Gabby Giffords urged the legislators to "be bold, be courageous." One can only hope.
The NRA's Wayne Lapierre advised them to do nothing. He wants no new laws. Wayne said that because criminals would never abide by any gun registration requirement, fuck it, any such law would be a useless waste of time. By that logic, because murderers disregard laws against homicide, the laws ought to be repealed. Wayne is a special kind of stupid, isn't he?
A proponent of guns for self-defense testified that "a woman with 3 or 4 or 5 violent attackers in her home" would feel "safer" with a high-capacity semi-automatic assault rifle by her side. I'd think she'd feel safer moving to a different neighborhood.
A representative of a concealed-carry advocacy group announced that the goal of his faction was to "normalize the presence of firearms in daily life." Come again? That's just so damn crazy! My goal is the exact opposite.
These stark differences will never be resolved by hearings or national "conversations", and political compromises (large magazine bans and federal registration OK, assault weapons ban not OK? WTF?) guarantee that progress, if any, moves at a snail's pace.
Not good enough. Neither bold nor courageous. Typical democracy.
Occasionally, democracy pulls up lame and rational discourse fails. This is one of those times. When America has a gun for every man, woman and child and the gun industry wants to make it two guns, when we're senselessly shot down ever more frequently in our schools, churches, theaters, and shopping malls, when we can't agree that enough is simply enough, then we are way the fuck past the point of useful democratic debate. We don't need a vote, we need a Czar, a Commissioner, someone to rule and make the call on what should be done, once and for all, without fear of reversal.
I humbly submit myself for the task. :)
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