Letters to the Editor
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Pro gun logic
According to pro-gun logic, the best way to create a safe and peaceful society is to arm every citizen to the teeth with weapons.
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I'm hoping for a 100,000 gun deaths next year
Just to see the looks on your dumb mugs. As discussed earlier there appears to be no upper limit in the number of gun deaths America is willing to tolerate before taking some action. I for one am fine with that. With 27 states having passed or trying to pass 'stand and deliver' laws that for the most part give free licence to shooting anyone in the street for about any reason I look forward to wading through blood puddles on my way to retarded ideological selfrighteousness.
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So...
Republicans rueing gun bans in the wake of the shooting is "exploiting tragedy for political purposes" (which, for the record, I agree it is), but seizing on it as a call to revive the gun control debate isn't? Methinks I smell a bit of hypocrisy here.
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We will Never Learn
The Bush administration has been shooting itself in the foot since it was installed into power. Of course shrub has continued the idiotic lagacy of Ronnie Raygun by slashing government mental health budgets...remember, Mr. 'Shining City on a Hill' was the one who emptied out the mental institutions and put all the disturbed people on the street...cut the budget for social programs! Cut taxes for the rich! Eliminate any semblance of government regulation of businesses and industry...let pollution and consumer/investor rip-off reign! Jettison a reality-based government for 'faith-based' solutions! The all-might market will reduce pollution, keep our food standards high, and take care of all of society's needs! Gun control is hitting your target! I used to be a republican...then I woke up...apparentlt one-third of Amerika's population is still in, and always will be in, the right-wing zombie trance. Go to bed at night asking yourself why in the hell all the nations in the European Union have vastly fewer gun homicides and suicides and accidental gun deaths than we do. Kindof takes all the wind out of the tired old mantras that 'If we take away the guns from law abiding citizens, then only criminals will have guns', as well as the tired old chestnut about redneck citizens needing guns to defend themselves from the possibility of their government turning autocratic...how many Euro governments have turned on their citizens in the last 60 years? The answer is for citizens to participate in their own governments (We the people...), not buy guns and bury them in PVC pipes in their back yards for 'the coming revolution'. Wake up, fellow Americans: We still have a great country, but we are behind the Europeans, Aussies, and Canadians on most quality of life measures (crime, pollution, education, health care and health of citizenry, social safety nets, and more. Are we really too arrogant to learn anything from the rest of the world? Sorry Ronnie Raygun...it is NOT 'Morning in America'...how about 'Mourning FOR America'. All you delusional cretans go pray to your God for all the good that will will do.
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How to achieve gun control
Nationalize the manufacturers and be very choosy about whom you sell guns to. (And nationalize cigarette manufacturers too.)
Be realistic: ask for the "impossible."
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A Thousand To One Longshot
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two Secret Service officers were injured on Tuesday after a gun held by another Secret Service officer accidentally fired inside the White House gate, according to a spokesman, Darrin Blackford.
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For every criminal thwarted by a gun wielding citizen there are a thousand accidents like this. I've got an idea. Why not require handgun owners to join the National Guard or some other well regulated militia?
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Meanwhile, in the real world....
The article is the sort of inside-the-beltway blathering that I read Salon to get away from. Nowhere was there any mention that maybe gun control belongs on the back burner, and that both voters and politicians understand that. We have bigger problems (Iraq, the pileup of debt, and the rape of the environment, to pull some examples out of the air).
For that matter, the problem that gun control was supposed to solve--gun violence--is not the scourge it once was. Crime is still much lower than before Bill Clinton came to office (which is no comfort to the victims of the Virginia Tech shooter or their families).
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As long as you're going to ban guns.....
How about banning drugs, too? That should take care of it.
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Proud to be a New Yorker
home of some of the strictest gun control laws in the world, but hey, if tolerating America's gun fetish is what it takes to bring rural and working-class whites back to the Democratic Party, I say make it even easier for them to buy, sell and carry guns.
The Virginia Tech killings were a terrible tragedy, but they're nothing compared to what we'll face if we don't control rampaging, even more murderous Republicanism.
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Anonymous?
".how many Euro governments have turned on their citizens in the last 60 years?"
France, Greece and Spain, certainly. Call it 60-odd years and you get some notable episodes in German and Italian history. Portugal turned against its people in the 1970s with a military coup. Then there's Serbia, Czechoslovakia, Turkey (a couple of times) Cyprus, If you want to get beyond Europe, it's a very long list.
So, yeah, except for those parts of Europe covered by France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Greece, Portugal, and some eastern outliers, you've got a great point.
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Not to mention...
... Reagan didn't cut a dime of social services spending. Setting aside the fact that budgets are determined by Congress (Democrats, back then) and not by the president, social services spending across the major categories (income support, healthcare, housing, nutrition, general social services, education/training) went up from $104 billion to $124 billion (i.e. an 18 percent increase) in inflation-adjusted dollars (1989 dollars, to be exact). Healthcare spending went up 63 percent during the Reagan administration. (Source: Congressional Research Service.) Do the flippin' math already.
The mentally ill were dumped out of the hospitals because of a convergence of 1960s-vintage liberationist social theory and bureaucratic rent-seeking at the county and state level, where most public mental hospitals were funded back then.
Is there oxygen on your planet?
Maybe you'd like to think about coming out of that comfortable cocoon of mythology and take a shot at dealing with life here in the real world.