Gun Insanity

It has been 243 days since Newtown. In that time, 7,199 people have been killed by gunshot. That isn’t just the number who have been shot, it is the number that have been shot and killed. It works out to 30 (29.6) people per day. Per day! At that rate, my school could be wiped out in just under 10 days. And the NRA sees nothing alarming about that. They, in fact, want to make more guns available, make more “concealed carry” laws, make it mandatory for every place to allow guns in their place of business. The NRA, as I have said before, is a domestic terrorist group.

I started reading the NYTimes Joe Nocera blog, with his Gun Tracker column months ago. I was overwhelmed by the sheer number of gun-involved crimes listed there.  By how widespread they were ~ there are very few states that haven't appeared in that column. And surprised to see how few of these incidents were either drugs or gangs related. And horrified by the number of children, 14 and under, who were shot and/or killed, often by another child, often under the noses of adults. (and positively incensed that all too often, the parents who left a loaded gun available to their children are not legally held responsible. Yes, I know that the loss of a child is a horrible event, but that isn't any kind of excuse for not holding that negligent parent responsible.)

More than 7,000 people have died since last December, by gun. Thousands more have been wounded, had their lives destroyed by a bullit.  Handguns have no place in the home. I don't want to take rifles and shotguns away from farmers and ranchers, or hunters. I want handgun ownership severely limited. I don't care what the NRA says (we do not negociate with terrorists, remember?)

If guns were banned, there would be no drive-by shootings. Children wouldn't be able to pick up a gun carelessly left in the open and shoot themselves, their siblings, or their friends. Women would be safer from spousal abuse, and some men, too. (Women are the majority of who gets abused, and so shot, but some men are on the receiving end of that as well.)

If America was to begin teaching common sense about guns, and not this hysterical, "my constitutional right" nonsense, eventually, anyone being shot and killed would be a rare event.  As it should be.

I'm Still Alive and still just as mad about what's going on

It's been months since I posted anything on this blog. Not because there was nothing to post about. I've just been really, really busy, with work and health issues. I'm just now recovering from a really serious pneumonia/sepsis/hypoxemia/anemia bout that very nearly killed me. (Don't wait so long to see a doctor!)

At the end of May, I came across this incredibly stupid comment:

State Senator Glenn Grothman defended Scott Walker's repeal of pay equity protections by explaining to reporters that women aren't paid the same as men for the same work because "money is more important to men." Of course it is. I'm a single woman, self-supporting. Of course, I don't care about money that much. Just that it means the difference between being self-supporting and being on the dole.

There seems to be an entire generation of old white men who feel free to spout the ugliest, most misogynistic nonsense about women whenever they feel like it. Betty Friedan never got the same freedom when she was spouting nonsense about men. She was constantly attacked, viciously attacked, both by men and by the women who will never understand that women are not inherently inferior to men.

So we have Congressional hearings on contraception, to which no women are allowed. Not as members of the committee, not as witnesses to the committee. We have the Texas governor saying that he just can't understand why that woman who fillibustered his pet abortion bill didn't learn from her own experience as a teenage unmarried mother. The governor who crows about executing more people than any other state, who insists that every life is important. Yeah, right.

We have old (and middle-aged, and even some young) white men, in state houses around the country, who are trying their best to take away as many rights from women as they can sneak past their constituents.

And the really sad thing about this is, it is almost universally Republican men who say these things. Sad, because the demise of a a formerly great party is sad. Really sad, because the Republican Party of the past was a much better party than it has devolved into. (Also, sad that a spokesman for Republicans could seriously say that the Party would be more appealing if they just didn't say offensive things. Duh.)

My father was a life-long Republican. I'm glad he didn't live long enough to see what that party has become. He would be a Democrat, today. Possibly an independent. Just definitely not a Republican. I don't know anyone, these days, who identifies as Republican, or who is thinking of joining the Republican Party.

And here's the thing that I really, really just don't get. The Republicans (and all thier subgroups) insist on smaller government, insist that there are too many regulations, too many rules, too much intrusion into the personal lives of our citizens. And it is the Republicans, who nearly every day, extend themselves to regulate a woman's body. Regulations on men are bad, but are good for women? How antiquated is that mindset? How seriously harmful is that mindset? Do they really think that way? Or do they just not think at all, simply spew out their bile and their hatred of women without considering it at all? And what about Republican women? Do they agree? Do they indulge in such self-lothing that they can merrily go along with depriving women of their basic rights, without batting an eye? Or are they so brainwashed by the men in their lives that they don't dare speak up?

 

Republicans need a wake up call. They are speeding into extinction, and there doesn't seem to be anyone awake at the wheel to stop them, or turn them aside. Maybe that's for the best, but it's still sad.

I don't really have much to say. I'm having trouble thinking up a coherent and polite way to express the anger and outrage I feel over the way this Congress is acting, the way the Republican party is acting, even the way my president is acting.

I mean, seriously, Paul Ryan's *new* budget? What's new in that outline to destroy the social safety net and French kiss the wealthy? I guess the Republican House members don't remember that Ryan's budget, along with Ryan, were soundly defeated in the last election. You know, that one we had back in November, 2012? In fact, the House republicans seem to have completely forgotten that election. And they seem to be heavily into ignoring all the public polling ~ at least all the polling not designed and paid for by them ~ that shows they are clearly out of step with the rest of the country.

And Harry Reid, bless his heart, just can't believe the Repubs would fillibuster anyone, since he believed them back when he could have gotten rid of the fillibuster, but the Repubs promised to behave nicely and not use it. Of course we should believe them, right? And Harry, again, deciding not to try to pass an assault weapons ban, because he wanted only the one he thought could pass. Really?

And Obama? Even though trashing Social Security isn't in the Ryan budget, Obama is promising to put it on the chopping block anyway. Huh? I'm not a mathematical genius, but I do understand that the chained CPI he's offering hurts retirees, a lot. (I am not a retiree, btw, but I will be in the next 5 or 6 years.) It would be lovely if just once, Obama's rhetoric and Obama's actions matched.

That's it. All I can say right now without ranting and spewing ugly language and thoughts.

On Sandy Hook

 

 

I was devastated to learn Friday that yet another massacre had happened, this time at an elementary school in Connecticut. I teach in an elementary school in SoCal, so this tragedy had a special intensity for me.

 

 

Of course, my district instituted new policies today. All the gates are locked shortly after school begins, now. Classroom doors must be locked at all times (but then our principal told us we could leave our doors open, as long as they were locked. ??). To get back on campus from lunch, we now have to open a gate ourselves, instead of using one door in the cafeteria. (You can't unlock, or lock, our padlocked gates without using two hands, so lunches have to be put on the ground to unlock it, picked up and brought inside to be put down again, to lock the gate up.)

 

 

While I am horrified at what happened at Sandy Hook, I don't care much for the knee-jerk reaction of my district. Schools in CA are much more open. My school has large windows on one side of every classroom, which reach from the ceiling to about 3 feet above ground. One row of our classrooms face a street, separated by a chainlink fence about 10 feet away. (Anybody could walk up to that fence and start shooting, and those classrooms would be under fire.)

 

These fences aren't tall enough to prevent a determined person from simply jumping over them to gain access. My school backs up to a housing project, and my classroom is in the row that exposes one wall to that project. (The windows on that side of my room are up high on the wall.) There is no part of my classroom that could be used to shelter kids if a crazed gunman was wandering the halls in search of innocent victims to kill. It's just a big square, no corners, nothing to hide behind or under.  I've never felt unsafe in my classroom, nor have any other teachers at my school, and until today, neither did my students.

 

America is a little like my district. After a tragedy like this, at the same time we're sifting through the gunman's past so we can thoroghly blame him, people start spouting off about what we can do to keep our kids safe. So now we hear that schools should have armed police officers on campus. Some states are suggesting that the staff of the schools should be armed.  Great. Let's put up chainlink fences all around the school, and hire armed guards to patrol the grounds.

 

When did schools become prisons? When did I sign up for guard duty? Parents have to check in to the office, sign a document, and wear a badge? At least they can see their "inmate" without a glass wall between them.

 

The solution to the increasingly violent world we live in isn't in imprisoning people for their own protection. It's in stepped-up mental health programs. It's in much tighter regulations on guns. It's in having the states supply the feds with their lists of mentally unstable people, so they can update the database that gun merchants use in background checks. It's in mandating that every single gun sold has to have had its purchaser undergo a background check, and a mandatory waiting period of at least 48 hours. It's in the absolute and complete ban on assault weapons and semi-automatic guns with bulk loaders.  It's in all of us, every American, finally realizing that we don't have an absolute right to own a gun, but we do have an absolute right to life and liberty.

 

It's in the NRA, which I consider a terrorist organization, backing off of its ridiculous stand on guns. More guns in more hands don't make us a polite society. It makes us a fearful society. A society that no longer feels safe enough to voice an unpopular opinion, no longer safe to disagree with someone. That's not polite. That's oppression.

 

And for that tired old saw that NRA members spout ~ Guns don't kill people, people do ~ well, think about this. Just a few hours before this young man, Lanza, burst into a school and killed 20 first graders and 6 adult staff members, another young man, Chinese, burst into a school in China and attacked 22 students. Not one of those students died, however. Their attacker didn't have a gun. He had a knife.

 



I am just so tired of the business world bashing unions. The latest, Hostess, is blaming its union for its decision to file bankruptcy and close down.  What Hostess failed to say, however, is that even as it was readying the bankruptcy filing, it boosted the CEO and other executives salaries an amazing amount.

This is from Nation Of Change, at the following address:

http://www.nationofchange.org/hostess-blames-union-bankruptcy-after-tripling-ceo-s-pay-1353255416

"At the time, creditors warned that the decision signaled an attempt to “sidestep” bankruptcy rules, potentially as a means for trying to keep the executive at a failing company. The Confectionery, Tobacco Workers & Grain Millers International Union pointed this out in their written reaction to the news that the business is closing:

BCTGM members are well aware that as the company was preparing to file for bankruptcy earlier this year, the then CEO of Hostess was awarded a 300 percent raise (from approximately $750,000 to $2,550,000) and at least nine other top executives of the company received massive pay raises. One such executive received a pay increase from $500,000 to $900,000 and another received one taking his salary from $375,000 to $656,256."

I'm sorry, but crying poverty while spending millions on a handful of executives just doesn't fly.

Unions are responsible for some of the best improvements in a worker's life. A 40-hour week? Thank a union. Sick time? Thank a union. Bloated CEO salaries? Thank (or not) a corporation. Lavish salries for top executives? Thank (or not) a corporation.

Without a union, you get places like Walmart. There, horrible working conditions have led to worker strikes, including the ones planned for next Friday, Black Friday. No healthcare, very small wages, working hours kept deliberately low, and shifting from week to week, working conditions unsafe at any time. And how has Walmart responded? Retaliation for any worker speaking out. The Walmart family (The Waltons) are multibillionaires. And it's the low-paid workers who have made them so wealthy. Walmart is such a bully that the suppliers to them adopt the same attitude towards their workers, just to meet Walmart's demands.

An attack on unions is an attack on the middle class. As union membership dwindles, so do wages and benefits. Companies place unreasonable demands on their employees, and the employees have no right to say no that doesn't include them losing their jobs.

I am not saying that unions are 100% good. They aren't. And yes, some unions have built themselves into such a power that they can bargain for, and receive, incredible benefits and wages for their workers. But the companies play a part in that, as well. They acquiesce. Strikes that don't find popular support fail. 

And really, how can a company that pays its executives exhorbitant salaries, even when they don't do a good job, say to its workers, who do a great job, that they can't pay them  a living wage? Don't blame the unions for bankruptcies. Blame corporate greed.

What is Wrong with Arkansas?

I read this earlier tonight, and was literally speechless for a bit. How is it possible that this man could find support, of any kind, in America, much less Arkansas? This is what I read:

"A candidate for the Arkansas legislature, Charlie Fuqua, says that children who don't demonstrate "respect for parents" should be put to death, the Arkansas Times reports. Fuqua is a former member of the Arkansas legislature and has received support from the Arkansas Republican Party and two sitting members of Congress.

Here's the key passage from Fuqua's 2012 book, "God's Law: The Only Political Solution":

The maintenance of civil order in society rests on the foundation of family discipline. Therefore, a child who disrespects his parents must be permanently removed from society in a way that gives an example to all other children of the importance of respect for parents. The death penalty for rebellious children is not something to be taken lightly. The guidelines for administering the death penalty to rebellious children are given in Deut 21:18-21."

And this man is running for public office? Not for the leader of a fundamentalist (loony) cult? When did America decide to accept murderous fanatics as fit for public office? For that matter, when did we decide to accept pathological liars as fit for public office? What ever happened to honor? Truth? Dignity?

More Insanity

I read an article by Richard (RJ) Eskow yesterday that I found in a newsletter I get. It was entitled "Hey, Sarah Palin! Some Marxists Want a Word With You". This may be the first time I've actually written the words "Sarah Palin". As a rule, I don't see/hear/read anything by or about that woman. I would say she's a disgrace to women, except that she is a disgrace to humanity.

 

In the article, Eskow ridicules Palin for her statements re Elizabeth Warren speaking at the Democratic Convention, stating that she's "almost confessed to her Marxist views". Eskow takes issue with Palin's use of the word "Marxist", as well as her locution, calling the verbal equivalent of an Escher drawing. (And I so agree with that!)

 

Eskow then offers her some other quotations from people she would have to call Marxist based on her criteria ~ people like Lincoln, Eisenhower, Bush I. One I really liked came from Eisenhower, who I have to admit is not a President I every really cared for. Except for this:

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.Should any political party attempt to abolish social security unemployment insurance and eliminate labor laws and farm programs you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group of course that believes you can do these things. Among them are a few other Texas oil millionaires and an occasional politician or business man from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid

Right on, Ike! Sadly, of course, their number is no longer negligible, but yes, yes, they are still stupid.

And another from Ike:

In most communities it is illegal to cry "fire" in a crowded assembly. Should it not be considered serious international misconduct to manufacture a general war scare in an effort to achieve local political aims? (Iran, anyone?)

I loved the fact that Eisenhower refused to lower the tax on the 2%ers. It was at 92% during his administration, and he felt the country needed the money, so he wouldn't lower that rate more than one point, to 91%. And insited that corporate taxes stay at 52%.. And they complain today about an effective rate of 13% being way too high? Oh, and he expanced the Social Security ranks by about 10 million people.

And from Lincoln:

Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.


"job creators"?

Lincoln also enacted the first Federal Income Tax, which was, effectively, a tax on the wealthy. It started at $600 dollars, which most people didn't earn in those days, at 3%, rising to 5% for those who made more than $10,000. Progressive taxes from Lincoln? Heh.

He goes on to state that there are only two explanations for the disconnect between Palin's view of Marxism and the actions and statements actually made by fellow Republicans. (I can think of a third ~ Palin has no clue what other Republicans, living or dead, have said or done. Reading comprehension is not one of her strong points.) So, Eskow says, "Either the Republican Party's greatest heroes were all closet Communists - or even the most right-leaning among them were not completely irrational human beings." (Italics are his)


 

I am just sick to death of these completely irrational human beings that currently inhabit the Republican party. To me, it's treasonous to sign a document pledging to uphold a policy of an individual who has never even held elective office. Congresspeople are sworn to uphold the Consitution, not Grover Norquist. It's at least fraud.



The duty of a congressperson is to represent the interests and concerns of the people who elected him/her. It is not to impose their own half-baked ideas on everyone, regardless of whether they're one of his constituents or not. What part of "representative" do these cretins not understand? And Mitch McConnell? You were sworn to uphold the Constitution, too. What part of "My goal for this Congress is to make sure that Obama is a one-term president" relates to that, at all? And did your constituency actually elect you to blockade a presidency? Did they elect you to try to torpedo each and every act that would better their lives, ease the rapid descent into poverty? I sincerely doubt that. Shame on all of you!

(Eskow's article can be found in the Nation of Change newsletter, but I can't find a way to link it here. Sorry.)