18 Children Among 26 Dead in Conn Elementary School Shooting

Grady wrote:

plaidvillain wrote: Doesn't Israel require everyone to serve in the military? Another example of a model I don't think we should follow.

I think it's a damn good idea. Many good things can be learned in the military, discipline, responsibility, team work, respect, sacrifice, honor, and not the least proper handling of and respect of weapons.

Personally I don't like the idea. Way too expensive, during the Cold War and the peacetime draft, a big percentage of our budget was spent training people who didn't want to be there. I like the volunteer force.

Back on topic. Keeping guns out of the hands of possible mental patients. I once bought a Marlin lever action from a father who was worried about his bipolar druggie son getting his hands on it. The man was actually selling the heirlooms of his father that day at the gunshop, sad but responsible.

And back to bad reporting, now it looks like the mother didn't work at the school. I hope some of these reporters get their hand slapped.

Soulshiner wrote: Required service ONLY if EVERYONE has to do it, no deferments or ways out for the rich kids.

Ok so it is a really scary thought to consider S***Shiner in required service.

But have to agree that there shouldn't be any way for the able bodied to walk or get a free pass out.

Posted this in another courthouse thread but maybe it belongs here.

akilina wrote:
It is time to have armed security or teachers armed, carrying concealed or open as they do in Israel, in the schools in villages of Ecuador, and in a school district in Texas.

As long as there are crazy people, there need to be people who can defend against them. How many more deaths at schools in the U.S.A. and elsewhere have to happen before we get real?

Does the communication officer or whatever his/her title is at Platte Canyon H.S. carry a weapon while on the premises? Does anyone know?

Keep Calm. Despite stories like this, schools are safer than they have ever been. Your child is much more likely to be run over than shot in a rare tragic massacre like this. (Per NPR this morning.)

It is becoming more common place. How many students will die before it is realized that gun free zones make it easy for the mentally ill's notoriety?

Knowing that teachers are armed and well schooled in the use of firearms and protection of the children will dissuade some. They will have to get their notoriety somewhere else.

Save your "comforting words" for those too stupid enough to be swayed by the reality right in front of them...... Tell the families that have lost their children in schools; movie theaters; shopping malls; churches...

Even Joe Scarborough, (who got the highest rating from the NRA during his four terms in Congress), and still stood for the libertarian view about "movie maker's First Amendment rights, and gun-collector's Second Amendment rights" after Columbine, after Aurora, after Arizona

Scarborough: Newtown Shooting Made 'Ideologies Of My Past' On Guns Irrelevant (VIDEO)

Joe Scarborough said on Monday that the massacre in Newtown had forced him to rethink his "long-held" belief about gun rights.

In a lengthy monologue, Scarborough talked about how shaken up he had been by the killing of 20 children at Sandy Hook Elementary School on Friday. He noted that his children's ages averaged that of some of the murdered victims.

"From this day forward, nothing can ever be the same again," he said. "... Let this be our true landmark ... politicians can no longer be allowed to defend the status quo."

He said that he was a "conservative Republican" who had been solidly aligned with the NRA during his time in Congress, and had previously held libertarian views on the Second Amendment. But he added that Friday "changed everything":

Joe Scarborough wrote: "I knew that day that the ideologies of my past career were no longer relevant to the future that I want, that I demand for my children. Friday changed everything. It must change everything. We all must begin anew and demand that Washington's old way of doing business is no longer acceptable. Entertainment moguls don't have an absolute right to glorify murder while spreading mayhem in young minds across America. And our Bill of Rights does not guarantee gun manufacturers the absolute right to sell military-style, high-caliber, semi-automatic combat assault rifles with high-capacity magazines to whoever the hell they want.

It is time for Congress to put children before deadly dogmas. It's time for politicians to start focusing more on protecting our schoolyards than putting together their next fundraiser. It's time for Washington to stop trying to win endless wars overseas when we're losing the war at home ... For the sake of my four children and yours, I choose life and I choose change."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/1 ... 15100.html

Powerful video. I guess the fact that one of the 6-year-old babies that's being put in the ground today was shot a total of 11 times with the assault weapons has gotten to be too much for him. It's time to drown out the usual crap chorus of "even if you did _______, it would not have stopped this tragedy." It's time to not let perfection be the enemy of the good. It's time to rein in the assault weapons and the high-cap magazines that can so easily fall into the hands of sick, twisted individuals who play too many violent video games, watch too many violent movies, and are so disaffected in their own environments that they are desensitized to killing, and the sociopathic feelings they get from their wacko parents (in this case). Nobody is saying the gun-nuts can't have guns... But it's time to close the faucet on the never-ending glut of military-style semi-automatic weapons and the high-cap magazines that were designed for one thing: killing.

I can already hear the arms manufacturer's and gun-shop owner's lobby screaming at the top of their lungs...not to mention the pre-recorded drivel from the NRA/all-guns-are-sacred wackos... But this time it's crossed the line...Things will never be the same. When you kill 20 6-7 year olds, (in some cases with ELEVEN (11) rounds), don't think for a minute that "the public's short memory" is going to make it go away this time. The public has listened to that crap for too long...and NOW it's getting personal.

And ANOTHER Pro-Gun NRA-approved Senator says "enough is enough":

Joe Manchin Ready For Gun Control Action: 'Everything Should Be On The Table' (VIDEO)

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), one of the strongest backers of the National Rifle Association (NRA) in the Democratic Party, said it is time to sit down and have a "sensible, reasonable" debate about gun control in light of the massacre in Newtown, Conn., and expressed an openness to banning assault weapons.

"It's time to move beyond rhetoric. We need to sit down and have a common-sense discussion and move in a reasonable way. ... Everything has to be on the table," Manchin said in an interview on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" on Monday, adding that he had just come from deer hunting with his family.

Manchin's comments are significant because he has an "A" rating from the NRA for his pro-gun positions, and the organization endorsed him as recently as October 2012.

In Monday's interview, Manchin was critical of assault rifles, saying no hunter needs a weapon like that, although he didn't explicitly say he would back Sen. Dianne Feinstein's (D-Calif.) ban on such weapons, which she has said she will introduce in the new year.

"I don't know anyone who in the hunting or sporting arena that goes out with an assault rifle. I don't know anybody that needs 30 rounds in the clip to go hunting," Manchin said. "I mean, these are things that need to be talked about."

While the NRA has always opposed such a ban in the past, Manchin said he believed the nature of the tragedy in Newtown changed the landscape.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/1 ... 14782.html

Just like the demographics of the electorate changing in the last election and the teabaggers "not 'getting it' ", the landscape just changed on this issue...and the same people still don't get it, and think it will blow over... This time it won't....

Some of the knuckle-draggers are already saying, "Now is not the time to talk about gun-control".... If not now, when? We're all getting really good at "dealing with things and moving on"... The public is fed up with "moving on"...

LadyJazzer wrote: Some of the knuckle-draggers are already saying, "Now is not the time to talk about gun-control".... If not now, when? We're all getting really good at "dealing with things and moving on"... The public is fed up with "moving on"...

First, grieve.

Then discuss new legislation.

Nothing good can come out of a reflex action emotionally charged proposal.

After the recent massacres at shopping malls, Aurora Theatres, Columbine High School, Virginia Tech, ad nauseum, this is hardly a "reflex action." It is a tipping point, and the public is fed up. They've been "grieving" for the last 10-15 years...including a LOT more in the last few months.

The landscape just changed.

Is the public really fed up? A lot of pro-gun Dems and Republicans were re-elected last month and Obama did not run on his desire for a new Assault Weapons Ban. It would have been a good way to attack Mitt, right?

And what is your exact suggestion that you think would eliminate something like this?

Interesting stat: 93% of violent felons and murderers identify themselves as Democrats. Maybe we should make it illegal for card carrying Dems to buy firearms.