Donald Trump experiencing cognitive decline. Check the reports about his May 31 2024 press conference

Echo opinion by Hafiz Rashid published by Yahoo❗ News

GUILTY❗

This could very well be another sign of cognitive decline from the Republican presidential nominee, exacerbated by possibly the worst news he’s ever received. Last week, at a Bronx rally, he bragged about being able to put on his pants, and two weeks ago, he seemed to freeze while speaking at the NRA’s annual convention. 

Trump's rant on Friday May 31, 2024, included an attack on immigrants who speak incomprehensible languages, a nod to similar bizarre remarks he made at the southern U.S. border in February.

If Trump hadn’t also explained why he didn’t testify at this trial, anyone watching his remarks would have realized why themselves.Trump Loses It Like Never Before in Wildly Incoherent Press Conference by Hafiz Rashid.

At a press conference on Friday May 31, 2024, Donald Trump ranted and raved about his displeasure at being found guilty of 34 felony charges in his hush-money trial.

Standing in front of a line of flags at Trump Tower in New York,  (thankfully, none of those Trumpzi made for TV flags was furled upside down❗) Trump took aim at Michael Cohen, Judge Juan Merchan, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, Democrats, and just about anyone who he thinks wronged him, violating his gag order in the process. But his biggest target might have been the English language.

"Trump really needs a teleprompter. He's not coherent. I dare you to try to make sense of this", wrote Aaron Ruper on X/ (formerly Twitter)

At times, his word salad phrases were hard to follow, as the first convicted felon former president went off on tangents with sentences with no clear end.

In one bizarre sentence, he demonstrated a profound misunderstanding about the word “literally” by claiming witnesses “for our side” were “literally crucified by this man who looks like an angel, but he’s really a devil,” referring to Judge Juan Merchan.

This could very well be another sign of cognitive decline from the Republican presidential nominee, exacerbated by possibly the worst news he’s ever received. Last week, at a Bronx rally, he bragged about being able to put on his pants, and two weeks ago, he seemed to freeze while speaking at the NRA’s annual convention. 

In fact, Trump's rant on Friday included an attack on immigrants who speak incomprehensible languages, a nod to similar bizarre remarks he made at the southern U.S. border in February.

If Trump hadn’t also explained why he didn’t testify at this trial, anyone watching his remarks would have realized why (his attorney's advised against his testimony) we can see his bizarre behavior for ourselves.

Voters must remove Congressional representatives who refuse to end gun violence

Weapons of War: 

Three echo opinion letters published in The News&Observer in Raleigh, North Carolina.

How many more innocent men, women and children must die because a certain group of people are fixated on having unlimited access to assault weapons? 

Granted, it is partially a mental health issue. However, those who commit mass murders would have a much more difficult time committing these atrocities without unlimited availability of weapons of war. Congress is to blame for the continuation of this easy access to assault weapons. One day of congressional action could potentially save thousands of lives. Our votes to oust supposed “representatives of the people “ could stimulate action. We are supposedly a country that is envied across the world. Let’s start acting like it. Stop the killing of innocent people. 

From Mel Sage, in Garner, North Carolina

A memorial for Joshua Barrick on display Monday, April 10, 2023 at Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Louisville, Ky. Barrick, a senior vice president at Old National Bank in Louisville, was one of five people killed Monday in a mass shooting at the bank. It was the 146th mass shooting in the U.S. this year. CLAIRE GALOFARO AP

Stand up against the National Rifle Association- Dear Editor,

I appreciate the work Senator Thom Tillis has done to get the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act passed, but much more can be done. As the father of two students and the husband of a teacher, I worry about my family’s safety every day. Along with the BSCA, there must be gun reform — universal background checks, red flag laws, outlawing weapons of war in civilian hands.

As my representative, I expect Tillis to do what he knows is right and help stop the senseless slaughter of our innocent children, teachers and civilians. I do not believe the senator, one of the top 5 recipients of NRA donations, can represent the needs of his constituents while still accepting NRA money. It’s an inherent conflict of interest that even the uneducated can understand. 

From Michael P. Trew, Boone 

SEN. TED BUDD In a letter, I urged Sen. Ted Budd to support an assault weapons ban. He said such a ban is overly broad. Please, senator, propose something that will keep our citizens, particularly our children, safe. Your silence is deafening. 

From Janice Woychik, Chapel Hill

Calling Senator Ted Cruz is a waste of time

Letter: Calling Ted Cruz: "Now, if I were a gun lobbyist giving Ted over $400,000 in contributions, Ted would be more receptive...."

Opinion letter echo published in the Longview News-Journal, a newspaper published in Longview, Texas.

Rafael Edward Cruz was born on December 22, 1970, at Foothills Medical Centre in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, to Eleanor Elizabeth (née Darragh) Wilson and Rafael Cruz. Rafael Bienvenido Cruz y Díaz (born March 22, 1939) is a Cuban-American Protestant preacher and the father of Texas U.S. Senator Ted Cruz. Donald Trump referred to Cruz as a “Canadian anchor baby”, at a town hall rally in New Hampshire.

When I have called Ted Cruz’s D.C. office to leave a comment, this is what I experienced over several months.

The Ted Cruz Goldman Sachs Loan, Explained

First you hear Senator Cruz in his most smarmiest voice saying what an honor and privilege it was to serve the great state of Texas, and he looked forward to hearing thoughts and concerns about issues.

Then press 1 to leave a comment. After listening to Ted again, the message goes to a box that can’t accept any more messages. If it happened once, I would chalk it up to a temporary anomaly, but it occurred over several months. So it occurred to me that maybe Sen. Cruz is not interested so much in my thoughts and concerns.

Now, of course, if I were a gun lobbyist, giving Ted over $400,000 in contributions, Ted would be more receptive, I assume. (National Rifle Association- NRA, and gun rights groups. are best friends with Ted Cruz!)

Actually, Sen. Cruz received that much, which was the largest amount for any Congress person from the gun lobby. 

Sadly, the Cruz fake solution to the school shooting in Uvalde Texas was to hire more police.

It seems 19 officers weren’t enough. 

And Sen. Cruz seems equally receptive to the military industrial complex lobby, with support for a continuous increase in Pentagon spending. 

But about my concerns, Cruz is obviously not so much interested. 

Will Rogers: “Politics has got so expensive that it takes lots of money to even get beat with nowadays.” DT #1538, June 28, 1931.

—From Jerry King, in Longview, Texas 

Interfaith united response protesting the National Rifle Association in Houston

Echo report published in Religion News Network by Monique Parsons:

Texans plan interfaith protest at Friday’s May 27, 2022, National Rifle Association #NRA convention in Houston. 

This protest, the organizers said, is meant to send a message to politicians who receive donations and support from the gun rights group.

A woman kneels as she pays her respects in front of crosses with the names of children killed outside of the Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas Thursday, May 26, 2022. Law enforcement authorities faced questions and criticism Thursday over how much time elapsed before they stormed the Texas elementary school classroom and put a stop to the rampage by a gunman who killed 19 children and two teachers. (AP Photo/Dario Lopez-Mills)

(Interfaith America) — Outraged by the massacre of 19 children and two teachers (and responsible for Joe Garcia's grief stricken heart attack death- husband of Robb teacher Irma Garcia)  inside a school in Uvalde, Texas, on Tuesday (May 24), organizers of an interfaith protest for stricter gun laws will gather outside of a Houston convention center on Friday where the National Rifle Association is holding its annual meeting.

“Civil and human rights happen when you have interfaith leaders that come together,” the Rev. Teresa Kim Pecinovsky of Houston said. “We have political power too.”

Pecinovsky, is a hospice chaplain and former elementary school teacher.

Pecinovsky, is a hospice chaplain and children’s book author who is affiliated with the Disciples of Christ denomination, was looking at social media Monday afternoon when news of the killings began filling her feed. She messaged Megan Dosher Hansen, a social media contact who lived nearby, asking if she knew of any faith groups gathering at the NRA meeting.

“I reached out to her and said, ‘Why don’t we co-organize an interfaith protest?’ And she said, ‘All right, I’m on board.’”

Hansen, an elder in the Presbyterian Church USA, created a registration page for the interfaith protest, which is planned for 1 p.m. Central Time Friday outside the George R. Brown Convention Center. Among the scheduled speakers are former President Donald Trump, Texas Governor Greg Abbott  (who has since changed his mind after this article was published) and Senator Ted Cruz, South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem as well as NRA officials.

By Thursday morning, some 400 people had signed up and word was spreading on social media. The two began a phone campaign as well, reaching out to Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Catholics, and members of other Protestant denominations. “We’ll gather and pray together and do a silent march through the convention center and come back out and recognize the victims,” Hansen said.

Texas gun laws are among the least strict in the nation; a law that went into effect September 1 allows people to carry handguns in most public places without permits or special training.

The protest is planned outside the NRA convention, the organizers said, to send a message to politicians who receive donations and support from the gun rights group. The NRA “used to be an organization that is for hunters, and that’s a sport that doesn’t require AR-15s,” Hansen said. “We just see so much tragedy that occurs at the end of a gun.”

Pecinovsky said her first reaction to the Uvalde massacre was shock, rage and grief. “I have preschool age children and I was in high school when Columbine happened. I remember it very clearly. The teenagers who survived that are now parents and have their own school age children. It has not stopped since.”

Gun violence is causing thousands of preventable American deaths.

Her voice broke as she described seeing images of the children and their parents, who were celebrating their achievements on the last day of the school year. As a former hospital chaplain, she witnessed the anguish of parents who have lost young children to violence. While it has been an honor to be present for grieving families and hospital staff, “You will never forget the images of dead children, and you will never forget the sound of their wailing mothers.”

“Most of us become anesthetized to the amount of murder that happens in our communities and our schools,” she said. “These are not other people’s children. These are our children.”

This article first appeared on Interfaith America.

Healing gun violence

"Violence is an interconnected web that has totally entangled our nation." Fr. Bob Layne.

Mass shootings in the USA in 2021: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/mass-shootings-u-s-2021-n1264354

Bob Layne: Why do we keep killing each other? Opinion published in the Kansas newspaper The Hutchinson News. Fr. Bob Layne is a retired Episcopal priest in McPherson.

In just one month in 2021, the US has suffered through tragedies in Atlanta, Boulder, Virginia Beach, Indianapolis and other gun murderers.

From whence comes such horrible violence? Why do we keep killing each other? The NRA and the ongoing gun lobby provides the means. The gun culture, so vehemently defended by the NRA, ensures that any would-be murderer has readily available ample means to do the killing. 

Handguns and semi-automatic weapons are nothing but anti-personnel weapons. They are guns designed to kill people. There is nothing “sporting” about them.

Yet, still, the (IMO domestic terrorist group) NRA protects the right and the readiness for any gunslinger to obtain one, including deadly automatic weapons. If violence is the message of the media, the means to do that violence is ensured by well-funded groups, like the National Rifle Association.

Enough is enough!  #EndGunViolence

Unfortunately, the previous Trumpzi national leadership modeled the message. A former guy president sought to solve the evil of terrorism by employing preemptive violence. He chose war.

Many continue to violently die. Obviously, seeking vengeance by returning violence for violence has not worked. And even today, our political leaders are more intent upon destroying the “other” political party than doing the work of the nation. In an important national debate, the message is “destroy the other guy”.

So the message is heard, the means are there, and the violence, physical or verbal, is used. Violence is an interconnected web that has totally entangled our nation.

How can we break free?

Perhaps we might measure a male no longer by his machismo power to conquer and control, but by his strength of character, his respect for all, and his willingness to risk loving another.  Moreover, perhaps we might begin measuring a woman no longer by her measurements and allure, but by her willingness to grow her family, her strength in bringing up those around her and her care for all hurting humanity.

Such a shift in emphasis would certainly be a change in humanity's infrastructure. Or more simply, we might begin to live the injunction given so long ago; we might just begin to love one another. I think it is still worth a try!

The seedbed of all this violence is a constant message that permeates American life: “violence solves problems”. From the Saturday cartoons to cheering fans of Ultimate Fighting in cages, through movies and television shows, we celebrate, sensationalize, and reward acts of violence as the means to solve all our troubles.

The message declares if one’s aims are thwarted, then punish or destroy that which stands in the way.

The problem will be solved. And that is exactly what so many of our vulnerable, impressionable, and immature fellow humans do. They solve their problems by removing the perceived hindrance. 

Such a shift in emphasis would certainly be a change in humanity's infrastructure. Or, more simply, we might begin to live the injunction given so long ago; we might just begin to love one another. I think it is still worth a try!

Evil semi-automatic rifles are the choice for mass murderers

Opinion letter echo published in the Shreveport Times newspaper in Louisiana.

How many more mass murders must we have until the U.S. Congress takes the required steps to subdue this matter. Before we get started, I’m not advocating banning all guns. I have some myself.

It is LONG past time to ban semi-automatic AR style rifles and BIG magazines and eliminate background check loopholes.

Face it, ARs are the choice of mass murderers (and right-wing nut cases, so called militias -- the biggest domestic terrorism threat.). (Maine Writer- IMO, trained military notwithstanding, the private purchase of an AR, regardless of what the reason, is an intentionality to consider murder.)

It is time for our gutless politicians to ban ARs, big magazines and close the loopholes.

The public, even Republicans, backs all. Such bans have never been found to be unconstitutional. The only thing blocking these reasonable steps is the lack of courage in Congress.

George W. Bush didn’t extend the Bill Clinton ban on them for political reasons in 2004. Clinton's 1994 ban passed in the Senate with a vote of 95-4 and the House by 235-195.

AR style rifles should never been allowed in the first place. A buyback program, similar to Australia's, should also be enacted for them.

Congressmen with a high NRA (National Rifle Association) rating should be thrown out of office. Why? – Not only are they for keeping AR style rifles in the hands general public but supported the NRA’s advocacy of silencers and bump stocks (converts ARs to Tommy guns) for the general public.

From Robert F. Martina, Shreveport Louisiana

Donald Trump is a Fredo - an echo opinion

TRUMP- "Fredo": I looked it up in the Urban Dictionary. 

 "Fredo" means they are just a dumb ass loser like the Godfather movie character.  Opinion letter published in the Boise, Idaho Statesman newspaper:

Donald Trump surrogate!

It’s been tough to take, at times impossible. This fluke president, this Electoral College president, with his ignorance of governmental functioning, his bumbling interaction with his own staff, his insulting approach to foreign policy, his absence of solutions to deal with domestic issues, his bizarre behavior concerning racial divides, and his hilarious massive public rallies portraying himself as someone that actually knows what he is doing and talking about on any given subject.

A total fool by any standard, but this elected fool outdid himself with the recent spate of mass killings with military grade assault weapons that murdered and wounded and maimed numerous innocent people, all provided by gun manufacturers in the name of the Holy Second Amendment and Corporate Profits.

And how did the Fool-in-Chief react? Fredo Trump spouted verbal drivel and clichés provided by the NRA (evil National Rifle Association) to feed a waiting America, looking for truthful explanations and positive leadership, thus reaffirming his proud status as the NRA’s highest paid toady. Fredo Trump dances around any meaningful gun control legislation questions like an obedient mouse, after which he flies off to Mar-a-Lago to carry Wayne Lapierre’s golf clubs.


From Tom Yount, Boise, Idaho

Echo opinion published in the Missoulian- NRA and Russia

Opinion letter published in a letter from Corvallis Montana....in the Missoulian news

America is in serious trouble with the continuing shutdown by a "president" who cares not about the people, who was born with a silver spoon, who appears to have conspired with the Russians and Saudi Arabs against our democracy.

The wall issue isn't important to Donald Trump; he didn't even want to go look at the border.

Do we remember that when people in the United States were slaughtered in mass shootings here, there was no mention of any of the many shootings, because of his connection with the NRA? He would say nothing. 

The NRA, which now has members who are Russian oligarchs and even Russian spies.

We have more to fear from this dictatorial president and the overreach of the Russians, Saudis and an organization such as the NRA.

We used to belong to the NRA,because we respected the organization and what they stood for. They are no longer this organization for the American people who have guns and like to hunt; they are supporters of a foreign threat to our democracy and corruption in our country.

Joseph Gervais,
Corvallis, Montana

Echo opinion letter from Pennsylvania ~ protect children from gun violence

Nothing is being done to protect our school children from gun violence!

Stop gun violence!

Donald Trump says he is “with them,” whatever that means.

A letter to the editor published in the Times Leader Newspaper, in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.

The truth is, he and the National Rifle Association support one another. According to the NRA and their members, if everyone carried a gun, the good guys would protect everyone. In fact, it would be the wild west all over again. The people who survived back then were the first to aim and shoot, whether they were saints or sinners.

The NRA has big money and power in Washington DC. 

In fact, the NRA throws support behind politicians that don’t support better or improve gun control. It's sickening, but Donald Trump is right up their distorted alley. He and the National Rifle Association care nothing about our kids, but everything about their own wealth.

If you are a member of the NRA, it is your finger  that are on the trigger, every time an innocent American is gunned down. Maybe God can forgive you, but nobody else should.

Mary E. Hawran, Honesdale Pennsylvania

Donald Trump as "Spanky" ~ Stormy Daniels in action

Echo opinion letter published in the Durango Herald in Colorado: truth telling in the era of Stormy Daniels.

Donald Trump with "Spanky" and his gang can’t tell the truth

Let me introduce you to "Spanky", writes Glen Fleming in Durango.

Stormy Daniels Confirms ~ She Spanked Donald Trump With a Magazine

Stormy Daniels "spanked" Donald Trump (with his permission) before having sex with him.

I think you know him by his real name, and that is Dirty Donald Trump. 

In fact, the name “Spanky” is a nickname that was suggested by the porn star Stormy Daniels, when Trump pulled his pants down and asked her to spank him.

Moreover, there's another name. Indeed, the “Caveman” name comes from the fact that Trump caves into all the special interest groups. 

Trump might brag that he isn't beholden to the National Rifle Association (NRA) and he is going to tighten up gun laws, but he hasn't yet done anything.  Blood will be on Trump's hands if he doesn’t do something soon. 

Unbelievable, but Trump can pardon a convicted felon, Joe Arpaio, in a second, but he won’t do anything about our children being slaughtered by assault weapons.

Trump also acts like a caveman when he bullies and assaults women against their will. How much has he paid out to silence his victims over the past 50 years? My guess is about $20 million; does that ring a bell?

This whole Russian probe would be over in a week if Spanky and his gang would just tell the truth, but that isn’t going to happen with this corrupt despot. Truth has never been spoken in the Trump White House. I sincerely hope, when Spanky is convicted and sentenced to prison for all his crimes, that he won’t pardon himself as the last act of his disgraceful presidency. I wonder if telling the truth would kill Spanky?

Gerry Fleming, Durango, Colorado

Vice President Pence must hear the March for our Lives message

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Victim's Fund

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School is located in Parkland, Florida, in the Miami, Florida metropolitan area. It is a part of the Broward County Public School district.

David Hogg, survivor of the mass shooting at the Marjory Stonman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, on February 14, 2018, who has used his newfound notoriety to promote gun reform, is demanding Vice President Mike Pence to withdraw from a planned speech at an upcoming National Rifle Association (NRA) convention, The Washington Times reported.
In a tweet Sunday, Hogg encouraged others to "Demand Mike Pence cancel his speech to the NRA convention on May 4." Accompanying his post was information about a petition by MoveOn.org asking for signatures that also demanded Pence cancel his NRA speech.

The petition states the vice president's presence at the convention was "a signal to young people organizing historic actions that the NRA's extremist agenda and donations are more valuable to Mike Pence than the lives lost." 

The petition also targets other lawmakers, insisting those who oppose the NRA "must hold all politicians to basic standards of decency."

The May NRA meeting is set to take place in Dallas Texas, and is a gathering of the group's political lobbying arm and not the broader membership, the Times article states.

Donald Trump double speak about gun safety in schools

The Gun-Control Debate After Parkland~ echo from Talk of the Town commentary.

This time feels different. Will things finally change?

Commentary published in The New Yorker by Margaret Talbot

Is this the moment when the politics of guns shifts? 

Tom Bachtell illustration in March 12, 2018, The New Yorker

Since the fatal shooting of seventeen students and staff members on February 14, 2018, at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, in Parkland, Florida, advocates of stricter gun laws have been asking that question, with the wary hopefulness of people who, time and again, have seen such turning points lead nowhere. 

Perhaps, this moment does feel different, largely because the teen-age survivors of the Parkland shooting have commanded the national stage with their raw and righteous indignation.

Last week, they got a real response, though so far it has come more from businesses than from elected representatives. The nationwide sporting-goods chain Dick’s announced that it would no longer carry assault-style rifles or high-capacity magazines, and would not sell guns to people under the age of twenty-one, regardless of local laws. The company’s C.E.O., Edward Stack, told the Times, “We love these kids and their rallying cry ‘Enough is enough.’ It got to us.” By the end of the week, Kroger and Walmart had said that their stores, too, would no longer sell guns to customers younger than twenty-one.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump startled senators and representatives in a subsequent meeting at the White House, by telling them that he wanted to revive a bill mandating universal background checks for gun buyers, chiding them for being frightened of the N.R.A., and saying that, in some situations, he was in favor of taking people’s guns away first, and asking questions later. This was particularly outlandish, given his ties to the N.R.A. and his enthusiasm for arming schoolteachers, not to mention the fact that, a day later, he was back tweeting “Good (Great) meeting tonight at the Oval Office with the NRA!”

But his remarks matter, anyway. The primitive sensors by which Donald Trump divides the world into winners and losers were telling him that for now, at least, the proponents of unfettered gun rights smell like losers. 

According to a Politico/Morning Consult poll conducted last week, eighty-eight per cent of Americans now support universal background checks, eighty-one per cent think that a person should be at least twenty-one in order to buy a gun, seventy per cent endorse a ban on high-capacity magazines, and sixty-eight per cent support a ban on assault-style weapons.

Still, gun-control advocates might not want to place too much hope in any single moment, even this one. They will have to play a long game, made up of many moments. That’s what their opponents have done. Matthew Lacombe, a doctoral candidate at Northwestern University, has been analyzing the N.R.A.’s rhetoric over the decades in editorials and letters to the editor that have appeared in its magazine, The American Rifleman. The organization’s leaders and members used a remarkably consistent series of words to describe their identity: “law-abiding,” “peaceable,” “patriotic,” “freedom-loving,” and “average citizens.” Their opponents were “un-American,” “tyrannical,” “Communist,” and “élitist.” Wayne LaPierre, the president of the N.R.A., echoed this language in a speech last week at the Conservative Political Action Committee, invoking a Democratic Party “infested with saboteurs who don’t believe in capitalism, don’t believe in the Constitution, don’t believe in our freedom, and don’t believe in America as we know it.”The N.R.A. has been honing its message since the nineteen-thirties, when it first became visible on the national scene, fighting federal legislation that mandated an early gun-registration and dealer-licensing system. “By the time the bill emerged from the lawmaking process,” the political scientist Carol Skalnik Leff and the historian Mark Leff write, it had been “gutted—stripped of its handgun clauses and revised in line with the objections of the National Rifle Association.”

The N.R.A.’s advantage isn’t only its ability to donate to candidates or to pay for expensive lobbyists and ads, though that is formidable. It spent four hundred and nineteen million dollars in the 2016 election cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, which reports that “career NRA support for some members of the 115th Congress now reaches well into the seven-figure range.” It spent more than thirty million dollars supporting Trump’s campaign.

But the organization also benefits from its unequivocal rejection of virtually all gun regulations, and from the way that certainty resonates. Most gun owners are not N.R.A. members, but, according to Gallup, people who want lenient gun laws are significantly more likely to be single-issue voters than those who want stricter laws. Gun owners are also more likely than non-gun owners to have contacted a public official about gun policy.

All kinds of people own guns, for all kinds of reasons. Still, some demographic features of gun ownership tend to reinforce a particular political posture. A 2017 Pew Research Center study found that forty-eight per cent of white men own a gun, compared with twenty-five per cent of white women, twenty-five per cent of non-white men, and sixteen per cent of non-white women. Gun owners are far more likely to live in rural areas. Forty-one per cent of whites with a bachelor’s degree are gun owners, versus twenty-six per cent of whites with a more advanced degree. Half of all gun owners say that ownership is essential to their identity.

Fear is a factor: nearly half of male gun owners and almost a third of female owners say that they have a loaded gun “easily accessible to them at all times at home.” According to the Pew study, “There is a significant link between owning a gun for protection and perceptions of whether the world broadly speaking has become more dangerous.” Jennifer Carlson, a sociologist who interviewed male gun owners in Michigan, found that many of them considered firearms crucial to reclaiming a sense of purpose, especially if they were no longer breadwinners.

Security, nostalgia for an era of unchallenged privilege, a sense of beleaguered white masculinity: these are powerful forces. They helped get Donald Trump elected. Advocacy for gun-control laws may never provide the same single-minded identity that politicized gun ownership seems to exert. But this year, again thanks in part to the Parkland students, it’s beginning to take a stronger hold. People who want this moment to mean something should remember that they are the majority, and that they, too, can choose, for however long it takes, to be single-issue voters.

 ♦This article appears in the print edition of the March 12, 2018, issue, with the headline “Gun Shots.”

Florida echo~ National Rifle Association's lobbyist pay for influence

A Pensacola Florida opinion explains how Senator Marco Rubio continues to support the agenda of the National Rifle Association (NRA), even after two mass gun violence slaughters have killed and irreparably harmed his Florida's constituents. (Pulse Nightclub in Orlando FL June 12, 2016, where 50 people were killed and 58 injured; and the February 14, 2018, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School slaughter, where 17 children were killed by a gunman.) This carnage is enabled by lobbyists who buy influence.

Opinion echo from a letter written by Patricia Edmisten and originally published in the Pensacola News Journal

Enough is Enough!

PENSACOLA, Fl ~ On Valentine’s Day, 2018, a sick young man took 17 innocent lives at Parkland High School. Surviving students plead with legislators to stand up to the NRA and do the right thing by banning assault weapons.

Femme Fatale, Marian Hammer, who ably represents the NRA in Florida, is a powerful lobbyist. She monitors legislators who depart from her talking points and the bills she helps to write on gun laws. Our legislators have sold their souls for an A-plus (MaineWriter~ but deserving of an F- public rating) NRA rating and funding from Ms. Hammer’s handlers. Florida U.S. Senator Marco Rubio, who received $3.3 million from the NRA, is also opposed to any ban on assault weapons. Nationally, the NRA just convinced Mr. Trump to reverse his gut impulse to call for a ban on assault weapons sales and a registration tax on ownership.

Article II of the Constitutional Amendments reads “…a well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” The second clause, “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed,” qualifies the first clause, “a well regulated Militia” And so it was understood until 2008, when, in a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court established an “individual rights” interpretation. District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S 570 (2008). Like most rights, the Second Amendment is not unlimited. “It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose” (Commentary, http://www.lawschool.cornell.edu/). 

In fact, the Supreme Court stressed that the right to keep and bear arms is subject to restriction, that protected arms are those used “for lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home,” in the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons. United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939).

Before and during the American Revolution, the United States had no standing army. To win independence the colonies required militias comprised of ordinary men, many of them farmers, who knew how to use a pistol, musket, or rifle. (Muskets relied on a flintlock, spark, gunpowder, and lead. They were fired from the shoulder and could only be fired four times a minute by a trained soldier.) The militias were subject to local control.

The majority of Americans want reasonable restrictions on guns. The banning of assault weapons and the requirement of universal background checks are not the first steps in a movement to deprive citizens of the weapons they keep for legitimate purposes, such as hunting and self-defense. My husband grew up on a North Carolina farm. Guns were a normal part of family life because they were used to bring home game for the table. No one, however, used anything more powerful than a 12-gauge shotgun.

Psychological screening of individuals who pose a threat to themselves and others is not a science. While desirable, it is magical thinking to believe that mental health professionals will be able to catch every instance of aberrant, violent thinking or behavior that may or may not lead to actual violence. 

Moreover, the arming of teachers is a dangerous and ludicrous decision that will undermine students’ relationships with teachers and further endanger them. While an armed school officer might lessen the carnage, it’s likely that he or she would be among the first eliminated. And even if the FBI and every local sheriff’s department acts precisely as they should, there is only one sure way to make mass killings less likely. We must accept reasonable restrictions upon gun ownership. Let’s start by requiring universal background checks and ban assault weapons and large capacity magazines. And to those legislators who continue to carry water for the NRA, I say grow a spine.

Patricia Edmisten is retired from the University of West Florida where she taught sociological foundations of education and served as director of the office of International Education and Programs.

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Ohio letters challenge automatic weapons - echoes from ordinary people

Published in Cleveland.com ~ two echoes from letters to the editor

The latest mass shooting of high school students and their faculty, in Parkland, Florida, only serves to emphasize what a disastrous situation this country is in, with no leadership in place to grapple with the issue of gun control. 

Effectively dealing with mental-health issues is only part of the problem. My question is, why does anyone who is not in the military or law enforcement have a need to access and carry an automatic or semi-automatic weapon? The issue of gun control must be addressed immediately and decisively for the safety of our children and the future of our country. Sr. Regina Fierman,
Broadview Heights

Assault weapons should not be available to citizens

When our nation's forefathers ratified the 2nd Amendment, the right to bear arms*, in 1791, would they have approved of having private citizens own automatic assault weapons? (Maine Writer- when the second amendment was written, the most deadly gun was a musket that could only fire one round at a time.) 

After the major tragedies involving assault weapon guns, how can the leadership of the NRA, its members, the Congress and Donald Trump, in good conscience, continue supporting the use of this murderous gun?  Ed Oberndorf, Cleveland

* The right to bear arms: what does the second amendment really mean? ~ Published in The Guardian: The amendment reads: “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”  But, the law does not automatically give people the unlimited right to own and use rapid fire assault weapons. In other words, the safety of the public can and should be protected against the unregulated use of deadly weapons of mass destruction.

Echo in Oklahoma news Tulsa World - enough is enough guns

Oklahoma opinion:
Americans must do something about gun control


BROKEN ARROW,

OKLAHOMA - Isn't it time we valued our children more than we value our guns? Politicians and the NRA (National Rifle Association) keep saying no laws would have prevented this or that massacre and event. Maybe not, but we could have made it less likely to happen. There are proposed laws out there that would not prevent law-abiding citizens from getting guns but would make it more difficult for guns to get into the hands of criminals and the mentally unstable.

Let's contact our politicians and get gun control laws passed. You've heard the saying that all it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing. We've been doing nothing too long already. Come on, good men and women, do something!

Letter to the Tulsa World from Sandra Baranet, Broken Arrow OK

Las Vegas murderer was the extreme outier

Ruben Navarrette Jr.: Is it time to start profiling white males?

What did we learn about the horrific Las Vegas mass murder where one white man slaughtered 59 people, wounded more than 500 others and emotionally traumatized thousands people?  In my opinion, in spite of what the National Rifle Association (NRA) says about "guns don't kill, people kill", the fact is, the Las Vegas mass casualty proves, once and for all, that it is guns that kill.  There was no way to profile the Las Vegas murderer as fitting a particular deviant personality. Republicans always look for some other reason why mass murderers execute people. It's like the killer person is the deviant and the guns are normal. In the case of the Las Vegas murderer (Stephen Paddock) , the killer seemed normal enough to escape a profile analysis, but his obsession with guns was building over time.  In fact, he purchased 33 of the guns he owned in just the past year.  I can't find anything but guns that separated the killer from being any other person.  

Murderer Stephen Paddock was the ultimate "outlier"; In fact, he didn't fit any profile at all

Stephen Paddock got away with the purchase of massive amounts of weapons and ammunition because he was a white male who didn't fit any profile. In light of his assault of massive numbers of people attending an outdoor Las Vegas concert, he bought those guns for the purpose of killing people with the weapons.

Therefore, should all people - including (and especially?) Caucasians- be profiled when they are stockpiling guns?

Here's what Ruben Navarrette wrote:

SAN DIEGO — White men scare me. There, I said it.

Based on my conversations with Latino and African-American friends, I think many of them feel the same way. If they’re walking down a dark street at night and see three white men in their 20s walking toward them, they’re thinking hate crime.

After all, pick up a history book, and look at what white males did to black slaves, American Indians, Chinese immigrants and Mexicans in the occupied Southwest. They’re the original bad hombres.

And so, after the Las Vegas massacre — where a 64-year-old white man named Stephen Paddock carried 23 guns into a hotel suite on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino and opened fire on an outdoor concert crowd, killing at least 59 people and wounding more than 520 others — it’s fair to ask: “Is it time for authorities to start profiling white males who purchase unusually large amounts of high-powered weapons and ammunition?”

Yes, it is. And why not? There is plenty of evidence that law enforcement officers routinely profile African-Americans, Latinos and Muslim Americans. It’s become part of police work.

In 1999, the New Jersey State Police admitted to pulling over African-American motorists more often than white drivers. In 2010, Arizona lawmakers codified ethnic profiling by requiring local police to determine the legal status of those suspected of being in the country illegally (read: Latinos).

So how did white men get to be so special that — in an era when so many mass shootings are linked to gunmen who fit that profile — it is still considered outrageous to say that this demographic merits extra scrutiny? Talk about white male privilege.

Given the carnage in Las Vegas, a lot of folks — on both the right and the left — are instinctively talking about guns. That’s a circular, highly charged argument that goes nowhere.

What we should be talking about is race. Not the race of the victims, but the race of the shooter.

Authorities insist that Paddock — who was reportedly wealthy, liked to gamble and had no known political or religious affiliations — fits none of the established profiles.

But actually, Paddock does fit one. He’s a white male, and most serial killers and mass murderers are white males.

For the sake of public relations, and because — in the era of “If you see something, say something” — law enforcement doesn’t want the public discounting anyone who might look suspicious just because of skin color, the FBI claims that it’s a myth to suggest that “serial killers are all white males.” The agency insists that serial killers span all racial groups.

Sure. But note that I said “most,” not “all.” The majority of mass murderers are white men. The fact that we might be able to find the occasional serial killer who is a woman of color does not significantly change the pie chart.

Besides, the FBI would be more convincing if it practiced what it preached.

In 2002, federal agents were frantically searching for the so-called Beltway Sniper, who killed 10 people and wounded three more in the Washington metropolitan area. Authorities got off to a slow start because, according to the profile, serial killers are usually white men. 

Retired FBI profilers went on broadcast media and said — as one put it at the time — “this is something white males do.”

The shooters — John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo — were African-American.

Like many Latinos, when I hear about a tragedy like the one in Las Vegas, I hold my breath and hope the culprit wasn’t one of ours. 

My African-American and Muslim American friends do the same. I’ve even heard a religious conservative call into a radio show and say he does it, too. It’s human nature.

Still, I have to wonder if white men go through that exercise. I don’t think so. That must be yet another ancillary benefit to being a white male.

Well, the free pass has expired. It’s time for law enforcement authorities to keep track of white men who stockpile guns.

To the profiled, I say: “Put up with it. After all, President Trump called my Mexican immigrant grandfather — who came to the United States legally a hundred years ago — a criminal and a rapist, and I survived. I can help get you through this. We shall overcome.”

And to those who think this whole concept is loony, and that — when it comes to who commits crimes — we can’t make sweeping generalizations about whole groups of people based on prejudice, I say: “Exactly. Now you’re getting the idea.”

Ruben Navarrette’s email address is ruben@rubennavarrette.com

Republicans stand behind untethered 2nd amendment but childrens lives don't matter

Speaking as a Roman Catholic woman, I'm calling out House Speaker Paul Ryan. Shame! Childrens' lives matter!

Reports, post the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting in Connecticut, described the dead children killed by a gun carrying killer, as being stacked like cord wood. They were among the 28 people who were the victims of the deranged school shooter, a misfit named Adam Lanza. He was believed to suffer from a personality disorder and lived with his mother, said a law enforcement official who was briefed on the investigation.

Following the deadly and preventable killings, the US Congress became paralyzed about enforcing common sense gun regulations to help prevent future mass killings. Nothing worked because Republicans in Congress prefer to save 2nd amendment rights rather than protect people from being the victims of gun violence.

Finally, President Obama took executive action to strengthen gun purchase laws. He intends to create barriers for convicted criminals and terrorists, to help prevent them from using loopholes, whereby they can buy guns without background checks. Believe it or not, Republicans are screeching like wounded hyenas about this common sense executive action.

Hyenas screech when empowered to feast on their prey

Obviously, the Republicans who screech the loudest about common sense gun regulations, like "Trump the Chump", "Cruz to loose" (aka "Senator Cruz"), and now add Speaker Paul Ryan to the triad, don't have any children among those whose bodies were stacked like cord wood, after the tragic Sandy Hook slaughter.

I'm especially disturbed by the negative response to the President's protective executive actions by politically blinded right wing politicians, like Congressman Paul Ryan. These wrong minded politicians and their zealous followers are obsessed by second amendment rights and blinded by guns while they need to protect human life. 

Indeed, the second amendment right wing zealots who lack compassion for victims of gun violence are a national embarrassment!

Americans must support President Obama's executive actions to help protect public safety during a growing gun violence epidemic. At the same time, American voters must reject all Republicans who are supporting 2nd amendment rights to own weapons, rather than protecting human beings from gun-violence. 

Childrens' lives matter!  (Rep. Paul Ryan alert!)