Showing posts with label Stephen Barton. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Stephen Barton. Show all posts

Thursday, October 11, 2012

More persuasions for gun control

Neither Barack Obama nor Mitt Romney broached the subject of gun control in the October 3, presidential debate.  Gun control advocates across the country took notice and many let their disappointment be known.  One such person was Stephen Barton who was one of the victims in the Aurora, Colo. movie theatre massacre.  Barton, who is from Brooklyn, was hit with 25 shotgun pellets and is suffering nerve damage.  However, Barton says he won’t give up.


Columbine shooters Eric Harris
and Dylan Klebold
Barton remarked it seemed absurd to not mention gun control in the Denver debate considering the short proximity to the Aurora carnage as well as the Columbine school shootings in 1999.  12 were killed in Aurora, 58 wounded.  In Columbine, 13 killed, 21 injured.  Barton places part of the blame for ignoring the gun issue on the debate host, Jim Lehrer, but mostly on the candidates.  You’d think a total of 25 killed and 79 wounded would raise some candidates’ hackles.

It didn’t, and, at least, this could have added some zip to Obama’s hollow performance.  Sorry, Mr. President, it was sorely lacking and some are saying it could put Mitt Romney ahead to stay.  I think not!  Whatever went on in your head that night has thoroughly confused many progressives, but we all know it was not the true Barack Obama.  But the fact remains that both you and Romney refuse to address the enormity of the problems of firearms in the United States.

Aurora and Columbine, and Tucson and Virginia Tech and the host of other major incidents of mass shootings should be enough to put any politician’s stomach in turmoil with it happening in the country he governs or wants to govern.  But not a word from either of you and that is unacceptable.  Maybe not to the gun nuts and the NRA and its leader, wacky Wayne LaPierre, but for the average citizen who values his or her life and that of family and friends.

Excellent video by Thom Hartmann making case for gun control:

And of course there is more.  On the streets of America each day 84 people are killed by guns, 603 weekly and 2,612 monthly, numbers that should drive any civilized government to regulate the source of the problem.  Like Canada and Australia, where steps have been taken to control this kind of individual and mass bloodshed due to firearms.  Recently a Quebec court let stand a law requiring the registration of even long guns along with the current handgun law.

Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn has proposed strictly banning assault weapons and New York lawmakers want broad legislation to limit weapons purchases.  On the other hand Dem. Majority Leader Harry Reid says that body is to busy to debate gun control this year with no promises for next year.  It is simply astonishing to me that our Congress is too busy to do something about the death of 84 innocent victims a day from guns, many illegal.  I guess the question is what will it take?

Doctors have even weighed in on the issue, asking the question, “Is a gun like a virus, a car, tobacco or alcohol?”  They say YES and want to approach gun violence as a social disease.  “What we need, they say, is a public health approach to the problem, like the highway safety measures, product changes and driving laws that slashed deaths from car crashes decades ago, even as the number of vehicles on the road rose,” according to the Associated Press.

VA Tech shooter Seung-Hui Cho
Mass shootings don’t seem to be on the rise but the accounting of the number of dead and wounded by police agencies for these incidents aren’t always reported immediately, sometime not for a year.  Emergency medicine professor Dr. Garen Wintemute of the U. of Calif. Davis said, "The greater toll is not from these clusters but from endemic violence, the stuff that occurs every day and doesn't make the headlines.”  Like those 84 deaths reported by the CDC.

And finally, there’s Paul Ryan.  His Vice Presidential candidacy is enough to make any serious gun control advocate throw up.  Actually, any progressive for that matter.  Example: Re. guns, in 1999 he voted against more stringent background checks for people buying at gun shows.  And in 2011 he voted for the bill that, if you have a concealed carry permit in one state, you would be able to carry your weapon concealed in any state.

FLASH: Since the state of Arizona will issue concealed carry permits to just about anyone who wants one, and allow them to carry their weapons anywhere they want to in the state, you will have hundreds of people walking around the U.S. who are not even qualified to own a gun.  Come on…doesn’t common sense demand more sensible gun regulations in America?

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

The debates may not make a difference but we’ll watch them anyway

BUT FIRST…THERE IS A DRIVE to confront President Obama and Mitt Romney in the Wednesday debate with the question of what they will do about regulating guns following all the recent gun massacres around the country.  In particular, eight of the 12 relatives of those killed by James Holmes in the Aurora, Colo. movie theatre have written to debate moderator Jim Lehrer saying:

“To ignore the problem of gun violence where two of the worst shootings in U.S. history took place - Aurora and Columbine - would not only be noticeable by its absence but would slight the memories of our loved ones killed." 


Obama Romney ready to debate

To coincide with this request and as a forewarning to both candidates, The Mayors Against Illegal Guns, headed up by NY Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston’s Thomas Menino, are running national TV ads featuring Stephen Barton, one of those wounded in Aurora, asking Obama and Romney how they would reduce gun violence.  MAIG uses high profile events—like a recent Super Bowl ad—and now pre-debate interest to get their point across.

Why we must debate gun control:

So in terms of their importance, the debates are going to be very important to gun control advocates if Lehrer addresses the issue.  It is beyond me why he wouldn’t.  There may be certain parameters set by the candidates, and this may be one they don’t want to discuss, but that too would be a travesty considering the gun mayhem that is taking place in America Today.  I will be releasing my monthly shooting report in a few days that will further confirm the problem.


NJ Gov. Chris christie
BUT WAIT…GOP vice presidential contender Paul Ryan says the debate is not really “critical” for Mitt Romney, at the same time praising Obama’s debating skills, attempting to take the heat off his running mate.  But at the same time, New Jersey Republican Gov. Chris Christie has predicted that the debate will literally turn the race around for Romney, apparently not knowing what Paul Ryan knows.  Like all politics, they turn these critical debates into a game.

Donna Brazile, Dem. strategist, comments that most debates since the 1980s haven’t changed the outcome of the elections.  She does cite one instance where it did make a difference in 1960 when Nixon apparently went through a meltdown which changed the direction of that election.  Nixon refused to debate in 1968 or 1972.  She also mentions the Reagan against Carter comment, “There you go again,” leading up to “Are you better off than you were four years ago?”

Obama Romney put on the gloves
Arch conservative Ann Coulter says that we are going to see an “unfiltered” Mitt Romney, whatever than means.  She adds in support like Christie, that this will make all the difference with Independent voters.  One poll shows it almost even with 47% of Independents for Obama, 45% for Romney.  Halimah Abdullah on CNN feels Obama won’t talk about his record but Mitt Romney will.  GOP pollster Whit Ayres feels it is all about who can fix the economy.

Brazile thinks that whether or not the candidates are good or bad, it can make a difference, but she agrees with Ayres, the conditions in the country right now are on everyone’s mind.  Voters want to hear how Obama and Romney will fix the problem and this could make a difference if the public believes one or the other of the candidates has the right answer.

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