Gonna open up a strip club called Thots and Prayers and make it rain sweet NRA dollars
— Ira Madison III (@ira) February 14, 2018
Schools should be places where children can learn, and faculty and staff can work, without fear of violence. My colleagues from Florida will carry home the prayers of the whole Senate, for victims and their families, for the community of Parkland, and for the first responders.
— Leader McConnell (@SenateMajLdr) February 15, 2018
This person waved a musket over his head at an NRA convention in 2014. He has a 93 percent rating with the NRA and does not support the bare minimum of gun reform that would protect children. But he has thoughts and prayers to offer. https://t.co/bVDP5d7z9Z
— Joy Reid (@JoyAnnReid) February 15, 2018
Ryan: Florida school shooting shouldn't result in taking away gun rights https://t.co/4B5VyxxI6s pic.twitter.com/V9mSa0Vs0q
— The Hill (@thehill) February 15, 2018
Literally more concerned with the rights of the murderer to buy guns than the victim's right to live. And that tells you everything you need to know about the Right To Life Christian Party. https://t.co/LjGxAXLNdT
— Stonekettle (@Stonekettle) February 15, 2018
historical note:
Democratic Congress/President enacted assault weapons ban in 1994
Republican Congress/President allowed it to expire in 2004
— John Harwood (@JohnJHarwood) February 15, 2018
Out of respect for the victims and their families, I will not be making an announcement tomorrow about the Senate race. (2/2)
— Mitt Romney (@MittRomney) February 15, 2018
If all potential GOP candidates refused to enter politics on days when Americans face gun violence, there wouldn’t be any GOP lawmakers and maybe we’d finally be able to pass gun control laws. https://t.co/IN49t3Hk0e
— Sam Ratner (@samratner) February 15, 2018
Corner Stone
Mitt Romney is going to get an A+ rating from the NRA for votes in the Senate and a 98% +/- “votes with GOP”.
germy
Cermet
My daughter was at a neighbor’s house until I could pick her up a little while ago – she went there after the lock down was over (all local roads were sealed off;) While her event was minor (as I posted earlier – the kid just had a real looking gun that shot pellets), none-the-less, no one knew that. The SWAT Officers were chasing the guy with the “gun” and he passed her classroom. The SWAT thought he was in her room. They broke the door open, she and her students put their arms up as they faced numerous SWAT guys with their rifles pointed at them (I got to see her video of it on her phone – not fun.) Seeing one kid who they thought was the guy they were looking for, they sized the kid, cuffed him, and took him from the room. All in all, a traumatic day for her.
debbie
That this keeps happening is such absolute bullshit.
Gun rights supporters need to stop blaming shootings on “mental illness.” That is a red herring. It allows a person to point to the schizophrenic across the street and say, “That’s mental illness. I’m not one of those. I’m fine,” when in fact that person with all his guns is not at all fine.
The fact is that the common factor in every shooting is rage, and there isn’t a single person in this world that isn’t capable of rage. Period. Combine rage with an available firearm, and a shooting can practically be guaranteed.
Not only does this country need to decisively deal with gun control, this country needs to revisit the willful misinterpretation of the Second Amendment. There is no guaranteed right to this madness.
Cacti
Was someone looking for the stupidest solution possible?
Well, Megan McArdle is happy to oblige.
She says train the kiddos to charge into a hail of bullets to take down the baddie.
I guess that’s preferable in glibertarian world to keeping AR-15s out of the hands of sociopaths.
germy
MJS
@germy: This should be talked about, but only in the, “Hey you stupid fucking Trump supporters, what did you think was going to happen when you donated to his inauguration?” sense. After that, there’s no need for anything more than derisive laughter.
germy
@Cacti:
Chyron HR
If I wrote a story where the Republican party makes a deal with Satan to kill as many Americans as possible in exchange for unholy power it would be considered implausible, but when they do it to get cash money from the NRA that’s just politics.
debbie
@germy:
The white supremacy organization he belonged to said he’d practiced in paramilitary drills.
germy
Roger Moore
@debbie:
It’s also bullshit because they’re A) doing nothing to help people who are mentally ill and B) dead set against keeping guns out of the hands of mentally ill people. Blaming mental illness and failing to do anything about it is just one more way they prove they don’t give a shit about other people’s lives.
? ?? Goku (aka Baka Amerikahito) ? ?
“Leader McConnell”
Oh, Christ…
dmsilev
Wait, I thought that it was now considered Accepted Washington Wisdom that a losing Presidential candidate needs to sit down, shut up, and never ever say anything or do anything remotely political for the rest of their lives (and also the lives of their children and grandchildren).
Or is there something different about Hillary Clinton compared to Mitt Romney?
dmsilev
@Roger Moore: Donald Trump and the Republicans _literally_ made it easier for mentally disturbed people to buy guns, by repealing an Obama-era regulation that mandated extra scrutiny for such sales.
chopper
@debbie:
but hey, by pointing our finger at mental illness we get to change the subject from guns and also stigmatize a long-suffering group of americans. it’s a win-win!
debbie
@Roger Moore:
I just now saw this on my FB feed.
I mean, seriously????
Yutsano
@dmsilev: Because Nothing Can Be Done*!
*Unless you mean make it EASIER to get guns. Then they’re all over that.
Mary G
Those of you on Twitter might want to remark on this asshole’s tweets – he works at the FTFNYT where they’re not allowed to give personal political opinions:
The ratios are unbelievable. Everyone is telling him to delete them. They’ve been up a couple of hours now.
ETA: Twitter is overloaded on this apparently, I wanted to add David Simon’s response and it won’t do it, so here it is copied and pasted:
Mnemosyne
@debbie:
But idiots on Facebook say it doesn’t matter that he was a white supremacist! Immaterial! Had nothing to do with his actions! Who among us has not joined a white supremacist militia and drilled with them?
germy
@Mary G: These villagers have their heads so far up their asses it isn’t even funny anymore.
One of the replies to Mr. Lipton’s tweet:
Time to examine your biases and reflect, my dude
JPL
@Cermet: How terrible, and I have no other words.
Mnemosyne
@dmsilev:
There’s something, but I can’t quite put my finger on it … ?
Cacti
@germy:
I can’t even pretend to picture a scenario where lady “pink Himalayan salt” would run toward danger.
Patricia Kayden
@germy: Trump has normalized sleazy governance. It’s like we’re overwhelmed by so much mess from his administration that we just can’t keep up — especially on a day when we’re dealing with another mass shooting.
smintheus
If there were Congressional shootings every few days, you can bet they’d be willing to pass any legislation necessary to stop it.
It’s not just with gun violence that people who know better are willing to look the other way. There’s something about violence against kids that makes even many ordinarily sane adults behave like they’re bonkers. The kind of bullying and viciousness I routinely witnessed in my schools when I was a kid would never be allowed to pass if it had been directed against adults. But it was shrugged off as ‘just kids’ and the adults did their best to pretend that nothing could really be done…or just turned their backs and changed the subject.
Kids are supposed to be subjected to at least some element of terrorism because that’s just the way it has to be, according to that cynical viewpoint.
TenguPhule
@Chyron HR:
Truth is stranger then fiction. They did just that with Donald Trump.
Roger Moore
@Mary G:
One more strike against FTFNYT.
Another Scott
Yeah, Rmoney not running for anything ever again is a pretty good solution.
In other news, Reuters:
(Emphasis added.)
Because of course he did.
Team D can’t protect the (remaining) Dreamers with a sensible bill on their own, but they can work to make sure that Trump and the Teabaggers alone own this GOP policy.
Cheers,
Scott.
Cacti
@smintheus:
FTFY
TenguPhule
@Cacti:
A bigger nastier danger chasing her from behind.
? ?? Goku (aka Baka Amerikahito) ? ?
@Mary G:
Cringe. Weren’t most of the victims POC?
Patricia Kayden
@debbie: See, Republicans care so much for the mentally ill/unstable that they’ve made it easier for them to get guns.
MAGA!!
efgoldman
Fucking christ on a surfboard. CBS now airing an interview with kids who lost friends,. Small sample, and selected, of course, but every one of them is in favor of gun control.
Maybe there’s hope for the next generation in Florida.
But I’m not holding my breath
BTW I’m surprised he didn’t try suicide by cop
PPCLI
One thing anti-abortion people have done and are doing successfully is picking the battles least favorable to their opponents. Avoid at all costs the ones that are hard for them to defend.
We need to start that. For example: Harp on the fact that the CDC is forbidden to do research on gun shootings. No Research. Keep asking every Republican congress-type: How can it be good not to know things? Focus on mentally ill purchasers. Hammer at Trump making it easier for them to buy guns. Stuff like that.
Letting the NRA change the discussion to “They are trying to take away every gun, everywhere, from everyone, all the time!!!” is a losing rhetorical strategy for us.
dmsilev
@Mnemosyne: Of course. I mean, so far as we know, Mitt Romney never had Vince Foster whacked.
Of course, so far as we know, Hillary Clinton never strapped a dog to the roof of her car, so I guess that’s a wash.
? ?? Goku (aka Baka Amerikahito) ? ?
@Mnemosyne:
How could that possibly be immaterial to what he did? They trained him for god’s sake!
Cacti
@TenguPhule:
Her next suggestion will be have the bigger kids throw smaller kids at the shooter.
Or maybe, have the bigger kids use the smaller kids as human shields and form a Spartan phalanx.
Calouste
@debbie: Wanting to own guns is a mental illness, so all shootings can indeed be blamed on mental illness.
TenguPhule
@PPCLI:
This would first require replacing 95% of the media. I’m open to suggestions as to how this miracle is accomplished.
hellslittlestangel
Not exactly heavy lifting, what with prayers having a net fucking weight of zero.
debbie
@Patricia Kayden:
Someone better grill SHS about this ASAP.
hellslittlestangel
@efgoldman: BTW I’m surprised he didn’t try suicide by cop
Florida cops might be traumatized at the prospect of killing a white man.
Amaranthine RBG
@germy:
But GUNZ is bad!!! Need to offer my hot takes on that.
Nevermind that crime and murder rates are lower now than they have been in the last 30 or 40 years or something. People busy working on their ragegasms.
This country is doomed.
Patricia Kayden
@smintheus:
I’m not so sure about that. Scalise was just shot at a Republican baseball game and he’s still a big gun supporters. Their god, Ronald Reagan, was almost assassinated and they still support guns. I don’t think there’s anything that would cause Republicans to turn against guns or the NRA. Would love to be proven wrong.
Amaranthine RBG
@? ?? Goku (aka Baka Amerikahito) ? ?:
Cringe.
But for different reasons.
Chyron HR
@Amaranthine RBG:
Right on, bro, crime is at an all-time low so there’s no problem with guns whatsoever! And also, too, the Messiah Formerly Known As Bernard decreed that only black people need to be subjected to gun control.
Cacti
@Amaranthine RBG:
Guns are great.
If you ask the Attorney General, an AR-15 is less dangerous than a bong.
Brachiator
@dmsilev:
I wonder what it could be?
SteveNKY
Never will the GOP allow 1.8 million +/- new voters to be added to the voter rolls. Will not happen.
You must register, know where to vote, know what identification to take and know how to keep from being forced to a provisional ballot plus drag 2 friends with you.
Mnemosyne
@? ?? Goku (aka Baka Amerikahito) ? ?:
Because (most) white people don’t want to believe that white supremacists are malevolent, because they mostly agree with them, even if they think their tactics go a little too far.
germy
Mnemosyne
@Amaranthine RBG:
Yes, please tell the parents of each of the 17 people murdered yesterday that their individual death is no big deal, because overall crime rates are down. What are a hundred or two mass shootings a year between friends, amirite?
TenguPhule
@Brachiator:
IOKIYAR.
Remember, Sarah Palin was also a loser.
TenguPhule
@efgoldman:
He may be expecting a pardon from Donald Trump.
The horrible thing is….he might actually get one.
dmsilev
@Patricia Kayden:
As Governor, Reagan supported some gun control, courtesy of some armed Black Panther folks. That might do the trick today, but finding volunteers would be hard given the very real risk of police …reaction.
germy
TenguPhule
@Patricia Kayden:
Every black and hispanic citizen just as heavily armed as the white folks.
Segregated Gun control so fast that your head would spin.
germy
The victims
Cacti
@TenguPhule:
He can’t pardon state-level offenses.
germy
TenguPhule
@Cacti:
He’s also not supposed to be able to ignore Congressional Legislation against Russia.
Brachiator
@efgoldman:
Only a crazy person would do that.
I know that this kid was troubled and had experienced family tragedy, but their is a rush to label him as “obviously mentally ill.” His escape plan (drop the weapons, pose as an ordinary student), appeared to be calmly rational.
Turgidson
@Cacti:
She’d hire someone to do it for her.
TenguPhule
@Brachiator:
Don’t try to confuse Republicans with simple facts. It never works.
Brachiator
@TenguPhule:
Oh, the haters are both irrational and inconsistent. Hillary Clinton is a woman and a Democrat, so obviously demonic.
Mnemosyne
@Brachiator:
All white spree killers are “mentally ill” now. Because to admit that they’re not mentally ill opens a can of worms about white male rage and white supremacy that our media and government is in no way prepared to handle.
JPL
@germy: I hope that Manafort and Trump have sweet dreams tonight.
Baud
@germy: What a nice Twitter handle.
debbie
@germy:
Just heartbreaking reading the bios and seeing their young faces.
WaterGirl
@germy: That’s happy news!
TenguPhule
@Brachiator: No, they’re completely consistent. Just evil.
WaterGirl
@germy: Sobbing at the loss of all those beautiful young people with their whole lives ahead of them.
Maybe someone could make an In Memoriam photo collection from all the mass shootings, like they do at the award shows, and the politicians who vote against common sense gun control could have their eyes forced open ala Clockwork Orange and be force to watch all the faces and descriptions go by.
joel hanes
@Calouste:
Wanting to own guns is a mental illness
We’re not going to depend on you to craft polically-useful messages.
Amaranthine RBG
@Chyron HR:
Blessings and peace be upon Him.
p.a.
Progress, right?: cops didn’t buy him Burger King.
Brachiator
@Mnemosyne:
We don’t know the ethnicity of Nikolas Cruz, doubly so since he was adopted and we can’t make assumptions about his name.
The white supremacy angle is unclear. Cruz may have just been looking for a place to practice his paramilitary skills.
But there are three clear categories: Muslim terrorists, “crazy killers who we can do nothing about so let’s not talk about guns” and “dangerous nonwhite people who can be shot anytime by a certified white person or law enforcement officer”
Also, there is a weird rush to try to label the high school students as upper middle class white, but this is also an oversimplification. See these Daily Mail photos of the students and their friends.
Ben Cisco (onboard the Defiant)
Well now…
kindness
I think the internet has made humanity more stupid. In the old days (old old days) communication was by writing. One took time to craft what they wanted to convey. People had to think some and make an effort to mail something. With the advent of radio, we get the modern era. With TV’s we get pictures…in color now too. Each step took us all a step away from having to reflect on what one wants to say. Now with the internet, it is so shoot from the hip and consider things second (too soon for such a poor choice of sayings today I know, sorry) makes us all dumber. I can’t believe some of the things I have read on friends fb posts about the 17 people killed. And some of the twitter posts are driving me batty. It isn’t making us proud as a people imho. Now I’m not ditching my internet. Don’t misunderstand what I wrote without reflecting much on what I wanted to say. I like seeing what the rest of the world says. But I’m going to have to self censor more or I’m going to lose all hope in us surviving as a species.
Brachiator
@kindness:
I understand your exasperation. Yep.
Mnemosyne
@Brachiator:
He was accepted as white by the white supremacist group, so I think we can say that he was white. ETA: This is a very clear example of “white” being a social category, not a matter of DNA.
Have you seen what they’ve been finding on his social media and what his former classmates have been saying? He was a white supremacist, and proud of it. There’s about as much doubt as there was with Dylann Roof.
hueyplong
@Mnemosyne: Wait, Clayton Bigsby wasn’t a real thing?
TenguPhule
@Mnemosyne:
To this day there are still white folks who have doubts about Roof.
B.B.A.
I propose banning white people, because it’d be easier than banning guns.
Mnemosyne
@hueyplong:
Haven’t you heard? White supremacists have been getting unpleasant (for them) surprises when they get their DNA tested. Turns out a fairly significant percentage is not as “Aryan” as they thought.
It’s all a conspiracy by the DNA testing companies, of course. ?
raven
@Mnemosyne: “Because (most) white people don’t want to believe that white supremacists are malevolent,”
That’s just fucking peachy.
? ?? Goku (aka Baka Amerikahito) ? ?
@B.B.A.:
Deport all Trump supporters and voters to Russia. That would solve the problem. And anyway, they’re the ones who deserve to be deported, not Dreamers.
“And nothing of value was lost.”
rikyrah
@Cacti:
I despise her??
Chip Daniels
As I mentioned on the other thread, I refuse to accept the existence of a “right” to own a gun in a civil society.
I won’t begin any discussion with the blithe assumption of that, and cede that ground.
We don’t accept a “right” to a fully auto, or explosives, but somehow a “right” to a semi-automatic is just assumed and unassailable.
Challenge it, question it, force them to justify its very existence, before we talk about any sort of compromise.
Immanentize
@raven: rotten ? of over inclusion…
hueyplong
@Mnemosyne: If only it were all of them.
Dan B
I’ve been thinking about the framing of “gun rights” supporters and how we have no effective counter rhetoric to it. What struck me most was the father whose daughter survived (was not shot). He was horrified but couldn’t imagine “taking away” all the guns we have. The standard liberal response is “we just want assault gun bans” or “we want background checks”. What I thought when I read the ‘father’s words was: Grow a spine, can’t you defend your own kid just because it’s hard?
We need to call them out for their lack of courage, because that’s what it is. And our liberal responses don’t sound courageous enough to meet the enormous challenge. Imagine how it would sound if a thousand school kids challenged adults to grow a backbone and stop this reign of terror.
Hellbastard
HEre’s SHS on 1/24/18 butting heads with a reporter over Trump’s lack of efforts on the school shooting epidemic. Just a few weeks ago…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VH11RN4iiY
TenguPhule
@Chip Daniels:
Those have all been tested in court.
If you want control of guns, the Heller decision needs to be thrown out first.
Mnemosyne
@raven:
A majority of white people voted for Donald Trump, and most of them refuse to believe that he’s a white supremacist.
I long ago accepted that I am an outlier: a middle-aged married white woman who votes for Democrats. Statistically, most of the other women in my demographic vote Republican.
TenguPhule
@B.B.A.:
Can’t we come to a 3/5ths compromise?
Sloane Ranger
As far as “thoughts and prayers” are concerned, we in Britain have a saying, “God helps those who help themselves.” It might be useful to introduce this saying to Republican politicians.
In regard to the shooter, I haven’t seen pictures of the victims, too depressing, is there any evidence he was targeting POC in particular?
raven
@Mnemosyne: whatever
Mnemosyne
@raven:
If it’s not about you, it’s not about you. I had two different (white) people on Facebook try to tell me that the fact that the murderer belonged to a white supremacist militia was meaningless and certainly shouldn’t have made police suspicious of him. Obviously, I disagree.
raven
@Mnemosyne: It’s not “most white people” either.
Frankensteinbeck
@TenguPhule:
There is a huge difference between things Trump can accomplish actively and things he can accomplish by sitting on his ass and doing nothing. Indeed, destruction by inactivity has been the vast majority of the damage Trump has done. Most of the rest has been the ICE.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@Amaranthine RBG: We are only allowed to be upset at ARGB-approved topics now – everyone got it? (And oh yeah – fork off, asshole)
Chip Daniels
@TenguPhule:
No, what needs to be thrown out first is the public attitude.
Politics flows downhill from culture.
We keep up the drumbeat of challenge and questioning and provocation until someday the idea of restricting guns seems as normal as restricting smoking.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@kindness:
That’s the stupidest thing I’ve heard all day.
Mnemosyne
@raven:
Here it is by the numbers: 63 percent of white men and 52 percent of white women voted for Trump.
You and I are the outliers, my friend.
Major Major Major Major
@?BillinGlendaleCA: fuck you!
Frankensteinbeck
@Mnemosyne:
And you can’t count anyone who didn’t vote, because there’s no reason to think they don’t line up exactly like the voters.
opiejeanne
@Sloane Ranger: They already know that one and think it’s from the Bible, and that it applies to poor people.
LongHairedWeirdo
McConnell is being disingenuous. The GOP position is that people should *always* fear violence. *ALWAYS*. So they should always go armed and ready to kill.
Mnemosyne
@Frankensteinbeck:
People who didn’t bother to vote because “Emails!” or “Republicrats!” are further down my shit list from actual Trump or third-party voters, but they’re still on there. If you couldn’t be arsed to keep Trump out of office by showing up to vote, you were useless in 2016.
Jay
@kindness:
Wonkette must reading,
https://wonkette.com/629807/of-course-florida-school-shooter-was-a-girl-hating-white-supremacist-of-course-i-am-tired-of-writing-this-article
Sometime around 2000, the numbers of assholes on like started to grow, exponentionally. By the time of GamerGate, you could make money and gain fame just for being an internet douche bag.
Brachiator
@Mnemosyne:
No. Sorry. This is just playing word games.
I haven’t been tracking the stories about his social media, etc. Too many attempts at instant analysis coming from too many directions. And the worst is coming from Trump and those trying to draw our attention away from the problem with guns.
Major Major Major Major
@opiejeanne: OT: my story got rejected again ?
? ?? Goku (aka Baka Amerikahito) ? ?
@Major Major Major Major:
That sucks. Did you submit it to an online magazine or a traditional literary mag?
Patricia Kayden
@germy: Hiw can you look at those photos and read about those kids without crying? Heartbreaking.
Sloane Ranger
@opiejeanne: Neither of which is true.
magurakurin
Nothing will change.
Nothing.
Because you couldn’t fill an elementary school lunch room with the amount of Americans who are willing to stand up and say gun ownership should be a privilege and not a right. A privilege with a very high bar to attain and maintain. But no one will say that. No one wants that. So, children will continue to be sacrificed on the altar of Gun Rights…as if owning a firearm actually was some inalienable human right. hah.
Major Major Major Major
@? ?? Goku (aka Baka Amerikahito) ? ?: working my way down to the places that’ll probably actually buy it ? early days, only the second rejection, not onto digital yet.
Joe Miller
I’m tired of just posting comments. I want ACTION. I have some suggestions here:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/2/15/1741803/-Don-t-Despair-TAKE-ACTION-Here-s-How-Take-a-look-With-Poll
? ?? Goku (aka Baka Amerikahito) ? ?
@Major Major Major Major:
Make sure you look out for magazines that have contests too. All that matters at this point is getting your work published and getting known. The rest will (hopefully) follow. Good luck!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Major Major Major Major: You’re on The List.
Amaranthine RBG
@debbie:
Parts of that law were sound, others were absurd.
It would have prevented gun ownership by people who have designated other people to be their social security payees. It’s common for elderly people to designate payees for a variety of reasons. My mom designated me when she underwent chemo because she just didn’t want to deal with paying bills and balancing her checkbook and so forth.
And some people living in SROs will designate the landlord as a payee because their credit is so bad that nobody will rent to them otherwise.
dww44
@magurakurin: Along the lines of your comment, this is a good op-ed from the Memphis Commercial Appeal:
ohthatguy
to be fair to Mitch, his tweet promises prayers, not thoughts and prayers. He at least has the honesty to not claim he will think about the victims
No One You Know
@ohthatguy: I’m adopting this. It’s got more burn than the dumpster fire gif I’d been using.
leeleeFL
@dmsilev: Yeah, can’t quite figure what the difference might be!