Showing posts with label guns. Show all posts
Showing posts with label guns. Show all posts

Friday, September 20, 2013

NO WORDS

Until I see the possibility of the enactment of sensible laws to regulate ownership of guns in the United States, I have no words. I am silenced by the insanity of acceptance of a culture of frequent mass shootings with no will to change.
"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
Surely, when the framers of the Second Amendment to the US Constitution included the words "A well regulated Militia", they did not intend the amendment to give free rein to the carnage we see happening all too frequently today.  Why do we continue to ignore the words "well-regulated" in the amendment?  That is all. 

Tuesday, May 7, 2013

HOME GROWN MILITIA TYPE ARRESTED

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) announced on Monday that it had arrested a Minnesota man for plotting a “localized terror attack.”
....

Several guns and explosive devices were discovered during the search of the residence” on Friday. Buford “Bucky” Rogers, 24, was arrested for unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon. An Associated Press report said that he had previously been convicted for felony burglary in 2011 and a misdemeanor charge of dangerous handling of a weapon in 2009.

The FBI believes that a terror attack was disrupted by law enforcement personnel and that the lives of several local residents were potentially saved,” the FBI said in a statement.
Obviously, Rogers was not a well regulated militia type.  Is it absurd to suggest that militia type individuals and groups known to have large stocks of arms and ammunition should be a tad more closely observed by law enforcement authorities?
H/T to Charles Pierce at Esquire.

Thursday, May 2, 2013

NO. STOP. PLEASE STOP.

As Stephanie Sparks cleaned the kitchen, her 5-year-old son, Kristian, began playing with a rifle he was given last year. She stepped out onto the front porch, poured grease out of a frying pan for the dogs and “heard the gun go off,” a Kentucky coroner said.

Authorities said the boy had fatally shot his 2-year-old sister, Caroline, in the chest.

In rural southern Kentucky, far removed from the national debate over gun control, where some children get their first guns even before they start first grade, the accident stunned the community.

Kristian’s rifle was kept in a corner of the mobile home, and the family didn’t realize a bullet had been left in it, Cumberland County Coroner Gary White said.
I read the tragic story the other day, and I had no words, only a broken heart.
“It’s a normal way of life, and it’s not just rural Kentucky, it’s rural America — hunting and shooting and sport fishing. It starts at an early age,” Cumberland County Judge Executive John Phelps said. “There’s probably not a household in this county that doesn’t have a gun.”
I'll let Charles Pierce speak for me.
Stop.

No.

Also, too: goddammit.

Up with this, I no longer have to put. If your "way of life" involves handing deadly weapons to five-year olds, your way of life is completely screwed up and you should change it immediately because it is stupid and wrong. (And, again, also, too: goddammit, "learning to use and respect a gun" means at least knowing that the fking thing is loaded when it's sitting in the corner of the parlor like it's a damn umbrella stand or something, and we should talk about that part, too.) It is not in any way "normal" to hand a kindergartner a firearm. If a mother from the inner-city of, say, Philadelphia did that, and the kid subsequently shot his sister to death, Fox News never would stop yelling about the crisis in African American communities and the Culture Of Death, and rap music, too. If your culture is telling you that children who have only recently emerged from toddlerhood should have their own guns, then your culture is deadly and dangerous and that should concern you, too. If your culture demands that, in the face of a general national outrage over the killing of other children, your politics work to loosen the gun laws you have, as they apparently did in Kentucky, then your culture is making your politics stupid and wrong and you should change them, too. I do not have to understand these people any more, and it is way too early in the day to be drinking this much.
Also Rmj at Adventus:
This gun fetishization has to stop.  "Thou shalt have no other gods before me" applies to the Second Amendment, too.
When I am too stunned for words, others speak for me.

I have no doubt the family is devastated, and I offer prayers for them.
Grant, O Lord, to all who are bereaved the spirit of faith and courage, that they may have strength to meet the days to come with steadfastness and patience; not sorrowing as those without hope, but in thankful remembrance of your great goodness, and in the joyful expectation of eternal life with those they love. And this we ask in the Name of Jesus Christ our Savior.  Amen.
And for their child.
O God, whose beloved Son took children into his arms and blessed them: Give us grace to entrust this child to your never- failing care and love, and bring us all to your heavenly kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.  Amen.
And I pray that many families will learn from the tragic loss in this one family.

Saturday, March 23, 2013

SECOND AMENDMENT FREEEEDOM!

AK-47
One of the strictest gun crimes on the books in Louisiana was ruled invalid Thursday by a New Orleans criminal court judge in the wake of the state’s powerful new “right to bear arms” provisions.

District Judge Darryl Derbigny ruled that the law prohibiting felons from carrying firearms violates Louisiana new “strict scrutiny” amendment to the state Constitution. The amendment, backed by heavy lobbying by the National Rifle Association, was adopted by a wide margin by voters last year and became effective Jan. 1.

The strict-scrutiny amendment makes gun ownership a fundamental right that can only be regulated by meeting a very narrow set of standards upon review by the state Supreme Court.

The Orleans Parish District Attorney’s Office immediately appealed Derbigny’s ruling, taking the case straight to the high court for a ruling.
Who says felons can't have their guns?  Well, they can here in Louisiana with our new constitutional  amendment requiring "strict scrutiny" for depriving anyone of the right to bear arms. So says the judge in New Orleans, and he may be right, according to the new law.  We'll see what the Louisiana Supreme Court decides.
The case before Derbigny involved a man who was caught with a .40-caliber pistol and AK-47. The man, Glen Draughter, previously had been convicted of a felony burglary charge.
Freeeedom! 

Regarding the push to arm employees in the schools, which we are told will prevent future shootings, I read yesterday that three people were killed at Quantico Marine Corps Base in Virginia.  The base is surely armed, and three people are dead.

May those who died rest in peace and rise in glory.  May God give comfort, consolation, and the peace that passes understanding to all who love them.

May God have mercy on us all.