YOUR HOME IS NOT SAFE UNDER CURRENT GUN CONTROL LAWS

So says the Washington Post Editorial Board, one of the leading U.S. newspapers. This piece starts out with the simple but oft-repeated phrase, “THIS SHOULDN’T happen in Troutdale. You don’t expect something like that to happen in your hometown.” This reaction after a 15-year-old high school student killed a fellow 14-year-old student and then shot himself. The Post says don't expect anything from this Congress which refuses to even consider gun control legislation. But just take a look back...from an elementary school where 20 6-year-olds were massacred with an assault rifle to the Washington Navy Yard where a gunman killed 12 with a sawed-off shotgun, and the same thing happens in hundreds of other  venues around the country. The Editorial Board comments, “We’re the only developed country on earth where this happens. And it happens now once a week..." President Obama has spoken forcefully. Now we need action!

GUN NUTS TURN TO BROOMSTICKS WITHOUT THEIR GUNS

The Department of Justice "Operation Choke Point" has been kept a secret but has come to light recently and has the gun nuts scared as hell. One such gun lover commented that if Choke Point worked, all that they would have left to defend themselves with was a "very powerful broomstick." The operation is so named for its ability to choke off financial services to targeted industries like gun manufacturers. A frustrated Obama administration is desperately trying to save lives from gun violence and, due to a yellow-bellied Congress, has had to resort to desperate moves. And that is what makes this sort of thing so egregious, a gutless Congress and an apathetic public that won't stand their ground.

GUN CONTROL TAKES OVER BROOKLYN BRIDGE

Chipotle gun nuts

They came, they marched, they made their point. It is time we see the well balanced people of the gun control movement out there in force for reasonable gun laws rather than the gun nuts who sling their assault weapons over their shoulders shuffling their way into a Target or Chipotle to protest and prove their masculinity. If ever there were a couple of losers, it's the two in the attached photo. Now to me this pair looks like what I call gun nuts; more guns than brains. But there were 1,000 gun control demonstrators on the Brooklyn Bridge, including almost 100 from Newtown, Connecticut, the site of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting rampage. Lots of moms against gun violence were there who look very intelligent compared to the Chipotle double-digit IQs. The momentum is obviously there this time for gun control.

TEA PARTY SITE PROVES IT'S TIME TO TAKE THEIR GUNS

I try my best not to call attention to a Tea Party site, if not based on the lack of accuracy, it is because of the numerous grammatical mistakes, but this one takes the cake. New York has put out a counter-terrorism bulletin because of the radical 2nd Amendment gang that is apparently saying they will do anything to keep the feds or NY state law enforcement from taking their weapons. These are the very people they should require to turn in all their firearms. The picture included with the TP post says it all; it's an assault rifle featured as if every American family needs one of these. Well, they don't, and it is this bunch of gun nuts that should be relieved of all their guns. The Tea Party obviously supports rebellion and I'm beginning to think that includes violence.

HAVE REALITY SHOWS BECOME REALITY?

Slenderman

The country is completely absorbed with television reality shows where dreamers can vicariously be whatever they want to. There's The Amazing Race, The Contender, Dancing with the Stars, Survivor, America's Got Talent, Big Brother, The Voice and the list goes on and on. Since the grownups are so engrossed in this kind of television, some kids might assume that it is okay to step away from reality and do something they conjure up from a mixed up mind. Something like stabbing one of your classmates in a fantasy world that still borders on reality.

Just what two 12-year olds did to impress a make-believe online character named Slenderman from a site called Creepypasta Wiki. Now in most cases even a 12-year old can differentiate between this kind of fantasizing but obviously with the recent shootings, and stabbings some parents aren't doing their parenting jobs. 

TEA PARTY STUPIDITY

Two people posting on Facebook have taken offense to my comments degrading the Tea Party calling them some favorite names like fruitcakes, idiots and morons. One such comment read,  "They do seem to be monolithic in their thinking. The other thing they do is rather than debate the merits of issues, they demonize, deride, and dismiss those who disagree with them," based on me calling them fruitcakes for their eternal bitching over President Obama, the borders, the Constitution, a balanced budget and the list goes on. But when they come up with a solution to problems it is usually looney tunes.

So I decided to do regular posts now showing why I use designations like fruitcakes, idiots and morons for Tea Party members based on these very members' comments. Here is why I use these pet names...

“You would be giving off more CO2 if you are riding a bike than driving in a car.”  – Ed Orcutt, Washington GOP State Rep., stating that bicycles pollute the environment more than cars do.

 “I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created — in the sense of rape — but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you… rape victims should make the best of a bad situation.” – Rick Santorum 

“When a physician removes a child from a woman, that is the largest organ in a body. That’s a big thing. That’s a big surgery. You don’t have any other organs in your body that are bigger than that.”  – Mary Sue McClurkin, Alabama GOP State Rep. 

 

Thanks to the Americans against the Tea Party site for these quotes

NRA SAYS STOPPING GUN VIOLENCE "UNETHICAL"

Let me explain that headline. To stop the daily gun violence in the United State that takes over 30,000 lives each year, we need to know something about the people who do it, the weapons they use, and the reasons for their actions. These facts are easily available if the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) were allowed to collect and analyze the data that's already there on gun deaths. They cannot. But they did this until pressure from the NRA stopped it cold in the mid-1990s. If the information being suppressed is not so negative to this bunch of gun thugs, why would wacky Wayne LaPierre and his NRA gun nuts want to censor it? The answer is obvious and is just another example of a gutless Congress that should be kicked out on their asses in November.

GUN CONTROL ADVOCATES-ELECTIONS TO WATCH

The Wall Street Cheat Sheet has lined up some races in November that us gun control advocates

Look closely for the bloody dead child

should pay particular attention to. One is Mark Udall (D-Colo) who voted to ban high capacity magazines and so far is in an even race against opponent Rep. Cory Gardner (R). Giffords' group is also backing Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-La.), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), and Al Franken (D-Minn.). Others include Reps. Ron Barber (D-Ariz.), Ann Kuster (D-N.H.), Carol Shea-Porter (D-N.H.), and Bruce Braley (D-Iowa), Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.). Giffords and Kelly's group, Americans for Responsible Solutions is attempting to show that it is possible to be an advocate of gun control and still support the 2nd Amendment.

Progressives must turn out in November if we are going to bring down the National rifle Assn. along with its leader wacky Wayne LaPierre.

MORE GUNS MEAN MORE VIOLENCE PROVEN

U.S. the worst in guns owned to gun violence

Two Harvard professors researched 26 high income countries finding that the high rate of gun ownership correlates with high gun violence. The United States has 88.8 guns per 100 people and in the U.S. an American is 20 times more likely to die of a gunshot wound than in these other developed countries. You have to look at this map and illustration showing the amazing difference in gun deaths across the world. Only Chile is close to the U.S. but look at gun control countries like Canada, Australia, Great Britain and others. But here's the catch. The report also found that just 52% of Americans felt gun control laws should be stricter. Are these people ill-informed, completely apathetic or just plain stupid. I vote for a little of each.

GUN NUTS CREATED BY NATIONAL RIFLE ASSN.

I have called them gun nuts for several years now, defined simply by the fact that they love their guns more than innocent human lives. Their gun rights are more important than those killed in

Wacky Wayne LaPierre

shootings from Columbine to Las Vegas. And they get it from the top, wacky Wayne LaPierre, head of the NRA. The Daily Beast says he and the organization have
created a monster in these misguided morons who walk into restaurants and retail chains with assault weapons slung over their shoulders. The group's command is go out and arm yourself and prepare for a war against the gun grabbers. Now this NRA hierarchy knows this will never happen but as long as wacky Wayne keeps them buying guns, the gun manufacturers are happy and LaPierre's pockets continue to be lined.

WHAT SHOULD PRESIDENT OBAMA DO ABOUT GUN VIOLENCE?

President Obama

Barack Obama is the President of the United States, after all. He should be able to put a stop to American gun violence that is one of a kind in developed countries. The Brits wouldn't allow this kind of bloodshed to continue over a period of time like it has in the U.S. Neither would Canada or Australia where gun control is the law. Columbine was in April of 1999; that's fifteen years. And through all this it has been the National Rifle Assn., led by wacky Wayne LaPierre, that keeps blaming it on everything but the real cause. GUNS. And it is a sniveling U.S. Congress, scared to death of the NRA, that refuses to pass the gun laws necessary to quell this violence. All of this perpetrated on the American people so gun manufacturers can sell more guns to more gun nuts. Obama has spoken out again. Will he follow up?

JOHN MCCAIN's TIME HAS PASSED

John McCain

He served the state of Arizona in the U.S. Senate well after being elected based on his Vietnam incarceration. Yes, there was a sympathy vote there which has arisen in many political articles over the years. Regardless, John McCain did good things for Arizona and the country. I had a great deal of respect for him as a GOP moderate and maverick who stood up for what was right, regardless of the party connection. But this is all history now. First there was his run for President against Barack Obama that was noteworthy...until he named Sarah Palin as his Vice President. Sheer stupidity based on choosing someone like Palin and dumber because it made the Republican Party look like a bunch of idiots. And then there were all the flip-flops first on immigration, on climate change, then on Bowe Bergdahl's prisoner exchange. All done for the sake of getting reelected. It's time to move on from John and hopefully in his next reelection we can send Jeff Flake packing.

NEIGHBORS KNEW OF LAS VEGAS COUPLE'S KILLING PLANS

Walmart Las Vegas shooting

What is it the American public can't understand about "I just might go out and do a mass killing?" The dialogue was similar in what the killers Jared and Amanda Miller told their neighbor,
Krisa Koch, before the killings. Their actual words were "the couple had told her they were going to carry out an attack." Koch said, " she thought they were 'crazy,' so she dismissed what they said." And then the woman the pair of murderers was staying with, Kelley Fielder, "She said she saw the pair leave the home early Sunday carrying weapons and ammunition." Good God, what does it take when there are killings like this daily in the newspapers and on television and the radio. Are these people just stupid or is this an extension of the American public's dismissive nature of the shootings taking place throughout the U.S? Either way it's pathetic.

ERIC CANTOR LOSES HOUSE SEAT IN VIRGINIA PRIMARY

Progressives can gloat over the House Majority leader's loss in today's Virginia primary but that's

Eric Cantor

only if that translates into a negative reaction to Tea Party candidates as it did in 2012. Eric Cantor trails his Tea Party backed opponent, David Brat 55% to 44%. Apparently no one saw it coming and hopefully this might be a precursor to the Democrats taking back the House in November. TPers have an inherent ability to really piss off sane voters and one can only dream of a replay of some of the 2012 races. But if Cantor is considered the most conservative in the House, God help us if Brat does win. Everyone says this seat is solidly GOP but time will tell.

LAS VEGAS SHOOTING CONCEALED CARRY CIVILIAN SHOULDN'T HAVE DIED

I've said it before and now it's happened again; a vigilante type carrying a gun in public has died as a

Cici's Pizza Las Vegas shooting

result this time. He shouldn't have but it is this kind of cowboy mentality promoted by the National Rifle Assn. that leads these folks to think they are ready to defend the American public. They aren't. It takes months of training for a police officer to know what to expect in crucial situations like this but I doubt if the armed guy, Joseph Wilcox, had anywhere near that. He didn't anticipate an accomplice and she shot and killed him. In the Gabby Giffords Tucson shooting in 2011, two Arizona gun gauchos tried to come to Giffords' aid and nearly shot each other. In Arizona the only thing necessary to carry a gun around on the streets is to have a pulse. I am firmly against open and concealed carry permits and hope that the Supreme Court will soon make this a thing of the past.

WHERE IS OBAMA? WHERE IS CONGRESS? AS THE CHILDREN KEEP DYING

Reynolds HS evacuation

My wife said this morning with the news that there was another shooing in Oregon with two dead, one a student at Reynolds High School in Troutdale, Oregon, just outside Portland, "It's beginning to look like a conspiracy." But who are the conspirators? Maybe the National Rifle Assn. is involved since we have had so many shooting incidents with absolutely no action from lawmakers. On the other hand each mass shooting fires up the gun nuts that much more to protect their right to own a gun. Which means gun manufacturers sell more guns and then shower the NRA with more cash donations to keep its head, wacky Wayne LaPierre happy. I'd hate to think I am right about this and I'm probably not. But this is coming to a crisis level, if it hasn't already, and if something isn't done for reasonable gun control soon, the National Guard will have to escort your kids to school, sit with them all day, and then escort them home.

NRA WANTS TO ARM MENTALLY ILL

I touched on this in an earlier post, “NRA wants to weakenVirginia Gun Violence Prevention Law.” but the mentally ill factor deserves more coverage. Although the Newtown shooting was horrendous due to the number of young children shot and killed, the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007, was the worst ever. Seung-Hui Cho shot and killed 32 people and injured 17 others. He was mentally ill. MSNBC provides some background: the Gun Control Act of 1968, prompted by the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, said once you were banned you stayed banned. After Virginia Tech, Congress passed the NICS Improvements Amendment Act, requiring states to submit mental health records to the national database.

After consideration, the NRA said this is no good for their membership. But you could pass it, if first the words "mentally defective" in the amendment were more narrowly defined, which I am guessing would keep it from identifying many of their members. Second there had to be an easier way for those deemed mentally unbalanced to get their guns back. Meaning some backwoods justice of the peace could say, "Halleluiah, they have been cured." A doctor's order would even be sufficient to get back his or her arsenal. The Gun Control Act of 1968 blown to smithereens. Does anyone else get just how stupid this all sounds?

And doesn't this remind you of the fact that Iowa wants to arm the blind.

 

 

 

 

 

TEA PARTY IS WORRIED WHETHER OBAMA IS SANE?

Now here is the epitome of the pot calling the kettle black except in this case the pot should be called an idiot. In a recent Tea Party post the headline read, "Psychology Expert Worries ‘Erratic’ Obama May Not Be ‘Sane.’" Either the guy is completely incompetent--something an association with TPers might suggest--or it's the usual misinformation we get regularly from Fox News, this time coming from CNN castoff Lou Dobbs.

Here's a typical quote from this organization of fruitcakes:

             “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways of shutting that whole thing down.”     -Todd Akin.  

 

The Tea Party is the group that thinks that people don't die of breast and prostate cancer anymore, believes you give off more CO2 riding a bicycle than driving a car, when a physician removes a child from a woman's body he has removed the biggest organ in her body, and there is no one who doesn't have health care in America...the list goes on. It is hard to imagine these individuals functioning in a normal society, and, of course, some of them don't. Hopefully November will be the deciding factor whether or not this bunch of morons survives or expires, preferably the latter. 

 

 

 

 

 





LAS VEGAS JUST THE MOST RECENT GUN VIOLENCE-WHERE'S THE UPROAR?

Why haven't we heard from wacky Wayne LaPierre, head of the National Rifle Assn., during the recent gun violence? There was Santa Barbara, then Seattle, Atlanta, and now Las Vegas. Four incidents of horrific gun massacre in four major cities in less than three weeks. A total of 13 killed and 16 injured. Did I hear, "Guns don't kill, people do?" Or maybe it was some left-overs from the mob in Las Vegas that made them do it. Could LaPierre be trying to decide whether we can call these "shootings." What bothers me most is the fact that the American public remains quiet, as if these kinds of events are now considered acceptable. Hey out there, don't you care that your friends, neighbors and relatives are being slaughtered with one of the 300 million guns on U.S. streets?

Maybe when it's one of your own you will.  

NRA WANTS TO WEAKEN VIRGINIA GUN VIOLENCE PREVENTION LAW

The Virginia Center for Public Safety reports the NRA wants to scrap a Virginia database that is state-of-the-art and second to none in the nation. The National Rifle Assn. is calling on its members to help repeal the 1989 law, the Virginia Firearms Transaction Program (VFTP). The VFTP works along with the FBI’s National Instant Background Checks System (NICS) to check the background of those purchasing firearms in the Commonwealth of Virginia. This helps catch those people not eligible to purchase firearms like felons and the mentally ill. And the point is it works much better than NICS. So why would anyone want to get rid of it? Only a bunch of morons that value their stupid gun rights over the lives of innocent people. 

 ThinkProgress details how the Bush administration proposedlegislation requiring states to share mental health history. It was passed by Congress but not until after the NRA watered it down significantly. The final bill set up restoration programs for the mentally ill, in effect to put guns back into their hands. And the definition for "mental defect" was narrowed to make it easier for this person to get his or her gun back. It's the typical NRA gun-running philosophy to keep putting more weapons on the street. Which means gun manufacturers sell more and give more money to the NRA. Pathetic and disgusting but seemingly approved by a lot of the American public, also pathetic and disgusting.

DEMOCRACY ALLIANCE PAVING WAY FOR GUN CONTROL-NRA CRINGES

Wacky Wayne LaPierre in his glory

Let's just look at what this club for gun loving misfits is for and against. The National Rifle Assn. is against universal background checks, lawsuits against the firearm industry, micro stamping and any tampering with the 2nd Amendment. They are for assault rifles, large capacity magazines, concealed and open carry anywhere and Stand Your Ground Law. There's more but these are the ones covered in a recent release from their Institute for Legislative Action. They rail over former NY Mayor Michael Bloomberg putting up $50 million to fight gun control along with George Soros's group divvying up $40 million. Wacky Wayne LaPierre's NRA addicts spent $40 million in 2008, $10 million of that to defeat President Obama. On the Colorado recall alone they spent $350,000. We know the NRA is against anything that would restrict their beloved guns. But what this bunch of gun nuts is finding out is that there are many of us out there that place saving the lives of innocent individuals over their stupid gun rights.

SMART MONEY GOING TO GUN CONTROL SINCE NEWTOWN

Michael Bloomberg

As of the end of April, the dollars with sense have passed the dollars with blood on their hands prompted by the Newtown gun massacre where 26 lives were taken by shooter Adam Lanza, 20 of them children around six years old. And they have apparently done it through grassroots organizations, you might say just the opposite of the gun nuts of the National Rifle Assn. Michael Bloomberg kicked in $50 million, Gabby Giffords and Mark Kelly's gun control group around $15 million. Gun control is about $5 million ahead of gun rights so far in the 2014 election cycle. They have trailed by over $31 million in the past. Now there are dour predictions out there for the GOP retaking control of the Senate and no chance of the Left taking back the House. Does this kind of momentum change that equation?

FAULT FOR GUN VIOLENCE PLACED EVERYWHERE BUT WHERE IT BELONGS...THE NRA

It's the media, it's the criminal world, it's video games, it's the U.S. government. The National Rifle Assn.'s list goes on and on but fails to identify the real reason we have so much gun violence in this country: The NRA. It's opposition to reasonable gun control, things like background checks. Wacky Wayne LaPierre, NRA head, has one solution to the problem: more guns. Based on the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, there are about 300 million guns in the United States. Access to firearms is about as easy as getting an ice cream cone, maybe easier. So we need more?

Missouri repealed a law requiring background checks leading to a 16 percent increase in the state murder rate, according to  Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research in Think Progress. Another study from this site reports that states, "...with more expansive background check laws experience 48 percent less gun trafficking, 38 percent fewer deaths of women shot by intimate partners, and 17 percent fewer firearms involved in aggravated assaults. How many facts like this are necessary to convince Congress and...wacky Wayne? 

HERE'S A NEW ONE-NRA DOESN'T WANT TO CALL SHOOTINGS "SHOOTINGS"

So what the hell do you call them, a reunion for gun nuts? This gaggle of reality restricted gun lovers over life complains the media "race[s] to label anything with a gun as a shooting." Although not directly related to the Isla Vista California shootings--oh sorry, I meant to say a completely innocuous use of firearms to kill innocent people in order to protect the rights of the radical double digit gun culture--the video was released right after that killing spree. Maybe the NRA is just pissed since in Santa Barbara three people were stabbed, only three killed with a gun; how could this killer be so inconsiderate to use a knife. Strange reasoning but then we're talking about the National Rifle Assn. The above article points out, "Firearms are used in 69.3 percent of murders. Of 37 public mass killings between 2006 and 2013, 33 involved firearms..." All gun control advocates eagerly await the latest epiphany from wacky Wayne LaPierre, NRA head.  

SOUTH RISES AGAIN...WITH MORE RACISM

Not just the old South anymore

Jim Crow days are back again...in Memphis, Tennessee. I spent several years there going to college and working in television, in fact, the very TV station that reported this story, WREG-TV. I left the South as fast as I could because in those days, the 1960s, racism was rampant all over that part of the country. I know that because I traveled six southeastern states with a publishing company. And one of my neighbors was a member of the Ku Klux Klan, something I found out after leaving Memphis. By reading and through friends still there who share my views on racism, the stigma has never left the South; it just became somewhat subdued.

But not like the supervisor at the Memphis cotton company who told a black employee, you can't drink from the "white" water fountain and if you do we'll hang you. He was fired but the damage was already done. You just wonder how much more of this is going on in the South, or the North, or the Midwest, or the Southwest, or the West or the Northwest.