Tom Toles for December 23, 2012

NRAs DOAs

Don’t you get it? The only solution to gun violence is more guns. Every single person should be packing heat every waking hour and be ready to shoot at a moment’s notice.

If the Founding Fathers didn’t want us all to have large clip automatic assault rifles, they wouldn’t have written the Second Amendment.

Unfortunately many people would still not understand the above comments as sarcasm.

“Well regulated.”Well regulated militia, to be precise.

Did anyone catch Wayne LaPierre’s speech in response to the Newtown Massacre. In short, he blew it. He came across as petty, angry, mean-spiriied, self righteous.and worst of all, self-pitying. Not one word of genuine sympathy for the parents or victims but lots whining about how ’everybody is picking on the NRA.

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That kind of sermon may go down well in the choir loft, but it’s not going to fly with the general public. The residents of Newtown were NOT happy with it, according to what I’ve been reading..

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And the worst thing is, LaPierre is capable of better than that. I heard him being interviewed on NPR once, and that time he showed himself to be capable of a very intelligent and reasoned argument. When asked whter violent movies hould be banned, he said, in effect that you can’t support the 2nd Amendment and ignore the 1st Amendment.

Where was that guy this time?

Best suggestion I’ve heard was for liberals to join the NRA en masse, fire Wayne LaP and hire somebody who would steer the organization back into the territory of responsible gun ownership and kick the armament manufacturers out of the temple.

The USA is quickly losing perspective on what is reasonable. It is unreasonable that we would tolerate this many gun related deaths just so the gun industrycan make money. Are excessive profits for the gun industry really worth dead children?

I appreciate the sentiment behind this strip, but as a cartoon it doesn’t work. The eye is immediately drawn to the strange pink “shadow” which frames the spent shells, which looks oddly like the monster “Gossamer” from the Bugs Bunny cartoons. E for effort.

Nobody is demanding that the entire nation be stripped of legal guns. The question is, what constitutes a “legal gun”? Is a .50 cal sniper rifle a legal gun? Is a Thompson submachine gun a legal gun? Would a RPG be considered legal “arms” under the Second Amendment? And what on earth are you talking about when you say that without personal guns we would be a nation of defenseless people? Have your heard that we have a National Guard, an Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, Coast Guard? That we have drones, guided missiles, thermonuclear weapons and a defense budget larger than the next 40 nations combined? Yes, I can see that the Russians, fearing my owning a .38 cal handgun, would call off an invasion of the US. Perhaps they fear my pellet gun, too. Only the most paranoid, fearful people thing that we are defenseless unless we pack our personal “heat”.

Like all those “decent citizens” who wear Glock’s on the hips when they go to Wal-Mart or Taco Bell, or carry assault weapons to political rallies and town halls. There are a lot of responsible gun owners who like to hunt, who know how to shoot, and follow the rules. There are also a lot of gun owners who worship the weapon. When they carry that gun into a store, restaurant, church or school, they do not make me feel any safer. I don’t know that they know the rules, or how to shoot, or when. I see people with issues, and personally, I consider anyone who feels the need to carry a gun openly into any of these places to already be borderline personality disorder, and only a slight step away from the person who shot 26 people in Connecticut.

Hey, hey, NRA, how many kids did you kill today?

Paranoid? That’s a sign of mental illness. No guns for you.-Well, I was just repeating the NRA’s mantra. For other examples, see the posts by Ima and skipcarlsen. Both believe the mantra.

“I have no guns. I would fear a nation of defenseless people. It has and keeps us from being invaded”Dang it! somebody should tell our armed forces they aren’t worth a shlt!

Not only is Mr. Ima repeating the lie that “the whole country should be stripped of legal guns”, but he thinks the only reason for gun regulation is this one recent massacre. No wonder he hates the phrase “well-regulated” if he thinks that’s the only reason.

Arm everybody then perhaps eventually be only one person left alive; then the original inhabitants can get their land back.

It’s totally true that guns don’t kill people, or at least rarely- about the only way you can kill someone with a gun is to beat them to death with it.There is no point in outlawing guns. They are out there, there are millions, they are made of metal and will last for a thousand years if they are kept oiled. Failing that, I could find materials in my basement that would produce a workable gun, and it doesn’t take much knowledge of the subject to figure out how to do it.BULLETS, on the other hand, are time consuming to make and require special equipment. Production of enough to do serious damage would require planning and patience that are not characteristic of those who shoot up elementary schools. And, working on such a project might attract the attention of someone sane.Bullets can be individually stamped, and their sale can be registered and entered into a computer base. They can be tracked from production to use, so that every bullet can be traced back to the person who purchased it. This way, a guy who wants to buy a couple boxes of bullets to go shoot deer, or the woman who wants a box to keep with the gun in her bedside drawer, won’t set off any warning bells. But the guy who is buying an arsenal will attract attention before he finds a more lethal way to do it.

I love the idea of collecting assault weapons to protect yourself against that Kenyan communist in the White House on whose “hit list” you are sure you have made the top ten.

It creates the picture in my mind of a redneck in a cabin filled with ammo and assault rifles looking up at an approaching drone.

Go ahead make more gun laws, criminals will ignore the new ones as well as the old ones!

One of these days you should actually talk to some liberals, rightisright. Then you wouldn’t sound so pitifully ignorant.Hey, did the Founding Fathers intend the Second Amendment apply to machine guns? How about shoulder-mounted tactical nukes?

Oh really?

Three words for you harley

1. Terry

2. Schiavo’s

3. Law

The entire power of the Federal Government brought to bear on ONE family…

While conservatives cheered their heads off.

‘Ban’ as in ‘kill’? .

And when tactical nukes are outlawed, only outlaws will have tactical nukes! There will ALWAYS be those who choose to live outside the law. We should not live our lives as prisoners because a few choose that lifestyle, and we CAN NOT protect ourselves from every eventuality.

And you know that HOW?

I’m all for everyone joining the NRA and then voting new leadership who will support sane gun laws.However, Mr. LaPierre says the NRA stands ready to do what is necessary to put qualified armed guards in every school. The average cost of such guards, including yearly updating of training, is 80k per year. Columbine had two guards and that wasn’t enough, so some schools may need 5 to 10 guards, or 400k to 800k.But Mr. LaPierre is COMMITTED to do EVERYTHING necessary to make this happen, so…I suggest the following.A fee of $100 per bullet capacity after 6 bullets. If you buy a 30 round clip, it will cost you $2400, just for the clip. Then there’s the gun. Any weapon that has the ability, or can be converted to, holding a high capacity clip should come with a $1000 fee. Sell 80 such guns, and you have paid for one guard. The bullets themselves should come with a fee. 10-50cents for shotgun rounds like 410 and 12 guauge. For hollow points perhaps 50 cents to a dollar, and for cop killer bullets $10 per bullet. I like my police. We’d have to make adjustments of course. But hiring enough guards for every school will be expensive and it will take all the NRA can do to make sure that rights are respected while schools are properly protected.Makes you proud to be an American. /wipes a tear.Of course, we could just ban military grade weapons or weapons that could be converted easily into military grade weapons. We could ban clips that hold more than 6-10 rounds. We could close the gun show loophole and get the states who don’t require background checks to change their laws. And after we do all of that, we can give it a couple of years to see if it makes a difference.But- If Mr. LaPierre and the NRA are willing to make the sacrifices in order to keep the status quo AND protect schools…at a dollar a bullet, we should be able to keep some guards in schools. But who protects us from the guards?I have a headache.painfully,C.

Yes, but we TAX the sale of alcoholic beverages. Do we tax the sale of firearms?

Wow, Ima…I haven’t seen someone trot out that height of ignorance “we evolved from monkeys” in a long, long time…but you never fail to disappoint.

Wow, Ima…I haven’t seen someone trot out that height of ignorance “we evolved from monkeys” in a long, long time…but you never fail to disappoint.Hey, Ima, maybe you can answer this: Did the Founding Fathers intend the Second Amendment apply to machine guns? How about shoulder-mounted tactical nukes?

Ban assault weapons? What next? Ban abortion? Ban Same Gender Marriage? Ban comments on the GoComics web site?! Never I say! Never!!

Yes, but that’s not what I said.

Yes, but that’s not what I said.

For once in your life, answer the question, rightisright, instead of just running away with your tail between your legs.Hey, did the Founding Fathers intend the Second Amendment apply to machine guns? How about shoulder-mounted tactical nukes?

Yes, the same reply to two separate comments.

Let’s see. Murder is illegal. Theft is illegal. School is a gun free zone. Need to get through a CBI background check to purchase a gun. How about all those laws currently on the books (not just gun laws, but laws governing illegal behavior) not even slowing down this madman. Yep, we need to go after those that did not even have a part in this criminal act. I propose that anyone, including our elected officials and editorial writers who work behind armed security, give up all armed protection and any privately owned firearms. Lead by example.

And civilian ownership of fully automatic guns has been illegal for a long time, and I would like to see a 200 round magazine. It would weigh too much to even stay in the gun.

My nephew has several fully automatic weapons, legally, he just got the permits, clearance, and paid the tax required. He’s also building an arsenal with the intent of opening a gun store and shooting range. He’s come close to getting the business loan several times, but the banks seem more interested in sitting on the money they borrowed from the government under Bush, and loaning it BACK to the government at much higher rates than the “loan” they got!

Yup, TARP really helped out “small business”, not

! BTW, the “stimulus” under Obama has funded improvements to our hospital, providing both contractor jobs, and long-term jobs for nurses and staff, funded highway improvements- more contractor jobs and improved safety, and provided money to upgrade our schools- MORE contractor jobs, and saving a couple teaching postions.

More lies from rightisright. Don’t you ever get tired of lying?

I read an interesting exchange between two people. One made the point that the 2nd amendment was written when muskets were the worst weapons available. The respondent made the point that the 2nd amendment allowed the people to own the same weapons as could be used against them. The first person responded that he could not find that language anywhere in the constitution. The second person said that it was written right beside the part that mentioned muskets.

“What is the gun community going to do about mass shootings?” " I don’t know, what is the homosexual community going to do about Penn State?"