How can a parent separate the two?
I just want to get these feelings down….so I can remember them in the years to come. So many things fade with time.
What happened at Newtown was once unspeakable. But no more. Little children. That’s what changes the equation. That’s what drives all this soul-searching now. It’s twisted that it takes the riddled bodies of little children to get to where we’re at. Thirty-two grown bodies at Virginia Tech wasn’t enough 5 years ago.
So here we are.
I’ve only known a few politicians personally, and most of them are in jail. I wish I was kidding but I’m not.
The nature of a politician is, once seated, to stay there. Those who do little or nothing always have the least amount of people mad at them. Keeping a low profile is what gets you elected and re-elected. Speaking out on just about anything is going to piss off at least half your constituents. Better to mumble and equivocate and form “committees” to “look into the problem”. Then attend some fund-raisers.
Some issues are hotter than others, obviously. Like guns.
Pro-gun politicians will take NRA dollars and live happily ever after, but they don’t want to stand on the stump waving UZIs and ranting about the 2nd amendment (Well, unless they’re from Texas. But Texans are exempt from much of this conversation). They’d look crazy…like a half-demented Charlton Heston marching into Colorado in the wake of Columbine thundering “from my cold dead hands”…..even though he wasn’t the one who just got a bullet in the head. Anti-gun politicians are terrified that even suggesting an assault rifle might not be a good idea will get them tarred and feathered and accused of pissing all over those poor defenseless (and omnipotent) framers of our sacred constitution. NRA lobbyists will mobilize like killer-bees and suddenly some guy named Billy-Bob has a war-chest of millions of dollars and has announced he’s running for Congress because his opponent hates freedom.
Yes sir. Leave them guns alone. The fiscal cliff. Now there’s something we can all agree on eh?
What are “arms” anyway? If I can legally own a Bushmaster .223, why can’t I own a nuclear weapon? Or a tank? Surely they are “arms” too? If “arms” were meant to mean only guns, why wasn’t it written the “right to bear guns”?
We can agree (I haven’t checked with Texas) that “arms” don’t mean “nuclear weapons”. We agree because it’s so silly and obvious. Obviously the first congress of the United States did not have the foresight to consider the splitting of the atom. Nor, I would argue, did they have the foresight, in their day of muskets and minie balls, to imagine something as lethal as the Bushmaster .223….spraying dozens of high velocity rounds into the tiny bodies of 6 and 7 year olds.
When gun control is suggested, the Deliverance-like squealing commences. “They’re coming to take our guns.” Forgetting for a moment that if your mind wandered in that direction while 20 first-graders were still lying where they were slain, you’ve got some serious dents in your humanity….can anybody name the person who is suggesting a repeal of the 2nd amendment? No, you can’t, so you need to turn off Fox News for a while and join the rest of us.
You want to hunt? Go hunting. They make guns for that. Not the Bushmaster .223, but then that would sorta take the fun out of it wouldn’t it? Can you imagine DeNiro in “The Deer Hunter”…..”one clip….deer has to be taken with one clip….two is pussy”.
Some are suggesting that we need to start arming teachers. I’m a product of catholic schools. What the nuns might have done if they had access to automatic weapons is something I don’t wish to dwell on. A paddle in the office to spank a kid would prompt howls and lawsuits, but now we’ve got an assault rifle over by the pencil sharpener? Genius. This nation already has more than a quarter of a billion guns. To suggest that adding more to the mix would somehow decrease gun violence is like arguing that banning contraceptives would decrease population growth. People who suggest teachers should be armed are the type of people you should avoid at parties.
Oh, and “where was God?” You’ve heard that bit I’m sure. God was pissed that he wasn’t allowed in public schools so, just to be a bitch, he allowed this kid to mow down 26 people. Yea, that sure sounds like the kind of God I’m looking for.
I was always taught God was everywhere. Masturbate under the covers? He sees you. To hell you go. But he can’t get through the security system of an elementary school? Or, even worse, he’s so churlish that he chooses not to because the kids are learning science and math and not Adam and Eve? This is the type of argument that loonies make. This is the type of argument that should prompt an immediate background check.
Of course, if you’re one of the 40% of Americans who buy their guns legally at gun shows, a background check is not required. This is not a loophole in gun laws folks. This is political insanity. This is what makes other nations look at us, scratch their collective heads, and say, “wow……those people really are insane.”
On Sunday night my daughter said to me, “Daddy, I’m afraid to go to school tomorrow.”
I didn’t know what to say to her. I was afraid for her to go to school too.
This is what we’ve become. Twenty dead children. Each decimated by multiple high velocity bullets at close range.
The NRA has made no statement, not even the “we’re sorry kids are dead” variety. They’ve taken their facebook page down. Meet the Press invited all 31 pro-gun US Senators to appear on its show Sunday morning. All declined.
Why?
I keep seeing the faces of these kids when I close my eyes. And next to theirs I see the faces of my own children. How can a parent separate the two?
Guns don’t kill people. People kill people.
Well….maybe that’s true.
But in Newtown it was a person with guns. Purchased legally. In a civilized nation. The kind of guns that are made for killing. The kind of guns that turned a first grade classroom into something that looked very much like a war.
If these guns weren’t available, how many of these children would still be alive this Christmas?
Can you answer that for me?
–Tom Flannery
Riding Both Rails 