This Has to Be the Time for Gun Control

Author Robert Shrum in the Daily Beast

How many children have to die, how many innocents have to be lost in a mall or a theater or on a neighborhood street, how many presidents or political leaders or prophets like Dr. King have to be shot down in a fusillade that wounds history itself, before America protects the first of our founding inalienable rights—to “life”—which surely comes before the “liberty” of carrying a cache of weapons. And that demands gun control—and I’m not using a politically convenient phrase like “gun safety legislation.” Some guns are outright unsafe—assault weapons—and all guns are unsafe in the hands of some people.

We as a society are hostage to the thugs of the NRA—which actually stands for the National Rampage Association.

Republicans who claim to defend the “right to life” profit politically by defending the moral wrong of a wholesale arsenal of death inflicted on the already living. The religious right that has allied itself with the gun lobby defies Christ’s warning that those who harm the children would be better off thrown into the sea with a millstone around their necks. Shouldn’t the protection of life begin not with a fertilized egg, but with human beings who are truly and fully alive?

And on the other side, politicians who know better, including most Democrats, cower before the threat of electoral retaliation—and invoke the rationalization that it is too hard to pass anything in Congress, even a ban on assault weapons or closing the gun-show loophole that lets criminals and the deranged shop for firearms without any background check. White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said today is “not the time” to talk about policies that at least in theory President Obama supports. Oh yes it is. If not now, when? If not the president, who? As he spoke in stricken terms, he seemed to comprehend that—and that he holds the office Franklin Roosevelt described as “pre-eminently a place of moral leadership.”

No measure short of banning all firearms could prevent all shootings. But we can take practical measures that would save many lives. Who among us, who among our children, could be the next to be killed in an unexpected moment of unspeakable horror? So now we will shed a tear again. And in the phrase of Robert Kennedy, who himself would soon be a casualty instead of a president, we should “say a prayer for ourselves and for our country.” And we should have the courage to do something for our country, too. We should look into the anguished faces of parents outside that Connecticut elementary school—faces now tragically incised on our national consciousness. We should recall events from that darkness at noon in Dallas nearly 60 years ago to the carnage at Columbine and Aurora. Those faces and events matter more than the scorecard of the National Rampage Association.

Let us resolve that half a century and more of this country as a killing field is more than enough. Let us refuse to let this day of dying fade into memory and the malaise of resignation to things as they are. Let us stand against the odds so that countless others who otherwise would never even know the cause of their slaying or the name of their executioner may instead live, laugh, and find love and not hate.

Today Barack Obama spoke his heart and the nation’s—and called on us to take “meaningful action regardless of the politics.” Maybe at last, this is the time; it must be the time. The massacre has come too many times.

90 Guns for every 100 Citizens

Re-posted November 5, 2013

Shooting in New Jersey Mall and at LAX

Gunman kills himself after terrorizing New Jersey shopping mall

Three dead, including gunman, in Oregon mall shooting in December 2012. Killings like this happen so often that few even pay attention.

I have written about this situation before. The United States has 90 guns for every 100 citizens, making it the most heavily armed society in the world. This has been reported by news agencies repeatedly.

U.S. citizens own 270 million of the world’s 875 million known firearms, according to the Small Arms Survey 2007 by the Geneva-based Graduate Institute of International Studies.

So is it any wonder that when Americans become angry they grab a gun, go to the mall or their church, and start shooting at everyone in sight. It is a society of frustrated people who want their way in everything.

Argument with your spouse, kill her/him. Argument with your boss, kill him/her. You look suspicious as you walk through my neighborhood I will kill you and ask questions later.

Well it’s all about Second amendment rights. The NRA (National Rifleman’s Association) says, Defend Your 2nd Amendment Rights, Help Protect Hunters’ Rights. There is nothing in the Second amendment that says you have the right to bear arms for your protection or to hunt. It does say, “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.”

The problem is the people of the United States. They really believe that their freedom hinges on their right to own weapons. Sales have dramatically increased in the past four years because many believe that the Obama administration has plans to enforce new gun controls. No laws have been suggested or proposed. Still, there are those who continue to believe that their weapons will be confiscated. The gun manufacturers are happy with this situation.

It is a puzzle to me that a nation of so many wise and smart people believes that owning a gun is a necessity of life.

Cash is Still King in Emergencies

Do you have some cash stashed away for an emergency?

The widespread and ongoing power outages caused by Hurricane Sandy not only left millions of people in the dark but reminded many of us of how useful it can be to have some good, old-fashioned cash on hand for an emergency.

For a few days after the Northridge Earthquake (1994) the power was out. The local market was open but to purchase anything required cash in small denominations. ATMs were not operating. Happily we had some money.

It’s all part of planning for the next emergency. Every part of the nation is subject to weather or other physical disaster occurrence.

So, before the next big storm, it may make sense to round up a little extra cash. Some advice from money experts:

If you want to conceal cash in a safe place at home, it’s easy enough to make one. For example, put a roll of bills into an empty food can and stow it deep in your pantry or hollow out that copy of “Moby Dick” you know you’ll never read anyhow. Burglars have seen it all, of course, but they’re usually in too big a hurry to check every book or canned good you own. If you’re not the do-it-yourself type, you can buy similar items, such as wall clocks with secret compartments and Pringles tubes with fake bottoms.

Consider a home safe. Safes are designed to protect their contents from fire, burglary, water, or some combination of those perils. So your first step is to decide what risks you’re most concerned about. You can find safes at retailers such as Costco, Home Depot, Lowe’s, Sears, and Target, as well at specialty stores and online. Expect to pay $50 for a small chest suitable for stowing cash or $100 and up for a safe large enough to accommodate other valuables and important documents.

What’s your plan?

Abraham Lincoln and the Never Ending Civil War

Perhaps the title of this post should be “Is this the and of the United States?”

The American Civil War, also called War Between the States , fratricidal four-year war (1861–65) between the federal government of the United States and 11 Southern states that asserted their right to secede from the Union. The war ended 147 years ago.

After all of these years since the end of the Civil War the South is still re-fighting every battle and every event connected with the confederacy. Steven Spielberg’s new movie simply titled Lincoln says we have not gotten over the war or the events that led up to the war.

The new Steven Spielberg movie is based upon the book Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin. It’s an enthralling book. Even someone who is not particularly interested in reading history books will find this biography a compelling read.

The troubling part of this story is that citizens of all 50 states have submitted petitions to secede from the United States and that happened just this year. Seven southern state petitions have collected significant number of signatures. The leading is Texas with over 101,000. Major numbers of petition signers are residence of Texas, Louisiana, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina, Georgia, and Florida.

Happily Anti-Secession Petitions are Gaining Clicks, Too! The thought is that those wanting to secede should be stripped of their citizenship and deported. I would agree with that thought. Perhaps Mexico will take them.

One More Reason There is a Federal Government

Those in the path of Hurricane Sandy should be grateful that Mitt Romney was not elected president. Last year Mr. Romney pledged that if elected he would shrink the deficit by axing FEMA and handing the responsibility of disasters over to the states and local governments.

During a CNN debate at the height of the GOP primary, Mitt Romney was asked, in the context of the Joplin disaster and FEMA’s cash crunch, whether the agency should be shuttered so that states can individually take over responsibility for disaster response.

“Absolutely,” he said. “Every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that’s the right direction. And if you can go even further, and send it back to the private sector, that’s even better. Instead of thinking, in the federal budget, what we should cut, we should ask the opposite question, what should we keep?”

“Including disaster relief, though?” debate moderator John King asked Romney.

“We cannot — we cannot afford to do those things without jeopardizing the future for our kids,” Romney replied. “It is simply immoral, in my view, for us to continue to rack up larger and larger debts and pass them on to our kids, knowing full well that we’ll all be dead and gone before it’s paid off. It makes no sense at all.”

The Los Angeles Times is reporting today that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is planning to ask the federal government to pay 90% of the associated costs. Those costs are estimated to be in the billions of dollars. They are already at $20 billion. New York officials have indicated they will seek more than $30 billion in federal aid.

It is unlikely that any state could handle the costs of devastating climatic or geological occurrence. Think Hurricane Sandy, Hurricane Katrina, and the Northridge Earthquake.

If we are the United States we come together to help those in need. This is just one of the many reasons Americans re-elected Barack Obama.

Romney the Pathetic

A pathetic phone call from Mitt Romney to his donors was reported tonight by the Los Angeles Times. The Republicans decried class warfare but they know that it is a fight between the rich and poor. Mr. Romney didn’t consider some other factors like women’s rights, the snuffing of the middle class, and his constant calls for armed confrontation with every foreign adversary. There were many other issues that put both Romney and Ryan on the side of a minority group.

“The Obama campaign was following the old playbook of giving a lot of stuff to groups that they hoped they could get to vote for them and be motivated to go out to the polls, specifically the African American community, the Hispanic community and young people,” Romney told hundreds of donors during a telephone town hall Wednesday. “In each case they were very generous in what they gave to those groups.”

Romney’s frank analysis echoed his secretly taped comments at a May fundraiser, where he told a small group of donors that 47% of the electorate was unlikely to vote for him because they paid no income taxes and were dependent on government. It followed his running mate Paul D. Ryan‘s assertion that Obama’s win stemmed from turnout among “urban” voters.

“With regards to African American voters, ‘Obamacare‘ was a huge plus — and was highly motivational to African American voters. You can imagine for somebody making $25—, or $30—, or $35,000 a year, being told you’re now going to get free healthcare — particularly if you don’t have it, getting free healthcare worth, what, $10,000 a family, in perpetuity, I mean this is huge. Likewise with Hispanic voters, free healthcare was a big plus.”

Happpily other Republicans quickly denounced the comments, including Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who were in Las Vegas for a meeting of the Republican Governors Association.

“We have got to stop dividing American voters,” Jindal said. “I absolutely reject that notion, that description. … We’re fighting for 100 percent of the vote.”

Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza says: “This won’t help the GOP’s efforts to win over minority voters, especially given Romney’s past “47 percent” comments. And the fact that Jindal and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) so quickly denounced Romney suggests party heavyweights are ready for the Romney chapter to be over.”