A woman in Michigan has come up with a great idea that I’d like to pass along.
It’s brilliant and something we can all do if you are fed up with the trite “thoughts and prayers” (TAP) being offered by our “leaders” as a solution to the mass killings of children.
She sent a LETTER to Rep. Jack Bergman (R-Michigan) which said,
“Dear Rep. Bergman:
“Since you and your colleagues in Congress seem to feel that this is the solution to mass murder, please accept this contribution.”
She enclosed a check to her congressman. Instead of a dollar amount, however, she simply wrote in “Thoughts and Prayers.”
She said she did it because “I’m hearing the same arguments after each and every time this happens.”
The letter quickly went viral and a woman in Florida said she was sending the same “contribution” to Sen. Marco Rubio.
Here are the addresses of Louisiana’s congressional delegation, in case you wish to follow suit:
Sen. Bill Cassidy:
520 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Sen. John Kennedy:
383 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Rep. Steve Scalise:
2338 Rayburn HOB
Washington, DC 20515
Rep. Clay Higgins:
1711 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Rep. Mike Johnson:
327 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Rep. Ralph Abraham:
417 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Rep. Garrett Graves:
430 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Rep. Cedric Richmond:
420 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
P.S. And don’t forget, not only do these people for the most part (with the possible exception of Richmond) avoid addressing the elephant in the room that is the easy access to semi-automatic weapons for fear of offending the NRA, but they also aided and abetted Trump in passing a budget that critically slashes funding for mental health treatment.
This is a brilliant way to get the idea across to our ruby red congressional delegation. I’m going to start writing “checks.” We also need to hammer the message that they are complicit in mass murder when they accept NRA blood money. You cannot be party to creating a killing field and also “pro life”. Stop claiming to be protecting life by meddling in women’s personal business when you allow the slaughter of living, breathing children and adults.
Congress: you cannot continue to be complicit in mass murder and still call yourself pro life.
“meddling in women’s personal business”
At the point a human life is conceived it ceases to become that woman’s personal business – unless you’re patronizing women to the extent that you think a woman can’t be expected to be smart enough to understand how babies are made (putting aside the minuscule percent that are a result of rape or incest).
You are an idot
But at least I know how to spell idiot. You have a nice day, too.
P.S. Love your choice for an alias.
Come on Tom,
What else can you expect from someone educated in LA schools? State funding for education has been cut so much that the idiots don’t even learn how to spell idiot!! 😆
Thank you for all you do. FWIW, Jack Ruby was a wannabe big shot. He was mainly just a loser.
Plus Jack Ruby used a revolver, not an assault rifle. What an idot indeed!
Excellent article, Tom, especially noting how much NRA/blood money they willingly accept.
Also, NRA handouts are so large and spread so far that gun/ammo manufacturer simply must be a huge factor.
Keep up the great work.
So where does the NRA get their money from? Members? Russians?
With its millions of members, membership dues would be more than enough for them to accomplish their lobbying needs.
Excellent, I am also listening to some awesome young people in Florida, they will be the change.
Save a special comment for Dr. Bill Cassidy to remind him that he took the Hippocratic Oath and not the hypocritical one. You know, first do know harm. He’s just beginning his eighth year and already he’s number nine on the NRA’s top recipients list. All this from a guy who, as a Democrat, worked as a doctor, GI I believe, at Earl K. Long in Baton Rouge. Someone convinced him to change to Republican and he’d be set. Worked out pretty good for him and his wife who now has jumped on Jindal’s charter school bandwagon after some questionable employment ethics wise between our state government. I believe Tom did a series on Bill continuing to collect money from LSU for hours worked while in Washington. I don’t know if he’s still got that money train going but the state never asked for their money back for theft. Bill Cassidy and Hippocrates, nothing in common. Bill and hypocrisy, oh yeah big time. $2.9 Million and counting.
Actually, it was Lamar White who broke the story about Bill Cassidy’s billing LSU for hours he supposedly worked—while he was in Washington. The story I did was about how Cassidy’s wife suddenly landed her cushy job in the Jindal administration.
We should also do the same on our tax returns… Why should we keep paying our hard earned dollars to the government only to have executive branch agencies waste them on political witch hunts that in no way serve the American public (such as having federal agencies work on behalf of a political campaign to surveille a political opponent’s affiliates and then spending millions investigating “Russian Collusion”, which has resulted in a meaningless indictment of people who don’t even live in this country – there is so much more I could say on this subject, but it is not directly germane to this post so I will save it for another day). Back to the waste of our tax dollars as related to “gun control” issues… I think that instead of griping to our legislators, we should be up in arms about how our government agencies continue to waste our money and continue to fail us by not doing their jobs. The legislature can pass all the legislation in the world, but without enforcement/action, those laws aren’t worth the paper they are written on. I would submit to you that there are suitable gun control laws on the books, but the agencies responsible for protecting us are failing us because they are too occupied with political agendas and perhaps, just maybe… preventing mass shootings does not fall into their narrative agenda of an outright ban on guns. Finally, before I provide examples on my point, I’d ask you to contemplate: has making drugs illegal removed them from our society or lessened the threats from them? The answer is no, it’s just enabled a strong/thriving black market for them – do you think that banning guns will have any different outcome? If your recommendation isn’t for congress to implement an outright ban on guns, then what exactly is it and how do you see any of their action being effective without effective response from the executive branch agencies charged with investigating and enforcing the laws?
Facts:
1. Nikolas Cruz – Majory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting: There was a valid and fact supported report made to the FB about the shooter in January of this year; nothing was done about it. There were also numerous (around 38) local law enforcement reports about the shooter, some of which challenged his mental capacity. Why wasn’t anything done about this? Some reports say that he obtained the gun(s) legally. If this is the case, then why aren’t we questioning ATF’s procedures for approving gun sales and making sure they were properly followed? What exactly could congress do about these systemic breakdowns other than banning guns for the majority of law abiding citizens (because, just as with drugs) criminals will find a way to get them?
2. Omar Mateen – Pulse Night Club shooting: had been referred to FBI for investigation, but there were no follow-ups or surveillance done on him.
3. Sayed Farouk and Tashfeen Malik – San Bernardino shooting: CA has some of the most restrictive gun control laws in the country, but they didn’t stop these criminals (one of whom entered the country on a fiancée visa by providing false information on her application that was never checked or verified).
4. Devin Patrick – Sutherland Springs, TX Church shooting: Patrick had been dishonorably discharged from the U.S. Air Force for domestic abuse. However, this information was not submitted to the proper channels to preclude him from being able to purchase a gun (whether you have received a dishonorable discharge and whether you have been convicted of domestic violence are both questions asked on the firearms transactions records form).
5. Stephen Paddock – Las Vegas shooting: Strangely, we have yet to receive hardly any information at all about this one…
6. Adam Lanza – Sandy Hook: Guns used were not sold to him. They were stolen from his mother who he also murdered.
And the list goes on and on….
Instead of blaming the NRA and Congress for every shooting, and screaming “no guns” what we should be doing is assessing these incidents for solutions and demanding them of the agencies charged with using our taxpayer dollars to enforce laws on the books. Are some legislative amendments needed? Maybe, but there is no legislative action that will fix the systemic bureaucratic incompetency.
@UMC, You may want to read gun laws by state beginning with Florida. One government agency that can make a difference is the CDC. However the federal government would have to first allow them to collect data on gun deaths. Then we can begin with scientific data on the public health crisis that guns are having on the mortality rate for the youth in America.
Correction; @SMC
What exactly would CDC do other than collect data that is already available? Would they include in that suicides (which anti-gun people frequently lump together with mass shootings to beef up “gun related violence” numbers), would they include a break down of legally purchased firearms versus illegally obtained ones? I believe that ATF has jurisdiction over firearm sales in every state and federal law preempts state law (most state law with respect to guns is based on the right to conceal or open carry, which isn’t really relevant here). I also believe that the FBI has enforcement jurisdiction in every state when it comes to domestic terrorism (which mass shootings have been considered). Finally, per the CDC, 28 people (one every 51 min) die each day in motor vehicle crashes that involve an alcohol impaired driver. However, no one is out screaming we should ban cars because everyone on knows that it is people, not cars, that cause fatalities – how are guns any different?
Interesting in knowing your what type of new additional gun laws other than the gun laws already in effect would have prevented the shooter from gaining access to guns.
Please remove the word “your” sometimes happens when multi-tasking.
1. You simply can’t conflate the issue of gun control down to the rudimentary assertion that because something terrible happened then any legal gun owners on the con-side of banning AR 15’s are then by proxy insensitive to school shootings and don’t care about the well being of the children of our communities.
2. I do fully believe we can visit the issue completely, considering all aspects, to see what better we can do as a nation. For example, instead of attempting to ban the most reliable rifle in America, improve the process to be more rigid to obtain ownership (ie, how on earth can a mentally imbalanced 19 year old with numerous documented threats be able to purchase ANY gun). Before you are too quick to type a venomous response, please skip ahead and read #4.
#3. The AR 15 is not an assault rifle, the “AR” stands for Arma-lite Rifle which is the manufacturer name. The AR 15 is a single shot rifle. Any modified version to be more than that is highly illegal and not what 99.9% of any Americans own.
We have connotations in our head as to the nature of this rifle due to it being popular with the military and with law enforcement – it’s popularity isn’t due to it being an automatic weapon, because it isn’t – it’s because it is a versatile and reliable rifle.
4. It’s completely ill productive to non-stop have one side blaming the other (that’s what a million other websites, blogs, and forums do – it always ends up in the same place -negative spewing and name calling).
5. If we are doling out “social responsibility” be sure to discern who all may be culpable (don’t just look at the weapon, look at the weaponized). For example, I will point out that today, as we sit, classic liberalism is being confused with “leftism”. Classic liberalism would call for free speech and protection of civil liberties – but leftism is not classic liberalism. Leftism by design constantly seeks to find an oppressed faction, adopts it as its own, and then shouts from the rooftops that it is the savior of whatever flavor of the month cause is that they are asserting to protect (see Nancy Pelosi etc). Leftism is what causes ANTIFA to take over college campuses. Leftism is what causes us to learn the term “non gender binary”. Leftism is what causes overt media bias and consistently seeks to stir the outrage of society against “the machine”. Leftism, in and of itself is it’s own true echo chamber of confirmation bias (see Google lawsuit by James Damore, a perfect microcosm of leftist ideology at work).
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3914586-Googles-Ideological-Echo-Chamber.html
6. Re-read # 5 then think about how society has changed over the last decade and a half. Our society now communicates instantly over social media and you don’t have to have many brain cells firing to see that we live in a victim society where everyone is outraged about something. Leftism will tell you that the higher up you are on the victim pole the more your voice matters – all others can keep their mouths closed.
7. Now ask yourself if you think this social expression of outrage, fueled part and parcel by incessant leftist media bias has affected people in our country (my point to ponder is that leftists only stay viable when we are in a crisis – thus they always cease to stir the propaganda machine). Of course this does not mean in any way shape or form that conservatives also don’t share in any problems we face – what I am saying is leftists take ownership of your part – it may very well be more to blame for increased school shootings than the actual AR 15 ( this isn’t a pot shot – it seeks to make a statement and ask a question, and that is since we have always had guns in this country, why are shootings rising NOW)?
8. I have to end my comments as I am sure I have pushed the envelope of paragraph limits and need to make sure my kids still understand their are only two genders and not 73.
Chris, Thanks! I have been struggling over the past several days because I believe “ban the guns” won’t work for many of the reasons you list.
I don’t want to force people who are uncomfortable with guns to carry. I own guns, consider myself a moderate and would agree to additional practices that may help – but are less than starting with a full ban. 1) All states should be REQUIRED to provide the necessary information to the FBI database (currently only 38 do so); I would accept a “waiting period” of 7-21 days; I can accept that firearms purchases be limited to 21 years and older.: I think requiring all purchasers to take a safety course at certain intervals is appropriate; I would even agree to a limit of how many firearms you can purchase in a year. But we never have these conversations because each side has to “win”.
Millions of us own firearms and have never killed people so is a ban really the ONLY workable solution?
In 2006, I averted a potential home invasion by 1) calling the police first; 2) by then loudly announcing to the people outside that I was armed and if they entered my residence I would “make them dead”. 3) I then loudly “racked my weapon” so they understood I was serious. The police response was just under 6 minutes (which is good). For that reason alone I will not accept a total ban on weapons nor will I allow someone to tell me what weapon I should use for protection
The comments of the posters here are instructive and they reflect the deep divide in our culture.
I am proudly antifa – and who, in their right mind wouldn’t be if they accept the definition as anti-fascist.
I believe there are steps that could help prevent gun violence by limiting access to certain weapons and accessories. AR 15s are not, as sold, automatic rifles. They are, however, rapid fire and can and have been used to kill human beings quickly and in numbers.
In Las Vegas, legal devices were attached to legal weapons firing illegal (if I am correctly understanding) ammunition to make them simulate automatic functionality and to enhance accurate tracking of shots fired for maximum coverage. Were this not the case, somebody would have gotten to the shooter before he killed and injured as many people as he did.
I do not disagree that law enforcement has had what seems to us to be adequate warnings about some of these killers, but I have no idea how many other such warnings they have gotten about how many people and how they prioritize them. To the extent they dropped the ball they should be held accountable, but I have no idea as to that extent.
We have long since lost the ability to prevent people from acquiring guns. I believe the statistics showing there are more guns in the U. S. than there are people so getting one’s hands on them is fairly easy no matter who you are. Should we give up entirely on all efforts to control them? No. I’m no expert on how best to do it, but I am confident there are ways.
Although the divide in our society is growing, I would hope there are still things people on which people on both sides of this issue and others can find common ground. I will never believe there ever was, or ever will be an effort to take away everybody’s guns and I certainly don’t believe it is possible to do so. Can’t we find something short of that, beginning, as some have suggested, by being sure laws on the books are enforced and holding those responsible for obeying and enforcing them truly accountable?
Gun violence is not getting better. It is clearly getting worse.
Stephen, I think you above being so simplistic by saying you are “proudly antifa” as we both know they are not even remotely about being anti fascist – ironically the thuggery and violence they utilize is the very definition of fascism in that they only want THEIR voice allowed and no others.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/antifa
I think we all understand the literal definition of antifa, I just assumed in contributing to the conversation you would acknowledge what the actual Antifa thugs represented…
Sorry to disappoint you.
from the Merriam-Webster dictionary:
2 : an anti-fascist movement
Antifa is the backlash to the backlash, a defensive response to the growing presence of right-wing extremism. —Todd Gitlin
By this definition, all of us who RESIST are proudly antifa.
We are not thugs.
Thanks Mr. Winham and Tom, just watched NRA Wayne L. at the CPAC. He is the President of NRA and controls Trump’s uncontrollable thought process. They control the entire Republican party with outright lies and utter ignorance. If I have offended anyone in the NRA/Republican party, I apologize to both of them. ron thompson