Last Updated on: 19th April 2013, 09:52 am
Update two: This is even more right than the satirical stuff. A Senate in the Gun Lobby’s Grip
By GABRIELLE GIFFORDS
Update: This also sounds about right. COURAGEOUS SENATORS STAND UP TO AMERICAN PEOPLE
This sounds about right. Next Week’s School Shooting Victims Thank Senate For Failing To Pass Gun Bill
I’m not what you’d call a gun control activist. I understand that responsible gun ownership is possible. Hell, I know some responsible gun owners. They’re pretty much all farmers and hunters who eat what they kill or protect their animals from wild things that might harm them and not folks walking around the city with protection weapons, but my point stands. Legally owning a gun doesn’t automatically mean you’re going to use that gun to go on a rampage.
What I am, however, is a person who doesn’t understand the need for assault weapons capable of firing gazillions of bullets in a couple of seconds outside of a war zone. That, to me, makes no sense. If you want a gun to defend your house and you feel you need something that powerful to do the job, move. You’re not living in a safe place.
I’m also on board with both background checks for prospective gun buyers and better mental health services across the board to get to people before they have to resort to shooting a place up. Neither of those things will stop everything, but they certainly can’t hurt.
Ultimately what I am is thoroughly disappointed in my southern neighbours today. Your politicians caved in to the gun lobby and voted down measures meant to save lives and help countless numbers of people who need it. For the sake of NRA support and dollars, they sold the regular people who just want to feel a little safer down the river. I shouldn’t be surprised. Often that’s what politicians do. But this one somehow feels worse than usual. Maybe it’s because as a Canadian, stricter gun laws just make sense. Maybe it’s because for once, more than 90% of Americans agreed on something. Whatever it is, it sucks.
I can’t sum things up any better than President Obama did yesterday. It really was a shameful day for Washington.
Where has this Obama been all these years, by the way. America could have used him.
Good morning. You and I read the same publications. Did you read former Congresswoman Gabby Gifford’s editorial yesterday? It’s in the NYT and all over the net. You and I are pretty much in agreement on gun control. My country is setting a record for greed and stupidity (bad combination).
I’ve heard so much about it that I feel like I’ve read it, but I still need to go back and do that. It sounds fantastic. Just a shame that it takes stupidity on top of tragedy to bring out actual emotion in politics.
Here’s Gabby. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/18/opinion/a-senate-in-the-gun-lobbys-grip.html?_r=0
Just read it. Not sure how anybody could disagree.
Stupid doesn’t begin to cover it. We’ll try again, probably with the same results. What gets me is that Canada, with all their wide open spaces and cowboy mentality there much like ours (no offense intended but I couldn’t think of a better description), still managed to pass civilized laws.
No offense taken. Those elements certainly do exist here, in parts of the west in particular. And as sensible as our laws are, the Conservative government has done its bit to gut parts of them on behalf of those elements. they framed it as a waste of public money, but that flies in the face of the rest of its “tough on crime” agenda. We had a national gun registry that the police said was useful and should not be dismantled, but because people with rifles hated it and probably because it was somebody else’s idea, it’s gone. Keep in mind that this is the same government that’s rammed measures that will waste countless billions on new prisons through in the name of safety.
I’ve been concerned about my favorite country for some time. You guys may be living in too close proximity to us. It seems to be rubbing off.
We’re doing the same thing with prisons and, worse, we’re privatizing them. With private ownership, the more prisoners, the more revenue.