Outrage

The NRA finally made what it billed earlier in the week as its “contribution” to the post Newtown dialogue. In the face of protestors who accused the NRA chief of being responsible for “Killing Our Children”, Wayne LaPierre called for armed guards in “every school in this nation”. Beyond that he stonewalled on any restrictions or new gun safety measures. His only real anger seems to have been reserved for the media which he claims has it out for the NRA. He apparently cannot believe that millions of Americans are outraged at the death of 20 children not to mention the continuing atrocities committed with guns in cities and rural communities across the country. He is out of touch with the majority of Americans who hold all of those who contributed to these deaths in any way responsible.
According to the NRA’s own website, in recent months the NRA has supported:
Michigan
•Repeal of the handgun safety test currently required to obtain a purchase license
•Repeal of the requirement that local law enforcement agencies maintain paper copies of purchases
•Allow non-residents for non-contiguous states to purchase rifles and shotguns in Michigan (A major cause of trafficking is the ability of people from tough gun control states to purchase weapons in weak states and transport them)
Hawaii
•Allow chiefs of police to issue licenses to openly carry firearms
Ohio
•Modifies the definition of a loaded firearm in a vehicle. Currently, a firearm is considered loaded if a loaded magazine is present in the vehicle, even if the magazine is not inserted into the firearm.
•Eliminates the renewed competency certification requirement for concealed carry license renewals
As late as August the NRA was strenuously lobbying against proposed Senate Legislation to outlaw large capacity magazine clips. The NRA website referred to the Senate sponsors, Lautenberg (D-NJ), Schumer (D-NY), Feinstein (D-CA), Boxer (D-CA), Menendez (D-NJ), and Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) as the “usual suspects”.
The NRA is in the tank for the gun makers, and now millions of NRA members need to decide if they will continue to stand with their organization and those that manufacture military style weapons, or whether they side with those seeking to legitimately improve the safety of our children. After Newtown no one, not the NRA, and not any Federal, State, or local official can have it both ways. Those that stand for more guns, which will only result in more killing, must be acknowledged for what they are: (Political) enemies of peace and civility.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/put-armed-police-officers-in-every-school-nra-head-says/2012/12/21/9ac7d4ae-4b8b-11e2-9a42-d1ce6d0ed278_story.html?hpid=z1See More

IF we let this moment pass, then shame on us. It is important to note that progressives have been fighting this battle all along. These gun safety proposals are not knee jerk responses to the atrocity, they were already out there before the killing and have only gained traction as a result of the images we have all seen. At the same time the NRA has been fighting hammer and claw against even the most reasonable restrictions, including the most basic gun safety proposals. Their goal is an armed and untrained population fighting “Bad Day at Black Rock” battles on every street corner in America. The battle never ends for them, because if it does, when it does, it will adversely affect the profits for their corporate masters.
Any suggestion to put guns in schools whether in the hands of teachers, administrators, or armed guards should be judged for what it is: A surrender to the immorality of the gun culture. Conservatives and Liberals who are opposed to the continuation of genocide in our cities, towns, and horrifically in our schools must take a stand and not allow ourselves to be sidetracked by petty political arguments. Now is the time to Stand and Fight!

The following Website contains contact information for the President, All Members of the House and the Senate. For those that have not already done so, please write your Senator and Member for Congress. Democrats should not assume that their elected Representatives are on the right side of this, or that they are properly motivated to vote for Gun Safety.

http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml

“Nobody knows the solution” is an “on the one hand, but then again on the other” sort of statement which sounds wise, but which reeks of foolishness.

There is no principle involved in standing on principle, especially for those that say that “Now is not the time”. There is, in fact, no better time than now to have an informed and enlightened debate about gun violence. Just today four more people were murdered and three policemen were shot. If we wait for a period of time when the genocide of gun violence in America has taken a pause we will wait till hell freezes over. A more specious argument cannot be made. The gunners among us made this same putrid argument after The Tucson shooting in January, the Aurora shooting in July, the Oak Creek shooting in August. The only case for this argument now, with 20 dead children the latest in this avalanche, is for the pure purpose of averting one’s eyes from the scope of the tragedy.

Some have suggested that murder rates are a fraction of what they were not so long ago. That’s true. The US murder rate in 2008, as reported by the FBI, was 4.8 per 100,000. That is down substantially from the peak in 1980 of 10.9 per 100,000. But today’s rate is about what it was during the early 1960’s. In short, beyond calming the streets of baby boom drug violence there has been little progress in creating a more sane and civil society in America. The suggestion that things are not that bad, and this is just an overreaction is repellant on the surface and not borne out by the FBI statistics.

For all the talk about guns and gun safety and even mass killings, the great tragedy of gun violence is largely endured by African Americans who make up 13% of our population but suffer nearly 50% of homicides committed by firearms. White Americans purchasing guns for home safety are largely feeding a paranoid reality which does not exist. Yet it is from these islands of safety that most of the recent mass murderers have sprung. The trend is further borne out in the numbers which clearly indicate that the number of gun owners is declining rapidly even as the number of guns owned is on a meteoric rise.

Beyond that we often hear that we really don’t know how to solve this complex societal problem. In both Great Britain and Australia public horror at gun violence resulted in near complete bans on privately held guns and the result is almost no gun violence. While it’s true that people bent on killing themselves will still find a way to do it, suicide rates are dramatically lower in Australia (14.9 per 100,000) and the UK (10) than the United States (20). The suggestion that a dramatic reduction of guns in society will not greatly reduce violent crime and suicide rates in just flat, plain, wrong. The problem in the US is that with 300 million guns in circulation, and a gun crazy minority, the aggressive actions taken elsewhere are nearly impossible.

The total civil disarmament solution is impractical and probably not advisable, but no one should pretend that we don’t know what works. Better we are honest and say, "Look, this shit happens", but too many of us want our guns. We might add that "A certain amount of child killing will have to be tolerated" so we can have our fun hobbies and cool toys. That, at least, would be honest.   

Some have claimed, with either stunning ignorance or willful contempt for the truth, that those who want to murder will do so even in a gun free country, but the murder rate in the US (4.8 per 100,000) is four times that of Australia (1.0 per 100K) and the UK (1.2 per 100K).

There is no scientific evidence that suggests that children affected by either autism or Aspergers, a disease on the Autism spectrum, which still leaves most as highly functioning members of society. Media coverage of this aspect of the case has veered between irresponsible and just merely ignorant.

On the other hand State spending on Mental Health Care has been cut dramatically since the financial crisis is of 2009. ABC News reports the following:

“Since the recession forced budget cuts in 2009, state general funding for mental health care has decreased by an estimated $4.35 billion nationwide, according to the National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors, which serves 6.8 million patients a year.

 “Since 2009 alone, 3,222 psychiatric hospital beds are no longer available to patients, and another 1,249 may disappear soon because of proposed closures, according to the association. That's about 10 percent of all state psychiatric hospital beds gone in about three years, said Dr. Robert Glover, the association's executive director…”

Funding is a huge problem. But in this case it can hardly be argued that resources were an issue. It has widely been reported that as result of the divorce settlement the killer’s mother, his first victim, received $250,000 per year in alimony and received substantial additional spousal support to care for her troubled son.

So yeah, I have an agenda. Let’s start by trying to be honest. Guns kill alot of Americans (way out of proportion to other developed nations), and a sizable segment of our population has a perverse attachment to them. Those who stand in the way of progress on this issue are the same ones that have stood in the way for decades. Gun makers getting rich on the sales of once esoteric military type killing machines have amplified their voices and polluted our politics, but generally the voices are the same. But if we are going to speak of agendas, let us be honest about that too. There is no bigger agenda than that of the NRA and its corporate masters. If one wants to raise objections to agendas raised at the time of tragedy let us understand that the agenda of the NRA is to maintain the profits for the gun makers even if it means sustained levels of genocide in this country, particularly among people of color.