Is This Time Different?

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If you missed Rachel’s rant on the last time Congress tried to pass universal background checks, here it is. Worth watching.

For a reminder of why Joe Manchin has to be treated carefully in spite of the problems he is causing, see Why Joe Manchin Owns Washington Right Now.

See also Is this time different? The latest GOP lunacy on guns demands a tougher response. by Paul Waldman and Greg Sargent at WaPo.

It just so happens that less than two weeks ago the House passed two bills to require background checks on all gun sales transfers and to create an expanded 10-day review of gun sales. Yet both faced nearly lockstep Republican opposition and will inevitably disappear into the black hole of the GOP Senate filibuster.

At a previously scheduled Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday on this very subject, Republicans were livid at the mere suggestion that we might do something about the thousands of Americans killed with guns every year.

“Every time there’s a shooting, we play this ridiculous theater where this committee gets together and proposes a bunch of laws that would do nothing to stop these murders,” said Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.).

But the reason it’s theater is the filibuster. Senators don’t need to consider gun legislation in a serious way, because Republicans can and will kill it no matter what it does or doesn’t do.

We’ve reached the point at which Republicans don’t have to seriously do anything except suppress votes, but that’s another rant. Waldman and Sargent go on to quote several Democrats saying that this time feels different, especially with the NRA on the ropes. We’ll see.

Also: Today my seven year old PC is having issues, so I’m getting this post in before I have to start fiddling with it. Wish me luck. It may be time to let this one go to PC heaven and get a new one. Good thing I just got my stimulus money.

10 thoughts on “Is This Time Different?”

  1. “Every time there’s a shooting, we play this ridiculous theater where this committee gets together and proposes a bunch of laws that would do nothing to stop these murders,” said Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.).

    Unfortunately he's partially correct.  He would be 100% correct if had said it this way:

    “Every time there’s a shooting, we play this ridiculous theater where this committee gets together and proposes a bunch of laws that republicans will never support” 

    I get why the democrats do it, to show the voters that we could get common sense gun laws in place but for the republican party.  But then, just as prominently and loudly as the republicans say what Cruz says here, they need to follow that up with, you are the "party of ideas" so either you propose a solution or we accept and tell all within earshot that you are fine with massacres of American citizens.

    In any case, if I had to bet, it would be that this time will be no different.  Sure, the NRA is back on its heels, but they had enough juice to overturn the weapon ban in Colorado not more than 10 days before this latest massacre.  Thanks to the NRA, the shooter was then able to buy his gun just a few days after that.  

  2. If the Universal Background Check is killed by the fillibuster, the GOP creates a powerful argument for ending the filibuster.  And in turn, the focus changes to a stronger majority in 2022 to pull the plug.

    Asian-Americans got a wake-up call on voting in 2022. 

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    • On the previous thread I was going to post a link to the picture of little Bo Peep with her original background decor. I was going to post it without any commentary, but I figured it would be a little too cryptic without a lengthy explanation to get my point across. So I decided against it.

       The point I was hoping to convey was the idea that it's not the guns per se that the focus should be on to stop the increase of gun violence and the proliferation of military assault type weapons. It's more of that unarticulated demon that exalts those weapons as a totem of freedom and power. And does that exaltation through political figures who exploit the ignorance and insecurities of people who can't understand the dynamic at play.

       When I see people like Boebert, Cruz, Greitens, Taylor-Green, and countless others who augment their legislative credentials by blasting targets or cooking bacon on an AR-15 my stomach just turns. It's like they've reached the top rung on the pandering ladder. I can only relate to that kind of marketing with memories of my own experiences of my childhood foray into the world of guns. The sense of empowerment I felt when I had a gun in my hand. It was such a deception because the only way I could utilize that power was through violent means. 

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  4. Best of luck with your PC, maha – old, or new!

    The RepubliKKKKLANS keep betting that the American people are stupid.  And with about 35% to 45% of them, they're 100% correct.  Those are their voters, so that bet would be money well-spent.  But what idiot's gonna take that bet?

    But with the rest of us, when we look at every nation's gun injuries and deaths in graph form, we are so far ahead the rest of the world – in a bad way – that it almost looks like a graph of different nation's economies in the immediate aftermath of WWII.  (The only countries close to us regarding guns, are ones like Yemen, Syria, Somalia, and other war-torn nations/areas).

    After WWII, we had so far and away the best economy in the world, that the real question might have been, "How do the rest of the world's country's economies, combined, compare to the US's economy?"  In other words, who has more money, the US, or everyone else combined?  It would have been the rest, combined.  But closer than optimal.

    Today, we have more guns than people in this country.

    Now regarding all those guns, RepubliKKKLANS might say, "Well, our 2nd Amendment Right is what makes us so exceptional. Guns are one of the most important reasons we are so damn exceptional!!"

    That's so monumentally stupid a statement, that for more reasons than I care to list, I won't waste anybody's time trying to explain the reasons why.

    Only a RepubliKKKLAN voter is likely to believe:

    A). That it's guns, to the exclusion of other factors, that makes us great.

    B). That we ARE so very great, and that we are SO VERY exceptional.

    We have all of those guns for a lot of reasons.  None of them have anything to do with any imagined exceptionalism.

     

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  5. And on and on, like a river flowing. Americans give up their gun fetish? Yeah, right.

    • It’s a minority that has a “gun fetish.” Eventually, when the majority gets disgusted enough at the carnage, there will be change.

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