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| The site of horror in Aurora, Colorado |
In 2006, firearms were used to murder 27 people in Australia, 190 people in Canada, 59 people in England and Wales, 18 people in Austria, and 10,177 in America.
~ States United to Prevent Gun Violence
There are over 30,000 gun deaths in America each year, nearly 12,000 of which are homicides.
~ Mayors Against Illegal Guns
Wayne LaPierre can kiss my fat ass.
The Executive Vice President of the National Rifle Association is lucky that he’s armed at all times, I’m sure, because if I ran into him in a dark alley and he weren’t able to fill me full of holes in a matter of seconds, his welfare would be in serious jeopardy.
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| Wayne LaPierre |
A depressing but well-written article in The Atlantic entitled “Why the Aurora shootings won’t affect gun laws” points out that if the Trayvon Martin and Gabrielle Giffords shootings didn't lead to policy change, the Colorado tragedy probably won't either. The article quotes Mark Glaze, director of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, who disputes my perception of LaPierre’s employer:
"The political reality is that the NRA is not as powerful as people believe, but there has not been enough grassroots activism and political support for tough gun laws. For members of Congress who have 50 things to care about, a vote for tougher gun laws can get you into trouble without much political reward."
In a land where unjustified war in Iraq is allowed to be waged for more than eight years, The Nuge is thought to be newsworthy, Gilbert Gottfried is thought to be funny and the few who do take to the streets and parks to protest greed and class warfare are ridiculed and marginalized, I’m inclined to think Glaze is right. The American people just don’t object to sh*t enough.
Consider these facts:
- Charles Whitman shot and killed 16 people and wounded 31 others from the clock tower at the University of Texas in Austin on August 1, 1966.
- William Ray Bonner shot and killed seven people and injured nine others in Los Angeles on April 22, 1973.
- John Parish shot and killed six people and wounded four others in Grand Prairie, Texas on August 9, 1982.
- George Banks shot and killed 13, including five of his own children, on September 25, 1982 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.
- Kip Kingle shot and killed two students and wounded 22 others at Thurston High School in Springfield, Oregon on May 20, 1988. He was just 15.
- James Edward Pough shot and killed nine and wounded four others in a car loan office in Jacksonville, Florida on June 18, 1990.
- James Swann shot and killed four and injured five in random drive-by shootings in Washington, D.C. between February 23 and April 19, 1993.
- Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris shot and killed 12 students and a teacher and injured 24 other people at Columbine High School – 20 miles away from Aurora – on April 20, 1999.
- Benjamin Smith shot and killed two and wounded nine during a three-day shooting spree in Illinois and Indiana in early July of 1999.
- Mark Barton shot and killed nine and injured 13 more on July 29, 1999 in Atlanta.
- Jeff Weise shot and killed nine and wounded five others on March 21, 2005 on the Red Lake Indian Reservation in northwest Minnesota.
- Jennifer San Marco shot and killed seven in Goleta, California on January 30, 2006.
- Charles Roberts IV shot ten little girls between the ages of six and 13 in an Amish one-room schoolhouse in Nickle Mines, Pennsylvania, killing five, on October 2, 2006.
- Seung-Hui Cho shot and killed 32 people and wounded 17 others on the campus of Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia on April 16, 2007.
- Patrick Burris shot and killed five people in Cherokee County, South Carolina in the summer of 2009.
- Jared Lee Loughner shot and killed six people, including nine-year-old Christina-Taylor Green, and injured 14, including Congresswoman Giffords, in Tucson on January 8, 2011.
- James Eagan Holmes shot and killed 12 and injured 59 – including an infant – in a packed movie theatre in Aurora, Colorado late last Thursday.
This long list – which, sadly, is the tip of the iceberg – is courtesy of the NRA (which was founded in November of 1871 to promote marksmanship, not fight responsible gun control). I sure am glad that the knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing, NASCAR-loving, Larry the Cable Guy-worshipping cretins who comprise its current membership care more about protecting the Second Amendment than about protecting mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, grandparents, best friends, coworkers, cousins, teachers, students and other victims of gun violence.
I was listening to the radio last night and caught The Washington Post’s E.J. Dionne and David Brooks from the New York Times discussing gun control and the NRA. Dionne referred to a column he had just written about the gun lobby and the worshipers of weapons. His conclusion: “Awful things happen, we mourn them and then we shrug. And that’s why they keep happening.”
223 West Jackson Blvd., Suite 802
Chicago, IL 60606
914-629-6726
Wayne LaPierre photo by Gabe Skidmore.
Sources: New York Times, Huffington Post, NBC News, The Atlantic, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, Washington Post, States United to Prevent Gun Violence.
No disrespect intended to the families and friends of the victims, but if you really want to honor the dead, say "Amen," get up off your knees, and dedicate your lives to defeating every politician who's in the pocket of the NRA.
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