In his statement on the Newtown, Connecticut schoolchildren massacre, the president said the following:
So our hearts are broken today — for the parents and grandparents, sisters and brothers of these little children, and for the families of the adults who were lost. Our hearts are broken for the parents of the survivors as well, for as blessed as they are to have their children home tonight, they know that their children’s innocence has been torn away from them too early, and there are no words that will ease their pain.
As a country, we have been through this too many times. Whether it’s an elementary school in Newtown, or a shopping mall in Oregon, or a temple in Wisconsin, or a movie theater in Aurora, or a street corner in Chicago — these neighborhoods are our neighborhoods, and these children are our children. And we’re going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics.
That bolded sentence at the end? That’s a lot easier said than done, because the politics never go away. But we know one thing for certain. We cannot develop a legislative or regulatory plan to address gun violence and mass killings if Congress won’t even agree to hold hearings on the issue.
Laws concerning guns come under the jurisdiction of Congress’s two judiciary committees. The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee is Patrick Leahy of Vermont. He has a C Rating from the National Rifle Association, indicating, actually, that he is fairly supportive of gun rights. However, he has supported eliminating the gun show loophole and he has opposed efforts to shield gun manufacturers from lawsuits. I think we can convince Sen. Leahy to hold hearings on the massacre in Connecticut, or at least to allow one of his subcommittee chairs to do so.
In the House, there will be a new chairman of the Judiciary Committee next year. His name is Rep. Bob Goodlatte of Virginia. He is a Christian Scientist who has co-sponsored a bill that would require all future presidential candidates to submit their birth certificates for inspection. He is a big opponent of online gambling and was a key driver beyond the attempt to pass the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA).
I don’t know if we can convince this man to hold hearings on the Connecticut massacre, but I think we ought to try to convince him that he has a responsibility to follow through on the president’s promise that we come together to do something meaningful.
Perhaps I can get a formal petition moving on this issue. But, in the meantime, you can get started by contacting Sen. Leahy and Rep. Goodlatte and telling them how you feel about this issue.
You don’t have to tell them what conclusions to draw. Just ask them to announce hearings and to invite a good cross-section of expert witnesses and issue advocates so that we can examine possible ways to make our citizens a little more safe and secure in their homes, on their streets, and in their classrooms.
I sent this message. I look forward to your petition if you decide to create one:
Please hold hearings, in the judiciary committee, on solutions to gun violence. Yesterday was too horrible. Someone has to look for answers. Please make this an issue that can be spoken about in the light of day again. We are being held hostage by the gun lobby. A society should not be flooded with firearms horrible massacres result. Gun shows are a major reason for this flood. We can start the conversation there.
I sent that to Leahy and Goodlatte. Maybe we can at least talk about some limits here. Better regulation of gun shows. There will be screams of gun loving rage. Stand your ground everyone. We are being bullied and people are dying.
This gave me chills:
https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/9148_409414029127435_106327197_n.jpg
Caption: Sandy Hook Elementary sent this to Virginia Tech in 2007.
If you urge hearings on repeal of the 2nd Amendment I will be with you, provided you also come clean that the problem is not easy sale of handguns but widespread ownership.
More than 300 million guns, they say, are owned by tens of millions of Americans; how many of them are already just what a mass murderer needs?
If we stopped all new gun sales tomorrow the problem would not go away for centuries, since guns generally stay in usable condition for a very, very long time and black market/homemade ammunition would remain available even if commercial sales were stopped.
The real objective has to be disarmament.
Short of that you’re just throwing out sucker-bait for voters.
A start is a start, though, and something is better than nothing. Since the expiration of the Brady Bill, it’s been nothing but downhill for opponents of gun violence. If nothing else, we can at least slow or halt the slide.
All or nothing!!! Balls to the wall!!!! Doesn’t matter if that shit won’t work at all. It’s got to be all or nothing.
Why don’t you start with a citizens campaign to repeal the 2nd? That’s where it can actually get some traction. No Way congress is going to vote for that without serious cover from back home.
Setting aside the logistics of meaningful reform for a moment, my take on the bolded last sentence from the President’s comments is that this is indication that he’s decided to make a priority of this issue, in a sort of reversal from his apparent strategy thus far to avoid it.
One can hardly blame him. Just by being himself, he’s driven gun sales, ammunition hoarding, and issuing of gun dealer licenses through the roof. If he had, during any of that time, actually come out with a harsh word against guns, god alone knows what might have happened.
We live simultaneously in an armed madhouse and a crowded theatre, and the President knows that the wrong word dropping from his lips could easily start a conflagration at any time.
What I took away from his statements today (bear in mind that my today is about 12 hours off from yours) is that he’s decided that the problem is so far out of control that it’s worth risking some political blowback in order to address this issue of gun proliferation and access, in a manner that only the President of the United States can.
In other words, it was a back-burner issue that he was hoping to avoid, but he has decided that his legislative agenda might have to take a hit or two in pursuit of dealing with this unacceptable state of affairs.
I realize that as President, there’s little or no direct action he can take on the matter. But I have no doubt that once he bends his will to the situation, he can find a way to exert a great deal of influence on it.
I agree. Well said.
Sorry but I have no use for a hearing. We are well past that tactic. Time to push for the registration and a back ground check for every gun sold in america. Close the loop holes and get it done….slow down the flow of illegal guns to the crazies and to urban areas. Write the legislation and make the GOP vote no/present. Move the issue forward now and make it political.
I think we are far more likely to get a hearing from Rep. Goodlatte on how excluding God from public schools creates tragedies like Newtown, or the need to require public school teachers to be armed at all times.
In all seriousness, Boo, it’s an outstanding suggestion, and the most concrete thing I’ve read in the tsunami of punditry now pouring forth. But what are the chances? What is the political incentive for either of these men – but especially Rep. Goodlatte, who even if he were inclined knows that such a move might get him instantly primaried by someone who thinks presidential candidates should be tested first for monkey DNA? Especially since next week most Americans will be immersed in last-minute Christmas shopping, Newtown long forgotten
(Of course, you could answer “because the country needs to change its policies,” and you’d be correct, and I’d spend the next five minutes laughing, and the five after that weeping. When has that last been the priority?)
It’s been a long time since gun reform (can we ditch the loaded word “control”?) advocates were an organized and meaningful political force. Without that, unless the Dems have supermajorities in both houses and the White House besides, even something as simple as banning these high-capacity magazines is not going to happen.
It would be nice kabuki to hold hearings in the wake of yesterday’s tragedy, but we know with certainty they would lead to nothing over the next two years. Our first long-term task is to make this an issue that a lot of people care about even when there isn’t the latest stack of warm bodies in some town’s church or mall or school.
The best opportunities are in the wake of such events, but they occur with such regularity in our sick country that waiting for another one to go off is the least of our worries. We need to make sure that when it does, we’re ready. Until we are, reform is going nowhere.
Excellent conversation on Chris Hayes UP this morning. It looks as though Bloomberg is commited to getting something done (Howard Wolfson on panel).
Interesting highlight was a debunking of the NRA myth that gun ownership has gone up. While it is true that gun sales are through the roof, actual individual gun ownership has been on the decline, both among men and women. Instead the thought is that arsenals are being created.
Piers Morgan laid into the NRA apologists last night which was pretty astounding to watch and worth putting up with his arrogance.
I keep waiting for a paradigm shift suggestion where we follow the Israeli airport security technique of profiling, if you will, the travelers rather than asking them to take their shoes off.
A thought brought up this morning was a kind of ‘earned right’ for gun ownership and/or for those determined to be in a risk category perhaps a delayed period, such as a couple of years, before they can be permitted.
One remark stood out that stated one thing is for sure, we are united that we don’t want to ever wake up again to a morning where the vision of 5-10 year olds have been killed within the walls of a school.
So we have thousands of people armed to the teeth who think the U.N. is after them or their “rights” are somehow being violated. Gun shows have many paranoid people who believe things that are not grounded in reality. I do not doubt arsenals are being created.
That is encouraging about gun ownership by individual. Did they say a percentage of the population that is armed?
I can’t remember if the woman offered that statistic. The show is generally replayed early afternoon or a tape may be up later today. The whole show was full of stats. I hadn’t known that Australia had a mass shooting in ’96 whereupon govt responded with harsh gun control and Australians have seen zero instances since.
Have a look at some statistics from the Children’s Defense Fund, you can google the information if you doubt my accuracy:
The number of gunshot deaths among children and teens:
2008 – 2,947
2009 – 2,793
Or one death every three hours for two years running.
The number of children and teens who experienced nonfatal gunshot wounds:
2008 – 2009 – 34,387
The number of preschoolers hit by gunfire (I didn’t note whether they all died or some got nonfatal wounds):
2008 – 88
2009 – 85
A small percentage of the children and teeners were victims of accidental gunfire. The others were intentionally targeted, presumably the largest percentages and numbers are among teenagers. No matter how the statistics break down they are appalling—-in the Greatest Country In The Whole Wide World!
OH yes!!! By all means. Just what we need. More “hearings.”
Please.
While we are at it, let’s have some “hearings” on the violence committed by the U.S. almost exclusively on brownish people since the Korean
War…errr, ahhh…police action.Let’s also have some “hearings” regarding the number of minority children unnecessarily dead in this country…from violence and from general societal neglect…over the past 60 years or so.
Like say the Warren Commission “hearings?”
Please.
Hearings where a bunch of political hustlers shake their jowls at each other while looking for a leg up and simultaneously trying to make sure that nothing incriminating about the government sees the light of day.
Ain’t no “hearing” going on in congressional hearings, Booman. They’re just more bullshit, up and down the line. Deaf to the truths of the matters at hand.
Meanwhile…on every level (and increasingly on the white middle-class level, where it gets positively rapt attention from the media) people suffer and die unnecessarily.
I really don’t know the solutions to our problems, but I do know this. “Hearings” won’t be one of them.
AG
P.S. Previous comments that I made on this general subject got troll-rated off of the site. If you really think that I am some kind of troll rather than a well-meaning commenter, feel free. Zero away. But if you do not think that, please rate me up. I ask this only in defense of my ideas. Sticks and stones can break my bones, but ratings can only disappear me. Down rated? I’ll still exist. Somewhere. Bet on it.
You like to talk about disappearing people, issues, comments.
I perused the right-wing blogs last night. For the most part, they were pretending the massacre didn’t even happen.
The president said we should come together and do something meaningful. Okay. I can try. I can’t make others try. But I can shame them if they don’t.
Or, I can’t just be cynical, satisfied that my smug detachment is probably justified.
If we can’t get the House to even acknowledge that something happened, we can’t come together at all.
I invited people to have coffee with me this morning to talk about what we can do. So we had a little gathering of 6 people and will have our next meeting on Tuesday. We are going to invite as many people as possible into this conversation and eventually into taking action. I do think that asking for hearings is a good first step. A hearing would be televised. A hearing would dispel a lot of the crazy ideas that somehow arming all the adults there would have prevented this. A hearing is a good place to start.
I love your comments. If Obama’s presidency changes how America functions in the long term, it will be because of you.
Oh thank you so much for saying this but I am one of many people who feel like this is our time to do something. I just found out that one of our group got a big space at the library. The librarian offered to help pay the fee (it isn’t too much) for the meeting room.
Now to invite people.
very good, thank you
“The House” will do nothing other than whatever appeals to its relatively short-term political expediencies, Booman. If we could make a large proportion of that august body of hustlers think that it might get voted out of office next time it is up for re-(
s)election then perhaps some good work could be done.However…as you say, the right-wing media machine is blaring its white noise at top volume in an effort to disappear the problem. The House-sitters have no fear. Why should they?
AG
In my PollyAnna world I’d like to see a discussion where we borrowed from Mothers Against Drunk Driving (since I can easily draw a correlation) and make the premise of ‘earned’ (right) to include education hours on an annual basis from parents or siblings who were impacted by our mass shootings etc.