Elementary School Shooting In CT....

[FlagmanL11]

Originally Posted by Jetworks

Outstanding entry by her. I pray she continues to find the strength for what must be done as her son grows older.



I'll admit I'm a bit dooshy lately about the subject. Between my psychology finals and the media not running with what happened at the Congressional hearings a couple of weeks ago, seeing this being put forth as a possible factor annoys me to no end. Apologies.

No worries...

[BushyTheBeaver]

Originally Posted by Fishooked

What's making this even more unbearable is seeing the faces of the kids - I don't know how this Dad managed to get through his news conference/statement without completely losing it. I couldn't watch with a dry eye.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/16/us/con...rticle_sidebar

I cannot imagine what it was like for the responders, walking into that school and seeing those tiny bodies, everywhere, covered in blood. Every time a part of my mind tries to picture the scene another part shuts it down because it's just too horrible to contemplate.

[MnJetFan]

I frankly don't know what the answer is anymore. I would say why did this young mans mother leave these guns around when she knew he was not all there.

[dustykeller]

When did Connecticut turn into the East Coast version of Compton?

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nati...icle-1.1221862

[Warfish]

SCHOOLS IN RIDGEFIELD, CONN. UNDER LOCKDOWN OVER REPORTS OF POSSIBLY ARMED PERSON

Per FOXNews, so take with grain of salt (Vulture Hype Media in full force right now).

But if so.....holy ****.

[DDNYjets]

Originally Posted by Warfish

SCHOOLS IN RIDGEFIELD, CONN. UNDER LOCKDOWN OVER REPORTS OF POSSIBLY ARMED PERSON

Per FOXNews, so take with grain of salt (Vulture Hype Media in full force right now).

But if so.....holy ****.

FOX actually had the J. Paul Lance, the State Police Lt. that is handling the school shooting on and he said he was aware of the situation and that someone "suspicious" was spotted at a train station.

I expect there to be a lot of these incidents the coming days b.c we are usually hyper-sensitive following something traumatic like this.

[Warfish]

As expenced, the first cries of "the response by white America to the Conn. Shooitn gis Racist" was heard this morning on Sirius Left.

Their argument being that "white America" doesn't care when hundreds of black kids die in Chicago or Washington D.C. each year, but get all worked up when any white kids die.

They went on to claim that "white America" values white life far more than black life.

So, there you, the African American Progressive response to this event.

[Fishooked]

Originally Posted by Warfish

As expenced, the first cries of "the response by white America to the Conn. Shooitn gis Racist" was heard this morning on Sirius Left.

Their argument being that "white America" doesn't care when hundreds of black kids die in Chicago or Washington D.C. each year, but get all worked up when any white kids die.

They went on to claim that "white America" values white life far more than black life.

So, there you, the African American Progressive response to this event.

/facepalm

I'm not going near this one.

[Fishooked]

Came across this today. Relevant. The first part of this post is also the main reason why Facebook has just driven me away completely.

The same old crap rehashed and retweeted from person to person.

[Bonhomme Richard]

Fish --

Crazies be crazy, on all ends of the spectrum. That's just superfluous noise. The Internet is great for giving voice to the self-absorbed and the righteously indignant.

[Fishooked]

Originally Posted by Bonhomme Richard

Fish --

Crazies be crazy, on all ends of the spectrum. That's just superfluous noise. The Internet is great for giving voice to the self-absorbed and the righteously indignant.

I dare not say what is truly on my mind when it comes to my Facebook account.

[Trades]

At Sandy Hook Memorial, Obama Showcases the Magical Thinking of Gun Controllers

Jacob Sullum|Dec. 17, 2012 12:40 am


On Sunday night, speaking at a memorial service for the 26 victims of Adam Lanza's horrifying shooting rampage at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, President Obama provided a window onto the magical thinking of people who think such appalling crimes could be prevented if only we had the courage to pass the right law:

We can't tolerate this anymore. These tragedies must end. And to end them, we must change. We will be told that the causes of such violence are complex, and that is true. No single law—no set of laws can eliminate evil from the world, or prevent every senseless act of violence in our society.


But that can’t be an excuse for inaction. Surely, we can do better than this. If there is even one step we can take to save another child, or another parent, or another town, from the grief that has visited Tucson, and Aurora, and Oak Creek, and Newtown, and communities from Columbine to Blacksburg before that—then surely we have an obligation to try.



In the coming weeks, I will use whatever power this office holds to engage my fellow citizens—from law enforcement to mental health professionals to parents and educators—in an effort aimed at preventing more tragedies like this. Because what choice do we have? We can’t accept events like this as routine. Are we really prepared to say that we’re powerless in the face of such carnage, that the politics are too hard? Are we prepared to say that such violence visited on our children year after year after year is somehow the price of our freedom?

Finally, a president who has the guts to come out against the murder of children. Not only that, but he is prepared to confront those who, for murky but clearly frivolous reasons, tolerate violence, oppose tragedy prevention, and shrink from saving innocent lives. Because "politics" cannot be allowed to obstruct the solutions that every decent, right-thinking person favors.
Such as? Well, the president did not say. Neither did New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Friday, when he scolded Obama for not taking a firmer stand against the wanton slaughter of elementary school students. “We’re going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this," the president had said, "regardless of the politics." Bloomberg was unimpressed:

Calling for "meaningful action" is not enough. We need immediate action. We have heard all the rhetoric before. What we have not seen is leadership—not from the White House and not from Congress. That must end today.

In Bloomberg's view, then, we need action that is not only meaningful but also immediate. Through leadership. By the White House as well as Congress. He reiterated that message on NBC's Meet the Press on Sunday morning, when he got a little more specific:

We kill people in schools. We kill them in hospitals. We kill them in religious organizations. We kill them when they're young. We kill them when they're old. And we've just got to stop this....

What the president can do is number one: through executive action he can order his agencies to enforce the laws more aggressively. I think there's something like 77,000 people who have been accused of lying when they applied for a gun permit.

We’ve only prosecuted 77 of them. The president can introduce legislation even if it doesn’t get passed. The president campaigned back in 2008 on a bill that would prohibit assault weapons. We’ve got to really question whether military-style weapons with big magazines belong on the streets of America in this day and age. Nobody questions the Second Amendment's right to bear arms, but I don't think the Founding Fathers had the idea that every man, woman, and child could carry an assault weapon. And I think the president through his leadership could get a bill like that through Congress. But at least he's got to try.

Since Lanza took the two handguns and the rifle that he had with him on Friday from his mother, who acquired them legally (and who was his first victim), the relevance of lies by gun permit applicants escapes me.

Furthermore, the rifle, a .223-caliber Bushmaster M4 carbine, was not covered by the federal "assault weapon" ban (which expired in 2004) or by a similar law in Connecticut. Even if it were, plenty of guns equally lethal against schoolchildren (hundreds of millions, in fact) are widely available. That is hardly surprising, since the "assault weapon" category is arbitrary, based more on scary, military-style looks than features that make guns more deadly in the hands of criminals. Likewise, Lanza reportedly used "high-capacity magazines" (holding more than 10 rounds), but millions of these are already in circulation, and they can be readily fabricated no matter their legal status. (That's leaving aside the question of whether the need to swiitch magazines or weapons makes much of a difference in a murderous assault on defenseless people.) The notion that restrictions like these can have a noticeable impact, let alone that they can "end" or "stop" occasional outbursts of senseless violence, is hard to credit unless you believe what Obama insists he does not: that evil can be legislated out of the world by acts of Congress.

http://reason.com/blog/2012/12/17/at...wcases-t/print

[BushyTheBeaver]

Originally Posted by Fishooked

I dare not say what is truly on my mind when it comes to my Facebook account.

I have a Facebook "friend" who this time of year is always posting straw man images or quotes that decry "the war on Christmas."

Which is especially odd since he's jewish.

[Snell41]

God is in churches all across the nation, yet little boys were repeatedly molested. Man's propensity for violence has not risen. We have been a violent species pretty much since our beginnings. In fact I would go so far as to say our fear of death and our propensity for avoiding death is probably greater now than ever before. In prior generations God was an absolute given. You didn't question it. It was the law (literally) of the land. You went to heaven or you went to hell based on your actions on earth basically put. That was widely believed. Today we question this more and more. It's only natural knowing what we know about our earth and universe today. I think more than ever man as a whole values their life on earth because we DON'T know what's out there for us when we die. I think we realize that scientifically and logically speaking there may actually be nothing.

Now we can all argue until we're blue in the face whether religion is right, science is, or something in between, or none of them at all but that's not my point. My point is I think we DO value life more than ever. I just think the minority that does not value life or has mental issues that cause them to not value life have access to weapons that can wipe out a massive amount of people in a very short timespan. The solution is to somehow identify these people who do not value life, and limit their access to guns and weapons. Now how do you do this within the confines of our existing laws?

[Trades]

Originally Posted by Snell41

God is in churches all across the nation, yet little boys were repeatedly molested. Man's propensity for violence has not risen. We have been a violent species pretty much since our beginnings. In fact I would go so far as to say our fear of death and our propensity for avoiding death is probably greater now than ever before. In prior generations God was an absolute given. You didn't question it. It was the law (literally) of the land. You went to heaven or you went to hell based on your actions on earth basically put. That was widely believed. Today we question this more and more. It's only natural knowing what we know about our earth and universe today. I think more than ever man as a whole values their life on earth because we DON'T know what's out there for us when we die. I think we realize that scientifically and logically speaking there may actually be nothing.

Now we can all argue until we're blue in the face whether religion is right, science is, or something in between, or none of them at all but that's not my point. My point is I think we DO value life more than ever. I just think the minority that does not value life or has mental issues that cause them to not value life have access to weapons that can wipe out a massive amount of people in a very short timespan. The solution is to somehow identify these people who do not value life, and limit their access to guns and weapons. Now how do you do this within the confines of our existing laws?

I read an article that related this tragedy to Pro-Choice leanings. While I think that the author took it way too far I can see his point that abortion, in his view, is a complete disregard for life. I do not endorse this article but I can see his rationale:

http://washingtonexaminer.com/gregor...l#.UM9lmXcXeSp

Dear Mr. President:
So you were moved to tears Friday when you gave your statement about the slaughter of 20 innocent children in Newtown, Conn.


Your tears may well have been genuine, your grief sincere. But I'm not impressed that a man with such devotion to the act of abortion as yours is upset at the deaths of children.


"The majority of those who died today were children," you said in your statement, "beautiful little kids between the ages of 5 and 10 years old. They had their entire lives ahead of them -- birthdays, graduations, weddings, kids of their own."


Very passionate words indeed, Mr. President, ones that might apply to unborn children as well, millions of whom are massacred every year.


Here's why I believe both your statement and your tears are suspect.
On Friday, a gunman walked into the Connecticut elementary school and methodically, fatally shot 20 children and six adults.


He has been identified as 20-year-old Adam Lanza, who apparently killed himself after the shootings. Now imagine the following hypothetical situation:


Lanza isn't 20, but a 30-something surgeon who, five to 10 years ago, sucked those same 20 children down a tube while they were still in the womb.


Would we be talking about the slaughter of 20 innocent children? Or would Lanza receive praises from you and others like you for being an avid supporter of women's reproductive rights?


You know the answer to that as well as I do. You believe protecting children should start after they're born. I believe protecting children should start while they're still in the womb.


So I'm not buying your grief or your tears, Mr. President. Nor am I buying your not-very-subtle hint that more gun control laws will prevent such tragedies in the future.


According to a story on foxnews.com, "[the president] called for 'action' toward the close of his remarks, citing the frequency with which such mass shootings have occurred."


The story then quotes you directly: "These neighbors are our neighbors, and these children are our children, and we're going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this -- regardless of politics."


It's not a question of how we prevent such tragedies, Mr. President. It's a question of why there are more of them now than in the past.


The automatic weapons that can kill large numbers of people existed in the past as they do today. Yet we have more apparent nut jobs killing large numbers of people today. Mr. President, are you naive enough to believe that the cause of this is firearms, or their availability?


There is much talk today of America's "gun culture." There is indeed a cultural issue here, Mr. President. But it has nothing to do with guns.
America has a culture where life has been devalued. That might not have started on Jan. 22, 1973, when the Supreme Court handed down the Roe v. Wade decision you so cherish, but it was the first time a branch of the federal government officially endorsed the devaluing of life.


Since then, one nut job after another has attempted to wipe out large numbers of people with the use of firearms. Other than the fact that they were all male -- the 10-ton elephant in the room in this debate that no one will address -- they all have one thing in common.


They were born in, reared in and received their values in a society where life has been consistently devalued. The availability of guns does not cause people to devalue life. Only the society they live in can do that.


When you and other elected officials face that sobering truth, maybe then we'll be on our way to preventing "more tragedies like this."


Examiner Columnist Gregory Kane is a Pulitzer-nominated news and opinion journalist who has covered people and politics from Baltimore to the Sudan.

[chiefst2000]

People come up with ridiculous conclusions when tragedies like this happen. The takeaways are simple but coming up with solutions are not as easy.

Sifting through some of the articles and FB postings and discussion here you see people saying things like "No one in America should be allowed to carry weapons outside their homes" or "we need stricter gun laws", or one wacko teacher believes that "fewer standardized tests" and "more money for education" would do the trick, we even see blaming "lack of Spirituality in our schools".

It is understandable when people react emotionally to such a tragedy. Personally I have a child in 1st grade and I've actually found it difficult to watch news coverage. That said we can look at this tradgedy and the Colorado theater shooting earlier this year and draw some conclusions. First I don't think concealed carry laws are the problem. These people aren't worried about if it is or isn't legal to carry a concealed weapon. They are planning on dying anyway. Should we ban all firearms? Well we banned drugs yet they are readily available in most neighborhoods in America. That alongside the 300Million gins in circulation means that banning weapons is not a serious solution. More religion in schools? I don't think that stops mentally disturbed people from going on rampages any more then giving Copurnicus an even more generous retirement package would.

These shooters do have something in common. Whether it was Jared Loughner who shot up Rep Giffords at the political ralley, or the psychos that commited the heinus acts in Newton and the Colorado Batman premier, they were all people that were obviously disturbed mentally. They were all people in which people that knew them were scared of what they might do. Many were reported to various authorities or had been in the council of medical health professionals. Somehow however we do not have a system in place to deal with mentally disturbed people that appear to be a risk of committing violence of this type but have not yet committed the act.

There is your problem it a nutshell. Anyone that is serious about identifying the societal problem that is causing these types of events happening and looking for the solution needs to start there. There are people walking around that have been identified as high risk mentally disturbed individuals and our legal system has no capacity to deal with them. Do we want to bring back forced stays at mental asylums committing people against their wills? That doesn't feel right to me. The solution however lies within the answer to that question. This has nothing to do with Guns, God or Standardized Testing.

[PlumberKhan]

Originally Posted by chiefst2000

Sifting through some of the articles and FB postings and discussion here you see people saying things like "No one in America should be allowed to carry weapons outside their homes" or "we need stricter gun laws", or one wacko teacher believes that "fewer standardized tests" and "more money for education" would do the trick, we even see blaming "lack of Spirituality in our schools".

I "sifted" through some postings as well.

Apparently, this weekend was a great time to post pictures of semi-automatic weapons.

[MnJetFan]

Originally Posted by Warfish

As expenced, the first cries of "the response by white America to the Conn. Shooitn gis Racist" was heard this morning on Sirius Left.

Their argument being that "white America" doesn't care when hundreds of black kids die in Chicago or Washington D.C. each year, but get all worked up when any white kids die.

They went on to claim that "white America" values white life far more than black life.

So, there you, the African American Progressive response to this event.

Because in the Black Community shooting are an everyday occurence. Not schools of course.

[chiefst2000]

Originally Posted by PlumberKhan

I "sifted" through some postings as well.

Apparently, this weekend was a great time to post pictures of semi-automatic weapons.

Your point?

[PlumberKhan]

Originally Posted by chiefst2000

Your point?

Nothing I guess.

I suppose no one will mind if a bunch of people spent Sept 12 posting pictures of 747's.