Yesterday two things happened . . .

[AndyS]

Ten years after 20 first grade children and six of their teachers were killed in a school shooting the Sandy Hook Memorial Garden opened.

https://www.curbed.com/2022/11/architecture-review-the-sandy-hook-memorial.html

AND

There was another shooting at the U of Virginia.
?c=16x9&q=h_270,w_480,c_fill
https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/13/us/university-of-virginia-shooting

In the name of God when are we going to deal with the fucking guns?

[lefthandedskyhook]

1. Cry for them

Their lives ended too soon for bad reasons

[mahina]

2. Oh those beautiful faces

💔
Their poor families

[William769]

3. K&R.

[republianmushroom]

4. Maybe, just maybe someday we won't have this BS. It will not be in my life time , but maybe someday

[Hope22]

5. Such a terrible tragic loss.

It’s a disgrace that the article tells of the talents of the shooter while he was in High School! Not a word about the honors and accomplishment of those he murdered. Disgusting.

Oh that we never had a need for that beautiful memorial. Everyday this country throws another victim on the pile with little consideration because, well tomorrow there will be another. My heart goes out to the loved ones of those killed at Sandy Hook and these young men. 🙏💗💗💗💗

[Delphinus]

6. I had

not heard about the shooting - except when Axios alerted me the shooter had been found.

My hearts breaks at these killings.

[sop]

7. The GOP and NRA have created wholesale carnage just so a few guys can enjoy their hobby.

[HuskyOffset]

34. I think you have that slightly wrong

I don't think the NRA gives a crap any longer about what their basic members want. The NRA serves gun manufacturers. All of this carnage, death, and destroyed lives are so that a few people can make a lot of money selling guns.

[grantcart]

8. With 400 million guns now in people's hands the answer, sadly, ifs never.

We are past any tipping point.

Only thing that is possible is to focus on assault weapons.

[AndyS]

10. I refuse to accept that.

400 million guns didn't magically appear overnight. Nor will they disappear.

It began with a step 10 years ago in a place called Sandy Hook. It gathered strength in a shopping center parking lot in Nevada. It got a boost from Michael Bloomberg when he put half a billion $$ into effort.

Ten years ago having gun control on your campaign literature was a sure way to lose, now NOT having it is a sure way to lose.

Every journey begins with a single step and that step was taken a decade ago.

Join me and stop wringing your hands over the gunner talk of it will never happen.

[grantcart]

16. 40 years ago I was offered chairmanship of a statewide campaign

to eliminate "Saturday night specials". I declined because it was over reaching. It failed in a landslide and set back reasonable laws 10 years in that state.

So you have worked on this for 10 years. Congratulations. Take it from those that have 40 years of experience that emotional over reaching efforts getting rid of all the "fucking guns" not only fails but actually helps the other side.

Nothing was as harmful as Beto O'Rourke (who I love)yelled "Yes we are going to take your assault guns away".

We are not going to get rid of 400 million guns. Concentrating on reasonable goals like restricting purchase of assault weapons, 100% background checks, eliminate high volume clips.

If you think that being against gun control is now adverse to election victory then obviously you live in a blue bubble. In AZ we have two Democratic Senators both of whom ran as proud gun owners.

I asked a pastor of a left wing liberal church what he thought about guns and he said that their church had a gun club and had joint skeet shooting and other experiences.

The ship for significantly reducing the number of guns has sailed. We have more guns than people. It would be easier to eliminate the NFL. The only option is to restrict the extreme lethality of the guns that are available.

I have lived in countries that have no civilian gun ownership. In a few years I will pack up my bags and retire to a country that doesn't have 400 million guns and that will be one of the reasons but I know that owning a gun is as American as baseball.

[AndyS]

17. I have been at this as long as you, at least 40 years.

The ten years I speak of was the tipping point everyone thinks is coming. That point isn't before us, it's in the past.

We will get rid of 400 million guns. It will take as long to cut that number as it took to build it.

I'm fucking sick of hearing 'we can't do anything about (what ever the shit we're talking about). Tell that to Moms Against Drunk Driving.

I live in Texas.

[live love laugh]

19. 💙💙💙💙💙💙

[grantcart]

26. Well then you haven't learned the first lesson of advancing policy

It doesn't have anything to do with what you are tired of and sick of.

It is not going to be achieved by winning 50% +1 of the vote (because obviously anything won by a narrow vote can be undone by a narrow vote).

The only way forward is to build a consensus with the 65% reasonable part of the country. Right before the pandemic I attended a conference in San Antonio with some professional colleagues which included a partner in the company that was an up line manager (we are all independent).

They are all Republicans and they know I am a Democrat but they also know I am better informed than they are. They also know that I don't patronize or disrespect them.

One of the partners (who at the time was starting to have dementia and now passed away) had sent a racist ant Obama email to everyone after he was elected and I called the other partner and he was taken off the email chain. In the elevator (now several years later) the remaining partner told me that he was 100% wrong about Obama, the ACA was good and he apologized for having said unkind things about him that Obama was a true gentleman even if he was unlikely to vote for him

A couple of hours later there were 8 of us and they started talking about the El Paso shooting. Everyone agreed something had to be done. These were all gun owners and several were very active hunters. They even had an annual hunt in Mexico (with their own guns, which should not be possible)

Anyway I was surprised that everyone agreed that there

1) too many guns
2) too many people who should not have guns have them get them
3): civilians should not be able to own military quality weapons
4) shouldn't have clips with excessive ammunition

Three of them had resigned from the NRA

Why didn't anything get done? Their opinion
Republicans refused any compromise and Democrats wanted to take their guns away.

In Arizona Democrats have embraced responsible gun ownership and we have 2 Democratic Senators, Democratic mayor's of Phoenix and Tucson, Democratic Governor, Secretary of State Attorney General with only 32% of the population Democratic.

You can engage in self gratification or work on generating a working consensus. I don't like guns, my wife is the widow of some one killed by gun violence. There are people on the other side that want some level of change. Unless we build a working consensus with them nothing will be passed.

[AndyS]

28. Good on you for all that. Where did it get you? I ask because you tell me

that what I am doing isn't working. What you've done is? I just don't see it.

You tell me that I haven't learned the first lesson of policy. You apparently haven't learned that times are changing and gun policy is now on the minds of just about everybody. It's mainstream. Right up there with the economy. All this has happened in the last few years, built on the preceding ten years.

My intent is to put gun policy at the fore in every way I can. I'm glad Beto said what he did. Start there and negotiate to your 'reasonable' ideas. We get blamed for wanting to 'take away the guns' anyway so just go with it.

It isn't the people on either side. It's the gun lobby. It's the money guys. We are finally getting to the point that our money matches their money. It takes donors to our gunsense candidates AND to our lobby.

That's where people like me come in. Rabble rousers who keep the topic top of mind.

The way you've gone about it while laudable is just ineffectual.

[Mr.Mystery]

24. I agree. This was a handgun shooting, not an assault weapon.

The best we can do is eliminate the weapons of mass destruction at this point.

[Pepsidog]

9. SCOTUS made carrying guns a whole lot easier. NJ used to issue about 2,000 carry permits a year. Now

after USSC ruled states can't make overly restrictive carry laws, tens of thousands of people have applied for a carry permit. If Dems ever get in a position of power they must reform SCOTUS who has tossed this country into chaos with its radical departure from precedent. SCOTUS is the most illegitimate part of our government and we cannot continue to allow these hateful, Christian Nazis to continue to impose their twisted and hateful views on American society.

[AndyS]

11. It WILL happen and this court has set the precedent

of overturning precedent.

Come senators, congressmen, please heed the call
Don't stand in the doorway, don't block up the hall
For he that gets hurt will be he who has stalled
The battle outside ragin'
Will soon shake your windows and rattle your walls
For the times, they are a-changin'

[FeelingBlue]

15. THANK YOU FOR THE REMINDER OF THIS SONG!! NT

[Pepsidog]

18. Right on!

[Mr.Mystery]

25. Dylan wrote this in 1964.

Last edited Mon Nov 14, 2022, 05:42 PM - Edit history (1)

I dunno. Things have changed -- Obama was a two term President and that would have never happened in the 60's.

On the other hand, we got Reagan and Papa Doc and Baby Doc Bush, so it's a mixed bag . . .

[AndyS]

29. It ended a war. That's what the song was about. Another day,

another cause . . .

[Mr.Mystery]

31. Well, that's rather a speculative interpretation

It was written in Oct 1963 before JFK was shot and when we had fewer than 20 thousand troops in Vietnam. No draft, no counter-culture anti war protest then.

It’s a great song, don’t get me wrong. I’ve performed it myself many times over the years. It may have inspired activism, and that’s good. But one can’t deny that one of the things “that were a-changing” turned out to be a right-wing backlash that led directly to Reagan.

I don’t think Dylan was singing about that.

[AndyS]

32. Welcome to DU.

Thanks for the history lesson. The song was very popular between 1969 and 1971, the years I was in the Army and the beginning of the wind down of Vietnam.

It is a great activist song and it worked well for that period and can fit any other era of change and upheaval.

I think it fits now as well as any other time for both the gun violence movement and Trumpism.

[3auld6phart]

23. Six

Of those sunsabitches should be on a charge.Aiding murder. The Gutless deckers. Robert’s toads.

[world wide wally]

12. Seems the Christo-fascist philosophy is that God will only "protect" us through our AR-15s

[Kennah]

13. Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius.

[vlyons]

14. 3 fine young men

and for what? So gun manufacturers can make money -- even more money.

How many millions, billions does it take to be happy? Their greed is infinite.

[Skittles]

27. so handsome, so young

[NullTuples]

20. Youngkin is not handling it well, either.

Link to tweet

[AndyS]

22. So? I'll take every little bit I can get.

It is a gunner 'debate' tactic to say that this piece of the death and maiming is too small to make a difference and then that piece over there is too small to make a difference.

Go talk to the starfish on the beach . . .

[electric_blue68]

30. 🕯️🕯️🕯️ Such young bright faces : ( Stregnth to their families,...

,friends, fellow students.

[The Jungle 1]

33. My community has a section of our park honoring children who have passed.

Not violent death just children passing to soon. The families keep it in perfect condition.
There are flowers, benches, statues of children at play and plaques. It is a very healing place. I always stop.
I will never understand how anyone recovers from losing a child.

[Danmel]

35. Can you imagine?

You send your beautiful sons to an outstanding university, their whole lives ahead of them and then this? You invest your love, your hopes, your values. You work.to care for them, nurture them and then this?
To lose them for what?
My heart aches for these young men and their families, friends.
Our country is still broken.

[3auld6phart]

36. When

They get rid Robert’s and his 5 black robed toads