At least that’s evangelical leader, former GOP Presidential Candidate, and 700 Club host Pat Robertson’s explanation for the Las Vegas shooting
Violence in the streets, ladies and gentlemen. Why is it happening? The fact that we have disrespect for authority; there is profound disrespect for our president, all across this nation they say terrible things about him. It’s in the news, it’s in other places. There is disrespect now for our national anthem, disrespect for our veterans, disrespect for the institutions of our government, disrespect for the court system. All the way up and down the line, disrespect.
Oddly enough, I don’t recall Robertson being so gung-ho on respect for “our president” when it was the previous tenant of the White House (anything but, in fact). In fact, Robertson’s statements are particularly ironic, since the current “our president” has, with his party, done his darnedest to increase “disrespect for the institutions of our government, disrespect for the court system.”
Not mocking the tragedy with that Onion article, but being angry about it, and the thousands of other gun deaths in this nation, every single year, month, day.
And, no, I don’t want to hear “There’s no way to completely stop all crazies with guns, so we shouldn’t do anything to try.” That’s not how safety regulation works.
And, no, I don’t want to hear “Well, automobiles kill more people and we don’t ban automobiles.” Not only has regulation dramatically reduced automobile deaths, but most people use their cars every day for useful activities quite different than killing other people with them.
And, no, I don’t want to hear “Not all gun owners are crazed lunatics / terrorists / gang-bangers, so why penalize the law-abiding citizens for their crimes?” Because enough of them are (and enough others are criminally negligent with their weapons, and enough others make use of them to kill themselves) that, yeah, they’ve spoiled it for the rest of you.
And, no, I don’t want to hear “Well, if only everyone carried a gun then this sort of thing wouldn’t happen.” Because the Las Vegas guy was shooting from a hotel room across the street, and the idea of a bunch of panicky concert-goers opening up with pistols on the hotel has the prospect of a death toll far higher than the original shooting itself.
And, no, I don’t want to hear “Criminals don’t obey the law, so laws restricting gun ownership will be broken by criminals, so such laws are useless.” Because that means we shouldn’t have laws against selling heroin, robbing banks, or assault, either.
And, no, I don’t want to hear “Well, people can be killed with clubs and knives, too,” because individuals who go crazy with clubs and knives don’t usually leave a toll of 50 dead and over 200 wounded, nor do they do so from across the street.
And, no, I don’t want to hear “If I don’t have a gun then I will be easy picking for muggers and rapists and grizzly bears.” Because, remarkably enough, a lot of people without guns aren’t instantly killed, even here in the United States.
And, no, I don’t want to hear “I have a Constitutional Right to own a zillion guns,” because even the Supreme Court ruling that overturned decades of jurisprudence to rule that the Second Amendment is, for some non-obvious reason, an individual right, not a state right about militias, also indicated that gun ownership could be regulated within the bounds of that right, which is why you can’t walk down the street with an Uzi, even in Texas.
And, no, I don’t want to hear “If we do background checks on everyone for every gun sale, then the government will enslave us.” That’s pretty close to a prima facie case that you shouldn’t own a gun.
There are things we can do, not to completely solve the problem (or, rather, array of problems), but mitigate them. We just don’t have the political will. They don’t necessarily involve banning all firearms, but they do require standing up to the gun manufacturing lobby (i.e., the NRA), they do involve not seeing guns as the ultimate expression of manhood and patriotism, and they do need us to realize that there are ways to prevent this sort of tragedy, if we so choose.
‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens
LAS VEGAS—In the hours following a violent rampage in Las Vegas in which a lone attacker killed more than 50 individuals and seriously injured 400 others, citizens living in the only country where this kind of mass killing routinely occurs reportedly concluded Monday that there was no way to prevent the massacre from taking place.
American gun manufacturers are in trouble. Ironically, with the departure of Barack Obama from the White House, the gun-buying frenzy whipped up by the NRA and its allies (“He’s coming to take your guns! He’s coming to shut down gun stores! Buy all you can NOW!”) has subsided, leading to a huge dip in gun sales. American Outdoor Brands (the owner of Smith & Wesson) has seen its stock fall 50% since the November election, and Sturm Ruger’s stock has fallen 26% over that time.
Americans just aren’t buying guns. So the Trump Administration is planning to make it easier for American gun manufacturers to sell guns outside of America, by shifting responsibility for overseeing international non-military arm sales from the State Dept. (which was trying to prevent American weaponry from getting into the hands of bad actors overseas) to the Commerce Dept. (which is out to increase American trade).
I’m sure all sorts of foreigners are just dying to see that change happen. Or will be dying when it does.
A lot of times its the Super Law-and-Order types that are most in favor of asset forfeiture laws (“Hey, this X looks like it was part of a crime; we are taking it from you, even if we don’t actually charge you with anything”). The ostensible reasons for such laws is making sure that Bad Guys don’t profit from their crimes and slip through the judicial cracks. “Yay for strong justice!” they cry.
Those same Super Law-and-Order types also tend to be hyper-supportive of folk guarding the border, because, you know, illegals and other Bad Guys.
And those same Super Law-and-Order types also tend to be very gung-ho over the Second Amendment, and very critical over anything that affects gun ownership and the Constitutional Right to protect oneself from the Bad Guys..
Now watch those three conservative causes crash and burn. Because authoritarian policing and lack of due process don’t just affect the Bad Guys. It’s a lesson of history we keep conveniently forgetting …
I am sincerely trying to understand how some people could be so cruel, so incomprehending, so blindly devoted to a cause that they would ignore the potential of what pain they are causing if they are wrong.
I mean, is this gunnuttery? Is it anti-government whack-a-doodltry? Is it just sheer psychopathic insanity? What would lead people to not only question the Sandy Hook school massacre, but actively harass and threaten the parents of the children who were killed there?
Jim Wright does great long-form blog entries at Stonekettle Station. Here he (once again) dives into the depths of pro-gun fervency, Twitter-style, and gets a predictable series of NRA talking points, ad hominem attacks, and other logical fallacies. It’s fun reading, if you’ve taken your blood pressure medication.
Bang Bang Crazy, Part 12 – God, Guns, and Suicide Machines
That’s how it began. My Twitter timeline was suddenly one day last week filled with the anguished wailing of tortured Christians. Persecution! Persecution! They cried. Our sincerely held religious beliefs are being daily th…
Not long after I moved to Colorado, I was driving into the office, spun out in the snow, and ended up in a ditch. I breathed really heavily (having done a full Speed Racer on the Interstate) and then wondered what the hell I was going to do.
A guy in a pickup pulled up a few minutes later, hooked me up, pulled me out of the ditch, then drove off. He was a Good Samaritan who helped me out, and I will be eternally grateful to him.
On the other hand, ammosexuals seems to argue that strangers are out to kill you, charity is a socialist sham, and government is the enemy. So it's hardly surprising that a guy with a gun would decide that people coming to help him after his car slid off the road were a mortal threat that meant he had to kill or be killed.
… is that he enjoys shooting down birds. … is that he thinks putting on camouflage and grease paint will make people think he is presidential material. … is that he loves us.[1] … is that this Duck Dynasty guy likes him.
So … an interesting correlation between state political leaning and state rate of gun deaths per capita.
Mapping Gun Deaths by US States’ Political Leanings (2)
By analyzing publicly available data on political contributions, Crowdpac’s algorithm calculates objective political ideology scores for candidates, donors, organizations…
The laws allow businesses and other private property owners to post signs banning open carry or concealed carry. And apparently a lot of places are posting both signs now, meaning that folk who were previously devoted to concealed carry are beginning to regret that the open carry folk "won."
'Weighing in again, the original poster, LTUME1978, felt that for Texas’s concealed carriers, the damage had been done. “The lid is off this can of worms and it will never go back,” reads a later post in the thread. “I hope the right to walk around looking like Wyatt Earp is worth it to the open carry folks because a lot of us are loosing our right to concealed carry and it may cost some of us our lives for your privilege to play cowboy.”
Last week, Charles Cotton, the NRA board member who moderates Texas CHL, weighed in on the public’s reaction to the new open carry law. “I truly wish that open-carry supporters would admit that they were wrong and that there is a problem,” he wrote in response to a post entitled “I now regret that OC passed.” “However, I won’t hold my breath. If I cannot carry my self-defense handgun into a store because they put up 30.06 and 30.07 signs, then someone’s ability to show their handgun to everyone will have cost me the ability to defend myself.”'
Because we can't have the Gummint gathering some actual data about guns and violence in a nationwide, funded, systemic fashion because … well, who knows what we might find?!
Even the original sponsor of Congress’s gag order on research now agrees. “I wish we had started the proper research and kept it going all this time,” former Representative Jay Dickey, an Arkansas Republican, told The Huffington Post in October. “I have regrets,” said Mr. Dickey, who now asks whether the advances made in auto safety could have been achieved on guns if political positions had not been so hardened.'
See! The Gummint made cars and driving safer! Next thing you know, they'll want to make gun ownership safer, too, those fiendish tyrants!
Yeah, I have problems with how the federal government creates lists of potential "terrorist" suspects / allies / affiliates / fellow-travelers.
But it's ironic (read: outrageous) that at a time when we are apparently terrified that some refugees might actually turn out to be (gasp) terrorists, we are so obsessed with Gun Rights that folk identified as possible terrorist types are vigorously protected in their right to buy guns because [heavenly chord] the Second Amendment.
The idea behind "open carry" (at least the publicly legitimizing idea) is that an armed society is a polite (and thus safe) society, and if people are carrying firearms openly, the Bad Guys won't start any trouble.
Which sounds good, until you end up with a case where an openly carrying person was the Bad Guy, the open carry was a sign the guy was an impending thread, and 911 declined to do anything about it because it was legal.
Is that enough to change the policy? Maybe not. But it's worth some consideration.
The cause of all this gun violence is that crazy people can get guns! And then they kill people (not because they have guns, or that they are crazy and have guns, but because they are crazy). So, somehow, we need to figure out how to stop that happening, while at the same time reducing medical coverage, reducing government regulation, and increasing access to guns (so that everyone can protect themselves against all the possible crazy people who are killing folk, not because they have guns, but because they are crazy).
Hey, Mike! Long time no talk with! Seems ages ago since you were the avuncular guest visitor on Jon Stewart. Y’know, the guy who was clearly conservative, but also clever, friendly, smiling, and probably a neat fellow to have over to the house. So what’s new?
Oh, you have an op-ed at Fox News? That sounds fun.
Are you going to ask him if he’s stopped beating his wife, too?
President Obama’s unwelcome visit to Roseburg, Oregon Friday …
Which, remarkably, actually occurred after this op-ed was printed — amazing, Holmes! — and before he actually spoke with reporters or anyone else there.
Also, “unwelcome”? Would it have been better if he’d gone golfing? Oh, wait, Fox News criticized him last time he did that in what it deemed a crisis.
Obama is visiting, as president, along with Oregon’s two US Senators and Rep. Peter DeFazio. Were they unwelcome, too?
Or was it his message, of late, that gun violence and … well, guns, might somehow be linked?
Don’t tread on us!
According to local press coverage, there were in fact some protesters at Obama’s visit. And they had a message that seems eerily like yours, Mike. Wonder how that happened.
There were also some folk who welcomed his visit.
I haven’t heard from the families he visited privately to give his condolences. Did any of them not show up in protest? Were they a majority? Is that where we are now at with polarization in this country?
… makes one thing clear: he is clearly more interested in politicizing the nine dead victims at Umpqua Community College than reducing violence in America.
Because his immediate and continuing message has been, “This is all the GOP’s fault! If the Republicans didn’t hold the House, these nine people wouldn’t be dead. Vote Democrat in 2016!”
No, wait, that hasn’t been it. Oh, yeah, he’s indicated that gun control might play a role in addressing these incessant — and increasing — occurrences of gun violence.
It’s always too soon to talk about gun control. It was back in 2011, and it still is in 2015. (Click to embiggen.)
Now, there are certainly people who disagree with that. But, heck, there are people who disagree with almost any policy proposal one might make. The argument that to propose policy for an ongoing problem that keeps recurring but that nobody seems willing to act on, or even talk about — too soon! now is not the time! is somehow politicizing the matter is ludicrous. It’s almost like saying that a presidential candidate accusing another politicians of politicizing something is, itself, politicizing the matter.
Oh, wait …
If the president truly wanted to solve the issue, he wouldn’t call for new gun restrictions, he’d instead address the root cause of violence in America – sin and evil and the families broken and torn apart because of it.
Yes, we need a debate about Theodicy, why God lets evil occur in this created universe when He is all-loving, omniscient, and omnipotent.
What’s that, Mike? You don’t want to go after that deep of a “root cause”? You’d rather just waive your hands about sin and evil and preach to constituency? Hmmm. Got it.
The newest GOP campaign ad, no doubt
So, you’re running on the “no sin and evil” platform. Well, that’s certainly an interesting and, um, all-inclusive stand, Mike.
President Obama’s hometown of Chicago would actually be a perfect place to start.
Yes, because as President of the United States, he has complete policy control over his home town.
Despite restrictions on guns in Chicago, bullets spray like summertime sprinklers in Obama’s hometown.
Oh, now you’re willing to grant that a major city in the United States is Barack Obama’s “hometown.” Got it.
Before you go onto a litany of horrors about Chicago and gun control and gun crime, let’s step back a moment and look at a couple of things, Mike:
Oh, for the good old days, when Chicago didn’t have all these liberal gun laws
Chicago’s gun control laws are not all that tough. And they’re hampered by Chicago’s immediate proximity to Indiana, which has very limited gun restrictions. Nearly half the guns taken by the police in relation to crime in Chicago were from Indiana or from nearby areas that have looser restrictions. Chicago’s own restrictions have been loosened substantially over the past decade, due to court rulings.
You’re hinting at a good point, but going at it sort of behind the curtain, Mike. There is a definite difference between mass shootings of the sort in Oregon (and Sandy Hook, etc.), and the everyday gun violence that occurs in this country. The former get a lot of the press (and therefore political pressure); the latter is a hugely larger source of death and tragedy. Depending on which you want to fight, various measures might be more or less effective than others. Criticizing Obama for suggesting we should try to do something about mass shootings by lunatics because it won’t solve the problems of, say, gang violence, is like criticizing him for meeting with China when that does nothing about Mexico.
This year alone, there have been 2,300 shooting victims. Obama’s fellow community organizers on the South Side live in a war zone, and the dots marking crime spots on these neighborhood maps look like a decade-old dartboard.
Local gang territories mirror school district maps, so teachers and parents protest redrawn school districts because it inevitably means open warfare. On Sunday a man was shot to death and four others were wounded, including two 14-year-old teens, just a few miles from the President’s Chicago home.
On weekend nights throughout the summer, ambulances and emergency rooms staff-up to treat the inevitable casualties. In the past two years, there have been 500 murders and more than 5,000 shooting victims.
Yes. There are gun violence problems in Chicago. Aside from hand-waving an implication that this is somehow all associated with Obama, or that since it’s in Obama’s “hometown” he should somehow focus on fixing that problem first, what’s your point?
Or, rather, what’s your solution?
The South Side of Chicago would be a perfect place for the president to condemn the root causes of this senseless violence – the evil and sin. That evil and sin has broken homes leaving children with no good role models, devalued life and made people believe the lie that one life is more important than another.
Perhaps a new federal program for handing out free bumper stickers
President Obama should use the White House pulpit to confront this issue head on and crush our culture of violence that glorifies death and destruction.
Lack of respect for life and the ever increasing coarseness and crudeness in our culture contribute to a community of indifference, self-centeredness, and mayhem. This evil infects neighborhoods, parks, and bus stops every day.
Ah, right, the anti-evil, anti-sin (also anti-crudeness, I guess) platform.
Aside from taking the Bully Pulpit and preaching to the people of Chicago “Don’t be so naughty” and “Evil and sin are wrong,” do you have something more concrete? Because I’m pretty sure that he’d be willing to do that if it would make a concrete difference.
Most of the victims are teenagers and young adults, but in the past decade, more than 90 children under five have been killed in the crossfire.
Apparently the US is significantly sinful and evil compared to, say, France
Hey, Mike? Did you know that in the one year after the Newtown massacre, 100 children were killed through firearm accidents? That in over a third of the cases, the wound was self-inflicted? And in three-quarters of those cases, the shooter was under 14? Is that a case of sin and evil, too?
And, yes, American kids are getting murdered — kids in the US ages 5-14 are seventeen times more likely to be murdered than kids in other industrialized nations. And we’re not talking here just about kids in poor, gang-banging neighborhoods; the stats are still much higher even when you account for poverty, education, and city-dwelling. Just having a gun in the house increases the risk of death by firearm — from which I might conclude that having a gun in the house is, itself, a mark of evil and sin, but I suspect that’s not the point you’re trying to make, Mike.
But instead of going to Chicago to address the real issue …
Because Obama is president of Chicago.
… Obama travels to Oregon to politicize last week’s community college shooting …
By suggesting that we should do something to keep it from happening on a near-weekly basis?
… and demand ineffective backwards gun-control policies that empower criminals and terrorists at the expense of law-abiding citizens.
Or maybe we Americans just like murdering people (homicide and firearm homicide rates, 2006)
If we control guns, the terrorists will win! Gun-wielding criminals will run amok! That’s why there are so many criminal and terrorist killings in the UK! And Australia! And Switzerland! Be warned!
When it comes to advancing his liberal agenda, President Obama will exploit anything, even death and suffering.
Well, as long as we’re not politicizing our discourse, right, Mike?
The Oregon shooting occurred in a “gun-free zone.” It’s time we realize that “gun-free zones” are “sitting duck zones.”
Hey, Mike, guess what? That college was not a “gun-free zone.” While the administration discouraged people from carrying guns on campus, it was not against the rules, and the school was not labeled anywhere as a gun-free zone. In fact, there were people on campus who had guns — and either didn’t have an opportunity to do anything, or were concerned that they might do more harm than good (or, worse, get shot themselves by the police when they showed up).
This has been known since the earliest coverage of this crime, Mike. Why are you not aware of it (or not correcting your stump speech for it)?
Question, Mike. Back in your days in the Arkansas state house, what was the policy for visitors carrying guns in and around the offices of your administration? Did you encourage it? Or was it banned — leaving state workers as “sitting ducks”? Should the US Congress get rid of those metal detectors and, yes, no-guns policy? Will that make them safer than they are now?
So, what’s your next fact-based policy observation, Mike?
If existing gun laws did not prevent this massacre, there’s no reason to believe more restrictive laws will. In fact, I keep asking liberals: ‘What law could we pass that would’ve prevented this?” Liberals never have an answer because there isn’t one and they know it.
Knee jerks with the doctors are good. Knee jerks with legislation is bad.
Now, see, that’s a good way of framing a policy debate: what would actually do something to have stopped this particular tragedy. If you were expounding on caution on that basis — “Let us not take rash actions in response to this crime that would not have actually stopped this crime” — then I could respect your position.
Given how fact-challenged you’ve been elsewhere in this op-ed, though, I have grave doubts as to your “no reason to believe” or that “there isn’t an answer” assertions.
And beyond that, to be honest, how “knee jerk” is any sort of gun control proposal at this point? It’s not like the Oregon tragedy was the first of its kind, after all. We’ve been debating this for mass shootings for many years; for gun violence in general for much longer than that.
Obama’s hometown has some of the toughest, strictest gun laws in America.
Prohibitions, bans, registrations, confiscations, and mandates—Chicago has it all. And what has it accomplished to make the streets safer? Absolutely nothing. Chicago remains one of the most dangerous and violence cities in America.
Actually, it doesn’t even show up in the list of the 100 most dangerous cities in America, based on the chance of a person living there being involved in a violent crime. Which isn’t to say that there aren’t very dangerous parts of Chicago, but there are also a lot of place in Chicago where people aren’t being mown down like weeds.
Beyond that, consider as well: if guns were freely available within Chicago city limits (i.e., strike down all the current gun laws), would it make matters worse? Better? Or the same? Would the impoverished citizenry of the South Side be able to arm itself and drive out the gangs? Or would the gangs just be able to buy (or steal) more guns than they currently have?
This real issue, at its core, demonstrates how conservatives differ from liberals whenever any “new” law is being discussed: Liberals ask, “How does this law make me feel?” Conservatives ask, “What does this law do?”
Talk of gun control makes the liberals feel warm and fuzzy.
Well, as long as we’re stereotyping, I might argue instead that conservatives ask, “Will this hurt business?” Conservative politicians ask, “Will this torque off the NRA?”
However, the cold reality is that when you disarm the good guys you put them at the mercy of the bad guys. That’s what gun control does.
Thus the mass violence and post-apocalyptic streets of Canada.
When Everyone Has Guns (click to embiggen)
Alternately, when you make arms freely available to “the good guys,” it means “the bad guys” can get them, too. Legally. Or by stealing them from the good guys. It also means the good guys are a lot more likely to use guns when they get really angry. Or really depressed. Or when they think someone else is a bad guy.
The Second Amendment is the last line of defense against evil and tyranny and it must be protected.
Oh, wait, we’re talking tyranny, too? See, Mike, you can’t bury something like that in your last line and hope that it will be noticed and accepted. Here I thought liberals wanted gun laws because it make them feel all fuzzy — now I have to consider that it’s because they are nascent tyrants who want to, um, take our guns and, um, let evil and sin reign. See? Your message is just too darned muddled. Along with your facts.
Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee is a 2016 Republican candidate for president of the United States.
Because, yes, of course we want people opening fire on anyone who seems to be committing any sort of crime. An armed society is a polite society! If we let shoplifters get away with it, the terrorists win!
Why, again, is this woman not actually under arrest or facing charges?
I disagree with the conclusion of article, which says, "The N.R.A. is no longer the voice of law-abiding gun owners, but rather a voice for criminals." The NRA is, in fact, a voice for gun manufacturers who are interested in maximizing sales of guns and ammunition, period. Any pretense to representing hunters, gun owners, law and order, or the Second Amendment is belied by the shenanigans described in the article (the rest of which I agree with fully).
Though, to be fair to the article's author, Alan Berlow, while I don't think the NRA is (intentionally) a voice for criminals, I think its actions make it far easier for criminals to obtain firearms. But, hey, criminals are citizens, too, right?
Who the N.R.A. Really Speaks For
The organization claims to represent everyday gun owners, but its lobbying work can have a more sinister impact.
You know, I'm talking about He-Man Jesus, not that namby-pamby liberal pacifist Jesus the wishy-washy hippy Christians and Episcopalians are so fond of. I mean, he was right there, telling his followers to cut down anyone who came to harm them (Luke 22:49-51, Matt. 26:47-53), to strike back at persecutors (Matt. 5:43-48, Luke 6:27-28), to fear those who come to kill you (Matt. 10:28), and to enjoy sweet vengeance if someone offers you violence (Matt. 5:38-39) because life and security in this world is the highest Christian virtue (John 18:36).
But, of course, I jest.
The question of Christian pacifism is a difficult one, debated by much more intelligent lights than Mr. Ramsey (or myself) for centuries. What seems pretty certain to me, though is there is no concerted mass wave of violence against American Christians. There has been one shooter who appeared to target Christians (and his argument seemed to be more against organized religion than Christian faith per se).
While there is a wing of Christians who seem bound and determined to portray themselves as Latter-Day Martyrs, there's as yet little foundation for such concern. (And, even if it were so, the Martyrs of Old were … Martyrs, not gunslingers fighting back against the sinister and superior forces of anti-Christian paganism. Until they were the ones in power, at least.)
My reading of the Gospels regarding violence and self-protection is that Jesus put such things in the hands of the authorities — the civil government and the military. There's ambiguity about personal self-defense — some passages where Jesus seems to be okay with people carrying weapons, but, as noted above, condemning their use. And while I am able to cite examples of Jesus suggesting that persecution and martyrdom and the attacks of enemies should be answered with love (and welcomed as signs of faith), I don't think I could be sanguine about an attack (religiously motivated or not) upon myself, let alone my family. Though I think that makes me less of a good Christian rather than rationalizing that Jesus is jiggy with Christians packing heat.
Gun use — safe and accurate gun use — is hard. Safe and accurate combat / conflict reactions are hard. Both take training. In the case of combat and law enforcement personnel, that training is repeated on a regular basis — and even so we still get cases of friendly fire / blue-on-blue deaths and injuries, not to mention collateral damage amongst the citizenry when the bullets start flying.
So why would anyone whose job is not to sell more guns and bullets think that putting more guns in the hands of ordinary folk and telling them their patriotic duty is to be "a good guy with a gun" in case a crime or mass shooting is being committed isn't going to frequently end badly? (See, for example, http://goo.gl/ucC8nK)
