The NRA and Dallas

[Stephen Fox]

What happened in Dallas last night was a tragedy in a city that was doing better in the face of the legacy of WA Criswell and the current buffoon Jeffress. It was the worst possible nightmare--headline at the Atlantic--at most politically Incendiary moment, NPR

Ive made comments this morning on the facebook wall of George Mason and New Baptist Covenant and their attempts to shine the Light in all this darkness.

I think the focus should be on the mendacious, nefarious, insidious politics of the NRA.

I hope any Christian who sees this post will read the following review carefully, even prayerfully.

Time to confront evil smartly like Bonhoeffer and King.

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/02 ... ard-right/

[Stephen Fox]

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/07 ... -our-guns/

Though the one on the GOP in first post is significant as well.

[John Sneed]

The NRA had nothing to do with the Dallas shooting.

[Sandy]

[David Flick]

[Sandy]

I consider the NRA responsible for the proliferation of guns and the ease of their availability. Their relentless pressure on lawmakers and courts has led to an abrogation of the second amendment in a way that was never intended, and thwarts any possibility of resolving the problems that are brought about by the combination of the ease of availability of high powered, military-style assault weapons and all kinds of firepower, and the violent nature of our society.

The shooter in Dallas was able to obtain a high powered, automatic weapon because of the NRA's lobbying efforts, and when he pulled the trigger, so did they.

[William Thornton]

[Lou]

[Sandy]

We've been over this several times. The arguments Lou uses are the same old, same old that always comes after a shooting. Semantics over "military" or "high powered" is obfuscating the issue. Ask any gun owning advocate who has a half dozen weapons, and they will tell you that any gun dealer, or any gun show operator will provide easy instructions on modifying semi-automatic weapons. Call it whatever you want, the only intentional use of a semi-automatic assault rifle is assault, not hunting rabbits or squirrels.

We keep hearing the argument that stricter laws and enforcement won't resolve the problem, yet our numbers of mass shootings and statistics on gun violence, robbery, and other crime committed by both legal and illegally owned weapons is much greater than anyone else, including countries where the right to bear arms is part of their constitutional system. The Swiss own more guns per capita than Americans do, yet the amount of gun violence in their country is negligible. What's the difference? They've figured it out, and so have a lot of Americans. The NRA hasn't. You can pull up any number of news items on any one of a dozen recent mass shootings, and easily uncover information which points to the stone wall that the NRA has pushed and bribed Congress into erecting on this issue, including the little games they played with amendments to recent bills that have been proposed. The NRA is behind all of it. So they need to own this shooting, too.

[Lou]

[ET]

[Sandy]

[Sandy]

[Lou]

[Sandy]

Typical diversionary tactic, avoid the direct subject. It doesn't matter if someone can use an AR-15 to pick their teeth or hunt cock roaches, the problem is that it is an easily obtained semi automatic weapon that is easily modified by kits that are sold in gun shops to be automatic, and the ease of its availability has created a problem in this country. But you'll never catch the NRA with facts, just diversions and excuses as to why restricting a terrorist from getting his hands on one is somehow a violation of their second amendment rights.

[Lou]

No attempt at diversion at all, bro. I was just taking your words to their own (il)logical conclusion. Once again, words mean things; and if you didn't mean what you said, you should've said what you meant.

Sandy, you keep on saying that it's possible for a person to go into any gun shop and easily buy a conversion kit to modify a semi-automatic rifle to full automatic. Until this morning I honestly did not know if your assertion was correct, or if it was just something you pulled out of thin air; so I decided to find out. On my way to McDonald's this morning for my Egg McMuffin, I drove past the local gun shop where I purchased my own pistol, and stopped in to ask one of the owners if what you said is true. When I asked him, he laughed. Literally. (There were also some eye-rolls involved.) He said that it's just as illegal to modify a firearm to full auto as it is to buy or sell an automatic weapon, and that no licensed gun dealer can or will sell any sort of hardware to facilitate that process. Sandy, if you have to resort to making stuff up to bolster your argument, that means that your argument is unsustainable by real facts.

I will also say that this lively conversation we've had over the past couple of days has had an unintended consequence. Specifically, it has underscored for me the fact that there are people who want to determine gun policy who (1) are abysmally ignorant of firearms and how they work, and also of current gun laws, and (2) have shown themselves willing to use distortion, half-truth, and outright falsehood in order to restrict gun ownership. And as a gun-owner myself, that is something I cannot abide, and also the kind of thing that the NRA tries to prevent from happening. So although I have not been an NRA member, this morning I went to their website and joined up. (Only a one-year membership though, at least for the time being--but even at that membership level I get a nifty duffel bag out of the deal, so that's kinda cool.) So thank you, Sandy, for helping me see the light.

[Dave Roberts]

[Lou]

[Ed Pettibone]

[Lou]

[ET]

[ET]

[Lou]

ET, I confess that up to now I'd never even heard of bump firing, and had to google the term. From the Wikipedia article it seems like it's the least-accurate (and therefore least-effective) of all possible ways to shoot a rifle (with the possible exception of shooting blindfolded while pulling the trigger with your toes). Thanks also for the education on the so-called "ease and simplicity" of modifying a rifle to full auto.

[Stephen Fox]

Here are my thoughts shared widely today on how this may effect SEC Football.

And for all of you who may need to know more than you think you know I highly recommend the drshow.org conversation this morning that included Harkins as I say in my blog. I hope to see Harkins at the Carter Atlanta convo with the Covenant. Will be grand opportunity missed if he's not there.

Presheate Sandy for having some sense on this one.

Hope all read the nybooks.com piece and my blog

http://foxofbama.blogspot.com/2016/07/n ... atter.html

[Sandy]

Most of this rhetoric is irrelevant to the subject of the discussion, and is the usual course of any conversation which involves doing anything about the problem of proliferation of guns and the mass shootings which happen in this country, and which are preventable.

It is a fact that most semi-automatic weapons can be modified to be automatic, and most gun shop owners or gun shows can provide that information and order the supplies to do it. It's not legal, but because those who can get the parts are not held accountable, it is unenforceable. Most gun laws are not enforced, because sellers and owners are not held accountable. That's the bottom line. But we also have a very distorted, and skewed view of this particular second amendment right. There's all this screeching and screaming and lip flapping over how this reason or that reason why laws won't stop shootings, and how legitimate gun owners are being denied their rights, boo hoo. But Hillary Clinton gets cleared in a thorough and complete investigation by the FBI (constitutional right of innocent until proven guilty, and there's absolutely no proof of guilt) and the nitpicking over that won't cease. Let's pick the gun lobby and the second amendment to shreds like she's getting done to her, and then we can talk. Otherwise, the boo hooing over the second amendment is blatant hypocrisy.