The big show on the Hill today: a Senate committee hearing on guns. Gabby Giffords will be there.
Two Senators are mad because they can't bring guns to the hearing.
The sequester is coming! The sequester is coming! (or not)
The electoral college plan dies in the Virginia Senate.
A horrible, scary hostage situation.
French troops enter the rebel stronghold in Mali.
How to get that Navy minesweeper off the coral reef where it's stuck? Take it apart.
GEOFFREY TRUDELL/U.S. NAVY, FLICKR
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Of course, Graham and Cruz, a couple of idiots want to bring guns. These guys are looney. Cruz is tea party and Graham is wanna-be tea party.
It goes beyond looniness, Karensc. What Graham and Cruz say they want to prove to everyone are things that everyone already agrees are true. By "proving" what's already obvious, they'll claim to have proven something quite different: that everyone should have access to deadly weapons of war for recreation and self defense. They're not idiots, they know this is deceptive, but they think most people won't notice. Sad thing is, they're at least half right.
OK I'll concede the point... most people should have guns, not everyone.
Note that they won't be educating fellow senators and members of the public by demonstrating the use of a Bushmaster for self defense, hunting, and sporting purposes.
How many of the 1200 deaths from gun violence since Newtown have been committed by formerly"law-abiding citizens"? How many occurred during the commission of a "crime", such as mugging, car-jacking, burglary, robbery, etc. by known "criminals" or those previously convicted? Much of the NRA'S efforts has resulted in laws that keep such information from being accumulated. They can no longer have it both ways; restricting access to the facts of gun violence does not advance their position. This discussion ought not be focused on mass slayings, awful as they are, but truly must look at how violence, especially gun violence, can be reduced substantially. To do that we must have the facts underlying when and how guns are used, and all the ramifications of those.
The sequester is coming, oh my! I'd be happy if the defense hawks would realize that domestic things like infrastructure (roads, bridges, dams, etc.) need a bit of cash... of course, they are much more dramatic when they fail (and oh so annoyingly expensive). And of course our conservative friends will be ever so sorry and point fingers when another bridge fails (remember Minneapolis?) How about a dam or an aging levee failure? Anyone remember the story about the Johnstown "flood"of 1889 where a dam failed (poorly constructed and, for all intents and purposes, unregulated) and where 2209 died. I wonder, do people think we are really smarter than that now? I'd bring up Hurricane Sandy, which will continue to cost a bunch - that is if anyone really pays, but I wouldn't want to overload this domestic platter discussion with disaster funding Sigh. We have to pay to live in the best country in the world, and it will only be the best if we take care of it and its people.
Perhaps you should consider that most of what you want takes years just to get permissions. Why? Because of people like you.
Totally false, like most of what you spout, Blanks. This country has never had trouble building and repairing infrastructure, when it felt like spending the money to do so. There has been no concerted effort by government at any level to do so for several decades now, with the result that we have some of the oldest, most rundown infrastructure of any advanced nation. I have friends and co-workers who regularly come to the US, and they are appalled at the state of our roads, bridges and airports.
Uff, I'm going to tell you the reason why our infrastructure suffers compared to the rest of the world. Ready?
It wasn't destroyed during WW2. We have been been patching up all along, mostly because our Govt can't arbitrarily take what it wants, and build what, where, and when it wants.
Any questions?
your statement is confusing shooter first you say there is all these permissions you need to get then you say the government can build anytime it wants so which is it?
Expecting consistency from Blanks is like expecting your dog to suddenly start spouting Shakespeare and quantum mechanical theory.
The military part of the budget is only 20%? That's not what most of the graphs I've seen look like.
The Virginia GOP bills (1) to change the electoral college and (2) to redistrict seem to be getting discussion separately but need to be considered together. By further gerrymandering the 11 congressional districts into 7 very safe Republican districts and 4 safe Democrat districts, and then trying to award electoral votes to the districts (with the winner of the most districts getting the remaining 2 votes), the GOP will have decided the next 2 presidential election results from the state. (Even without redistricting passing, that will pretty much be the case.)
Let's make that clear. NBC news can call the Virginia results the moment this passes: it WILL BE 9 to 4. The GOP will have ensured that the results of the popular vote make no difference whatsoever. That sounds an awful lot like taking away our right to vote.
It should also be asked what the Virginia GOP knows about the 2016 election that causes them to believe that a guaranteed 5 vote advantage (4 electoral votes to each candidate cancelling each other out) is a better deal than a chance at winning all 13 electoral votes through the current system.
Would the 67 year old whacko in Alabama, who kidnapped a child off a school bus,have been able to do it if he'd had to use a knife or a lrge stick? Yeah, I know ... I'm just sayin' ... ... .
:-\
"How to get that Navy minesweeper off the coral reef where it's stuck?"
well they are being retired soon and seem that the reef has it , i say strip it decommission it drag it off sink it let it become an extension of the reef.
smiling
Yea, another beautiful day of gun violence and pointless bravado in Amercia*. And this (so far) is just one tiny story in sea of madness!! Wayne LePoo should be so proud!
I wonder if the guy in Alabama is one of Lindsey Graham's "law abiding citizens". Hey, Senators - EVERYONE who grabs a gun and shoots someone for the first time has been a law abiding citizen And might still be one, were not a gun so handy.
How can there be a serious discussion about gun violence without talk of probably it's biggest cause: Prohibition 2, the totally failed and insane War on Drugs?
Creel told the newspaper that the man [Alabama kidnapper] was “the type that thinks the government’s out to get them.”
The "type?" You mean like the NRA type that constantly drills that meme into gun owners' heads? I heard today that the headline on Mitch McConnell's new fundraising letter is "they are coming to take your guns." Not hard to figure out who "they" is. I wish "they" had taken this guy's gun. So does the bus driver.
This is refreshing - when is the last time you have heard a politician from ANY party say this:
Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D.,
"I would tell you as you talk about Jim Messina, the president lost North Dakota by almost 22 percentage points and I was still elected the United States senator and I was elected because I promised people I was going to be their voice not the voice for a political party, not the voice for a president who happens to be in the same political party that I am but I am the voice for the people of North Dakota," Heitkamp says. "I'll make my decisions based on what I believe is in the best interest of the people of North Dakota, the people of this country. And if in six years people don't agree that I made the right choices, I'll find something else to do."
Why did Bill Clinton borrow all the money out of the Social Security Trust Fund? He had a surplus anyway. Was this to make the percentage of money spent on defense look smaller when you look at the whole pie?