Weekend Open Thread

"Mercy Now" - Mary Gauthier

"We hang in the balance, dangle between hell and hallowed ground."

I was going to entitle this post "All Hail American Exceptionalism" but then felt bad about it -- and then discovered James Fallows had gone there.  I never feel adequate to these kinds of occasions.  Like l-t c, I feel a sense of overwhelming disgust that the society in which we live is one that has decided that these kinds of massacres must be tolerated.  I don't care what the gun nuts say -- that is precisely the blood-soaked calculus in which they and their political enablers engage.  

It does not have to be that way.  No other industrialized country tolerates or endures this sort of thing.  I would be supportive of a Japanese style prohibitionist approach to gun ownership, but that ship sailed so long ago, to speak of it is an utter pipe dream.  It seems to me that we could at least ban high capacity clips, assault weapons, and the ability to avoid background checks via the gun show loophole.  Whether any of these changes would make a difference remains to be seen.

(Opposed as I am to gun violence, I would love to take a baseball bat to Mike Huckabee's knees.  What an imbecilic sonofabitch.)

What say you?  

Comments

[Prup (aka Jim Benton)]

Didn't read Huckabee, but it couldn't have been worse than Brian Fischer's stomach-turner. And I'm waiting for Wayne LaPierre to call for the arming of five year olds.

Then there's Michigan.

Anyone want to try writing a 'clarifying amendment' to the Second Amendment. It won't pass today, but at the rate these are happening, sadly, give it a month...

[Prup (aka Jim Benton)]

Read Huckabee. Fischer says the same, but in a more offensive manner.

[nancy]

Not a violent person, but I will gladly help with the baseball bat to Huckabee's knees. Dear lord, what is the matter with such people? Are there no tears? No decency? No kindness?

[kathy a.]

here is something for the NRA: the guns were legally owned by the shooter's mother. having the guns did not protect her (or all those others) in the least.

i saw a report that she trained her boys, took them to the shooting range. one of the horrible facts about this shooting is that only one of the people shot survived. one injury; 28 deaths.

[low-tech cyclist]

Huckabee, from SC's link:

"We ask why there is violence in our schools, but we have systematically removed God from our schools," Huckabee said on Fox News. "Should we be so surprised that schools would become a place of carnage?"

This line of reasoning isn't new for Huckabee.

Speaking about a mass shooting in Aurora, Colo. over the summer, the former GOP presidential candidate claimed that such violent episodes were a function of a nation suffering from the removal of religion from the public sphere.

"We don't have a crime problem, a gun problem or even a violence problem. What we have is a sin problem," Huckabee said on Fox News. "And since we've ordered God out of our schools, and communities, the military and public conversations, you know we really shouldn't act so surprised ... when all hell breaks loose."

If I were talking with Huckabee, I'd show him the graphs at #5 and #6 of Ezra's 12 facts about guns and mass shootings, and point out to him that the U.S. must therefore be the most sinful nation of the developed world, and the South, by the same token, must be the most sinful region of the United States, while the Northeast must be the least sinful region.

Because it would be fun to see his head explode.

[kathy a.]

the huck is impervious to your heathen facts.

[kathy a.]

so are any assholes who quote william burroughs about “they always want to take the guns away from the people who didn’t do it.” this would be the author who shot his wife through the head while performing a "william tell" trick after imbibing a few.

and also from LGM, a righteous rant about the fucking NRA, and other crap crawling around the woodwork.

i'm aware of an unhealthy pre-occupation with this; but i cannot bear to just resign myself to "the routine" of believing nothing will change. the NRA needs to be beaten into the "gun safety" organization it sometimes says it is. politicians need to get their fucking acts together, get off the trough, and protect us. NOW. last week would have been better, but NOW.

in my opinion, they can all start by sitting down and personally reviewing every single crime scene and autopsy photo from this shooting, in the presence of responders who had to deal with the carnage. that oughta put them off their feed. then they can explain why these children and their teachers are less important than selling and owning these kinds of weapons.

[Crissa]

We can also require trigger-locks, gun safes, trigger-locking mechanisms on new weapons sold, etc.

[kathy a.]

how japan has virtually eliminated gun deaths. my friend points out that suicide is the leading cause of death in men 20-44 in Japan, but without access to guns they can't take others with them when they decide to go.

[nancy]

Garry Wills: Our Moloch . From the NYRB blog [which is not paywalled].

kathy, Glenn Reynolds has been an undaunted fool forever. He ought to be re-thinking that *insta* part.

[Linkmeister]

nancy, you beat me to Wills. That's a powerful powerful essay.

On Reynolds, as much as he professes to hate government, it doesn't seem to bother him to be cashing paychecks from a university funded by same.

[low-tech cyclist]

Gail Collins nails it:

when a gunman takes out kindergartners in a bucolic Connecticut suburb, three days after a gunman shot up a mall in Oregon, in the same year as fatal mass shootings in Minneapolis, in Tulsa, in a Sikh temple in Wisconsin, in a theater in Colorado, a coffee bar in Seattle and a college in California — then we’re doing this to ourselves.

And:

“We need to look at what drives a crazy person to do these kind of actions,” said Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington, one of the highest-ranking Republicans in the House.

Every country has a sizable contingent of mentally ill citizens. We’re the one that gives them the technological power to play god.

[Mandos]

Here's some morbid amusement for y'all, as if you needed any.

[kathy a.]

thanks for the collins link, lt-c. and nancy -- wow.

the fucking westboro nutjobs plan to picket the funerals of these children and their teachers, which just makes it all perfect hell on earth. i hope that normal (unarmed) people form a human shield against the hate.

[nancy]

Mandos, Ugh. Looks like a poor exercise that should have been filed in the "think about this more before sending" file. I sometimes read Volokh or The American Conservative to see what the more respectable other side is thinking. So much for VC. He can now usefully be referenced by the intransigent and foolish arsenals-forever people. We should brace for the legislative wave of bills mandating *patriotic* weapons training classes, for teachers and students alike, that are surely to be introduced soon in red states near you.

From the New Yorker blog -- a perspective I'd not thought about: "China Watches Newtown: Guns and American Credibility" .

[Sir Charles]

Mandos,

Thanks for the wanker link -- do any of these assholes know what it takes to stand in the fire and shoot a heavily armed assailant without harming other people? Do they have any sense of how difficult it is for someone trained in this sort of thing to do it, not to mention some amateur caught by total surprise and needing to retrieve a firearm that is not on their person?

I shake my head really.

kathy,

I agree -- someone needs to keep these Westboro clowns as far away from these funerals as humanly possible.

[beckya57]

Something here is really bothering me. I've seen a lot of condemnation of the NRA the last few days, and they certainly deserve every word of it. What I am not seeing is any realization that a huge part of our inability to get any gun control enacted is because gun manufacturers make a lot of money and thus have a lot of power. The NRA is the public face of the resistance to gun laws, but I don't see how they alone can explain the unwillingness of Congress to even consider an assault weapons ban. We ought to be looking at who's making the money, and push these people out of the shadows in which they're operating so that the country starts to understand that we're sacrificing children so that a few corporations can make massive profits.

[low-tech cyclist]

What I am not seeing is any realization that a huge part of our inability to get any gun control enacted is because gun manufacturers make a lot of money and thus have a lot of power.

becky - I've heard this said a lot of times over the decades, but I've never seen it backed by statistics - either of the profits of gun manufacturing for sale to private individuals (as opposed to sale to military, police, etc.), or of money flowing from the manufacturers to Congress or the NRA. I'm not saying it isn't so, just that it needs substantiation before I'm ready to take it seriously.

OTOH, there's a LOT of gun nuts out there. Their combination of numbers and passion, and eagerness to deluge their Congresscritters whenever the NRA raises the alarm, strike me as sufficient to explain why nobody dares cross the NRA.

[kathy a.]

YES, becky. i think that is buried in one of the many comments and links, but i can't remember exactly where. oh, right: nancy brought up alec, and all the big money thereabouts and with NRA.

[beckya57]

Wish I could give some stats, ltc, but I know I've seen stuff about this. Looks like nancy had some info. You're right about the gun nuts of course, but I think money is a big factor as well.

[nancy]

becky - The election of 1994 with the replacement of Speaker Tom Foley after 30-some years in Congress, solely due to the assault weapons ban, cast a long shadow for politicians. It's obviously past time for us and them to confront and challenge that pre-sumption and its trajectory. Twenty years of exponential weapons accumulation since then is more than with us, undeniably. Yes, it's big big money, but also electoral fear. We all must step up again and again, as long as it takes.

Interestingly, disgusting person and famous Romney endorser, Ted Nugent, has a twitterfeed that has been silent since Friday, and he of course never puts a sock in it. Proud NRA boardmember is he. And it, also too, has been so proud to have him speak coarsely for them. NRA is in radio silence as well.

[paula]

Connecticut River Valley, which runs through VT, NH, MA and CT, has long been a hub for weapons manufacture. Here are a few lists: http://bit.ly/TpDn43
http://bit.ly/TpDE79
Think Springfield rifle, Colt, Enfield, Winchester.
Most of those companies are gone, but have been replaced.
You could say Newtown is on the western edge of that region.

If those disgusting people from Westboro picket the funerals, I may go down there to join the human shield, if I can stand being that close to those animals.

[Ken T]

Thanks for the Mary Gauthier clip. Very appropriate, from a wonderful performer who deserves to be much better known.

I can only hope that, with each time Huckabee opens his mouth like this, more people will realize that under the surface, he is really no different than the Westboro slime.

[oddjob]

Apparently Ms. Lanza was herself a paranoid gun nut.

[Bill H]

Becky, you make a point that should get more conversation than it does. We condemn the corporations and lobbyists who provide the bribes, but we keep reelecting the legislators who accept the bribes. I have long argued that accepting the bribe is the greater crime, because those legislators are not only guilty of bribery, they are betraying a trust. We elect them to represent us and they betray us, representing their own interests instead of ours. And instead of blaming them and throwing them out, we reelect them and blame the ones who provide the money.

[kathy a.]

plenty of blame to go around, bill -- you've got a good point about the politicians who've taken the largesse.

i think it is worth remembering, though, that there is big money and a huge lobbying effort involved. that manufacturing and sales of firearms are lucrative businesses, and sales go up when people are persuaded they need more weapons, bigger weapons, more potent weapons. fear is the magic sauce; and it is served with a side of faux constitutionality.

here is a piece on how australia ended mass shootings.

[oddjob]

Thanks for that link, kathy a.

[kathy a.]

a conservative pro-gun democrat says, the newtown massacre "has changed everything", that policy changes must be made, that hunters do not need semi-autos or 30-round clips. i'm taking that as a hopeful sign.

[Eric Wilde]

My parents had guns when I was a child. They were family heirlooms and kept unloaded in an (unlocked) gun cabinet. They have since changed their opinion about owning guns and ditched the lot of them.

The turning point was during my 12th year of life. I was a troubled child and had anger management problems. One day I took up a pistol, loaded it and pointed it at my brother. He had the good sense to vanish. My parents had the good sense to get rid of all the guns.

Would that the owner of these guns used in Connecticut had good sense and gotten rid of her guns.

[paula]

worth reading:
http://huff.to/UMql0h

[kathy a.]

paula -- moving. raw. honest.

[paula]

See this an ad for the shooter's weapon, reportedly one of the most popular guns bought today in the US:
http://bit.ly/UMxKN1

Are we ready to consider the possibility that this socially acceptable but contorted search for male identity might be a mental health problem? The man card seems to show up in the hands of people in all income and education levels, regions, ages and even gender. We may laugh over the contrast of sensitive male v. Rambo, but the laughter stops short when we hear the names of the dead read at a vigil. Is this what it takes to be a man or strong woman today? That's the picture we paint in entertainment media, isn't it?

[Lex]

I read what Huckabee said, and I thought to myself:

Let us suppose that a nut with an assault weapon and a ton of ammo went into a fundamentalist church and killed a couple of dozen people before killing himself. And let us further suppose that a Rachel Maddow or Keith Olbermann had gone on the air and claimed that the slaughter would not have happened had the church members not been so bigoted.

Now, keeping in mind that even Rupert Murdoch himself has tweeted that the U.S. needs Oz-style gun control (enacted after a mass killing there in '96, since which Australia has had no more mass killings), one must ask:

Why does Mike Huckabee still have a fucking job?

[oddjob]

"...The demographic shifts that Obama and the Democratic Party appear to be profiting from may also mean Dems no longer need to tip-toe around the “God, guns, and gays” cultural issues (with God excepted, of course) that inflame the voters they are less and less reliant upon."
- Greg Sargent, making the case that the Americans most opposed to gun control legislation are also those who won't vote for Dems. anyway, and whom demographics are turning into a future political minority as well

[oddjob]

Is this what it takes to be a man or strong woman today? That's the picture we paint in entertainment media, isn't it?

As Gary Wills put it: our Moloch.

[paula]

I was just told that there's some question over the veracity of Liza Long's viral post about raising a mentally ill son. Stay tuned.
Whatever the outcome, the issue still stands. We need to do a better job raising our children and to do that, we need more access to high quality mental health and education services, not less. No more cuts to the parenting infrastructure. As Obama said yesterday, not many aspects of life are more basic than the years and the energy an adult spends raising a child. Our children--ALL children--deserve the best of what we've got, yet they have been short-changed by government cuts since Nixon's first term.

[oddjob]

It's being reported that senator and war hero Daniel Inouye (D-HI) has died.

[oddjob]

His office has confirmed it.

[low-tech cyclist]

John Cole and Imani Gandy have already said plenty about this over at Balloon Juice, but McMegan easily outdoes Huckabee and Bryan Fischer.

Her solution? Teach kids to rush the shooter, all at once.

I thought they had to be kidding until I read McMegan for myself. That really is her proposal.

That is so deeply wrong in so many different ways, I can barely get my head around it.

What a waste of oxygen.

[nancy]

l-tc, I'm not sure she outdoes Huckabee and Fischer, but she certainly shuffles the crazy-deck. One hopes that the woman declines to become a parent. Evidently she hasn't spent much time around children. They tend to be somewhat small. And sweet. Generally.

Megan loves her abstractions.

[paula]

A tweet too good to not share:
‏@LOLGOP
Amazing how the people who freak out about losing control of their phallic symbols want to put the government in charge of all vaginas.

[nancy]

No peep from the right about public employee unions in the wake -- teachers, police, first responders. Crickets.

Also, the memorial service was hardly godless secularism. Quieter crickets.

[Crissa]

I dunno paula. I don't think that's at all informative. If a mother wanted to hospitalize her minor son, she can. She escalates nearly as fast as he does, in her stories. She tries to impose her will upon him whenever they clash (according to her stories).

Not at all useful.

Even if all the murders in the country were cause by mental illness, they'd still be but 1% of those suffering from some sort of mental illness.

[paula]

Not sure I follow you, Crissa, but you might have missed my comment about Liza Long's blog post about her son. Did you see her blog? I understand there's much more to her story than what she reveals in I Am Adam Lanza's Mother.
We're on the same page, though, about the number of people with mental illness. Obviously, most aren't violent. I still believe we need many more dollars poured into mental health services, parent support and training programs, residential treatment centers and the like. Instead, those are always the first programs to go when money is tight.

[jeanne marie]

Sorry I haven't been participating in this important conversation, I've been busy over at Facebook. Here are a couple of important links:

I am Adam Lanza's Psychiatrist - another mental health perspective and a list of things that would make it easier to catch problems before they erupt

[jeanne marie]

Debunking the Gun Fetishist Propaganda - a list by Bob Cesca

[beckya57]

This is late, but just wanted to mention that the NYT has a series of editorials up about the gun issue, and they include the point I was trying to make about the ties between the NRA and its lobbyists and the gun industry. The latter gives generously to the NRA, which pushes to weaken laws, while the industry makes millions by continuing to sell more and more guns. We need for the public to begin to understand that people are getting rich by putting children at risk of an early, violent death.

[nancy]

becky, Jim Wright at Stone Kettle Station is the writer I'd demand that our NRA members, their lobbyists and pols, be required to read and discuss. The subject and his series of posts, Bang Bang Crazy, deserves their immediate attention. I'd challenge any of them to read his bio and then his assessments and come up with any reasonable counter-argument. Can't be done, Justice Scalia to the contrary. [Apparently he still sleeps at night, somehow, incredibly.]