What About the Other 20-Year-Olds?

Sportswriter Dave Zirin correctly analyzes the fallout from Louisville basketball player Kevin Ware’s horrific injury in the NCAA tournament. Zirin points out that while the school, which makes millions of dollars from intercollegiate athletics, may pay for near-term medical expenses, Ware will be on his own afterwards. And if Ware is unable to play, his scholarship is not guaranteed.

Is Louisville the most profitable college hoops team in USA? Yup. But not for Kevin Ware. m.cnbc.com//id/100581891
— Dave Zirin (@EdgeofSports) March 31, 2013

Yet, in a sense, Ware is lucky. Our nation is creating thousands of Kevin Wares and Eric LeGrands every day in unnecessary wars in the Middle East and elsewhere. Men and women who come back without limbs, with stress-induced mental diseases, or in body bags.

As the nation’s attention is riveted on the Final Four™, other 20-year-olds are having their lives altered in worse ways than Ware’s. We must support the troops by bringing them home.

The Second Amendment

The Second Amendment does not give people the right to own nuclear weapons.

The Second Amendment does not give people the right to own biological weapons.

The Second Amendment does not give people the right to own surface-to-air missiles.

The Second Amendment does not give people the right to own Claymore mines.

The Second Amendment does not give people the right to own assault weapons.

The Second Amendment was written in the days of muskets – weapons that fired single shots before needing to be reloaded.  Just as we have libel laws limiting the scope of the First Amendment, we have reasonable laws limiting the scope of the Second Amendment. None of these laws infringe on the rights of hunters, collectors, or citizens who think they need guns for self-protection. 

Educating America About Chris Christie

The American people are being sold a bill of goods. Make no mistake about it - the upcoming New Jersey gubernatorial election is a national event. Not just because Chris Christie is leading the diminishing sane wing of the Republican Party for the 2016 presidential nomination, but also because he will be using his media-induced star power to raise tens of millions of dollars for his gubernatorial race this year.

The problem is that Christie's record is painted by his handlers and the media as a tough-spoken, hard-driving manager who has put New Jersey on the road to economic salvation. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Yet, most people outside of New Jersey and even many in the Garden State don't see it that way.

No doubt, the Democrats led by Senator Barbara Buono will work hard to get out the message that the effect of Christie's policies are not much different than those of some of the more extreme GOP governors like Scott Walker, Rick Scott, and Rick Snyder. And if Christie is re-elected, it will embolden him to move even closer to a dictatorship of the wealthy.

Christie is running a national campaign for the New Jersey governorship. This is exemplified by his fundraiser with Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and his cozying up to the Koch Brothers and their billions of dollars of stealth campaign contributions.

No Democratic candidate would be able to match the GOP's Citizens United juggernaut of campaign dollars. Environmental and gay rights groups can't match the fortunes of the polluters and the education/military/insurance industrial complex.

Because a significant portion of Christie's campaign dollars are coming from outside the state, it's important to educate America about Chris Christie. The nation needs to know the truth about his infrastructure blunders, his anti-equality stance, his dealings with his cronies, his dubious budget manipulations, and his politicizing just about everything from the Supreme Court to the Rutgers Board of Trustees.

We can't stop the flow of right-wing dollars into the Christie campaign, but by taking Senator Buono's message nationwide, we can help to work to mitigate the Christie dollar advantage. Talk to your out-of-state friends about the truth about our governor. Make them understand that this election is not just about New Jersey, but it's for the future of our kids, minorities, and women's rights. Having them send a few bucks to Buono's campaign would be nice, but educating them about the real Chris Christie is essential.

One Million Moms for Gun Control Rally in Jersey City

January 26 was a freezing cold day, but that didn't stop about 200 citizens from gathering in Lincoln Park in Jersey City to hear elected officials and others talk about sensible gun laws.

Not a single speaker spoke about repealing the Second Amendment.

Not a single speaker proposed taking guns away from responsible citizens.

Instead, they spoke about the children of Newtown and countless other tragedies that have been precipitated by this nation’s obsession with guns.

It took a generation to change the tobacco culture in America. It may take longer to change the faux machismo worship of killing machines. But we have to start some time. That time is now.

Below are links to the videos of remarks from the speakers at the Jersey City Rally.

Introductory Remarks - Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy

Mandi Perlmutter of One Million Moms 4 Gun Control

Former Governor Jim Florio

Congressman Frank Pallone

Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver

Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg

Senator Barbara Buono

Senator Sandra Cunningham

Senator Bob Gordon

Senator Ray Lesniak

Assemblyman Joe Cryan

Assemblywoman Angelica Jimenez

Assemblyman Charles Mainor

Assemblyman Jason O'Donnell

Assemblywoman Connie Wagner

Where Do We Draw The Line?

According to the gun fanatics, the Second Amendment gives Americans unfettered access to assault weapons.

Why draw the line there?

Can we extend their rationale to say that the Second Amendment gives Americans the right to own bazookas? How about surface-to-air missiles? If someone is carrying a surface-to-air missile and launcher in the back of their pickup truck near an airport, do the gun fanatics claim he shouldn't be arrested?

Why draw the line there?

By their logic, any American should be able to own a Howitzer to launch tactical nuclear weapons.

This exercise in absurdity shows that the Founders never intended for Americans to own weapons of mass destruction like automatic weapons with large clips.

I wonder why the Second Amendment absolutists don’t attack restrictions on the First Amendment. If they are to be consistent, they should lobby for the repeal of libel laws. After all, those laws inhibit “free speech.”

The Constitution is a living document. Hopefully, our legislators and courts apply a common sense filter to extrapolate 18^th Century intent into 21^st Century reality. Is expecting reality from the gun fanatics achievable?

Is the NRA a Terrorist Organization?

In exploring the answer to this question, one must separate the NRA leadership from its members. I suspect that many NRA members are sane, law-abiding citizens who register their guns and do not fire them in fits of anger. But an organization reflects the position of its leadership, so when I refer to the NRA, I’m talking about its leaders and sponsors  –  the gun manufacturers.

One definition of terrorism is “the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, especially for political purposes.”

By this definition, the NRA is not a terrorist organization. The organization itself does not use violence to achieve their goals. Rather, they leverage the killings that their policies abet to lobby for unrestricted access and unbridled proliferation of guns. And I suspect that not all of the hundreds of killers that we read about all too often are members of the NRA.

The goal of terrorists is to instill fear in the general population. And the reaction to that fear is more police presence, more intrusion into the daily routine of life.

Al-Qaida, the preeminent terrorist organization of our time, has forced us to spend billions of dollars on transportation security, establish a multi-billion dollar Cabinet department, and has eroded our freedoms due to government surveillance and intrusion. Al-Qaida has succeeded in instilling fear and achieving their political goals.

While the NRA’s political goals are to elect right-wing anti-gun-safety politicians, they also have a political agenda. More significantly, their stated goal, to establish a TSA-like atmosphere in schools plays off their agenda of unrestricted access to guns and other lethal weapons. And schools are just a start. If we place armed guards in schools, what about malls, churches, parks, and other places where children and adults congregate?  In the end, if the nation adopts the NRA agenda, the result is no different than that which Al-Qaida has already accomplished, only on a much larger scale.

So by strict definition, the NRA is not a terrorist organization and Al-Qaida is. The difference is that the policies of the NRA have resulted in more dead Americans than Al-Qaida could achieve in its wildest dreams.

The Gun Nuts are Wrong. But Not for the Reason You Think

First of all, if I intentionally use an inflammatory term like “gun nut”, you need to understand why. In my mind, there are differences between gun nuts and responsible gun owners.

Responsible gun owners keep their weapons locked up when they are not in use. 

Responsible gun owners practice safety first.

Responsible gun owners own their guns because either they feel they need a gun to defend their homes against intruders, or they are responsible hunters, or they are responsible collectors.

Responsible gun owners don’t normally own automatic weapons. If they are collectors and desire to own these killing machines, they have the firing mechanism welded shut so the weapon can never be used to shoot.

Responsible gun owners don’t purchase “cop-killer” ammunition.

Responsible gun owners register their guns with authorities.

Responsible gun owners understand that background checks are necessary to keep guns away from those who would use them irresponsibly.

So here, I’m not talking about responsible gun owners, but the gun nuts. I’m talking about the gun zealots who are afraid that the government is going to take away their weapons, or that the United Nations is going to somehow usurp the Constitution. I’m talking about the nuts who contend that the murders in Connecticut, Blacksburg, Columbine, and elsewhere are the fault of gays, Jews, blacks, liberals, Mayans, abortion doctors, or gun-control advocates.

It’s difficult to put myself in the mind of these gun nuts, but it seems that their main argument is that they need their killing machines in vast quantity and unparalleled lethality to defend themselves against the government. They seem to contend that someday the black helicopters of the “guv’mint” will descend on their homes to take away their freedoms.

Well, gun nuts, I have news for you. The process of the government usurping our freedoms has started, and your guns are impotent. Your freedoms are already being eroded, and your assault weapons are powerless.

Guns cause harm to physical bodies. But the erosion of our freedoms is not corporal, it’s mostly cyberial. (OK, so cyberial is not a word. But I can invent words, can’t I? It’s an adjective meaning “pertaining to cyberspace.”)

Unless you’re a prisoner in Guantánamo, the government is not going to lock you up for your thoughts. But it is eroding your freedoms with the invasion of your privacy through cyberspace.

With the cooperation of the telecommunications oligarchy, the government has complete records on your phone calls and internet activity. Since the so-called “Patriot Act”, the government has access to your financial data, travel activity, and God knows what else. Much of this without a warrant.  Want to open a bank account? You need to fill out Patriot Act paperwork. If you buy e-books or visit a public library, I would not be surprised if your reading habits are being monitored. What we know is just the tip of the iceberg. It’s what we don’t know about government intrusion that’s worrisome. And your guns are powerless in today’s information-centric world.

So to those who believe that the government is going to take away your guns, chill out.  If you’re a responsible gun owner or just a patriotic American, instead of sending your money to the NRA, send it to the ACLU, where it will do some good.