt in manufacture or sales of firearms and a ban on all interstate transportation of firearms to or from individuals not licensed as dealers, manufacturers, importers or collectors. In 1994, the Federal Assault Weapons ban was passed but it was only on weapons manufactured after that date. That law "sunsetted" in 2004, during Dubya's "Presidency".
But these civilians with military grade weapons in their closets think they ARE at war - with democracy and the democratic process. They are criminals just for having possession of those guns.
This is all good, Faye. But, have you ever strapped on a badge, gun, and worked the streets as a law enforcement officer? Have you ever, in your life, been in a ‘shoot, don’t shoot’ situation?
If your answer us “no” to these two questions, please don’t assume you know anything about when an officer should or shouldn’t use deadly force.
An officer is bound by the same laws for the use of his firearm as anyone else, the one exception is the fact that he/she has undergone extensive training in when to use it, and how. One such training is the ‘shoot, don’t shoot’ scenarios.
An officer has only a split second to determine whether the use of deadly force is justified, in any situation. If the officer takes longer than that, we will be hearing about his death, and funeral. A split second. That’s it between life, and death, for the officer.
On these recent occasions where the officers killed the individuals who were doing the mass killings. The officers went in and immediately located, and killed, the person. In both occasions the individual had fired at the officers first. If I was their training officer, I would be using these films as good training films. When that Individual raised their firearm slightly toward the officers, that’s when they should have fired. Not wait until they have been fired upon.
In the incident yesterday in KY at the bank. Two officers were shot, one critically. Why? The perp was allowed to fire upon them before they returned fire killing him.
Law enforcement officers are hesitating because of the way the public has perceived them. The officers are waiting. What’s this causing? For last year, 536 names being engraved on the Law Enforcement Officers Memorial where officers were killed in the line of duty.
This country can’t even address mental health issues as is! Never mind try to evaluate every person who wants to buy a gun. The second amendment has been so misinterpreted and high jacked I am without hope for change.
Yes, you’re right. Gun laws are critical and especially ban the military assault weapons that are frequently used in mass shootings. Stop open carry. Second Amendment was and is for government militia, not individual citizens to build an arsenal in their private homes or to carry weapons around intimidating the public. Why does America need to be number one in gun related deaths of children or guns per capita compared to other countries. No matter Democrats or repubs or independents this epidemic of gun violence affects all of us.
Highly possible. If nothing else, the psychological evaluation would surely catch it, and that would block their purchasing a firearm, plus get them the medical help needed in the process.
"We need to make it near impossible for a person to purchase a weapon."
Srsly??? You'd fit right in with Bull Connor and the other southern sheriffs who tried to make it near impossible for black people to vote---despite the fact the Constitution guaranteed them that right.
Don't be Bull. One was more than enough.
Gun ownership is protected by the Constitution, which means "damn near impossible" is D.O.A. Don't believe me? Apply your litany of restrictions to free speech, religious freedom, right of assembly, voting, or any other constitutionally protected right and see how far you get. Want to post on Professor Richardson's board? No problem! Just apply for a federal speech license, submit your comment, pay a $500 tax, wait thirty days (use the time to get clearance from a licensed psychiatrist that you are mentally healthy enough to not write something libelous), and if the comment review council approve of your free speech, then wait a week before replying to replies. That cooling-off period will let you more carefully consider your comebacks.
Only when you agree to subject yourself to those conditions for your free speech would I consider accepting your conditions for my right to arms.
Shane, I appreciate your feedback, but as a man that carried a gun for his livelihood for 26+ years, and witnessed first hand the damage bullets frim these rifles do to a human body, I’ll stand by my comments. The laws to purchase, own, and arm a firearm need to change. Three days is not enough time for the background checks to be properly conducted through all the agencies that need o conduct them. Three days isn’t time to have proper psychological exams, which is quite evident that they are needed. The computer network needs to be set up as I described and these laws enforced by the local, state, and federal agencies.
No, I’m not advocating that all guns be eliminated. But these weapons of mass destruction have no business in the hands of any private citizen. None whatsoever. Besides, there’s already over 20M of these assault type rifles that have been sold in the United States. There’s no way to remove them from these homes without the government doing a massive ‘buy back’, which I seriously doubt they will do.
Thank you for your civility, Daniel, as gun discussions can go off the rail in a hurry. I understand the horrific damage bullets do to human bodies, but that does not justify the draconian amount of hurdles and regulations you want to impose on the exercise of a constitutional right.
This nation collectively owns an estimated 500 million guns. If guns were such a clear and present danger to the nation to justify the draconian laws you want to impose, then why aren't we all dead?
Of those 500 million guns owned, 20,000 are used to murder someone any given year. Another 30,000 are used to wound someone any any given year. So, say 50,000 criminal uses of weapons out of 500 million guns owned, every one of which comes from a criminal action that's already banned: assault, mayhem, murder.
That amounts to 0.01 percent of guns being used to harm or murder innocents . . . and 99.99 percent doing nothing wrong.
You seem particularly concerned about assault rifles: "These weapons of mass destruction have no business in the hands of any private citizen. None whatsoever." Why not? Assault rifles are used in only 1.5 percent of annual gun murders. If 98.5 percent of assault rifles don't cause any harm, why ban people from owning them?
Gun violence is a serious concern and our culture needs to slow it, no question. But layering more gun control on top of all the gun control laws we already don't enforce will not save a single innocent life. Crime control and gang intervention would be far more useful, reducing the harm of unlawful use of guns without stepping on the 2A rights of the 99.99 percent of gun owners who don't do anything wrong. So would strict enforcement of existing gun laws--the refusal of the ATF to prosecute the thousands caught lying on gun application forms every year is particularly grating to me--and banning local prosecutors from offering plea bargains to violent gun criminals.
The Second Amendment protects the right of individual Americans to own and operate arms for any lawful purpose, including, but not limited to, service in a well-managed government Militia. That's my take on what the Founders wrote, and the data I laid out prove that concept has worked well for our nation, then and now.
Bottom line, the vast, vast majority of Americans own guns safely and responsibly, there are many ways to reduce unlawful use of guns, and so I'm not going to subject American citizens to psychiatric exams or any other hurdle that you wouldn't be willing to apply to voting, speech, religion, or any other right. We can reduce illegal gun violence in ways that don't step all over 2A.
Shane READ the second Amendment "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." Proposed September 25, 1789; ratified December 15, 1791. I have included the dates for a reason. We fought the American Revolution against the much stronger force of Great Britain. The war began 1765 and ended 1791. We were a very small Country of approximately 4 million people hugging the shores of the Atlantic Ocean. Our army was disbanded in 1791. The farmers, land owners, apprentices, shop owners, factory owners, business men returned home. We had money sufficient to maintain a navy. Hence the words "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State...." There was no standing army, no national guard. We didn't form another National army until 1812, 21 years after ratification. James Madison, who is generally credited with writing the Bill of Rights, was not in favor of arming thugs, murderers, insurrectionists, seditious treason. He wanted to make sure that good, honest, hard-working people could protect themselves and the newly founded America from any attackers (including, unfortunately, the indigenous whose lands we were in the process of stealing). The weapons manufacturers and the NRA has chosen to quote only the last half of the sentence "...the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." No one in government, police, or plain citizens wants to take all your sporting guns away from you. But none of the aforementioned sees any reason for an ordinary citizen to have an assault weapon, a sniper's rifle, a bazooka, grenade launcher, shoulder mounted missile launcher or any other weapon designed mainly to kill people.
Thank you Fay. The US Constitution is a venerable and revolutionary document in need of amendment to make it more relevant to our rapidly changing society. Unfortunately, we have a SCOTUS that has been cleverly engineered by the modern GOP to misread the Constitution in the attempt to guarantee minority rule by the wealthiest white men, supported by a motley collection of religion and/or racism inspired ideological fanatics. Clearly Mr. Gericke has fallen for at least some of this hook, line and sinker.
The strongest part of his argument is that despite the ubiquitousness of military type semiautomatic rifles and other firearms useless for either hunting or target shooting, -- Christ, is it really 500 million? -- we haven't all killed each other yet. I suppose that's proof we Americans aren't all violent assholes suffering from extended adolescences, but even the relatively small percentage of gun deaths compared to number of guns leaves us with truly unenviable statistics that leave people in the rest of the world scratching their heads.
What I don't understand is what so many Americans are afraid of that they think they need to walk around armed.
Back in the day (1972) I received 2 months of nearly daily training to shoot the M-16, so I am familiar with the allure of guns and the feeling of power one has while holding one with a full clip. Luckily, I was never required to fire the M-16 at anything but pop-up targets, and it has never even occurred to me to buy a gun for self-protection or any other purpose.
Correct, Fay. These murderers are not part of a well-ordered militia, but murderers of innocent adults and children. There is no excuse for civilians to own and operate an AK - anything. In the 1700s there were no hand-held weapons that weren't made for hunting deer and squirrel. The people used their rifles to fight against the British troops.
It is ridiculous and dangerous to transpose a 1700s gun onto a 22nd century hand-held weapon of war. Shane, you are living in a reality that is 600 years old.
Why do you assume I haven't? I know the arguments, counter arguments, and counter counter arguments quite well and base my views on them. That your views and mine are not the same is fine, but don't assume I don't know what I'm talking about.
"No one in government, police, or plain citizens wants to take all your sporting guns away from you."
"All your guns?" I agree, they don't want to take all our guns. But most of our guns? Of course they do. Semiautomatic handguns and rifles are about 80 percent of the modern gun market, and every anti-gun advocate I know wants them banned. The New York Times and Washington Post both published columns in Monday's editions cautioning that "the work isn't done" even if an assault rifle ban goes into place because "handguns" are used in far more murders. They both mentioned "nine-millimeter semiautomatic pistols" like Glocks as being extra-murder-y.
Since handguns are the best way for me and other law-abiding innocents to protect ourselves from the rare but unpredictable violent attack, I have no intention of giving up handguns so gun haters can feel warm and fuzzy. If James Madison were alive today, he'd carry a Glock.
"Ordinary citizen" is not a lesser class of American, by the way. We ordinaries are equal to anyone in government, police, or social elites, and we get to arm ourselves as our needs dictate, as long as we use those guns lawfully. Those who don't are criminals and can and should have their weapons rights revoked.
Yup.. all these well-intended folks need to (each) sit down and write the Rule so that it is enforceable, as you have pointed out, instead of wanting someone else to write (the Rule) it for them. I quietly hesitate, but there are lots of "weapons of mass destruction" out there. We drive them.. we fly them.. and people bent in some weird direction often operate them.
Thank you, Ms. Reid. Mr. Gericke's impassioned defense of the indefensible caused a rant on my part (most of which I deleted). Thank you for your more measured (albeit no less passionate) comment.
Shane, that “0.01 percent of guns… used to harm or murder innocents” may seem insignificant, but when a child you love 100% is senselessly killed, it becomes clear that military weapons held by civilians hands is utterly unjustified. Who honestly wishes such a tragic, horrific loss onto others (or themselves!)? Do you, really?!
If Americans want to be a member of a “ well regulated militia”, they should join the National Guard.
The men who wrote the 2nd amendment were living in an America with no standing army & a country where the weapons they owned were muzzle-loading, one shot muskets. There is no comparison between those guns & an AR-15.
We are required to take written exams & road driving tests before being allowed to drive a car, & we are required to show proof of insurance & have state car registrations, which must be updated according to various state laws. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t pass similar laws for gun ownership.
You are already a member of the militia, KMD. Every American is by dint of citizenship. Didn't you get the hat?
Guns are constitutional rights and cars are not. Therein lies why cars are licensed and taxed up the ying-yang and guns are not. Yet, more people are killed and injured in car crashes than are shot and killed by guns. So much for all those written exams, road tests, drivers licenses, plate fees, massive registration databases, traffic cops, and myriad federal and state driving laws keeping every driver free from harm.
And yet, due to pressure on the auto industry to help prevent deaths in auto accidents, car manufacturers began installing seat belts in cars sold in the US in the 1950s. And in 1968 the federal government began to require lap & shoulder seat belts in the front seats of all new passenger cars sold in the US. Individual states enacted their own seat belt laws in different years. Then in 1999 air bags were required on both sides of the front seats in all cars & light trucks.
Since these protections were enacted, seat belts & air bags have saved thousands of Americans each year from death in auto accidents. We are not potted plants! We can enact laws that can help prevent gun deaths.
Furthermore, the guns that were used during the writing of the US Constitution were muzzle-loading, single shot muskets. I certainly support all Americans’ right to own as many of those weapons as they want or need.
Another though, you mention the 500 million guns. That does NOT mean 500 million PEOPLE own guns---many people own quite a few guns!
We need to be very careful when applying statistics, but one that seems quite telling is the number of mass shootings that have occurred since the ban on automatic weapons was lifted, and also the rate of gun deaths in the US as compared with the world.
I imagine this youtube clip might annoy you, but I hope you will watch it to see the statistics that Brian Tyler Cohen relates in it.
Miselle, the telling number is 500 million guns in homes, glove compartments , purses, waistbands, wherever in this blessed country ? Permitless open carry and other insanities ? Where is a sane public policy in all this ? We must stop listening to those who would insist that it is their right to own any type of gun unregistered and without adequate training and screening. They are wrong ! Do not give them equal time as their position is not valid.
Few gun owners want zero restrictions or regulations. I am fine with gun control laws that reduce the death and injury of innocents. We only differ on what is "reasonable." Safety training to own a gun is reasonable. Banning guns is not.
Our position on guns and regulations is as valid as yours. You don't need to give us "equal time," we say what we want on this issue and make our arguments on any forum we wish, and you have no ability to stop us.
Finally, if guns were the atomic powered death rays you seem to believe they are, and gun owners psychopaths just begging for a chance to open fire . . . why aren't we all dead? 500 million guns, 20,000 annual gun murders. Yeah, our "insane public policy" sure is killing everyone deader 'n Raid.
Information in and of itself never annoys me, Miselle. Thanks for the link, I'll watch it. I routinely read the positions of anti-gunners to see what they're up to anyway, and if they happen to make a valid argument, I incorporate it into my own thinking.
Shane, you have all good points, as the same as everyone who’s commented here before me. The point I was trying to portray was that these gun laws we currently have need to be changed, sensibly. Yes, I laid out what might seem to some as stiff regulations, but truly, what’s so stiff about them.
Currently the waiting period is 3 days. This needs to be extended to 30. I base this on this fact. To do a thorough analysis of background checks by all the various agencies requires more than 3 days. I base this on the fact that NOW a deranged individual, a person currently undergoing treatment by psychologist or psychiatrist walk into a gun shop or gun show, and buy a gun, or walk into several gun shops within a few days and buy guns. Why? Because the application that person completed to purchase that firearm, or firearms, lied, and all that happened was it was shoved into a file drawer in the gun shop and forgotten about until that individual takes that firearm and goes into a school and kills 6 people, or a shopping center and kills a dozen, or a church and kills 8 or 9, or whatever.
More needs to be done with that piece of paper instead of shoving it into a filing cabinet. It needs to be faxed/sent to the local law enforcement agencies so then it can be sent to the FBI, and ATF. Then the agencies can collaborate and check out the application thoroughly.
Requiring a computer database where gun shop owners, gun show operators, may check it to make sure this individual isn’t going to numerous gun shops, etc, to purchase firearms. Plus it gives the law enforcement agencies the opportunity to quicker check this firearm when it is used in the commission of any crime. Right now, when a person commits a crime with a firearm, such as yesterday’s 2 masa shootings at the same time in the same city, ATF is immediately dispatched. The first thing they do upon arriving is take possession of the firearm(s) and run them through their computer system to learn the history of that weapon. They have the capability to trace that firearm from manufacture to gun shop. Then they have to get the firm from the gun shop to know who bought it. Why? Thus information should have been available in a computer database, immediately, to all law enforcement agencies on the scene.
Automobiles is mentioned as to the deaths caused by them. Yes, this is true. Just like airplanes and everything else in this world. People die every day in all kinds of various ways. But, with the automobiles, when there’s a wreck, the law enforcement officer has the capability to get on his laptop in his cruiser and know the immediate history of the vehicle, the driver, any arrest record, any warrants, etc. Why not have the same capability for a firearm?
Airplane crashes. The law enforcement agencies have the capability to immediately pull the history of the maintenance of the plane on the scene on their laptops. They can get the flight plan, crew names, passenger list, everything in a matter of seconds or minutes on their laptops on the scene.
This same capability needs to be afforded on firearms as well.
No, I do NOT want to take guns away from anyone. NO, I do NOT wish to keep anyone from purchasing a gun, IF that person is fit to own a gun. Things have got to be changed, and what I laid out might seem a bit harsh to some, but so be it. Let the gun laws get harsh. Maybe, just MAYBE, they need to be a bit harsher than they currently are.
Yes, I agree that the law enforcement agencies should do their jobs more efficiently. But, when they do, it’s harassment, or brutality, or some other reason.
Please, don’t throw the recent beatings, etc, of the officers on these people that has been widely reported. That’s a complete different discussion apart from firearms. But, I will say, from what I saw on the media, which we all know the media only shows the finishing conclusions, and not what led up to the actions of the officer(s), the officers went to far. Once an individual is on the ground, and restrained, it’s over. Get him up off the ground and loaded in your patrol car. Take him to jail. Yes, I used to instruct this, too. Enough said on this.
There’s one thing for certain. The system we currently have in affect isn’t working. It’s broken. It’s antiquated. Out of date, and it needs to be changed, NOW.
I don't believe I said one word about police officers, Daniel. You might be confusing me with someone else. And if I believed government would use your proposed thirty days to actually do its job running a thorough background check, I might go along with it. But all that will happen is thirty days will go by, the checks will not be done because there is no staff or funding to do them, and so what's the point?
I fully understand your thought, but, this is what has to change. Right now, due to forced budget cuts, our law enforcement agencies, all of them, are so understaffed it isn’t funny. The salaries of law enforcement agencies are pathetic, because that’s one area that doesn’t have “visible production of a product”. The law enforcement agency doesn’t put something on the shelf for the consumers to spend money on, and Americans don’t want to pay the law enforcement agencies/officers any more than they absolutely have to because that might mean higher taxes.
The resolution, I believe, to this problem is take the high salaries our politicians are being paid and divide it amongst the law enforcement agencies. Use it to hire more people to get in the computers and run these background checks. Use it to hire departmental psychologists and psychiatrists to do the required analysis of the people applying to purchase weapons. They can also be used to treat the officers. Because I can tell you first hand. After going through an incident like the school shooting in Nashville, or Louisville, the officers need someone to be able to go and talk to also.
All I know is if our politicians can waste good taxpayer dollars on what they are doing now, then these taxpayer dollars can be put yo much better use.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
“A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
Okay, Shane, let's see if you can tell the difference between these two amendments.
One of them says Congress shall make NO law touching First Amendment rights.
The second one STARTS with regulation.
So maybe you need to read more of the US Constitution than the Second Amendment.
Or perhaps you'd like to explain to the rest of us how letting 18 year olds buy weapons of war falls under "well regulated."
Republican governors are already putting restrictions on speech, on religious freedom, ON VOTING - so to act like Republicans aren't already assaulting the First Amendment suggests that either you think the rest of us are fools or you are.
Thank you Bridget! I might add that when the Constitution was written, the available rifles were muzzle loaders, not automatic weapons. If all the gun crazy people in America want to buy a muzzle loader, have at it. NO one should be able to buy an automatic weapon.
And yet you wrote this on a computer and uploaded it to the Internet, neither of which the Founders had when they wrote the First Amendment. Should your right to free speech apply only to that which you write with quill pen on parchment?
Mussel loader? How will the oysters and clams defend themselves?
I think the point is that if the type of weapons that exist today existed back then, the founders would have written the second amendment differently. How about the Virginia Declaration of Rights, Section 13: "That a well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural, and safe defense of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, should be avoided as dangerous to liberty; and that in all cases the military should be under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power." Common sense.
Thank you for pointing out my spelling error this morning. I don't think my computer has killed anyone, at least not in the recent past. I think you are trying to change the subject or at least distract people from the real problem.
My right to free speech should be abrogated because I'm working on a computer or the increased lethality of firearms should be ignored because Second Amendment nuts can't read a dependent clause?
I will also point out to you that Republicans are ALREADY restricting my free speech and the free speech of others. They are ALREADY passing laws about where and when someone can peacefully protest. They are banning books. They are requiring more ID to vote than they do to buy that AR-15.
Do you really want to argue that you can't tell the difference between a medium and a tool?
We all accept regulation on cars and no one argues that the Founders wouldn't have restricted use of wagons - because most of us understand that a lot more people can be killed by an incompetent or inebriated driver than could have been killed by a wagon. Are you going to argue differently?
A well-regulated militia - the Founders backed gun control laws. Heck, I believe they passed them.
"I will also point out to you that Republicans are ALREADY restricting my free speech and the free speech of others. They are ALREADY passing laws about where and when someone can peacefully protest. They are banning books. They are requiring more ID to vote than they do to buy that AR-15."
I believe they should do none of that, for the same reason you should not be trying to ban guns.
I've read the whole Constitution. I was taught it in school. And that means I am well aware of the history of the Constitution and the 2nd before Heller.
Someone who knows more about guns than I do already disputed your points. My cousins with military backgrounds, my friends who hunt don't agree with you either.
But my real disadvantage is that I was raised by men who were dangerous enough not to feel a gun was necessary. And in the 70+ years that they lived, they proved that in multiple instances.
I realize a lot of males need a gun. I was not raised by them and therefore I find it difficult to have empathy for you all.
BTW, when you think about it, you might want to ask yourself whether using Dr. King in a discussion about gun violence was the right place to go.
I don't need your empathy, I know more about gun issues and real-life use of weapons than you ever will, and I will bring up Dr. King whenever I damn well feel like it. So go lecture someone else with your condescending twaddle. I'm done with you.
The same as the Founders did: "works well, does what it's designed to do, efficiently and accurately," "well-managed and operating as designed."
A well-regulated clock is one that keeps accurate time and chimes as designed. A well-regulated Militia is one that does its job--defending the state or nation--well and accurately, putting down rebellions (and, sadly, catching slaves) quickly and efficiently.
But "well-regulated" applies only to the Militia as a unit of government. The right of the people (individual citizens) to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
Shane you are a dog with a bone. I just tuned back in. I thought I was tenacious. So here goes. Amendments have been amended. It is possible...probably far fetched at this point...but possible that the 2nd could be clarified and amended. We took away booze, we brought it back. We made abortion legal, now we've back pedaled on that with a conservative court that believes more in the rights of 2 cells, than in the reproductive and health rights of a fully functioning woman...or girl for that matter...that rape and incest don't matter. The man who broke the law has more rights than the woman he violated. That's interesting isn't it? In some states a Priest could now screw his way through the girls entrusted to him and he could father a dozen children in a year if he wanted to.
Anyway, if and when 2/3 of the states can agree on how the 2nd should be interpreted...the 2nd that YOU interpret, could be changed and modified to something that restricts the weapons involved in most of the yearly murder spree...and regulate purchase and use in ways that do actually affect the murder rate. True?
The only way the 2nd Amendment "works well, does what it's designed to do, efficiently and accurately" is if you thinking losing 42,000 people (annualized) is a goal we should be reaching for.
Or unless you worship Moloch and feel that sacrificing small children will make the rains come and the crops grow.
Shane I don't agree with your interpretation of the 2nd for a lot of reasons. The main one being the Founders could not anticipate the gun's used for mass murder situation that exists today. When they wrote the 2nd, the fastest anyone could reload their single shot weapon...rifle or handgun was about 3 times a minute. So a single individual could not possibly kill and wound multiple people in 30 seconds . There were NO...NONE...mass gun killings by a single individual in America until...I don't know exactly...but the first one with 10 victims that is on record is in 1949 after WWII when automatic weapons became more available to the public. The only way to kill a bunch of people in one minute was through the massed fire of an organized and co-ordinated unit...a militia. Mass killing incidents by gun were VERY rare until the 1960's...happened a little more in the 1980's and have exploded in the past 10 years. America leads the world in mass death by automatic and semi-auto weapons by a LOT. We have an epidemic on our hands by any sane measure...that "thoughts and prayers" is not helping at all.
I'm not advocating making it near impossible to buy a gun. I'm advocating for sanity in this situation. We regulate every dangerous thing out there. Cars did not exist in 1776. AR-15's did not exist. Both were impossible to even conceive of. Let's get real. The founders did not give anyone a god given right to own a weapon of mass destruction with no regulation. Conservatives want to be "originalists" until they don't. There is no document that says every American should have the ability to kill and maim 20 people in less than one minute before reloading. Balls in your court. Go for it.
"Conservatives want to be "originalists" until they don't."
You'll have to take that up with a conservative, Mike. I'm a liberal whose views are my own.
If we were limiting the discussion to only assault rifles, my views would be a little more sympathetic to control. But the thread was about making it "nearly impossible" to own any gun of any kind, and I will not let that go unchallenged. Ninety-nine-plus percent of gun owners have never harmed an innocent, so mangling 2A is not only illegal, it's insulting.
A far better way to reduce illegal gun violence is to enforce the myriad of gun control laws we already passed but do not enforce for reasons of funding and staffing; disallow plea bargains on any violent crime involving a gun; do not let violent gun felons out of prison early; physically confiscate guns from anyone convicted of a violent crime; fund the violence interruption programs proven to reduce gang gun crimes and retaliations; set up red-flag systems that allow anyone to ask a court to review whether Person X should be prohibited from owning guns temporarily, but fund it with enough judges, prosecutors, and defense attorneys to make the system work fast; and if we're going to have a digital instant background check system for guns, demand that every state and federal jurisdiction update that database the moment someone is convicted of a gun-prohibiting crime or adjudicated so mentally ill by a court that guns should be prohibited.
I'm sure there are things I've forgotten, but that will do for a start. I find the notion that slapping more and more gun-control laws that won't be enforced on top of the layer cake of gun-control laws already not being enforce is a waste of time and energy. Better to go after the people who pull the trigger, because without them, guns only collect dust.
Agree with what you state. One of the BIG problems is the lack of laws in many states and the attempted roll back of laws in others. It's a quagmire and the NRA likes it that way. The gun murder situation here in Baltimore is beyond ridiculous. Everyday...and the shooters are getting younger and have no sense of where they are. Any place, any time is now ok. In the days of the Wire, it was mostly drug gang turf battles at midnight in an ally execution style. Not any more. Thanks for your thoughtful response. I wasn't accusing you of being a conservative. Just stating a fact.
It's only been a few hours since people were killed in Kentucky, mere weeks after children were killed in its neighboring border State Tennessee. Beyond that, how many of our fellow Americans just since the year began, have seen their last perspective on this earth fade to black to the sickening soundtrack of senseless gun violence!
Finally, let's not pretend that the 2nd Amendment's conditional right to bear arms is anywhere nearly as important and necessary as the First Amendment, no matter what the worst Supreme Court Justice since Roger Taney, the corrosive corrupt Clarence has to say
My jets are quite cool, thank you. Mr. Cooper presented his arguments for draconian gun control, I presented my counterarguments, and we were both quite civil.
I bow to no one in my disgust that Clarence Thomas remains a SCOTI, but my views on 2A and guns have nothing to do with him. I'm a liberal and I make my own conclusions, I don't borrow them from MAGAs.
Fair enough. I'm not trying in any way to hurl you into the MAGA mosh pit.
Yet a reflexive and strident defense of AR 15s combined with a snarky, fantastical insinuation that reasonable, civilized gun regulation is tantamount to state censorship of free speech rights doesn't sit well while the bodies are being counted.
The ability to own weapons of mass murder for every ordinary citizen is ridiculous and even SCOTUS has said so. The 2nd amendment as written had conditions. The rational that citizens may be armed in order to form a well regulated militia in order to protect the state. Because at that time many were afraid of and against the establishment of a national military. So every state was to defend itself and such defense was to be organized. Never would the founders agree to allow anybody to own a weapon this powerful given the mass murder we are witnessing. We are allowed to amend the constitution. And given the horrific misinterpretation of the 2nd amendment we are clearly in need of an amendment to it. Because some would argue beyond reason and experience that we must oblige the minority who demand they have a right to own any gun they choose because they think that is what the 2nd says. When it doesn’t. And when children in schools are being slaughtered. And when women are being killed by abusive partners. And when people of color are being targeted. We have a right to our safety and equality. We can allow gun ownership with practical regulation to help mitigate the mass slaughter of people by people who have no business owning a gun. We can compromise. We can be reasonable.
I was raped by two men in an outhouse, at knifepoint, at age 11. My diplomatic skills were really really good, but damned if their blade to my throat wasn't sharper.
Twenty-five years later, I was hiking on a remote trail when three young men decided that I was all alone so they should pick up some tree limbs and charge me, hoping I had some money they could steal. I pulled back my jacket and put my hand on the butt of the revolver holstered on my belt. They stopped like they'd hit a glass wall, mumbled something, tossed the limbs, then ran off into the woods. I hiked back to my car and drove home. No shots fired, no gun pulled, no harm to either party, just the way I preferred.
But maybe I should have tried your diplomacy again, sweet-talk them out of cracking my skull. That's what you would have done, right?
I understand the need for guns for self protection & guns for hunting. I dont understand the need for guns that kill many people in nanoseconds or large capacity clips. I dont understand why States are legislating no safety. The NRA use to have excellent gun safety & training programs, I took some. I would like to see programs like that. Before you get a drivers license you have to take a written & hands on test. Why should that not be a requirement for owning a gun?
If we were debating restrictions only on "assault rifles," that would be one thing. But my original reply was to a suggestion that ALL guns be subjected to "make it nearly impossible to own one" regulations, and I will fight that crushing of the 2nd Amendment as hard as I'd fight a ban on free speech.
Using the term gun violence rather than control makes it clearer. We need to be more definite in our language rather than sound bites. Assault rifles is a term of debate when talking about weapons killing lots of people in seconds. The bans dropped in 2004, why not? As a young person u have to take a gun safety class to get a hunting license. To drive a car, you have to pass tests. Bring back the NRA safety programs & stress responsibility before rights. We will always have people who will use weapons to kill, having assault rifles too available only enables them.
Mr. Gericke, I am sorry that you were raped as a child. What those criminals did to you was heinous. I hope they were held accountable for their crimes.
Thank you for your graciousness about my dealing with my boyhood, um, "adventure." I came to terms with it eventually, and reclaimed my life. I appreciate what you said, very much. I know that women fear this far more than men, because women are far more brutalized by these monsters than men. Men who rape and molest are so beneath contempt that I'd like to see them disappear behind prison walls and get out only in a pine box.
"Automatic weapons of war," you'll be relieved to know, are already so heavily regulated under Title II gun laws that these machine guns haven't been used in violent crimes in decades. If you want to reclassify ARs and other "assault rifles" to Title II status with its heavier regulations, that debate is worth having. But Glocks, Smith & Wessons, Beretta, Remingtons, and other semiautomatic handguns, rifles, and shotguns are perfectly legitimate weapons that should not be targeted by gun banners in any shape or form.
I have no objection to gun safety training in order to buy a firearm. Let the NRA run the classes as it does the Hunter Safety Program--in order to get a hunting license, states require you show proof of completing that Hunter Safety class. It isn't a license, and asking the NRA to do it would be useful buy-in to this sensible program.
Licensing? No. Licenses are used solely to create databases, which are used to impose gun bans when politicians feel like creating them to get themselves re-elected. New York State did exactly that: required owners of "assault rifles" to register them with the state with the written promise that the database would never be used to ban the weapons, only to track crime guns. Only a fraction of owners were gullible enough to believe NY, and registered.
One or two years later, they all got a letter from the state: We have updated our assault weapons law, and what you own is now banned. You have 90 days to sell it, move it out of state, or turn it in to law enforcement.
And if registration worked nearly as well as its supporters insist, why do we have millions of automobile crashes, injuries, and deaths. Cars are among the most regulated consumer products in the nation, including mandatory licensing, annual plate renewals, searchable databases, and fees, fees, fees. None of which stops a single crash from happening.
Liability insurance does not exist and will not be written by the insurance industry. Why? Because no insurer will pay if the gun is used in a crime or for suicide, and those two things by themselves account for 95 percent of annual gun deaths: murder and suicide. If insurance companies saw a market niche to fill, they would already offer liability insurance for criminal use of guns. That they don't says it all.
I don't think we need more gun control. What we desperately need is crime control and suicide prevention--target the person with the trigger finger, not the trigger itself--and a willingness to spend the billions of dollars it will take for those tools to reduce gun violence. We also need to enforce all existing gun laws, because they're mostly unenforced so we have no idea how many crimes would be prevented if enforcement was the rule, not the exception.
An example: tens of thousands of people are caught lying on the forms they fill out to buy a gun at a federally licensed dealer. That is a felony, and easily proven because the person signed the form and provided identification during the commission of the crime. Yet, the ATF investigates only hundreds, and prosecutes and convicts mere dozens. Why? These people are generally claiming they're not violent felons when they in actuality are. Or claim they're not addicted to mind-altering chemicals when they in fact shoot up twice a day. They count that the astounding lack of enforcement by the feds will let them buy Precious. This is the lowest-hanging fruit in the law enforcement tree, because the evidence is at the gun dealership, in writing. But, nada, because ATF is understaffed and underfunded.
That's just one of many examples. If we don't treat gun crimes as seriously as we claim, why should criminals take us seriously enough to stop?
Sorry for the length, but your respectful post demanded a respectful and thorough answer.
Shane, respectfully here--when we say gun ownership is our Constitutional right, I tend to really think of the amendment as our Founding Fathers wrote it. So, I believe anyone who wants to own a musket is welcome to do so, and they must adhere to what it would take to be "well regulated militia" which to me, suggests what the current Reserves do. I believe that is one weekend a month, and perhaps 2 weeks a year in the training? (Anyone in the reserves care to verify?)
I also believe the right to own a gun does not mean that you need an entire arsenal at your personal disposal.
Ok, you probably can't find many muskets out there, so I'm fine with a hunting rifle and a handgun if you really feel that insecure about your personal safety.
Since you were a Chicago journalist, I'm sure you are very aware of the amount of gun violence in the city. I am not claiming it is more or less than any other place in the country or world, that is not what I am debating. However, we could probably agree that too many guns fall into the hands of criminals. I'm not sure the claims of the criminals will get guns anyhow is a good counter to wanting some reasonable gun laws. Why have child-proof caps on meds to prevent childhood poisonings, when there are so many other things they could ingest---but we don't stop trying.
Also, personally, I wonder if down in Ulvalde, those cops might have gone in if it was someone with a simple handgun rather than a semi-automatic weapon? I sure don't know that I'd have the courage to run at someone who had the capability to mow me down. I come from a family of 3 police officers (two retired now) and I sure as heck don't like them being out-armed by loonies!
I get so tired of hearing that the libs are coming to take your guns! I don't know a single lib who says that! Can't we come to some compromise between the scenario you portrayed and reasonable gun laws?!
The nut to crack is "reasonable gun law," isn't it? I have my definitions, you have yours, everybody else has theirs. I can back up my "reasonableness" with hard data, but the raw emotion of seeing children mowed down in schools is as much a factor in the debate as cold numbers.
What new gun control laws would stop these nihilists from invading schools, churches, synagogues, and office buildings and mowing down as many people as they can? Banning assault rifles? Those are used in only 1.5 percent of annual gun murders, and that includes Uvalde, Louisville, and every other massacre. So, OK, ban assault rifles. When the murder rate doesn't drop--and it will not--what other classes of guns become the new "weapon of war that ordinary citizens don't need to protect themselves?"
That's the real problem here: we both want the gun murder rate to keep dropping as it had from 1994 to Covid---the rate had dropped by more than 50 percent, from 10+ gun murders per 100,000 Americans to 3.8 per 100K. The rate kicked back between 4 and 5 thanks to Covid unleashing the freaks who like to see kids die. It is already inching lower now that Covid is (mostly) over.
I don't care about assault rifles per se. I no longer own them and have no vested interest one way or the other in them. My goal is to protect the right of every American to own and operate guns FOR ANY LAWFUL PURPOSE, and banning an entire class of weapons (ARs) makes banners hungry for the next group: any semiautomatic weapon.
Since semiautos are about 80 percent of the modern gun market--think Glock--banning them would effective disarm us. That is not acceptable to me, because guns, including Glocks, have perfectly legitimate uses whose social good vastly outweighs their social evil.
If we could narrow this debate to ONLY assault rifles, I'd be more inclined to agree they pose a public danger that other classes of guns do not and so they can and should be more regulated, perhaps by reclassifying them as Title II weapons---machine guns, which require far higher hurdles than buying a Glock. I'm open to that.
But if it's only the stalking horse to going after all semiautos--which more than one politician and gun control lobby has specifically target for execution--then I will fight all of it. Show me a proposal that reclassifies ARs and AKs to Title II status and leaves everything else alone--and I mean everything else--and we can talk.
[Writer's note: Edited to eliminate my unfair cattiness to Miselle]
Shane, that last sentence was not typed as condescension. You read it that way but it was not at all meant that way. I said "if you truly feel that insecure about your personal safety", you should have one. I personally know two people who have good reason to fear for their safety and I totally understand it. I don't understand why you object to me being okay with guns in certain circumstances, I have hunters in my family! (And btw, all of them want enforced gun laws and bans on assault rifles.)
I was talking about assault rifles in my comments. You have many debates going here with others, perhaps you are getting us all mixed up or perhaps you are getting yourself upset.
Since you didn't mean it that way, I freely apologize for misinterpreting it and thank you for your courtesy. I don't object at all to you being okay with guns in certain circumstances---to me that's the gold standard of OK! We only differ on what those circumstances should be.
Have a lovely day, and thanks for a discussion held with respect. I'm going to edit out that last sentence, and thanks for pointing it out.
Hmmm...your right to arms. There it is in a nutshell. Do you own a AR-15 or some sort of automatic weapon? Everyone has the right to protect their life and home, but I don’t think that requires an automatic weapon. Do you?
Your comparative perspective is interesting but freedom of speech and guns are hardly the same. Words may hurt but they don’t usually kill.
Yes, they are the same. I defend the Constitution and Bill of Rights. All of them, not only the ones with which I personally agree. You and others here seem to want 2A to disappear on the misguided notion that America will suffer no more murders. That's not at all true; more murders are committed with hands and feet than with assault rifles.
Be careful what you wish for on eliminating protections you don't personally like. DeSantis, Trump, and other mouth breathers don't like free speech that contradicts their views, and would happily go after your 1A rights. DeSantis has already done that in his own state, with "Don't Say Gay" and "Child Groomer" laws that criminalize the free speech and honest teaching efforts of educators, and by attacking the Disney Corporation's revenue because its board objected to his LGBTQ laws.
"Your right to arms" is also YOUR right to arms. You can own them or not as you wish, that's up to you. But you don't get to dictate that for anybody else.
I don't own automatic weapons. They're too expensive and with their rapid rate of fire, ammo is a budget breaker. I used to own AR-15s and other "assault rifles," and not one of them did anything except punch holes in paper targets. I sold them years ago and own only handguns now.
If you can personally guarantee that criminals will make appointments to rape, mug, or murder me, so I can call 911 instead of showing up for the attack, I'd give up guns. But since that isn't possible, I will keep them, as handguns are the most efficient way to stop someone bigger, meaner, and more psychotic than me from cracking my skull for laughs. These people do not respond to logic, pleas, or diplomacy. The do stop what they're doing when they realized they will be shot if they don't.
Hey, Shane. I have followed your conversation here with great interest.
I like what you had to say about enforcing the laws we already have. For obvious reasons, I would like to see a reinstituted law banning assault weapons, and also a requirement of having proper instruction before taking possession of any gun.
I've tried to give the bare bones of a reply elsewhere. This will be a mere fragment, repeating much the same points...
What didn't make sense to me:
Not your correct understanding of the Constitution, as currently interpreted by the Supreme Court, but what one might term your "constitutional absolutism".
That Anglo-Saxon obsession with "relevance" which, by hermetically sealing off a case from all context, can end up so separating it from reality that it becomes irrelevant...
Which only proves the truth of Lex asinus est.
I am not, then, taking issue with your understanding of your rights, rights which you share with all other US citizens, but with the interpretation of the Second Amendment by your country's most distinguished jurists.
Whatta nerve!
Surely. For I am a layman, a mere translator, with marginal experience of legal drafting. One with the greatest respect for the distinguished jurists I have met and sometimes had the honor to work with; correspondingly with scorn for those at the service of criminals.
I hasten to insist that the last point mentioned has nothing to do with the matter we are now discussing or with the honor of the Justices.
The citation that follows, from a not insignificant philosopher, is not aimed specifically at you or at cargo cultist worshippers of what was once among the finest such documents that mankind has yet drafted but which time, neglect and vested interests have reduced to a curate's egg, good in (most) parts.
It just seems worth thinking about:
“When that which cannot feel, does not feel itself and is devoid of desire or love, is enshrined as a universal organizing principle, that signals the advent of madness, for madness has lost everything but reason.”
Seriously, Mr. Gericke? What about the rights of my kids and grandkids to LIVE?
How about making that clause about a well-regulated militia a far more prominent part of that Second Amendment? Every gun worshipper and ammosexual is so frigging focused on the "right to bear arms" that the OTHER PART of that Amendment seems to get forgotten.
PS: trying to make an equal case of regulating "free speech", "right of asssembly" and regulating "the right to own firearms" is pretty much the dictionary definition of a false equivalency.
"What about the rights of my kids and grandkids to LIVE?"
They have every right to live. The Second Amendment does not protect unlawful use of arms, including murder.
If you want to amend 2A to protect the gun rights of ONLY Militia members so you can take guns away from everybody else, feel free to get that amendment passed. It's your right to try. I predict utter failure, but you should go for it.
Until then, 2A protects the right of individual Americans to own and operate arms for any LAWFUL purpose, including, but not limited to, service in a well-regulated government Militia. "Well-regulated" does not means "lots of regulations," it means "working well, efficiently, smoothly, and as designed."
A common error made by gun paranoids, that meaning of well-regulated. But I'm happy to have had the chance to properly educate you. Now, I normally would not be snotty in my replies, but calling me a gun worshipper and ammosexual made it easy.
I support every right protected by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, from free speech to voting to freedom of assembly to not harboring soldiers in one's home to the right of citizens to own and operate arms not being infringed.
Bull Connor did not support the constitution and I do, so I'm not Bull Connor. But points to you for attempted cleverness.
Finally, decent folks are saying, “Enough!” A 36-0 vote shows solidarity that you cannot take away people’s duly elected representatives without pushback.
I drive past Joan’s home in Woodside CA many times a week. Her exquisite artwork has graced the entry to her property - portraits of RBG, Zelenskyy, and most recently, her former husband noted Vietnam war protested David Harris. I feel inspired each time I pass by. Joan is a national treasure with a voice still so pure and beautiful and strong.
Let’s just rewind history and say the repubs never expelled two black legislators because they were black. Let’s say their protests were recognized as the lifting of voices for all the children killed in mass shootings. To plead for gun laws that prevent the needless deaths of children. Protect children not guns. Let’s say all Americans care enough to lay down their arms and choose to protect all our children. All. Let’s say they met Joan Baez because there is karma in protestors meeting without a plan, not a dream, but all our dreams. Then they sang together. “Last night I dreamed the strangest dream.” Let’s say every American is sick at heart being world leaders in numbers of guns per person, numbers of shootings, numbers of children dying. Let’s say we show our children we love them by our actions. And we sang together, Joan Baez, our children, the Democrats and even the repubs. Let’s say dreams might someday come true. “Last Night I had the Strangest Dream.”
When I was in the US Army, a well trained militia, all weapons, including assault rifles, were stored in unit armories with steel reinforced doors and at least two high-grade locks. The only persons who carried weapons were the Military Police. If Marjorie, Mat, Jimbo, Clarence and Ginny and the other Christmas tree Rangers of the boom-boom club walked onto the post where I was stationed with their Happy New Year assault style tree ornaments they would have no trouble finding the bars: they would be on the doors and windows. It's happy hour. How in Hell's name did the 2nd Amendment get a reading that has allowed the gun culture to become what it has. When 2nd Amendment folks go abroad where all arms are forbidden or strictly controlled, do they take comfort animals when they have to leave their arsenal's behind?
My theory: Guns metaphorically are stand-ins for poorly functioning penises. A handgun barely cuts it. No, the longer the better. The rifle's shot is puny. So, here come the ar-15s--the optimum blast. So., the fear of having their guns taken away feels exactly like...well, I don't have to tell you....
What beautiful images in my head: one young man re-entering the legislature and one singing we We Shall Overcome with Joan Baez. Just wow. I will go to sleep with happy thoughts.
This is how change actually occurs in America. Black folks protest (or any other skin shade except white)...or gay, trans...name whatever "minority" group protests some injustice and white folks in power overreact out of fear...cameras record it and distribute it...a large group of folks see it...then react...and the white folks in power who felt threatened are now REALLY threatened by far more people who are focused on them like a laser beam. In the 1960's when these things occurred like at the Edmund Pettus Bridge there was a HUGE backlash at the White folks in power that did not serve what they wanted to preserve at all. Instead of putting the breaks on, they accelerated their already out of control situation...which literally crashed and burned all around them. They just co-created a situation they did not intend...because they acted out of fear...not love....and then the Universe puts the folk singer together with the protestor and they sing "We shall overcome". Peace to all...thank you again HCR for the report & the history. .
The Tennessee legislators that barely held back from calling the two Justins "boys," must be feeling a little gobsmacked that people are not standing for BS. Hey guys, how's that going to feel like on a daily basis? Our youth is my prayer answered....
The Right wing is going so overboard and is so desperate to get in every piece of legislation, and action that they can before the tables are turned, or so that it becomes impossible to turn the tables. These sorts of victories keeps the hope alive and makes me want to be sure to get out the vote in 2024 and turn things back around. At the same time it is concerning to read elsewhere and again today in The Lever that The No Labels party is possibly going to run the government through a third party which they pretend is centrist, but is not, and is funded by a lot of undeclared dark money.
I would agree that they did violate that law and many others, not least of which was a byproduct of their gerrymandering; a majority of us within the borders of supposed 'red states' have little to no representation. ? Did we not hurl 'tea' in a harbor over such abuse .... I think I remember so. Is not besides sedition, a deprivation of our rights to representation, at least a civil court manner that should be pursued ? I think so.
Unfortunately, SCOTUS and many state courts are political groups rather that pro-justice courts. Maintaining Republican power is their well-funded purpo$e.
I agree! I not only think they should be taken to court, and I believe the ACLU was going to do that, don't know if they still will. Hope so! I also think we need to make sure that any fines must come out of their personal monies, not their campaign chest as they are so known for passing the buck, or bills, as it may be. Prison time would be good too. There is nothing clearer to people suffering from Antisocial Personality Disorder than limits on their actions and punishment. Risking loss of freedom or financial ruin, is the consequence that makes people think and other avoid actions that are punished. Might put the breaks on Governor DeSantis, known by my 24-year-old nephew and his friends who are all graduate students as DeSatin! Moral appeals do not work on them, so forget community service. Fines and time is what they should get!
How delightful to hear Jones and Baez sing those iconic civil rights songs together, passing on the torch from one generation to another. On the same plane? John Lewis must be smiling in heaven.
I grew up on Joan Baez’s music, protests etc. I’ve seen her in concert more than any other singer. It was great to see the videos on FB & T today. Maybe JL arranged it…good trouble!!!
We need to turn TN BLUE AS POSSIBLE. Hell I'd even settle for purple. Then maybe other Red states would fall into place. " HOPE is the last thing to die ".
I would be happy with purple. That is what we were until 2010. 4 out of 9 of our national reps were Democrats. We had a Democratic governor in the 2000’s. I want an end to gerrymandering and voter suppression nationwide. And yes, it needs to happen in blue states, too. It is an artificial state that leads to toxicity in the state, which we are seeing the manifestation of in Tennessee as the latest example.
I am so, so happy that this harsh light is shining on my state. I have been screaming for this to happen, but thinking it never would. This is the first step to governmental healing for my state. I pray now we take the next steps. But until we get national voting rights through, to deal with our district maps and voter suppression, I think the best we can see is inroads into margins by which the GOP wins by.
But that is also a start!
2024 will be seminal in terms of national voting rights. Dems have to take back the House and keep the Senate. In Wisconsin we are hoping to finally see some light regarding our extreme gerrymander. Dems and independents just want fair maps!
Redistricting – Voters Not Politicians https://votersnotpoliticians.com/redistricting/
Don’t count on it. We’re getting a LOT worse before we get better. Count on it
Sadly so
Please send some purple to KY. I’m so sick of the KYGOP. So corrupt. Mitch rules in KY. Sickening.
Where pray tell has KY's Mitch been hiding since he 'fell'? Did he actually have a stroke or worse?
He's in Purgatory. Or " I don't give a tinker's damn ".
The current splitting up of Nashville's solid Democrat vote into minorities among 3 mainly Republican and rural constituent assemblies is a glaring example of ongoing gerrymandering. Republicans euphemize the elimination of Nashville as a Democratic electoral stronghold. 62% white, 27% African American.
Is it possible to do what Michigan did with our ballot initiative for redistricting, or have the Repugnants taken away that right, too?
Redistricting – Voters Not Politicians https://votersnotpoliticians.com/redistricting/
Sadly no. Michigan is NOT Tennessee. I haven’t forgotten the beating death of Mr. Tyre by FIVE Memphis thug-cops
National Voting Rights, Cathy, critical, and ushering in an issue as important as abortion rights in this 2024 election!
Protecting the "Youth Vote" is nationally important as well. On Wisconsin ... Beau both at Eau Claire (up 232% since 2019) & Madison (up 240%). Thank you HCR for re-posting Victor Shi's Voters Tomorrow data to help focus voters in 2024. All ages --- vote in 2024.
Cathy
This was more than just a start! Republican lawmakers at every level better recognize this as the alarm klaxon it was! We citizens have had ENOUGH of this nonsense and those who perpetrate it!
Those in the Tennessee Statehouse took advantage of the protest to punish members they don't like. Their little pizzing contest backfired big time. What would have been an invisible protest became front page national news! Tennessee is under the microscope in a way it never would have been. We are watching.
Standing with you, Cathy💙
I am confident that the rash and racist move of the Tennessee House to eject Reps. Pearson and Jones marked the beginning of the end for the Racist Republican Party in that state. It won’t happen overnight, and Republicans will still win some fights, but the course is now set.
" THE FALL OF THE REPUBLICAN EMPIRE ". About damn time ! I'm sure that the Romans thought that their empire was the dog's bollocks, until it collapsed, & the " Holy " Roman Empire was a marginal improvement.
Oh they’d like to make Holy. Christian Nationalust
They'd have Gladiatorial games - Humanists, atheists, Jews, Hindus, Moslems, Latin Americans, gays, lesbians, Transsexuals, maybe Native Americans, any non - Evangelicals facing trained AMERICAN GLADIATORS or lions.
Absolutely correct. And just WHO is going to PAY for those re-election? The state? Gimme a break
My eyes are still blurry from reading that last paragraph. The “coincidence” of Baez on same plane and then them singing together those particular songs sounds like a Hollywood ending...or Divine intervention. Alleluia!
No such thing as coincidence. Synchronicity!
That's what I thought too!
I have always loved Baez's music, etc. I haven't seen the video yet, but will seek it out. Good trouble indeed.
Heather posted the link at the end of the newsletter.
Thanks. I didn't look at the links.
Click on Heather's link near the bottom of her list.
As my wife since the 60s says, we need a new generation of protest songs. Of course, to go along with and add to our many great historical songs of protest.
Oh what a lovely thought!
What a joke. There are two forms of justice in America. One for Democrats and one for republicans. Enter a capitol building as a republican and you are terrorist, enter a capitol
as leftist and you are are beautiful and moral. Its disgraceful and people in America can see it everyday. There is different justice for Biden/Clinton then there is for Trump.
There is an America civil coming if the left thinks it can continue to criminalize politics.
As for Tennessee, I applaud the legislators kicking out the representatives.
I agree, James A! Joe Biden tried to coerce a foreign leader into finding dirt on a political opponent, paid off a porn star to hush up before an election, misled the FBI about classified documents in his possession, pushed a lie that an election had been stolen, incited an attempted coup - and he's walking around scot-free!
Appreciate the irony.
I think you meant to name Donald Trump, as Joe Biden did none of those things
It is sarcasm.
AND UP IS DOWN AND DOWN IS UP. WELCOME TO THE Fing METAVERSE.🤪
Robert🙏😳
Those that entered the US Capitol on Jan 6 did so by force at a time when it was closed in order to disrupt the counting of the electoral vote. They were violent and attempted to obstruct an official proceeding. Hence why many are now in jail. The people who entered the TN Capitol did so peacefully, they were protesting, they did not forcefully attempt to stop legislation. People are allowed to watch TN Capitol legislation from the balcony. This is not nearly equivalent. Republicans wish to have authoritarian rule and to return us to the ugly days of overt racism. They have turned against democracy and as we have witnessed in TN overrule the majority voice. Democrats are attempting to strengthen democracy, protect the right for everyone to vote and overturning gerrymandering as per the Voting Rights Act which was voted against by every Republican. Eventually democracy will win. It is inevitable as more young people and women vote. They will not remain silent as rights are being stripped away, books are being banned and people seeking asylum are trafficked across state borders. The majority of the people will have their voices heard and lawfully enacted as they should in a democracy.
Your reply is very interesting considering the color of your skin. More GOP equals
more racism. The Civil War was fought and the North won. We don't need another one.
sock puppet. in blackface too.
WTF?
Robert🙏😳
I just laid out a whole paragraph and that's the best you can come up with?
Yes I have a problem with people that storm a capitol building to support a murderer.
The absurdity of trans rights activists lecturing citizens on guns rights when a trans person
just murdered 3 children and 3 adults. That takes a lot of chutzpah.
There wasn't an ounce of sympathy for the victims.
Imagine if it was the other way around? You would know the name and biography of
every person murdered.
The whole thing is disgraceful.
James A-The people in Nashville were NOT there to support a murderer. They were protesting the omnipresence of guns and the murder of the people/children in Covenent School and the ongoing killing of school children and others. Justin Jones was muzzled by the Speaker of the House and NOT allowed to speak. As far as the bullhorn, if he hadn't been muzzled, he wouldn't have used it. Did you know that since January first, over ELEVEN THOUSAND have died of gun violence in the U.S.? https://abcnews.go.com/US/116-people-died-gun-violence-day-us-year/story?id=97382759
Democracy can work! The people’s voice matters!
Yes, but... Even when the Tennessee Three are all back in their seats in the legislature, what comes next for democracy? They will be marginalized, the two young Black men will be forced to run again, and marginalized again when they win. Can the Tennessee legislature welcome back two young Black men and one white supportive woman? Is the Tennessee legislature ready to listen to the voices of the constituents of the Tennessee Three? Is there any hope in the foreseeable future for any gun legislation to be debated, let alone pass? Yes, I believe that democracy can work, but I'm not sure how many decades it will take for districts to be redrawn so that voters' voices can actually be heard in in the legislature in Tennessee.
I respectfully disagree; the leadership they will provide will not be defeated for this country and these young people have had more than enough fear and violence! They are ready to vote the friends of the killers out of office. My foundation Inspire2Vote has registered "nonpartisan" 105,000 young high school seniors all across the country to vote and I assure you they are ready for leadership in 2024. We have just merged with a fabulous group of Harvard students who are working to register young voters in 2,700 high schools; please click on www.turnup.us and support this optimistic leadership going forward. It's time!
Agreed! And thank you for your efforts ! Young voters are fed up. And they are showing up. And TN is not so red - they are gerrymandered. Republicans cracked Nashville to gain this super majority. They had to cheat. The majority are not being heard. And they are speaking out. Things are changing. And as women are nearly dying without the ability to make healthcare decisions regarding their pregnancy they are joining the young people. There will be a tidal wave. It is already happening.
The speaker, Cameron Sexton, May be in some trouble for fraudulently claiming to be living in Crossville and collecting a much higher per diem when he actually lives in Nashville. Courtesy of Judd Legum and the TN Holler
Respectful disagreement is good. : ) So is registering people to vote. The League of Women Voters has, for years, been registering high school students to vote. In addition to voting, though, we need to encourage young people to run for office. Maxwell Frost is in his 20s, as are the two Justins, so we know that when they run, they can win. Maybe some of your Harvard students can challenge our current state reps and state senators and turn the MA legislature blue.
In my local school board election coming up, we have a young woman Haley Taylor Schiltz running. She’s the youngest graduate from SMU law school and she’s amazing! At 20 years old she is our best hope. There are only two seats open and we’re getting out the word to vote for her and one other reasonable candidate. The young voters are here and I hope more run for office. We have to overcome the christo fascist wave!
The MA legislature is already blue. So is the MA governor. We have two progressive senators here, Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey.
We have a legislature in MA that votes the way the leadership does, in both the House and the Senate. Check out Act On Mass to see how resistant our leadership is to letting us know how committees vote. Why are progressive bills (e.g., Medicare for All, the Safe Communities Act) reintroduced year after year without any hope of passage? Yes, Warren and Markey are on the the progressive side, but read some of what Healey says and does. Pretty centrist. Are our legislators Dems? Yeah. Blue? Maybe pale blue. Progressive? Not very much.
DOJ needs to investigate all the repugnants in congress who were involved with J6 and removed!
Haley just bought a years supply of the morning after pill so….
If everyone doesn't vote, how can the word democracy have any meaning?
I have said for years and continue to say " if you don't vote, you have no right to complain".
Australia REQUIRES everyone to vote or else you are fined!!!
Can one of these three (TN) run for Congress?
"Now you're talkin'!!!
Young people have had enough. They are angry that we have ignored the Climate Crisis and that we have let guns be more important than their lives.
Thank you for your work on this. And turnup.us is inspired!
Thanks Bill please pass on the turnup info to your friends!
Spreading the word about turnup.us
https://billalstrom.substack.com/p/winning-with-youth
I donated to turnup. Thank you for letting us know about this.
Thank you for your civic engagement and for getting young people registered to vote. I'm great at knocking on doors but terrible at registering voters because I'm super partisan and can't keep my mouth shut. Lol
Fear and violence - GOP specialties of their menu. They THRIVE on negativity. Pathetic.
I don't know many hs age kids, but I do know a few hs teachers, so I send the link to them. I see that they pay hs kids $100 for 2-4 hours of work and that could be very appealing to them. Thanks, ira!
But what happens when the repugnants states are all gerrymandered??
Just donated!
Already donated last week! I’m so excited to see what these new voters can do to turn our Country back toward DEMOCRACY! ❤️
Love this. Please post about it on PACEsConnection.com. Democracy is the anti-trauma. People need and deserve voice and choice. Political subterfuge in the form of gerrymandering and trying to keep the people silent is the true Damndemic. Thank you for your amazing work. Please do post about it! Join (it’s free) and post and please connect with me on LinkedIn. Carey Sipp
Betsy, I would note, because state legislatures are subject to regulations of Congress, were the Freedom to Vote Act—that, among other provisions, mandates fair voting maps—to pass, we’d see an end to votes being diluted through partisan gerrymandering. You might recall, in January, 22, the legislation passed in the House, but was blocked in the Senate by Manchin and Sinema, who, along with the 50 Republican Senators, filibustered the bill.
Accordingly, were Democrats, in 24, to retake the House, pick up 1 Senate seat, and hold the Presidency, the federal regulations, from which states would not be exempt, would become law.
Will donate my last dime to have one more REAL Dem senator
Hopefully Arizona will get rid of Kyrsten Sinema.
She is registered as I so will get some, or many, Republican votes.
Kathy, Aside from working for Arizona Democratic Senate candidate Ruben Gallego, whose campaign is focused on representing the interests of a wide range of voters, I am banking on two factors: 1) Sinema has grown increasingly unpopular among all Arizona voters and 2) She’s not sufficiently conservative, given the demographics of Arizona’s mostly far-right Republican voters.
Jeri, Because the 24 Senate map favors Republicans, we’re seriously going to have to mobilize to hold onto our incumbents. Additionally, we need to get behind Arizona Democrat Ruben Gallego if we’re to have 50 Democratic Senators receptive to modifying, if not abolishing, the Senate filibuster, ultimately, to move legislation to the floor for debate and an up or down majority vote.
Yes, things have to happen in the Senate to push through filibuster proof majority or just get rid of the filibuster.
Frank, Considering the 24 Senate map favors Republicans, we’re going to have to seriously mobilize just to retain our incumbents. Beyond that, we need to get to work to insure Arizona Democrat Ruben Gallego wins Arizona’s Senate seat. Only then will we have 50 Senators (Harris being the 51st vote) receptive to modifying, if not abolishing, the Senate filibuster to allow legislation to move to the floor for debate and an up or down majority vote.
I’ll keep donating and I’ll hope but that’s a lot of “ifs”.
Maria-Elena, In my view, re-taking the House and holding the Presidency will be a less formidable challenge than retaining the Senate, whose map, in 24, favors Republicans. Rather than repeat myself, I would note my reply to Frank Loomer, part of this thread, establishes a plan for seating 50 Senators receptive to modifying, if not abolishing, the filibuster to move legislation to the floor for debate and an up or down majority vote.
It will be up to all the Americans who decide to leave their comfort zone and become visible. Whether you were visible in the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, the fight for democracy has no time stamp. Across the Nation, there needs to be voices heard and people seen demonstrating ¨enough is enough¨ . We need gun reform. We need Roe v Wade back in place. We need Acts that penalize those who lie to the public (like the Fairness Doctrine). We need stricter guidelines for running for office. You need to at least know how the government operates, know the names of all the states, know the branches of government and who is responsible for what, ....
Yes, but...these days of rapid communications and alert journalist might be the nemisis of those Southern confederate bullies.
From your keyboard to God's ( whoever's ) eyes.
I fear that you are right, Betsy. Tennessee is a deeply red state and the redistricting has made it difficult for any Democrat to win anything. But, it is good to see that they will be back and have the people behind them!
The city of Knoxville is blue but the surrounding county not so much. Shelby County is largely dem. The city of Nashville was also. Now the legislature is punishing Nashville by getting in the city’s business to break it. I think there may be hope that this time the legislature went too far. To see a blatantly demeaning “speech,” Google “Andrew Farmer Justin Pearson” and watch. It made me cringe.
thanks -I did find the "Temper Tantrum". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Halw3xpd_Tc
People like me who live where this would and could never happen should see this video to understand where parts of this country are politically, socially. They should listen to the difference in quality of mind between one representative who *thinks* he has the power and thus entitled to his hubris, and another who does not only have the real power, the moral power, but the right and the duty to stand and fight and the duty to fight regardless. Without people like Justin Pearson this is one way democracy gets stamped out.
Well said, Potter. Thanks for posting the full speeches by both Farmer and Pearson. Farmer's demeaning and disparaging remarks made me cringe, too. But Justin Pearson handed it right back to him brilliantly and with clarity. As has been said, therein lies our hope — with our youth.
Yes, what Farmer did unknowingly ( stupidly) was to hand Pearson an opportunity. He was more than ready. These people,Farmer and those who who bolster him, should be shamed. With awareness and shame, hopefully they will be unseated.
Long-time organizers that both Justin's are helps a lot!
Is that not insulting?
I hope you are right. My husband's sister lives in Chattanooga (we almost moved there too many years ago). She and her husband always despair how red their city is. In retrospect, I'm happy that we stayed in Michigan, bad weather and all!
The good weather's coming! And Michigan people worked very, Very, VERY hard to get into place an independent redistricting committee. It worked...and now for the first time in decades Dems control the legislature (not by much, but enough) and the offices of the governor, attorney general, and secretary of state. We will have no-reason absentee voting, extended days to vote....and the abortion ban was overturned. Gun safety legislation is coming.
Yes, we Michiganders have worked hard for many years to make positive changes in our state and we finally have a leadership team in Whitmer, Nessell, and Benson (plus the House and Senate majorities) to really enact these positive changes. It has been a LONG time coming! We LOVE "Big Gretch"! Plus, I-94 is getting fixed!
Twenty-seven years we lived in Livingston County duking it out with the Repub hierarchy. They had votes coming from 60% of the county population. Intelligence, they were shy on and a few of us backed them up with our commentary.
Of course, we move south to AZ and the state changes. It must be because of something I said. I had to be the instigator. I love reading about Mallory McMorrow putting Lana Theis in her place. It was great theater. The latter and I had gone a few rounds in dialogue along with her forerunner Hune.
Good to read this
What a great story to shout from the rooftops, Ann!
Colette My thoughts of Tennessee include:
1) Tennessee volunteers fought bravely but could not dislodge Col Joshua Chamberlain and his 20th Maine from Little Round Top at Gettysburg;
2) The locale of the Scopes trial in which William Jennings Bryan debated Clarence Darrow on evolution;
3) By one vote Tennessee was the decisive state in approving the admendment giving women the vote; AND
4) Red necks in the Tennessee General Assembly vastly outnumber the sensible citizens., though there are some urban streaks of blue.
I have seen the evil up close, where Beto got creamed by the cheating bastards. This time, I hope (hope not yet dead in Texas), that the evil has jumped the shark this time. May 2024 give us back our humanity. Deport Rupert, dump chump, resurrect the real Jesus, and call the cult MAGAts what Ike proved to the Germans that they had been worshipping - the devil and his disciples. The civil war needs to be won for real this time…
To hear the the republicans sat silent is heartbreaking. It is so indicative of a mindset unwilling to even consider change. The lack of gun laws of almost any kind is unconscionable.
Every change starts somewhere …
Nobody says it will be easy. The USA has been slipping toward oligarchy for quite some time. Corporate powers are deeply entrenched. We are in rough seas, but we are not drowning. Not yet. Young men like the Justin's and strong women like Gloria. And millions of young people coming up are our captains and we are their crew. We have, some of us at least, fought and led. Now we support them and speak and sing and work with them to reach the promise of America that has never yet happened: Equality and Justice for All.
I was distressed by the “both sides-ism” of the, I assume, official, comment from Shelby County. It can be paraphrased as, “He lost his head in the heat of the moment”. That is to say, it was a grievous error. The rest was weak sauce.
No, no, no. More, not fewer of these “transgressions” are needed. Each one is the blow of an axe chopping down a rotting tree. Civility is not the response that is needed when there are horrors stalking the land, one of them obviously being the current American fetish to strip away any and all gun restrictions. Legislators need to fear when the next bitter protest will erupt and what boundaries of decorum it will cross.
North of Tennessee four unsuspecting people were shot to death in a bank yesterday, probably within a few hours of Justin Johnson reclaiming his seat while being ignored by the Legislature’s troglodytes. Maybe more people will feel the urgency of this moment.
"Is there any hope in the foreseeable future for any gun legislation to be debated, let alone pass?"
As far as I can tell the answer is no.
It is now after 1:00 p.m. here in the west and already some things are happening for good in Tennessee. There may be a breakthrough in gun laws being changed there.
Glad the fascists lost a round, but they'll be back to trash democracy again soon enough. Democrats must learn to fight better, longer, harder, and with more desired results, or we will be out of power again soon.
I fear, sometimes we'll have to descend to their level & fight dirty. Hopefully briefly.
Republicans are nasty humans, or at least they look human.
Hahaaahaaa.. Craig..and those fascist-dickheads are 'our' fascists, elected by all of 'us' the American people(s) and those of TN. So let's call em "R"-fascists.... RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR..RRRRRR..RrrrRRR%&$rrrrrRRgaggRR##^}rrrrrrghh.ahhh FASssshits. There!! Whew.., finally got it out Craig.. whew! I feel better now.
Freedom of expression unobstructed. 1 victory at a time.
One of the two expelled senators from Tennessee was reinstated today to his seat. Senator Justin Jones (D-Nashville) was sent back to the Tennessee Senate today with a resounding unanimous vote by the Nashville local officials. The vote was 36-0, and immediately afterward, they marched him to the state capital to be sworn in and retake his seat.
This was extremely exhilarating to watch. It made me feel really proud this black man, this man of color, had the opportunity to ‘stick it’ to the Tennessee Republican Party.
Hopefully, in a day or so, the other senator will be returning to the Tennessee Senate Chamber.
Now, I want to turn to the sad news of yesterday.
More souls taken from us in Louisville, Kentucky in two mass shootings that happened almost simultaneously only a few miles apart. Two mass shooters in one city at the same time. Just exactly how many people have to die in mass shooting involving weapons of mass destruction. Two more people get their hands on weapons that have no sense with a gun, of any kind.
There’s absolutely no excuse why we can’t get reasonable gun restriction laws passed across this country.
There’s absolutely no excuse why we can’t raise the age to purchase a weapon to 21 across this country, change the process to buy a gun of any type. We need to make it near impossible for a person to purchase a weapon. Change age limit, waiting periods. Make the waiting period thirty days, if that’s what it takes to do a thorough medical, psychological, and criminal background checks. Make it mandatory that every person that purchases a weapon undergo psychological examinations during the waiting period prior to being authorized to pick up that firearm. Every person that purchases a weapon must get a seal of excellent mental health from a psychologist assigned by the law enforcement agency to do these assessments.
Make it where a person can only purchase a firearm, but must wait an additional amount of time to buy ammunition for that firearm. Then they can only purchase a certain amount at a time over a period of time.
Make a national database accessible by all gun shops so every purchase is immediately entered into it, and it be mandatory for every gun shop to check the database to assure that person isn’t going to several gun shops to purchase weapons or ammunition.
Have the same laws enforced for gun shows as they are for gun shops. No weapons may be purchased and delivered at the show. The same 30 day waiting period, same background checks, same psychological assessment. Everything. And especially the same access to the data base that must be checked.
Maybe, just maybe, we can slow down these mass shootings where our loved ones, friends, neighbors, are being gunned down by a lunatic with a damn gun!
Make it a crime to own an AR15, if you're not in the military!
I doubt seriously this will happen, although I’d like to see it. There’s no reason an assault rifle needs to be in any home.
AR-15 weapons are marketed to make it look cool to own one. What on earth is an ordinary person going to do with a combat weapon that obliterates its target?
They are sometimes marketed to potential buyers by showing a mighty male with an AR15, with the screaming headline " Get Your Man Card."
Sick.
Daniel - I think that it's Freudian " overcompensation " for lack of size elsewhere.
Could be. Who knows. I’m not one to check their lack of size of anything.
👍👍👍 x a gazillion
The heart of the issue is vulnerability. The gun industry has succeeded in persuading many citizens to own multiple guns/more lethal guns/a wall of ammo how? By appealing to their sense of vulnerability. They will resist their guns being taken away. We will have to “pry them out of my cold dead hands”, yada,yada,yada. Vulnerability. Who gets to be protected from the feeling of vulnerability? People who love guns and the “cool” factor they represent. Yet the rest of society gets to sit uncomfortably / precariously / dangerously with their vulnerability. Disenfranchised voters? “Just suck it up.” Children without enough food? “Quit your whining!” Children of undocumented workers brought here when they could barely walk? “Hit the road back to the Sh*thole country you came from!” The working poor who need healthcare? “You’re probably poor because Jesus is displeased with you!” A woman bleeding out from a pregnancy complication? “You should not have had sex in the first place!!!!!” Children wanting to go to school and know they will return home at the end of the day? “Arm the teachers, the lunch-helper, the recess-helper, the Hall-monitor, the Custodian like a super-max prison!” Vulnerability. Who has to just “suck it up?” Apparently the majority of us because we don’t deserve it as much as gun lovers.
It is an "us versus them" mentality and fear of the "other" that supports AR15 ownership.
Completely agree, AR15's should be completely illegal.
I have never, never been able to understand why compulsory insurance should apply to driving a motor vehicle but not the ownership of guns, especially weapons more powerful than those used by infantrymen in both world wars.
America's firearms regime shames mankind and brands the country with the mark of Cain.
At least there was a purpose to human sacrifice in the Aztec empire. A purpose. America's haphazard random sacrificial practice is beyond savagery. It demonstrates that, for all the talk of religious values, all the claims of being "Christian", the only cult that counts is the idolatrous worship of Mammon and Moloch. Money and murder.
They've given " Christianity " 2 black eyes, a number of bruises & scrapes, at minimum.
If my cousin the Evangelical read what I'm writing she'd come over here, rip my head off of my shoulders, eat it, then c--p it out. Then she'd justify it.
Hell, I sent her something about Jimmy Carter working with Habitat for Humanity in his NINETIES, & she acted like I had endorsed Satan.
Daniel, I am a believer in Christ and I have not and will not succumb to the propagana and indoctrination coming from many .....I will not even call them pastors.
They are also using the pro-life movement......which I at one time supported. I knew nothing about the plight of women's suffering or the horrors of bringing a child into this world to be abused, used, sold....even here in the USA much less the women left alone to take the blame for everything and the responsibility for everything.
There is no other commonsense response but to support the rights of women. Women have had to bear the burden while the sperm looks for another host!!! It is reality!
Emily Pfaff "Daniel, I am a believer in Christ and I have not and will not succumb to the propagana and indoctrination coming from many .....I will not even call them pastors."
Have you ever felt like your religion just wasn’t enough? Like the values you were taught and the beliefs you held dear somehow fell short? If so, you’re not alone. From broken promises to harsh realities, these 15 things have left countless people feeling disillusioned and spiritually bankrupt.
Greedy Megachurches
“They received over 1 mil in donations every week and spent it on elaborate props, rather than helping the community.” One Reddit user said.
“My husband, who went to school for music production, said the soundboards they had were minimum $1mil each and they had like 7 of them.”
Unnecessary Showiness
“The first thing I saw upon entering was a life-size bronze statue of the pastor.”
“There’s a megachurch in Florida that has a Starbucks in it.”
“2 bands, a stage, not an altar. They had a commercial break for expo erasable markers in the middle of it.”
Lack of Gratitude
“When I was 6, the pastor gave a letter to my mom saying that we were not donating enough money to the church.”
Another user had a similar experience: “The church wrote a letter saying they knew how much money he was making and that he should be giving more to the church.”
Entitlement
“When I was in middle school a pastor created this chart showing what everyone should be donating each week/month based on your household’s income. I stopped going after and my parents largely have too, that was a real blow to them to see something so asinine.”
Religious People
“Only God has the right to judge, yet religious people are the most judgemental people you can meet.”
“Also, if you’ve ever been to a church, they all gossip about each other.”
“My mom was a church organist/choir director for a long time, and I got to know many of the members. Some of the fakest people I’ve ever met.”
Abuse
“Being told that being SA was good as God needed to teach me a lesson. I was seven.”
“When my SIL got her Masters in counseling, one of her professors said that many predators ‘hide behind’ the facade of Big Church Guy. He said they will purposely seek out a board position or similar so that people won’t question what he’s doing.”
Empty Advice
“The non-answers to all my questions as a kid. “You just have to have faith” is a dumb way to respond to an inquisitive mind.”
We Don’t Ask Questions Like That
“When I was a kid, I asked my grandmother where God came from, and she smacked me across the face and said, ‘We don’t ask questions like that’. I was just being curious, and her reaction shocked me.”
Contradictions
“In school, we learnt about the Greek gods, and I was like, wait, hold on there are other gods??
“It was explained that ‘oh no it was a long time ago and they just didn’t understand how the world worked, so they made those gods up as explanations’. That led to a lot of questions about how we know God is real then.”
Religious Complex
“Some people believe that being religious makes them better than non-religious. When I left the church, I was persona non grata. None of the members will even look at me now.”
“There is this Christian radio my parents listened to, and when the hosts were talking about some gathering, they referred to non-believers as ‘icky people.’
Religious Leaders
“Religious leaders ruined religion for me.”
“I never met a single priest who could tell me about heaven, but they all knew every square inch of hell. They should. They built it.”
Misogyny
“When the pastor started ranting about the evils of women, saying that Satan walks among us in the body of every female, and men must take measures against them. I don’t think everyone in the faith is like that, but it was the one moment that ruined religion for me. Especially seeing his wife react to the sermon with such support of the message. It was one of those defining moments in my life, a very negative one.”
Control
“It became evident that many people who call themselves religious only do so to feel morally superior to others, and then use that superiority to try to control everything.”
Power-Hungry
“Seeing how people use religion as an excuse to be bad people.”
Lack of Empathy
“I was 15. My father had been diagnosed with ALS. I had gone to a youth group, and they had a circle of teenagers talking about things going on in their lives. When it was my turn, I shared that my father was dying. I was angry and said something like I doubted there was a God if this was happening. I got chewed out for questioning God, and the kids refused to talk to me the rest of the night. You would think I had killed someone. It was THAT strong of a reaction.”
https://becausemomsays.com/things-that-ruined-religion-for-you/?fbclid=IwAR0Oje4WBtYVeoRqPyqw1LwkgCZ84SsYDVG7gTOqL-6ke2cJAQ9oWBVn9Pc
How to "like"?
How not to endorse this catalogue of human frailty and hypocrisy?
It's miserable and, for the Nth time, I fail to see how any organization, any community, can so thoroughly pervert the Christian gospel. After all, what's the point of all this make-believe? Why pretend? Why use religion as a vehicle for escaping truth and responsibility? What's the point of living as a complete fake?
What is, however, clear as daylight is the way in which totally failed would-be politicians on the loony far-right SAW THE LIGHT and turned to "religion", i.e. Godbiz, found "SUCCESS"! sheared the flock! made loadsamoolah! directed voting! Etcetera etcetera etceteraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrghhh. . . . .
After all that, is it surprising if they take a Coney Island sideshow barker for their savior?
Satan will be enjoying the show...
Does your cousin realize that Jimmy Carter taught Sunday school at his Baptist church for years? He walked his faith talk.
Jimmy Carter could WALK ON WATER & HEAL SICK PEOPLE & she would still think he was an acolyte of Baal / Beelzebub.
Poor thing, your cousin. It's not nice being forced to pity fellow-citizens, let alone to protect ourselves from them...
All of us are too prone to to built-in habits of judging others, the better to avoid our own mirror. All of us, very much including those who see themselves as atheists, have been deeply conditioned by monotheism and even more so, regardless of anti-clericalism, manipulated by habitual mental patterns inherited from domination by churches. Influence all the more powerful for being unconscious. Regardless, then, of our belief or unbelief, we need to bear constantly in mind the guidance in Matthew 7:1-3.
Peter, I've said this before (maybe even on this forum? not sure) but I've had this argument with people: if you don't believe in God or a higher power of any sort, can you at least be a Jesus-fan, no different than say the "Deadheads" or a "Chicago Cubs" fan? By this, I mean, can you admire the Jesus that walked the Earth, who proclaimed love and forgiveness, who stood up for the weak, the poor, the downtrodden, the sinners? Can you admire Jesus enough to consider Him a role model? Someone to emulate? I've had a few people truly stop to think about that. I feel like sometimes religions, esp the radical right, have forgotten God.
That Jesus has been replaced by Pharisees with a prosperity gospel. Now the WWJD message has been translated to “hate the libtards.’
This is why when I mention " Christians ", I bring out the " ". The " Christians " would have Jesus committed if not crucified or shot if he was here today.
Please lets not insult Pharisees, Jeri... Or confuse the Gospel with the Bad News.
But... I really do wonder how they do it... The Gospel's so plain, so radical, so demanding. By what juju do they transform it into all it is not?
Evangelicals DO LOVE their Mammon & WASP tribalism.....
I also believe that she might have Asperger's Syndrome, because she seems to lack BOTH empathy & she has a distinct lack of curiosity re the world beyond metro Nashville. When she asked about Buddhism, I was stunned almost beyond words. the only genuine emotion that she seems really fully capable of is ANGER when her faith is questioned.
Monotheism is immensely demanding, it calls for real humility. Otherwise, there's such a great risk of getting it all wrong because we are so ill-equipped to believe in what is beyond our understanding that, instead of nurturing simple faith and self-confidence, we can easily develop a crippled and crippling wreck of a belief in something we like to imagine we understand but don't... some shard of what once was whole.
So we're scared, behind the bluster we feel defenseless, then grasp that shard and use it as a weapon.
I should send this to my cousin, but I'm reasonably sure that she'd come out from behind the bluster to beat me about the head & shoulders " 'cause she's a Chriss - CHUN " ( Christian, natch ).
None so blind as those who will not see. A cult, me thinks. Like those who have no ears. But the cult mantle requires that you see in others the evil that you project. Took Ike to break the mold in Germany…. Reason won’t do it.
Daniel, I work with Habitat for Humanity and I’m 76. Next up is a return to Portugal with Fuller-Habitat this coming September. Gratitude to Jimmy Carter for Habitat and for leaving Southern Baptists because of the church’s stance on equality for women. https://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=95311&page=1
Some of our politicians are worse than rabid dogs! What does it say about their supporters and financial backers?
Indeed Lan
Well Lan.., they have trouble 'reading' and they can't 'write' .. what can we expect?
I've never understood how people who call themselves evangelical Christians can be both "pro-life" and "anti gun safety."
Peter, I agree. I think requiring that gun owners be insured could be an important step. And making gun sellers and manufacturers liable for what their guns do could be another. And if one couldn’t get insurance without first undergoing weapons training, including safe storage, even better. And get rid of assault weapons. It’s been done before; we can do it again.
Little Switzerland with its citizens' army manages fairly well to exemplify how the Second Amendment should have worked. Except... Except that America now has the largest, most over-equipped armed forces the planet has ever (to my knowledge) seen, plus National Guardsmen, plus a plethora of not-always-very-well-regulated (but heavily armed) police forces, so that the discombobulated citizens with their vast military arsenals can make only for insecurity in a free State.
All that this proves is that millions of Americans are more afraid of their neighbors... and their shadow... than of any conceivable invader. Justifiably, perhaps, given mass psychosis and all those millions of itchy trigger fingers.
Heaven forbid that those millions -- or even a tiny fraction of them -- ever turn come out firing at each other; but there are already far too many who have are doing just that.
From American amok, Good Lord, deliver us.
[I am not, of course, referring to innocent marksmen or to dwellers in the wilderness with a genuine need for weapons with which to discourage bears or marauders, etc.]
So well said, Peter!
What we really need are laws relegating sports weapons ONLY to the general public. Hunting rifles and shotguns. Target pistols. Only members of the military while on active duty need weapons of war. They should not be allowed under any circumstance to have military weapons after they leave service. I know of no one who shoots deer, bears, wild pigs, water birds, pheasants, or turkeys with an AR15 or any other automated type weapon, All these weapons are designed to kill one animal and one animal only....Homo sapiens (human beings)
I'm sorry that authoritarians find it necessary to attack peaceful sovereign nations; but that seems to be a characteristic of tyrants (including those who fancy themselves as 'royalty).
Police and Sheriffs need weapons to protect themselves and the general public from persons intent on killing. My only problem there is training. Shoot first and question later may be a good line in entertainment but it does not apply to real life. Police must be trained to deescalate first and shoot only when that fails. Police do not have the right to be prosecutor, juror, judge, and executioner. Killing should be the last unavoidable resort.
I have no problem with people who hunt animals for food, they actually do a service to the deer since our not too distant ancestors saw fit to eliminate predators. I have no problem with persons who compete in skeet, or target practice and competition.
Personally I dislike guns, I also dislike boxing and commercial wrestling. but that is personal and not something that applies to other people. I also dislike auto racing and motor cycle racing for the same reason I dislike guns. They are noisy, dirty, and smelly, but I also recognize that it is me and does not apply to anyone else.
I must disagree with one point you make Fay; ie., "I know of no one who shoots.... etc., wild pigs..." I distinctly recall video opps of at least 2 doing just that out of *a helicopter. Two ugly azz dudes; one was Ted Nugent the other was that other guy Marjorie T. G. (lol).
Thanks for the images, D4N. Two “pigs with lipstick” killing wild pigs!
And speaking of MTG, if “breaches of decorum” were legitimate grounds for expelling representatives, she should
have been expelled two weeks after she took office. And Santos too. And Boebert. And… most Republicans, in fact!
MTG & Boebert, the Demonic Duo ! At least Sarah Failin' can't add to this crapstorm in an official capacity anymore.
Yes, at least…. Wonder if she’s keeping watch on Putin from her front porch 😉
My cousin thought that she'd make a good president. Her answer ? " 'cause she's a good Christian ". These pathetic people would only support people who waved a flag & held a Bible.
What is the saying ? " When tyranny comes, it will come holding a cross wrapped in a flag ", IIRC.
You mean Mad Marjore the Mental Case. I think that Mental MTG is far beyond help.
Ted Nugent has been batshit crazy for decades!
I stand corrected, how disgusting. But what can you expect from lowlife scum.
Fay, it's not "you". A reasonable person wouldn't feel the need - or craving - to own an assault rifle.
"What we really need are laws relegating sports weapons ONLY to the general public. Hunting rifles and shotguns."
I completely agree and also will offer: In the 1970's when I was living in East Texas, hunting rifles and shotguns were the ONLY guns offered for sale. In gun stores all over Texas you could find Winchester and Remington rifles and shotguns and not a single AR-15 would be found anywhere.
In fact, because I never saw an AR15 for sale, I did not even know what they looked like until in the last 10 years.
I’ve heard hunters claim they hunt with their AR15s. That and the sport-exception won’t work. Too easy to work around. I would like to see the gun industry not able to advertise their lethal products. Also, mandatory insurance for each gun owned. And a thirty day waiting period. I would also like the definition of “Well-regulated militia” to be revisited. If they were well-regulated we could have stats on them to show if they provide no-adverse harm to the greater society. If their members are involved in a disruptive or rogue situation, it is noted and weighed against their “well-regulated” standing.
Perhaps those "Constitutional originalists" in the Supreme Court would have a hard time overturning gun laws if they were written to state that only members of well regulated militias could carry certain weapons. The passage of a national law defining well regulated militias might be helpful.
Mike-the manufacture and sale of AR-15s increased when Obama was elected.
There was a Federal licensing law imposed on all weapons back in 1968 on individuals who dealt in manufacture or sales of firearms and a ban on all interstate transportation of firearms to or from individuals not licensed as dealers, manufacturers, importers or collectors. In 1994, the Federal Assault Weapons ban was passed but it was only on weapons manufactured after that date. That law "sunsetted" in 2004, during Dubya's "Presidency".
But these civilians with military grade weapons in their closets think they ARE at war - with democracy and the democratic process. They are criminals just for having possession of those guns.
This is all good, Faye. But, have you ever strapped on a badge, gun, and worked the streets as a law enforcement officer? Have you ever, in your life, been in a ‘shoot, don’t shoot’ situation?
If your answer us “no” to these two questions, please don’t assume you know anything about when an officer should or shouldn’t use deadly force.
An officer is bound by the same laws for the use of his firearm as anyone else, the one exception is the fact that he/she has undergone extensive training in when to use it, and how. One such training is the ‘shoot, don’t shoot’ scenarios.
An officer has only a split second to determine whether the use of deadly force is justified, in any situation. If the officer takes longer than that, we will be hearing about his death, and funeral. A split second. That’s it between life, and death, for the officer.
On these recent occasions where the officers killed the individuals who were doing the mass killings. The officers went in and immediately located, and killed, the person. In both occasions the individual had fired at the officers first. If I was their training officer, I would be using these films as good training films. When that Individual raised their firearm slightly toward the officers, that’s when they should have fired. Not wait until they have been fired upon.
In the incident yesterday in KY at the bank. Two officers were shot, one critically. Why? The perp was allowed to fire upon them before they returned fire killing him.
Law enforcement officers are hesitating because of the way the public has perceived them. The officers are waiting. What’s this causing? For last year, 536 names being engraved on the Law Enforcement Officers Memorial where officers were killed in the line of duty.
Also, or at least, require firearms safety training prior to purchase of each gun.
I agree wholeheartedly. Extensive training.
This country can’t even address mental health issues as is! Never mind try to evaluate every person who wants to buy a gun. The second amendment has been so misinterpreted and high jacked I am without hope for change.
BUT I don’t disagree with your thoughts one bit!
That’s what this forum is all about. The ability to agree to disagree, and have open discussion about it. Without getting pissed off!
Daniel,
I like all of your proposals on gun control. Where do I sign the petition?
:-)
Yes, you’re right. Gun laws are critical and especially ban the military assault weapons that are frequently used in mass shootings. Stop open carry. Second Amendment was and is for government militia, not individual citizens to build an arsenal in their private homes or to carry weapons around intimidating the public. Why does America need to be number one in gun related deaths of children or guns per capita compared to other countries. No matter Democrats or repubs or independents this epidemic of gun violence affects all of us.
I would bet that a 30-day waiting period would have an extra benefit because of the number of suicides that would be averted or avoided too.
Highly possible. If nothing else, the psychological evaluation would surely catch it, and that would block their purchasing a firearm, plus get them the medical help needed in the process.
"We need to make it near impossible for a person to purchase a weapon."
Srsly??? You'd fit right in with Bull Connor and the other southern sheriffs who tried to make it near impossible for black people to vote---despite the fact the Constitution guaranteed them that right.
Don't be Bull. One was more than enough.
Gun ownership is protected by the Constitution, which means "damn near impossible" is D.O.A. Don't believe me? Apply your litany of restrictions to free speech, religious freedom, right of assembly, voting, or any other constitutionally protected right and see how far you get. Want to post on Professor Richardson's board? No problem! Just apply for a federal speech license, submit your comment, pay a $500 tax, wait thirty days (use the time to get clearance from a licensed psychiatrist that you are mentally healthy enough to not write something libelous), and if the comment review council approve of your free speech, then wait a week before replying to replies. That cooling-off period will let you more carefully consider your comebacks.
Only when you agree to subject yourself to those conditions for your free speech would I consider accepting your conditions for my right to arms.
Shane, I appreciate your feedback, but as a man that carried a gun for his livelihood for 26+ years, and witnessed first hand the damage bullets frim these rifles do to a human body, I’ll stand by my comments. The laws to purchase, own, and arm a firearm need to change. Three days is not enough time for the background checks to be properly conducted through all the agencies that need o conduct them. Three days isn’t time to have proper psychological exams, which is quite evident that they are needed. The computer network needs to be set up as I described and these laws enforced by the local, state, and federal agencies.
No, I’m not advocating that all guns be eliminated. But these weapons of mass destruction have no business in the hands of any private citizen. None whatsoever. Besides, there’s already over 20M of these assault type rifles that have been sold in the United States. There’s no way to remove them from these homes without the government doing a massive ‘buy back’, which I seriously doubt they will do.
If they can make reproductive health a crime, they certainly can make weapons of mass destruction one too. Where there's a will, there's a way!
The Repubs DO LOVE things capable of destroying lives. The " Party of ( Manson ) family values ".
Thank you for your civility, Daniel, as gun discussions can go off the rail in a hurry. I understand the horrific damage bullets do to human bodies, but that does not justify the draconian amount of hurdles and regulations you want to impose on the exercise of a constitutional right.
This nation collectively owns an estimated 500 million guns. If guns were such a clear and present danger to the nation to justify the draconian laws you want to impose, then why aren't we all dead?
Of those 500 million guns owned, 20,000 are used to murder someone any given year. Another 30,000 are used to wound someone any any given year. So, say 50,000 criminal uses of weapons out of 500 million guns owned, every one of which comes from a criminal action that's already banned: assault, mayhem, murder.
That amounts to 0.01 percent of guns being used to harm or murder innocents . . . and 99.99 percent doing nothing wrong.
You seem particularly concerned about assault rifles: "These weapons of mass destruction have no business in the hands of any private citizen. None whatsoever." Why not? Assault rifles are used in only 1.5 percent of annual gun murders. If 98.5 percent of assault rifles don't cause any harm, why ban people from owning them?
Gun violence is a serious concern and our culture needs to slow it, no question. But layering more gun control on top of all the gun control laws we already don't enforce will not save a single innocent life. Crime control and gang intervention would be far more useful, reducing the harm of unlawful use of guns without stepping on the 2A rights of the 99.99 percent of gun owners who don't do anything wrong. So would strict enforcement of existing gun laws--the refusal of the ATF to prosecute the thousands caught lying on gun application forms every year is particularly grating to me--and banning local prosecutors from offering plea bargains to violent gun criminals.
The Second Amendment protects the right of individual Americans to own and operate arms for any lawful purpose, including, but not limited to, service in a well-managed government Militia. That's my take on what the Founders wrote, and the data I laid out prove that concept has worked well for our nation, then and now.
Bottom line, the vast, vast majority of Americans own guns safely and responsibly, there are many ways to reduce unlawful use of guns, and so I'm not going to subject American citizens to psychiatric exams or any other hurdle that you wouldn't be willing to apply to voting, speech, religion, or any other right. We can reduce illegal gun violence in ways that don't step all over 2A.
Shane READ the second Amendment "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." Proposed September 25, 1789; ratified December 15, 1791. I have included the dates for a reason. We fought the American Revolution against the much stronger force of Great Britain. The war began 1765 and ended 1791. We were a very small Country of approximately 4 million people hugging the shores of the Atlantic Ocean. Our army was disbanded in 1791. The farmers, land owners, apprentices, shop owners, factory owners, business men returned home. We had money sufficient to maintain a navy. Hence the words "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State...." There was no standing army, no national guard. We didn't form another National army until 1812, 21 years after ratification. James Madison, who is generally credited with writing the Bill of Rights, was not in favor of arming thugs, murderers, insurrectionists, seditious treason. He wanted to make sure that good, honest, hard-working people could protect themselves and the newly founded America from any attackers (including, unfortunately, the indigenous whose lands we were in the process of stealing). The weapons manufacturers and the NRA has chosen to quote only the last half of the sentence "...the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." No one in government, police, or plain citizens wants to take all your sporting guns away from you. But none of the aforementioned sees any reason for an ordinary citizen to have an assault weapon, a sniper's rifle, a bazooka, grenade launcher, shoulder mounted missile launcher or any other weapon designed mainly to kill people.
Thank you Fay. The US Constitution is a venerable and revolutionary document in need of amendment to make it more relevant to our rapidly changing society. Unfortunately, we have a SCOTUS that has been cleverly engineered by the modern GOP to misread the Constitution in the attempt to guarantee minority rule by the wealthiest white men, supported by a motley collection of religion and/or racism inspired ideological fanatics. Clearly Mr. Gericke has fallen for at least some of this hook, line and sinker.
The strongest part of his argument is that despite the ubiquitousness of military type semiautomatic rifles and other firearms useless for either hunting or target shooting, -- Christ, is it really 500 million? -- we haven't all killed each other yet. I suppose that's proof we Americans aren't all violent assholes suffering from extended adolescences, but even the relatively small percentage of gun deaths compared to number of guns leaves us with truly unenviable statistics that leave people in the rest of the world scratching their heads.
What I don't understand is what so many Americans are afraid of that they think they need to walk around armed.
Back in the day (1972) I received 2 months of nearly daily training to shoot the M-16, so I am familiar with the allure of guns and the feeling of power one has while holding one with a full clip. Luckily, I was never required to fire the M-16 at anything but pop-up targets, and it has never even occurred to me to buy a gun for self-protection or any other purpose.
Correct, Fay. These murderers are not part of a well-ordered militia, but murderers of innocent adults and children. There is no excuse for civilians to own and operate an AK - anything. In the 1700s there were no hand-held weapons that weren't made for hunting deer and squirrel. The people used their rifles to fight against the British troops.
It is ridiculous and dangerous to transpose a 1700s gun onto a 22nd century hand-held weapon of war. Shane, you are living in a reality that is 600 years old.
Hopefully the 22nd century will be truly gun free.
"Shane READ the second Amendment . . ."
Why do you assume I haven't? I know the arguments, counter arguments, and counter counter arguments quite well and base my views on them. That your views and mine are not the same is fine, but don't assume I don't know what I'm talking about.
"No one in government, police, or plain citizens wants to take all your sporting guns away from you."
"All your guns?" I agree, they don't want to take all our guns. But most of our guns? Of course they do. Semiautomatic handguns and rifles are about 80 percent of the modern gun market, and every anti-gun advocate I know wants them banned. The New York Times and Washington Post both published columns in Monday's editions cautioning that "the work isn't done" even if an assault rifle ban goes into place because "handguns" are used in far more murders. They both mentioned "nine-millimeter semiautomatic pistols" like Glocks as being extra-murder-y.
Since handguns are the best way for me and other law-abiding innocents to protect ourselves from the rare but unpredictable violent attack, I have no intention of giving up handguns so gun haters can feel warm and fuzzy. If James Madison were alive today, he'd carry a Glock.
"Ordinary citizen" is not a lesser class of American, by the way. We ordinaries are equal to anyone in government, police, or social elites, and we get to arm ourselves as our needs dictate, as long as we use those guns lawfully. Those who don't are criminals and can and should have their weapons rights revoked.
Yup.. all these well-intended folks need to (each) sit down and write the Rule so that it is enforceable, as you have pointed out, instead of wanting someone else to write (the Rule) it for them. I quietly hesitate, but there are lots of "weapons of mass destruction" out there. We drive them.. we fly them.. and people bent in some weird direction often operate them.
Thank you, Ms. Reid. Mr. Gericke's impassioned defense of the indefensible caused a rant on my part (most of which I deleted). Thank you for your more measured (albeit no less passionate) comment.
Shane, that “0.01 percent of guns… used to harm or murder innocents” may seem insignificant, but when a child you love 100% is senselessly killed, it becomes clear that military weapons held by civilians hands is utterly unjustified. Who honestly wishes such a tragic, horrific loss onto others (or themselves!)? Do you, really?!
If Americans want to be a member of a “ well regulated militia”, they should join the National Guard.
The men who wrote the 2nd amendment were living in an America with no standing army & a country where the weapons they owned were muzzle-loading, one shot muskets. There is no comparison between those guns & an AR-15.
We are required to take written exams & road driving tests before being allowed to drive a car, & we are required to show proof of insurance & have state car registrations, which must be updated according to various state laws. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t pass similar laws for gun ownership.
You are already a member of the militia, KMD. Every American is by dint of citizenship. Didn't you get the hat?
Guns are constitutional rights and cars are not. Therein lies why cars are licensed and taxed up the ying-yang and guns are not. Yet, more people are killed and injured in car crashes than are shot and killed by guns. So much for all those written exams, road tests, drivers licenses, plate fees, massive registration databases, traffic cops, and myriad federal and state driving laws keeping every driver free from harm.
And yet, due to pressure on the auto industry to help prevent deaths in auto accidents, car manufacturers began installing seat belts in cars sold in the US in the 1950s. And in 1968 the federal government began to require lap & shoulder seat belts in the front seats of all new passenger cars sold in the US. Individual states enacted their own seat belt laws in different years. Then in 1999 air bags were required on both sides of the front seats in all cars & light trucks.
Since these protections were enacted, seat belts & air bags have saved thousands of Americans each year from death in auto accidents. We are not potted plants! We can enact laws that can help prevent gun deaths.
Furthermore, the guns that were used during the writing of the US Constitution were muzzle-loading, single shot muskets. I certainly support all Americans’ right to own as many of those weapons as they want or need.
Another though, you mention the 500 million guns. That does NOT mean 500 million PEOPLE own guns---many people own quite a few guns!
We need to be very careful when applying statistics, but one that seems quite telling is the number of mass shootings that have occurred since the ban on automatic weapons was lifted, and also the rate of gun deaths in the US as compared with the world.
I imagine this youtube clip might annoy you, but I hope you will watch it to see the statistics that Brian Tyler Cohen relates in it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MaH33uoJeM
Miselle, the telling number is 500 million guns in homes, glove compartments , purses, waistbands, wherever in this blessed country ? Permitless open carry and other insanities ? Where is a sane public policy in all this ? We must stop listening to those who would insist that it is their right to own any type of gun unregistered and without adequate training and screening. They are wrong ! Do not give them equal time as their position is not valid.
Few gun owners want zero restrictions or regulations. I am fine with gun control laws that reduce the death and injury of innocents. We only differ on what is "reasonable." Safety training to own a gun is reasonable. Banning guns is not.
Our position on guns and regulations is as valid as yours. You don't need to give us "equal time," we say what we want on this issue and make our arguments on any forum we wish, and you have no ability to stop us.
Finally, if guns were the atomic powered death rays you seem to believe they are, and gun owners psychopaths just begging for a chance to open fire . . . why aren't we all dead? 500 million guns, 20,000 annual gun murders. Yeah, our "insane public policy" sure is killing everyone deader 'n Raid.
Information in and of itself never annoys me, Miselle. Thanks for the link, I'll watch it. I routinely read the positions of anti-gunners to see what they're up to anyway, and if they happen to make a valid argument, I incorporate it into my own thinking.
Thanks for sharing!
Shane, you have all good points, as the same as everyone who’s commented here before me. The point I was trying to portray was that these gun laws we currently have need to be changed, sensibly. Yes, I laid out what might seem to some as stiff regulations, but truly, what’s so stiff about them.
Currently the waiting period is 3 days. This needs to be extended to 30. I base this on this fact. To do a thorough analysis of background checks by all the various agencies requires more than 3 days. I base this on the fact that NOW a deranged individual, a person currently undergoing treatment by psychologist or psychiatrist walk into a gun shop or gun show, and buy a gun, or walk into several gun shops within a few days and buy guns. Why? Because the application that person completed to purchase that firearm, or firearms, lied, and all that happened was it was shoved into a file drawer in the gun shop and forgotten about until that individual takes that firearm and goes into a school and kills 6 people, or a shopping center and kills a dozen, or a church and kills 8 or 9, or whatever.
More needs to be done with that piece of paper instead of shoving it into a filing cabinet. It needs to be faxed/sent to the local law enforcement agencies so then it can be sent to the FBI, and ATF. Then the agencies can collaborate and check out the application thoroughly.
Requiring a computer database where gun shop owners, gun show operators, may check it to make sure this individual isn’t going to numerous gun shops, etc, to purchase firearms. Plus it gives the law enforcement agencies the opportunity to quicker check this firearm when it is used in the commission of any crime. Right now, when a person commits a crime with a firearm, such as yesterday’s 2 masa shootings at the same time in the same city, ATF is immediately dispatched. The first thing they do upon arriving is take possession of the firearm(s) and run them through their computer system to learn the history of that weapon. They have the capability to trace that firearm from manufacture to gun shop. Then they have to get the firm from the gun shop to know who bought it. Why? Thus information should have been available in a computer database, immediately, to all law enforcement agencies on the scene.
Automobiles is mentioned as to the deaths caused by them. Yes, this is true. Just like airplanes and everything else in this world. People die every day in all kinds of various ways. But, with the automobiles, when there’s a wreck, the law enforcement officer has the capability to get on his laptop in his cruiser and know the immediate history of the vehicle, the driver, any arrest record, any warrants, etc. Why not have the same capability for a firearm?
Airplane crashes. The law enforcement agencies have the capability to immediately pull the history of the maintenance of the plane on the scene on their laptops. They can get the flight plan, crew names, passenger list, everything in a matter of seconds or minutes on their laptops on the scene.
This same capability needs to be afforded on firearms as well.
No, I do NOT want to take guns away from anyone. NO, I do NOT wish to keep anyone from purchasing a gun, IF that person is fit to own a gun. Things have got to be changed, and what I laid out might seem a bit harsh to some, but so be it. Let the gun laws get harsh. Maybe, just MAYBE, they need to be a bit harsher than they currently are.
Yes, I agree that the law enforcement agencies should do their jobs more efficiently. But, when they do, it’s harassment, or brutality, or some other reason.
Please, don’t throw the recent beatings, etc, of the officers on these people that has been widely reported. That’s a complete different discussion apart from firearms. But, I will say, from what I saw on the media, which we all know the media only shows the finishing conclusions, and not what led up to the actions of the officer(s), the officers went to far. Once an individual is on the ground, and restrained, it’s over. Get him up off the ground and loaded in your patrol car. Take him to jail. Yes, I used to instruct this, too. Enough said on this.
There’s one thing for certain. The system we currently have in affect isn’t working. It’s broken. It’s antiquated. Out of date, and it needs to be changed, NOW.
I don't believe I said one word about police officers, Daniel. You might be confusing me with someone else. And if I believed government would use your proposed thirty days to actually do its job running a thorough background check, I might go along with it. But all that will happen is thirty days will go by, the checks will not be done because there is no staff or funding to do them, and so what's the point?
I fully understand your thought, but, this is what has to change. Right now, due to forced budget cuts, our law enforcement agencies, all of them, are so understaffed it isn’t funny. The salaries of law enforcement agencies are pathetic, because that’s one area that doesn’t have “visible production of a product”. The law enforcement agency doesn’t put something on the shelf for the consumers to spend money on, and Americans don’t want to pay the law enforcement agencies/officers any more than they absolutely have to because that might mean higher taxes.
The resolution, I believe, to this problem is take the high salaries our politicians are being paid and divide it amongst the law enforcement agencies. Use it to hire more people to get in the computers and run these background checks. Use it to hire departmental psychologists and psychiatrists to do the required analysis of the people applying to purchase weapons. They can also be used to treat the officers. Because I can tell you first hand. After going through an incident like the school shooting in Nashville, or Louisville, the officers need someone to be able to go and talk to also.
All I know is if our politicians can waste good taxpayer dollars on what they are doing now, then these taxpayer dollars can be put yo much better use.
At Mr. Gericke's defense of the indefensible: 🤣🤣🤣
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
“A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
Okay, Shane, let's see if you can tell the difference between these two amendments.
One of them says Congress shall make NO law touching First Amendment rights.
The second one STARTS with regulation.
So maybe you need to read more of the US Constitution than the Second Amendment.
Or perhaps you'd like to explain to the rest of us how letting 18 year olds buy weapons of war falls under "well regulated."
Republican governors are already putting restrictions on speech, on religious freedom, ON VOTING - so to act like Republicans aren't already assaulting the First Amendment suggests that either you think the rest of us are fools or you are.
Thank you Bridget! I might add that when the Constitution was written, the available rifles were muzzle loaders, not automatic weapons. If all the gun crazy people in America want to buy a muzzle loader, have at it. NO one should be able to buy an automatic weapon.
The GOP backs the firearms industry. A firearm & a cross in every " Good Christian Home ", more's the pity.
This is so true, Daniel and unbelievably sad.
And yet you wrote this on a computer and uploaded it to the Internet, neither of which the Founders had when they wrote the First Amendment. Should your right to free speech apply only to that which you write with quill pen on parchment?
Mussel loader? How will the oysters and clams defend themselves?
I think the point is that if the type of weapons that exist today existed back then, the founders would have written the second amendment differently. How about the Virginia Declaration of Rights, Section 13: "That a well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural, and safe defense of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, should be avoided as dangerous to liberty; and that in all cases the military should be under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power." Common sense.
Thank you for pointing out my spelling error this morning. I don't think my computer has killed anyone, at least not in the recent past. I think you are trying to change the subject or at least distract people from the real problem.
I replied directly on point to your view that only muzzleloaders are protected by the Second Amendment. How was that changing the subject?
As for mussel loader, hey, I couldn't help it, I never get to use mussels, clams, and oysters in a gun discussion!
So which one are you going with, Shane?
My right to free speech should be abrogated because I'm working on a computer or the increased lethality of firearms should be ignored because Second Amendment nuts can't read a dependent clause?
I will also point out to you that Republicans are ALREADY restricting my free speech and the free speech of others. They are ALREADY passing laws about where and when someone can peacefully protest. They are banning books. They are requiring more ID to vote than they do to buy that AR-15.
Do you really want to argue that you can't tell the difference between a medium and a tool?
We all accept regulation on cars and no one argues that the Founders wouldn't have restricted use of wagons - because most of us understand that a lot more people can be killed by an incompetent or inebriated driver than could have been killed by a wagon. Are you going to argue differently?
A well-regulated militia - the Founders backed gun control laws. Heck, I believe they passed them.
"I will also point out to you that Republicans are ALREADY restricting my free speech and the free speech of others. They are ALREADY passing laws about where and when someone can peacefully protest. They are banning books. They are requiring more ID to vote than they do to buy that AR-15."
I believe they should do none of that, for the same reason you should not be trying to ban guns.
Muzzle?
You are absolutely right! I am having spelling issues this morning...I need more coffee!
In fairness, Colette, on the east coast you were replying around 2 am.
I assumed it was a spelling error.
CBD / THC for me, please.....
Preach sistuh Bridget !
Given her utter lack of 2A and arms knowledge, her "preaching" would make her Farrakhan, not Dr. King.
Poor baby.
I've read the whole Constitution. I was taught it in school. And that means I am well aware of the history of the Constitution and the 2nd before Heller.
Someone who knows more about guns than I do already disputed your points. My cousins with military backgrounds, my friends who hunt don't agree with you either.
But my real disadvantage is that I was raised by men who were dangerous enough not to feel a gun was necessary. And in the 70+ years that they lived, they proved that in multiple instances.
I realize a lot of males need a gun. I was not raised by them and therefore I find it difficult to have empathy for you all.
BTW, when you think about it, you might want to ask yourself whether using Dr. King in a discussion about gun violence was the right place to go.
I don't need your empathy, I know more about gun issues and real-life use of weapons than you ever will, and I will bring up Dr. King whenever I damn well feel like it. So go lecture someone else with your condescending twaddle. I'm done with you.
😡
❤
Given your constitutional illiteracy and dumpster full of snottiness, Bridget, I have no intention of wasting my time debating this with you.
Hint: "Well-regulated" does not mean "lots of regulations," so 1A and 2A both prohibit infringing on those rights.
How do you interpret "well-regulated"?
The same as the Founders did: "works well, does what it's designed to do, efficiently and accurately," "well-managed and operating as designed."
A well-regulated clock is one that keeps accurate time and chimes as designed. A well-regulated Militia is one that does its job--defending the state or nation--well and accurately, putting down rebellions (and, sadly, catching slaves) quickly and efficiently.
But "well-regulated" applies only to the Militia as a unit of government. The right of the people (individual citizens) to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
Shane you are a dog with a bone. I just tuned back in. I thought I was tenacious. So here goes. Amendments have been amended. It is possible...probably far fetched at this point...but possible that the 2nd could be clarified and amended. We took away booze, we brought it back. We made abortion legal, now we've back pedaled on that with a conservative court that believes more in the rights of 2 cells, than in the reproductive and health rights of a fully functioning woman...or girl for that matter...that rape and incest don't matter. The man who broke the law has more rights than the woman he violated. That's interesting isn't it? In some states a Priest could now screw his way through the girls entrusted to him and he could father a dozen children in a year if he wanted to.
Anyway, if and when 2/3 of the states can agree on how the 2nd should be interpreted...the 2nd that YOU interpret, could be changed and modified to something that restricts the weapons involved in most of the yearly murder spree...and regulate purchase and use in ways that do actually affect the murder rate. True?
But civilians are NOT militia!
https://abcnews.go.com/US/116-people-died-gun-violence-day-us-year/story?id=97382759
11,523 dead as of yesterday in 2023 ALONE.
The only way the 2nd Amendment "works well, does what it's designed to do, efficiently and accurately" is if you thinking losing 42,000 people (annualized) is a goal we should be reaching for.
Or unless you worship Moloch and feel that sacrificing small children will make the rains come and the crops grow.
Where in the 2nd Amendment does it reference individual citizens?
You're basing your interpretation on Heller which was a stretch.
I'm with Bridget.
🎶"If you're offering me diamonds & rust, I've already paid".🎶 jb
Shane I don't agree with your interpretation of the 2nd for a lot of reasons. The main one being the Founders could not anticipate the gun's used for mass murder situation that exists today. When they wrote the 2nd, the fastest anyone could reload their single shot weapon...rifle or handgun was about 3 times a minute. So a single individual could not possibly kill and wound multiple people in 30 seconds . There were NO...NONE...mass gun killings by a single individual in America until...I don't know exactly...but the first one with 10 victims that is on record is in 1949 after WWII when automatic weapons became more available to the public. The only way to kill a bunch of people in one minute was through the massed fire of an organized and co-ordinated unit...a militia. Mass killing incidents by gun were VERY rare until the 1960's...happened a little more in the 1980's and have exploded in the past 10 years. America leads the world in mass death by automatic and semi-auto weapons by a LOT. We have an epidemic on our hands by any sane measure...that "thoughts and prayers" is not helping at all.
I'm not advocating making it near impossible to buy a gun. I'm advocating for sanity in this situation. We regulate every dangerous thing out there. Cars did not exist in 1776. AR-15's did not exist. Both were impossible to even conceive of. Let's get real. The founders did not give anyone a god given right to own a weapon of mass destruction with no regulation. Conservatives want to be "originalists" until they don't. There is no document that says every American should have the ability to kill and maim 20 people in less than one minute before reloading. Balls in your court. Go for it.
"Conservatives want to be "originalists" until they don't."
You'll have to take that up with a conservative, Mike. I'm a liberal whose views are my own.
If we were limiting the discussion to only assault rifles, my views would be a little more sympathetic to control. But the thread was about making it "nearly impossible" to own any gun of any kind, and I will not let that go unchallenged. Ninety-nine-plus percent of gun owners have never harmed an innocent, so mangling 2A is not only illegal, it's insulting.
A far better way to reduce illegal gun violence is to enforce the myriad of gun control laws we already passed but do not enforce for reasons of funding and staffing; disallow plea bargains on any violent crime involving a gun; do not let violent gun felons out of prison early; physically confiscate guns from anyone convicted of a violent crime; fund the violence interruption programs proven to reduce gang gun crimes and retaliations; set up red-flag systems that allow anyone to ask a court to review whether Person X should be prohibited from owning guns temporarily, but fund it with enough judges, prosecutors, and defense attorneys to make the system work fast; and if we're going to have a digital instant background check system for guns, demand that every state and federal jurisdiction update that database the moment someone is convicted of a gun-prohibiting crime or adjudicated so mentally ill by a court that guns should be prohibited.
I'm sure there are things I've forgotten, but that will do for a start. I find the notion that slapping more and more gun-control laws that won't be enforced on top of the layer cake of gun-control laws already not being enforce is a waste of time and energy. Better to go after the people who pull the trigger, because without them, guns only collect dust.
The problem with your approach is that for far too many mass shooters, the mass shooting is their first offence.
Agree with what you state. One of the BIG problems is the lack of laws in many states and the attempted roll back of laws in others. It's a quagmire and the NRA likes it that way. The gun murder situation here in Baltimore is beyond ridiculous. Everyday...and the shooters are getting younger and have no sense of where they are. Any place, any time is now ok. In the days of the Wire, it was mostly drug gang turf battles at midnight in an ally execution style. Not any more. Thanks for your thoughtful response. I wasn't accusing you of being a conservative. Just stating a fact.
Why stop thinking at today’s semi-automatic weapons? Why not favor bazookas, armed drones, nuclear weapons?
Cool your jets there, Shane!
It's only been a few hours since people were killed in Kentucky, mere weeks after children were killed in its neighboring border State Tennessee. Beyond that, how many of our fellow Americans just since the year began, have seen their last perspective on this earth fade to black to the sickening soundtrack of senseless gun violence!
Finally, let's not pretend that the 2nd Amendment's conditional right to bear arms is anywhere nearly as important and necessary as the First Amendment, no matter what the worst Supreme Court Justice since Roger Taney, the corrosive corrupt Clarence has to say
My jets are quite cool, thank you. Mr. Cooper presented his arguments for draconian gun control, I presented my counterarguments, and we were both quite civil.
I bow to no one in my disgust that Clarence Thomas remains a SCOTI, but my views on 2A and guns have nothing to do with him. I'm a liberal and I make my own conclusions, I don't borrow them from MAGAs.
Fair enough. I'm not trying in any way to hurl you into the MAGA mosh pit.
Yet a reflexive and strident defense of AR 15s combined with a snarky, fantastical insinuation that reasonable, civilized gun regulation is tantamount to state censorship of free speech rights doesn't sit well while the bodies are being counted.
The ability to own weapons of mass murder for every ordinary citizen is ridiculous and even SCOTUS has said so. The 2nd amendment as written had conditions. The rational that citizens may be armed in order to form a well regulated militia in order to protect the state. Because at that time many were afraid of and against the establishment of a national military. So every state was to defend itself and such defense was to be organized. Never would the founders agree to allow anybody to own a weapon this powerful given the mass murder we are witnessing. We are allowed to amend the constitution. And given the horrific misinterpretation of the 2nd amendment we are clearly in need of an amendment to it. Because some would argue beyond reason and experience that we must oblige the minority who demand they have a right to own any gun they choose because they think that is what the 2nd says. When it doesn’t. And when children in schools are being slaughtered. And when women are being killed by abusive partners. And when people of color are being targeted. We have a right to our safety and equality. We can allow gun ownership with practical regulation to help mitigate the mass slaughter of people by people who have no business owning a gun. We can compromise. We can be reasonable.
Guns are for killing.
Killing is for war.
War is for defence.
Has anyone attacked you?
Does anyone have a reason to attack you?
If you think you need a gun, you should study diplomacy first.
“If you think you need a gun, you should study diplomacy first.”
Or join the military!
" Cowboy diplomacy " shoot 1st. The rest you know.
I was raped by two men in an outhouse, at knifepoint, at age 11. My diplomatic skills were really really good, but damned if their blade to my throat wasn't sharper.
Twenty-five years later, I was hiking on a remote trail when three young men decided that I was all alone so they should pick up some tree limbs and charge me, hoping I had some money they could steal. I pulled back my jacket and put my hand on the butt of the revolver holstered on my belt. They stopped like they'd hit a glass wall, mumbled something, tossed the limbs, then ran off into the woods. I hiked back to my car and drove home. No shots fired, no gun pulled, no harm to either party, just the way I preferred.
But maybe I should have tried your diplomacy again, sweet-talk them out of cracking my skull. That's what you would have done, right?
I understand the need for guns for self protection & guns for hunting. I dont understand the need for guns that kill many people in nanoseconds or large capacity clips. I dont understand why States are legislating no safety. The NRA use to have excellent gun safety & training programs, I took some. I would like to see programs like that. Before you get a drivers license you have to take a written & hands on test. Why should that not be a requirement for owning a gun?
If we were debating restrictions only on "assault rifles," that would be one thing. But my original reply was to a suggestion that ALL guns be subjected to "make it nearly impossible to own one" regulations, and I will fight that crushing of the 2nd Amendment as hard as I'd fight a ban on free speech.
Using the term gun violence rather than control makes it clearer. We need to be more definite in our language rather than sound bites. Assault rifles is a term of debate when talking about weapons killing lots of people in seconds. The bans dropped in 2004, why not? As a young person u have to take a gun safety class to get a hunting license. To drive a car, you have to pass tests. Bring back the NRA safety programs & stress responsibility before rights. We will always have people who will use weapons to kill, having assault rifles too available only enables them.
I forgot to add why not reinstate the ban that was dropped in 2004?
Mr. Gericke, I am sorry that you were raped as a child. What those criminals did to you was heinous. I hope they were held accountable for their crimes.
Thank you, Kamila, I appreciate your graciousness. They were never caught.
Dreadful. I also hope you received the support and care you deserved.
Thanks, Zella, I'll reply more fully to this soon. Time for me to hit the hay, it's been a long day in Shaneville :-)
Thank you for your graciousness about my dealing with my boyhood, um, "adventure." I came to terms with it eventually, and reclaimed my life. I appreciate what you said, very much. I know that women fear this far more than men, because women are far more brutalized by these monsters than men. Men who rape and molest are so beneath contempt that I'd like to see them disappear behind prison walls and get out only in a pine box.
"Automatic weapons of war," you'll be relieved to know, are already so heavily regulated under Title II gun laws that these machine guns haven't been used in violent crimes in decades. If you want to reclassify ARs and other "assault rifles" to Title II status with its heavier regulations, that debate is worth having. But Glocks, Smith & Wessons, Beretta, Remingtons, and other semiautomatic handguns, rifles, and shotguns are perfectly legitimate weapons that should not be targeted by gun banners in any shape or form.
I have no objection to gun safety training in order to buy a firearm. Let the NRA run the classes as it does the Hunter Safety Program--in order to get a hunting license, states require you show proof of completing that Hunter Safety class. It isn't a license, and asking the NRA to do it would be useful buy-in to this sensible program.
Licensing? No. Licenses are used solely to create databases, which are used to impose gun bans when politicians feel like creating them to get themselves re-elected. New York State did exactly that: required owners of "assault rifles" to register them with the state with the written promise that the database would never be used to ban the weapons, only to track crime guns. Only a fraction of owners were gullible enough to believe NY, and registered.
One or two years later, they all got a letter from the state: We have updated our assault weapons law, and what you own is now banned. You have 90 days to sell it, move it out of state, or turn it in to law enforcement.
And if registration worked nearly as well as its supporters insist, why do we have millions of automobile crashes, injuries, and deaths. Cars are among the most regulated consumer products in the nation, including mandatory licensing, annual plate renewals, searchable databases, and fees, fees, fees. None of which stops a single crash from happening.
Liability insurance does not exist and will not be written by the insurance industry. Why? Because no insurer will pay if the gun is used in a crime or for suicide, and those two things by themselves account for 95 percent of annual gun deaths: murder and suicide. If insurance companies saw a market niche to fill, they would already offer liability insurance for criminal use of guns. That they don't says it all.
I don't think we need more gun control. What we desperately need is crime control and suicide prevention--target the person with the trigger finger, not the trigger itself--and a willingness to spend the billions of dollars it will take for those tools to reduce gun violence. We also need to enforce all existing gun laws, because they're mostly unenforced so we have no idea how many crimes would be prevented if enforcement was the rule, not the exception.
An example: tens of thousands of people are caught lying on the forms they fill out to buy a gun at a federally licensed dealer. That is a felony, and easily proven because the person signed the form and provided identification during the commission of the crime. Yet, the ATF investigates only hundreds, and prosecutes and convicts mere dozens. Why? These people are generally claiming they're not violent felons when they in actuality are. Or claim they're not addicted to mind-altering chemicals when they in fact shoot up twice a day. They count that the astounding lack of enforcement by the feds will let them buy Precious. This is the lowest-hanging fruit in the law enforcement tree, because the evidence is at the gun dealership, in writing. But, nada, because ATF is understaffed and underfunded.
That's just one of many examples. If we don't treat gun crimes as seriously as we claim, why should criminals take us seriously enough to stop?
Sorry for the length, but your respectful post demanded a respectful and thorough answer.
Shane, respectfully here--when we say gun ownership is our Constitutional right, I tend to really think of the amendment as our Founding Fathers wrote it. So, I believe anyone who wants to own a musket is welcome to do so, and they must adhere to what it would take to be "well regulated militia" which to me, suggests what the current Reserves do. I believe that is one weekend a month, and perhaps 2 weeks a year in the training? (Anyone in the reserves care to verify?)
I also believe the right to own a gun does not mean that you need an entire arsenal at your personal disposal.
Ok, you probably can't find many muskets out there, so I'm fine with a hunting rifle and a handgun if you really feel that insecure about your personal safety.
Since you were a Chicago journalist, I'm sure you are very aware of the amount of gun violence in the city. I am not claiming it is more or less than any other place in the country or world, that is not what I am debating. However, we could probably agree that too many guns fall into the hands of criminals. I'm not sure the claims of the criminals will get guns anyhow is a good counter to wanting some reasonable gun laws. Why have child-proof caps on meds to prevent childhood poisonings, when there are so many other things they could ingest---but we don't stop trying.
Also, personally, I wonder if down in Ulvalde, those cops might have gone in if it was someone with a simple handgun rather than a semi-automatic weapon? I sure don't know that I'd have the courage to run at someone who had the capability to mow me down. I come from a family of 3 police officers (two retired now) and I sure as heck don't like them being out-armed by loonies!
I get so tired of hearing that the libs are coming to take your guns! I don't know a single lib who says that! Can't we come to some compromise between the scenario you portrayed and reasonable gun laws?!
The nut to crack is "reasonable gun law," isn't it? I have my definitions, you have yours, everybody else has theirs. I can back up my "reasonableness" with hard data, but the raw emotion of seeing children mowed down in schools is as much a factor in the debate as cold numbers.
What new gun control laws would stop these nihilists from invading schools, churches, synagogues, and office buildings and mowing down as many people as they can? Banning assault rifles? Those are used in only 1.5 percent of annual gun murders, and that includes Uvalde, Louisville, and every other massacre. So, OK, ban assault rifles. When the murder rate doesn't drop--and it will not--what other classes of guns become the new "weapon of war that ordinary citizens don't need to protect themselves?"
That's the real problem here: we both want the gun murder rate to keep dropping as it had from 1994 to Covid---the rate had dropped by more than 50 percent, from 10+ gun murders per 100,000 Americans to 3.8 per 100K. The rate kicked back between 4 and 5 thanks to Covid unleashing the freaks who like to see kids die. It is already inching lower now that Covid is (mostly) over.
I don't care about assault rifles per se. I no longer own them and have no vested interest one way or the other in them. My goal is to protect the right of every American to own and operate guns FOR ANY LAWFUL PURPOSE, and banning an entire class of weapons (ARs) makes banners hungry for the next group: any semiautomatic weapon.
Since semiautos are about 80 percent of the modern gun market--think Glock--banning them would effective disarm us. That is not acceptable to me, because guns, including Glocks, have perfectly legitimate uses whose social good vastly outweighs their social evil.
If we could narrow this debate to ONLY assault rifles, I'd be more inclined to agree they pose a public danger that other classes of guns do not and so they can and should be more regulated, perhaps by reclassifying them as Title II weapons---machine guns, which require far higher hurdles than buying a Glock. I'm open to that.
But if it's only the stalking horse to going after all semiautos--which more than one politician and gun control lobby has specifically target for execution--then I will fight all of it. Show me a proposal that reclassifies ARs and AKs to Title II status and leaves everything else alone--and I mean everything else--and we can talk.
[Writer's note: Edited to eliminate my unfair cattiness to Miselle]
Shane, that last sentence was not typed as condescension. You read it that way but it was not at all meant that way. I said "if you truly feel that insecure about your personal safety", you should have one. I personally know two people who have good reason to fear for their safety and I totally understand it. I don't understand why you object to me being okay with guns in certain circumstances, I have hunters in my family! (And btw, all of them want enforced gun laws and bans on assault rifles.)
I was talking about assault rifles in my comments. You have many debates going here with others, perhaps you are getting us all mixed up or perhaps you are getting yourself upset.
In any case, I'm done with "Letters" for today.
Since you didn't mean it that way, I freely apologize for misinterpreting it and thank you for your courtesy. I don't object at all to you being okay with guns in certain circumstances---to me that's the gold standard of OK! We only differ on what those circumstances should be.
Have a lovely day, and thanks for a discussion held with respect. I'm going to edit out that last sentence, and thanks for pointing it out.
Hmmm...your right to arms. There it is in a nutshell. Do you own a AR-15 or some sort of automatic weapon? Everyone has the right to protect their life and home, but I don’t think that requires an automatic weapon. Do you?
Your comparative perspective is interesting but freedom of speech and guns are hardly the same. Words may hurt but they don’t usually kill.
Yes, they are the same. I defend the Constitution and Bill of Rights. All of them, not only the ones with which I personally agree. You and others here seem to want 2A to disappear on the misguided notion that America will suffer no more murders. That's not at all true; more murders are committed with hands and feet than with assault rifles.
Be careful what you wish for on eliminating protections you don't personally like. DeSantis, Trump, and other mouth breathers don't like free speech that contradicts their views, and would happily go after your 1A rights. DeSantis has already done that in his own state, with "Don't Say Gay" and "Child Groomer" laws that criminalize the free speech and honest teaching efforts of educators, and by attacking the Disney Corporation's revenue because its board objected to his LGBTQ laws.
"Your right to arms" is also YOUR right to arms. You can own them or not as you wish, that's up to you. But you don't get to dictate that for anybody else.
I don't own automatic weapons. They're too expensive and with their rapid rate of fire, ammo is a budget breaker. I used to own AR-15s and other "assault rifles," and not one of them did anything except punch holes in paper targets. I sold them years ago and own only handguns now.
If you can personally guarantee that criminals will make appointments to rape, mug, or murder me, so I can call 911 instead of showing up for the attack, I'd give up guns. But since that isn't possible, I will keep them, as handguns are the most efficient way to stop someone bigger, meaner, and more psychotic than me from cracking my skull for laughs. These people do not respond to logic, pleas, or diplomacy. The do stop what they're doing when they realized they will be shot if they don't.
Such abstraction.
As befits a State, not of laws, but of lawyers.
What abstraction? My arguments were very specific, as was my supporting data. That you don't like my views doesn't make them abstract.
Hey, Shane. I have followed your conversation here with great interest.
I like what you had to say about enforcing the laws we already have. For obvious reasons, I would like to see a reinstituted law banning assault weapons, and also a requirement of having proper instruction before taking possession of any gun.
Well, Sir, what do you think I meant by "abstraction"?
Might not your arguments and supporting data have been too narrowly specific?
It's not so much that I dislike your views as that I am unable to make sense of the reasoning whereby you arrive at them.
I'd be quite unable to justify your underlying assumptions.
"Might not your arguments and supporting data have been too narrowly specific?"
No.
"I am unable to make sense of the reasoning whereby you arrive at them. I'd be quite unable to justify your underlying assumptions."
If you "can't make sense" of what I wrote, then you can't justify or not justify my conclusions. What parts didn't make sense to you?
I've tried to give the bare bones of a reply elsewhere. This will be a mere fragment, repeating much the same points...
What didn't make sense to me:
Not your correct understanding of the Constitution, as currently interpreted by the Supreme Court, but what one might term your "constitutional absolutism".
That Anglo-Saxon obsession with "relevance" which, by hermetically sealing off a case from all context, can end up so separating it from reality that it becomes irrelevant...
Which only proves the truth of Lex asinus est.
I am not, then, taking issue with your understanding of your rights, rights which you share with all other US citizens, but with the interpretation of the Second Amendment by your country's most distinguished jurists.
Whatta nerve!
Surely. For I am a layman, a mere translator, with marginal experience of legal drafting. One with the greatest respect for the distinguished jurists I have met and sometimes had the honor to work with; correspondingly with scorn for those at the service of criminals.
I hasten to insist that the last point mentioned has nothing to do with the matter we are now discussing or with the honor of the Justices.
No response?
So be it.
The citation that follows, from a not insignificant philosopher, is not aimed specifically at you or at cargo cultist worshippers of what was once among the finest such documents that mankind has yet drafted but which time, neglect and vested interests have reduced to a curate's egg, good in (most) parts.
It just seems worth thinking about:
“When that which cannot feel, does not feel itself and is devoid of desire or love, is enshrined as a universal organizing principle, that signals the advent of madness, for madness has lost everything but reason.”
Gimme a break, Peter, I was sleeping when you wrote this. I'm not online 24/7.
Sorry, Shane. Understood.
I too have plenty of other stuff to be looking after -- none more important than taking a break when I need one.
Spare yourself a headache with the philosophy -- maybe another time...
What might be your constructive suggested solution ... sir ?
Seriously, Mr. Gericke? What about the rights of my kids and grandkids to LIVE?
How about making that clause about a well-regulated militia a far more prominent part of that Second Amendment? Every gun worshipper and ammosexual is so frigging focused on the "right to bear arms" that the OTHER PART of that Amendment seems to get forgotten.
PS: trying to make an equal case of regulating "free speech", "right of asssembly" and regulating "the right to own firearms" is pretty much the dictionary definition of a false equivalency.
"What about the rights of my kids and grandkids to LIVE?"
They have every right to live. The Second Amendment does not protect unlawful use of arms, including murder.
If you want to amend 2A to protect the gun rights of ONLY Militia members so you can take guns away from everybody else, feel free to get that amendment passed. It's your right to try. I predict utter failure, but you should go for it.
Until then, 2A protects the right of individual Americans to own and operate arms for any LAWFUL purpose, including, but not limited to, service in a well-regulated government Militia. "Well-regulated" does not means "lots of regulations," it means "working well, efficiently, smoothly, and as designed."
A common error made by gun paranoids, that meaning of well-regulated. But I'm happy to have had the chance to properly educate you. Now, I normally would not be snotty in my replies, but calling me a gun worshipper and ammosexual made it easy.
“Don’t be Bull” back to you.
I support every right protected by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, from free speech to voting to freedom of assembly to not harboring soldiers in one's home to the right of citizens to own and operate arms not being infringed.
Bull Connor did not support the constitution and I do, so I'm not Bull Connor. But points to you for attempted cleverness.
Finally, decent folks are saying, “Enough!” A 36-0 vote shows solidarity that you cannot take away people’s duly elected representatives without pushback.
I drive past Joan’s home in Woodside CA many times a week. Her exquisite artwork has graced the entry to her property - portraits of RBG, Zelenskyy, and most recently, her former husband noted Vietnam war protested David Harris. I feel inspired each time I pass by. Joan is a national treasure with a voice still so pure and beautiful and strong.
Correction: protester.
A portrait of John Lewis was being installed as I drove by Joan's home this morning. Lots of good trouble going on!
Let’s just rewind history and say the repubs never expelled two black legislators because they were black. Let’s say their protests were recognized as the lifting of voices for all the children killed in mass shootings. To plead for gun laws that prevent the needless deaths of children. Protect children not guns. Let’s say all Americans care enough to lay down their arms and choose to protect all our children. All. Let’s say they met Joan Baez because there is karma in protestors meeting without a plan, not a dream, but all our dreams. Then they sang together. “Last night I dreamed the strangest dream.” Let’s say every American is sick at heart being world leaders in numbers of guns per person, numbers of shootings, numbers of children dying. Let’s say we show our children we love them by our actions. And we sang together, Joan Baez, our children, the Democrats and even the repubs. Let’s say dreams might someday come true. “Last Night I had the Strangest Dream.”
https://youtu.be/lgMMfe7wRzc
Transcendently beautiful, Irenie😍
Here they are, singing:
https://www.silive.com/news/2023/04/singer-joan-baez-sings-alongside-expelled-tennessee-lawmaker-justin-jones-in-viral-tweet.html?outputType=amp
Thank you for this! Joan looks fabulous!
When I was in the US Army, a well trained militia, all weapons, including assault rifles, were stored in unit armories with steel reinforced doors and at least two high-grade locks. The only persons who carried weapons were the Military Police. If Marjorie, Mat, Jimbo, Clarence and Ginny and the other Christmas tree Rangers of the boom-boom club walked onto the post where I was stationed with their Happy New Year assault style tree ornaments they would have no trouble finding the bars: they would be on the doors and windows. It's happy hour. How in Hell's name did the 2nd Amendment get a reading that has allowed the gun culture to become what it has. When 2nd Amendment folks go abroad where all arms are forbidden or strictly controlled, do they take comfort animals when they have to leave their arsenal's behind?
My theory: Guns metaphorically are stand-ins for poorly functioning penises. A handgun barely cuts it. No, the longer the better. The rifle's shot is puny. So, here come the ar-15s--the optimum blast. So., the fear of having their guns taken away feels exactly like...well, I don't have to tell you....
O mg Preach Sadpanic ! ooorah !
The more fascism guides the GOP, the more clear messaging the Democrats can run on if they take advantage of this. Beautiful essay Heather and thanks!
…if they take advantage….
Lawmakers drunk on power and a delusional sense of superiority have invigorated those they see as enemies - and the quest to preserve democracy.
What a glorious blunder!
What beautiful images in my head: one young man re-entering the legislature and one singing we We Shall Overcome with Joan Baez. Just wow. I will go to sleep with happy thoughts.
Yes, WE shall overcome!
This is how change actually occurs in America. Black folks protest (or any other skin shade except white)...or gay, trans...name whatever "minority" group protests some injustice and white folks in power overreact out of fear...cameras record it and distribute it...a large group of folks see it...then react...and the white folks in power who felt threatened are now REALLY threatened by far more people who are focused on them like a laser beam. In the 1960's when these things occurred like at the Edmund Pettus Bridge there was a HUGE backlash at the White folks in power that did not serve what they wanted to preserve at all. Instead of putting the breaks on, they accelerated their already out of control situation...which literally crashed and burned all around them. They just co-created a situation they did not intend...because they acted out of fear...not love....and then the Universe puts the folk singer together with the protestor and they sing "We shall overcome". Peace to all...thank you again HCR for the report & the history. .
Yes, Mike! Karma works in mysterious ways, doesn’t it?
I call that the ”Joanie on the spot” incident. Once again she emerges.
The Tennessee legislators that barely held back from calling the two Justins "boys," must be feeling a little gobsmacked that people are not standing for BS. Hey guys, how's that going to feel like on a daily basis? Our youth is my prayer answered....
We Shall Overcome. Deep in my heart/I do believe . ..
The Right wing is going so overboard and is so desperate to get in every piece of legislation, and action that they can before the tables are turned, or so that it becomes impossible to turn the tables. These sorts of victories keeps the hope alive and makes me want to be sure to get out the vote in 2024 and turn things back around. At the same time it is concerning to read elsewhere and again today in The Lever that The No Labels party is possibly going to run the government through a third party which they pretend is centrist, but is not, and is funded by a lot of undeclared dark money.
https://www.levernews.com/americas-first-dark-money-ballot-line/
I am glad that Jones is reinstated, but the people who committed this crime need to be brought to justice.
https://www.stereogum.com/2219807/joan-baez-sang-two-songs-at-the-newark-airport-with-rep-justin-jones-of-the-tennessee-three/news/#:~:text=Jones%20and%20Johnson%20flew%20from,Nobody%20Turn%20Me%20'Round.%E2%80%9D
https://boingboing.net/2023/04/10/we-shall-overcome-justin-jones-and-joan-baez-unite-in-song-at-airport.html
I still say the Republicans violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
https://www.dol.gov/agencies/oasam/civil-rights-center/statutes/civil-rights-act-of-1964#:~:text=The%20Civil%20Rights%20Act%20of%201964%20prohibits%20discrimination%20on%20the,hiring%2C%20promoting%2C%20and%20firing.
We have our work cut out for us. Thank you for posting this victory Prof. Richardson.
I would agree that they did violate that law and many others, not least of which was a byproduct of their gerrymandering; a majority of us within the borders of supposed 'red states' have little to no representation. ? Did we not hurl 'tea' in a harbor over such abuse .... I think I remember so. Is not besides sedition, a deprivation of our rights to representation, at least a civil court manner that should be pursued ? I think so.
Unfortunately, SCOTUS and many state courts are political groups rather that pro-justice courts. Maintaining Republican power is their well-funded purpo$e.
I agree! I not only think they should be taken to court, and I believe the ACLU was going to do that, don't know if they still will. Hope so! I also think we need to make sure that any fines must come out of their personal monies, not their campaign chest as they are so known for passing the buck, or bills, as it may be. Prison time would be good too. There is nothing clearer to people suffering from Antisocial Personality Disorder than limits on their actions and punishment. Risking loss of freedom or financial ruin, is the consequence that makes people think and other avoid actions that are punished. Might put the breaks on Governor DeSantis, known by my 24-year-old nephew and his friends who are all graduate students as DeSatin! Moral appeals do not work on them, so forget community service. Fines and time is what they should get!