Students Make Voices Heard Again - As Communities Around The Country Pass Stricter Gun Laws

Students packed into New York's Washington Square to make their voices heard again - this time for an anti-gun vote in the November midterms.

Not to be denied their first amendment rights, thousands of students staged another walkout and mass protest Friday in schools across the country - even as assorted communities are taking matters into their own hands re: gun laws.  Here in Colorado, students from Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High in Parkland FL also joined Columbine students to rally Thursday night in Clement Park near Columbine High for a get out the vote message, urging all those of voting age to get signed up.  As one of the kids said:

"The only thing a gun obsessed politician fears is a vote against him or her."

Bingo! He's nailed it. The guntard politicos only fear being displaced from their pseudo reigns. Below is one of the activist Columbine kids:

This first ever "Vote for our lives rally" drew nearly 500 in Littleton and many thousands more around the nation and preceded the Friday student protests-walkouts, which were tied to the 19th anniversary of the Columbine High School massacre. As if to punctuate student concerns a shooting at Forest High School in Ocala, FL left a 17-year old student injured. Fortunately for those students, the perp misfit (Sky Bouche) wasn't wielding an AK -47, Bushmaster.223, or AR-15. Unfortunately, for 4 slain Waffle House patrons in Tennessee, the degenerate that fired into that establishment did pack an AR.  But the dumb gunnies still insist "more people are killed  each year by fists than guns", yeah right, and pigs fly upside down.

Meanwhile, as reported in the Weekend WSJ (p. A6), NRA honcho Wayne LaPierre told a conservative audience, e.g. at CPAC in February that "current laws" - if vigorously enforced - "are sufficient to curb mass shootings".

Well, hardly  if so many millions of assault type rifles are out there, as well as over 300,000 bump stocks which can easily convert any semi-automatic into an effective automatic (and we saw what that could do last year at the Las Vegas massacre).

So now assorted localities are taking matters into their on hands.  As reported in the WSJ on Friday (p. A6)  Deerfield, IL has now "unanimously  passed an assault weapons ban".  The ban will mandate that all owners of such weapons - residents turn them in by a specific deadline. Failure to do so will result in "violators being fined as much as $1,000 a day from the point the law take effect".  Thus, if any violator delays ten days ditching their AR after the law is enabled, he or she will owe a nice tidy sum of $10,000.

Meanwhile, the city council in Lincoln, Nebraska and the Maryland General Assembly (MD already has an assault weapons ban that has been tested under the 2nd amendment and been preserved) voted to ban all bump stocks.  Then in Coral Springs, FL there is a major push to limit the sale and transfer of large capacity magazines in the city. In addition, Coral Springs, along with two other municipalities is suing the state to be able to do so.  (Many states, like Florida, for some idiotic reason prohibit  municipalities  from drawing up their own legislation.)

Then there is Boulder, CO whose city council has approved an ordinance that would ban the sale and possession of any assault weapons in the city, Infraction may result in a long jail term, possibly up to 2 years.  Predictably, on Saturday a bunch of NRA- backed losers came out to squeal ...errr, protest, about the ordinance - barking the usual false "Nazi" comparisons - which any dumbo that's studied the actual history of the Third Reich knows aren't true,  and carrying fake and real AR-15 rifles as they marched. One bozo quoted in The Sunday Denver Post (p. 2B) whined:

"This demonstration is because of the extremes that the Boulder City Council is going to. If they weren't I wouldn't be here."

Aww. . .boo hoo hoo. This turkey actually believes he has a 2nd amendment right to own an AR. Newsflash,  he doesn't.  He needs to process the words of conservo pundit Joe Scarborough from two months ago:

"If you want to make the argument that the Supreme Court should protect your rights to have military style weapons, that's legitimate.  But if you say it is your God-given constitutional right to have an AR-15 that is not what the second amendment says. And it's not what Justice Scalia says or the Supreme Court says."

 If that Boulder assault weapon ordinance protester doesn't like the ordinance perhaps he needs to move to Texas or Kansas and out of the "People's Republic Of Boulder".

The beauty of all these local actions is there is very little the gunnies (perhaps other than in FL) can do to thwart them. We already know as I've stated at least a half dozen times before, that assault weapons are not protected under the 2nd amendment. This was in the famous  2008 SC case District of Columbia vs. Heller:
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2018/02/sorry-you-have-no-constitutional-right.html

The majority opinion was written by arch-conservative Justice  Antonin Scalia who - while upholding the right to own arms - adamantly asserted that those weapons "most useful in military service" fall outside the scope of the 2nd amendment.

A recent article in The Wall Street Journal ("Ban On Military  -Style Rifles Upheld", April 7-8, p. A3) notes that earlier SC ruling was once again upheld in a Massachusetts . And I am sure it will be upheld in the more recent Deerfield IL, Boulder CO, etc cases too - for the same reasons.  

As federal judge William G. Young  wrote in the MA  ruling:
"The AR-15 and its analogs - black, semi-automatic rifles with pistol grips and other military features - are simply not weapons within the individual constitutional right to bear arms."

The kids from Parkland and around the nation are now having an effect, with a powerful energy to reclaim gun sanity.  That sanity underscores that there is a higher freedom to live and let live than to be suddenly cut down in a hail of assault rifle bullets as those people at the Waffle House were early yesterday.

The beauty is that the gunnies and guntards will not be able to stop them, or stop the movement now in motion and gaining more steam every day. And that is irrespective of how many photo-shopped images of David Hogg with Hitler, or in a Nazi uniform, they put up on their stupid blogs.

David Hogg Is 100 Percent Correct On His Gun Control Stance - Never Mind The Right's Haters

After the Laura Ingraham faceoff with Parkland survivor David Hogg, with the conservo guntards and snowflakes still melting down in screaming fits, it behooves us to try to get it into their thick skulls that Hogg is not against the Second Amendment.   As Hogg and fellow classmate Cameron Kasky made clear last month on HBO's Real Time, neither condemns the Second Amendment or wants it repealed.

It's not the Second Amendment that needs  condemnation or rejection but rather ignorant and juvenile interpretations  of it, i.e. which claim that one is entitled to own an AR-15 or any similar military type assault rifles under that banner. I had previously skewered this balderdash in my citation of the 2008 SC case District of Columbia vs. Heller:
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2018/02/sorry-you-have-no-constitutional-right.html

The majority opinion was written by arch-conservative Justice  Antonin Scalia who - while upholding the right to own arms - adamantly asserted that those weapons "most useful in military service" fall outside the scope of the 2nd amendment. What exactly is there about this ruling the guntards don't get - or are they plain and simple "gun-tarded"? Do they need to be spoon fed and walked through it paragraph by paragraph, or sentence by sentence? 

A recent article in The Wall Street Journal ("Ban On Military  -Style Rifles Upheld", April 7-8, p. A3) notes that earlier SC ruling was once again upheld in a Massachusetts case whereby:

"A federal judge ruled that the Constitution offers no protection for the military style rifles used in recent mass shootings - dismissing a legal challenge by gun owners and dealers in the state."

Adding:

"Judge William G. Young's ruling followed the reasoning of an opinion last year by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which upheld a Maryland law similar to Massachusetts."

The piece also noted that Judge Young  cited the 2008 Heller case that assault style weapons fall outside the province and protection of the Second Amendment. As he wrote in the ruling:

"The AR-15 and its analogs - black, semi-automatic rifles with pistol grips and other military features - are simply not weapons within the individual constitutional right to bear arms."

The same legal cases are now also being invoked  (according to a Denver Post report two days ago) to ban all AR-15s and other assault type rifles in Boulder, Colorado-  along with bump stocks and high capacity magazines.

Seems to me if the guntards want to whine, piss and moan about gun control "infringement" on their rights, they'd do better to condemn Scalia's 2008 ruling on the unconstitutionality of  a "right" to own AR-15s in  the Heller case.   As long time conservative pundit Joe Scarborough put it two months ago, soon after the Parkland shooting:

"If you want to make the argument that the Supreme Court should protect your rights to have military style weapons, that's legitimate.  But if you say it is your God-given constitutional right to have an AR-15 that is not what the second amendment says. And it's not what Justice Scalia says or the Supreme Court says."

But the guntards ignore all reason, and all legal basis for limiting military grade weapons, preferring to scream like banshees on their blogs and spew hate at Hogg. who is merely the messenger. All Hogg is really demanding is that the same standards Antonin Scalia already upheld in D.C. vs. Heller, be implemented nationwide.

The biggest howler in all the protracted hyper reactions of the Right, is the absurd belief that Hogg  is being fed prompts and scripts by Left groups, George Soros, or Media Matters.  Again, as I noted before, because these knuckle draggers can't conceive themselves speaking articulately and knowledgeably at the age of 17, they refuse to accept David Hogg can do it. Hence, he must be part of a halfwit "conspiracy"  - as confected by the dunces -  like Steve Duncie- ...errr Doocy...on 'Fox and Friends'. (Doocy is the resident genius on "Fox and Friends" who once tried to roast marshmallows using just his bare hands and a plastic spoon, e.g.
https://www.mediamatters.org/video/2010/11/19/fox-amp-friends-attempt-to-roast-marshmallows-w/173553

He also once averred that the Swedes are "pure" because they only marry other Swedes, not "other species".)

All this is part of the  disproportionate vitriol directed at Hogg, much of it driven by pure envy given Hogg's motley crew of haters wish they had  half  the brains he has. The Right's snowflakes' hate is also spurred by the kid's resolve, given  he has not been deterred by their attacks. He continues to speak and write in whatever venue allowed for the limits on military style weapons with pistol grips and high capacity magazines..

Among the Right's vitriolic haters is Virginia Lamp, aka Ginni Thomas, the wife of the dumbest, most unqualified candidate ever to be appointed to the Supreme Court (as the classic token black). Lamp wrote  on Monday - in one of the most lame brained posts ever - accompanied by images of Holocaust survivor shoes:

"To all the kids that walked out of school to protest guns. These are the shoes of Jews that gave up their firearms to Hitler. They were led into gas chambers, murdered and buried in mass graves. Pick up a history book and you’ll realize what happens when u give up freedoms and why we have them," 

Well, at least we can see she's a good I.Q. match for hubby, Clarence! She doesn't even know that Jews were allowed to keep their guns until  November 11, 1938, when the German Minister of the Interior issued the Regulations Against Jews Possession of Weapons.    Assuming she can count  using the fingers on one hand this was five years after Hitler was appointed to the Chancellory by Paul von Hindenburg.  Why didn't the Jews rise up in those intervening years? Huh? Speak up, Lamp and fellow cretins!

Again, NO one has any intent to  "take guns away" or make anyone "give up freedoms", as the hysterical Hogg haters  (and Parkland activist haters) like Lamp  insist. They can still stock all the other weapons they want:  shotguns, pistols,  bolt action rifles, you name it - just not ARs or their cousins (like the Bushmaster .223).  Maybe, these complainers and Hogg attackers need to go back to school and study some of the legal aspects related to the Heller case. They'd sure as hell make much more constructive  use of their free time than spamming juvenile Hogg -Hitler images!

Kudos to Hogg for taking on almost single handedly the entire vile NRA-linked  network of fools, lobbyists, hacks and yahoos who'd rather spend time creating fake images of Hogg with Hitler than learning more on specific legal cases limiting the ownership of assault- style weapons. 

See also:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/jill-richardson/78566/this-popular-pro-gun-argument-doesn-t-make-any-sense

Excerpt:

"As our nation debates gun rights vs. gun control, there’s a stupid argument that keeps resurfacing on the anti-gun control side. I’m not anti-gun, but I am anti-stupidity, so this is bugging me.

It’s the idea that because criminals, by their very nature, do not follow laws, we should not pass any laws limiting gun rights.

The thought goes that if we, say, require universal background checks, good, law-abiding people will follow that law, but criminals will still buy illegal guns. Therefore, why bother with the background checks?

This is ridiculous for several reasons.

First, that’s not how laws work. We don’t say, “Well, we could ban rape, but rapists would still do it anyway. I guess rape should be legal.”

Second, it could deter some people. There are some people who believe in following laws, or at least don’t want to get punished for breaking them. Even if the illegal gun buyers are unethical, many gun sellers will refuse to violate a law.

Third, not all criminals plan their crimes in advance. Some gun violence is done in a fit of passion.

Yes, the person premeditating murder might go get a gun in advance.

But let’s say it’s someone who would not be able to get a gun legally if there were universal background checks. Maybe they’re a convicted felon, or they have a mental illness that predisposes them to violence, or they’re a domestic abuser.

If this person flies into a murderous rage, it’s harder to get a gun quickly, because nobody can legally sell them one."

FOX Harpy Laura Ingraham Has To Eat Dung....Errrrr... Humble Pie, After Attack On David Hogg

"I don't care how much you hate, I can hate more!"

"The issue for me is how David Hogg, specifically, seems to have triggered all these snowflakes on the Right. I'm fascinated by how they are so activated by the Parkland students and him in particular. I can't quite put my finger on what it is the Right finds so intimidating about these children. I wonder if it's their idealism or when you see young people this motivated, this organized, it's the biggest threat to the standing order." - Anna Marie Cox on 'All In'.

"The bottom-feeders of the right-wing ecosystem, of course, haven't held back at all. Alex Jones has equated the Parkland survivors to Nazis, suggesting they intend to murder gun owners. "Alt-right" sites are spreading fake images of the kids and spreading conspiracy theories, including claiming that the students are actors or that no massacre happened at all. Breitbart has joined in, trying to convince readers that Parkland student David Hogg threw a Nazi salute during last weekend's March for Our Lives. (He didn't.)"  - Amanda Marcotte, salon. com

It was bound to happen. The degenerates on the Right had become more and more brazen about mounting spurious bullshit attacks on the Parkland shooting survivors, especially the articulate and passionate David Hogg. As Janice asked this morning, after reading about the Right's latest collective assaults on Hogg and fellow Stoneman Douglas survivors in a salon.com piece by Amanda Marcotte: "What's wrong with these people? What are they afraid of?"

I answered that this was precisely the issue: The Right's minions were pissing in their panties and terrified of Hogg's command of the language and media prominence,  and they feared his ability to make inroads on gun control.  We also know when certain humans are overcome by fear, their innate weakness causes them to lash out at those viewed as threats.

Such has been the case with FOX News' Laura Ingraham and her "Ingraham Angle" in which she launched one of the most ill advised twitter attacks ever, e.g.

David Hogg Rejected By Four Colleges To Which He Applied and whines about it. (Dinged by UCLA with a 4.1 GPA...totally predictable given acceptance rates.) 

The ill-conceived attack instantly brought retribution including from Hogg's 14 year old sister, Lauren, e.g.

"How low are your ratings @IngrahamAngle that you have to start attacking my brother’s grades to get attention? If you ask me, he is more articulate than you and has far better character. Man, that’s real low even for you. Coming from a 14 year old, please grow up. #NeverAgain https://t.co/CgUVeGRfxP"

David himself then followed up: with a tweet to his nearly 600,000 Twitter  followers identifying Ingraham's sponsors, e.g.

Pick a number 1-12 contact the company next to that #

Top Laura Ingraham Advertisers
1. @sleepnumber
2. @ATT
3. Nutrish
4. @Allstate & @esurance
5. @Bayer
6. @RocketMortgage Mortgage
7. @LibertyMutual
8. @Arbys
9. @TripAdvisor
10. @Nestle
11. @hulu
12. @Wayfair

The tweet was flooded with replies from Hogg’s supporters, some of whom pasted images of their messages to the companies in question,.  Ingraham herself was deluged with responses including many taking her to task for stooping so low. This prompted her to finally yelp 'Uncle!' tweeting:

Any student should be proud of a 4.2 GPA —incl. @DavidHogg111. On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland. 

Note she acknowledged his 4.2 GPA and also the  record shows he attained a 1270 in the SAT.  Not getting into the college of his choice is no mystery, given as the WSJ noted today (p.A3) there is a crush now with college applications and the Millennials feature the biggest contingent ever- bigger in numbers than the  Boomers.  So,  Hogg will definitely gain entrance to a good school, just perhaps not his first choices.

What has provoked the savage Right wing attacks, including Ingraham's? Well, during a TMZ interview Hogg had simply  expressed disappointment about letters of  rejection from four schools (in the Univ. of Calif. system) he'd applied to, but said it has been difficult to focus on college lately.  The Right, always hyper -macho in a distorted way (which is why they embrace a gun identity),  took this admission as weakness and whining then went full bore mad dog on the kid.  "How dare this punk talk like a kid?!"  Of course, at other times they were whaling. on him as a veteran "bully" fighter who takes no prisoners.

At least one Media Matters spokesman quoted in Marcotte's salon.com piece asserted the "Right felt it had no choice"  other than to attack the Parkland survivors as they were getting way too much media traction. They also had Republicans "rethinking" their positions on the gun issue, and FLA governor Rick Scott even signing a new gun safety law. And  with Reepos, woe betide anyone who thinks too much or signs new gun laws, say that increase the age to access AR-15s. So these  dregs like Ingraham and others felt they had to unload on Hogg especially - as one of the most outspoken. Even writing fake news trash that he left school years ago and came back for the moment. (Tomorrow I will look at Malaysia's punishment for fake news spreaders and whether we need to adopt them here.)

The reaction to the Right has been equal rage-filled snark  from the Left who are flabbergasted these knuckle draggers have the balls to go after school shooting survivors  Since the tweet was posted, Ingraham herself has received backlash on social media, including castigating her as a mother who "ought to know better than attack a child."

Many of us have viewed her recent actions — the latest in a slew of right-wing attacks against the Parkland survivors — as particularly appalling, given that she is a parent and theoretically ought to know better.

In all of this there is an object lesson about having basic respect for victims of a mass shooting, especially victims who have found their voice and are prepared to speak out. As for the trope that Hogg and his followers are "bullying" Ingraham and the Righties, that's really choice - given they have been hammering at the Parkland kids including stupid conspiracy BS about "child actors" the past 4 weeks

At this writing, online travel website TripAdvisor said it will stop advertising on Ingraham's show after she attacked Hogg. The company joins Florida pet food brand Nutrish which also has responded to Hogg’s boycott call, tweeting Thursday morning “We are in the process of removing our ads from Laura Ingraham’s program.”

Footnote:

Seven advertisers have abandoned Ingraham's show after her apology - deeming it inadequate.  David Hogg himself pointed out she only delivered it after she began to lose advertisers and found herself approaching a crisis similar to O'Reilly's before he was booted. So she only proffered the apology to save her sorry tail. The advertisers leaving now include the two already mentioned, plus: Expedia, Wayfair,  Hulu, Johnson & Johnson, Stitchfix and Nestle. Eight others remain incuding AT & T and we must see whether they can find their consciences assuming they have any. Meanwhile, the WaPo's Eugene Robinson has predicted Ingraham will soon offer a second, more heartfelt apology - minus the "Holy Week" babble. We will see. For the Right, this ought to be an education: Do not fuck with these kids!

See also:

• Roseanne tweets 'NAZI SALUTE' to Parkland survivor, gets a call from a ratings-obsessed Trump
  
  
• Parkland parent takes down Fox News' Ingraham's pathetic apology for what it is: desperate greed
  
  
• And another one: Laura Ingraham continues to bleed advertisers after mocking David Hogg

First Clue, Sherlock: Do Not Use Hate Attacks On The Parkland FL Survivors

Mainer Leslie Gibson, learned the hard way to keep his yap shut about insulting shooting survivors.

Most brane space readers would likely never have heard of Leslie Gibson,  a former  Reepo lawmaker from Maine's hinterlands who looks like a human cloning experiment (using a Moose's uterus)  gone bad.

Gibson has been under fire the past week for comments he made online about two teens (David Hogg and Emma Gonzalez)  who survived the Valentine’s Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.   What provoked this inbred (or cloned, using a female Moose) ignoramus we can't say.  It's always difficult to tell with inbreds, partial Moose offspring, or knuckle draggers. But I suspect it was Ms. Gonzalez'  buzz cut hairdo and Mr. Hogg's articulate activism on behalf of controlling AR-15s and other military style weapons.

Whatever the trigger, this since rapidly retired asswipe from Maine's state house  can now repent at leisure.  Well, maybe so long as he keeps his twitter feed private.  Evidently the poor little misfit has been taking savage blowback on twitter since calling  Emma Gonzalez a "skinhead lesbian,"  and David Hogg "a bald faced liar."  (Ms. Gonzalez has since clarified she  accepts a bisexual sexual identity. In either case, lesbian or bisexual, it is of the most sordid hate to take her to task for her sexual choices. )

Unable to withstand the backlash he's  taken his Twitter feed private. Apparently, he's been miffed and appalled at all the mean things people were posting there: But what did this former lawmaker expect when you - as an elected pol - assume the role of a common bully and vilify kids whose school just endured the worst high school shooting in U.S. history?  Did he really seriously think he'd garner plaudits and kudos? Especially after going after a teen student's physical appearance.

How badly did this asshole blow himself up? Gibson had been cruising toward an unopposed election in the  particular Maine district, which included two hamlets,  Sabattus and Greene. But his comments stirred both a moderate Reep (Thomas Martin Jr.) and Democrat  Eryn Gilchrist to join the contest. As Martin put it:

“There’s enough division in our state and country already without ramping up the rhetoric,"

Yeppers, and Trump, aka Dotard or Hitler Jr. provides much of it.

So, "hoping to restore some peace and quiet in our lives,", Gibson  has abandoned his effort to win a state House seat. I'm sure a lot of Mainers are keenly disappointed but they are more than likely of the "basket of deplorables"  kind that would agree with his slander about Emma Gonzalez.

Among the last comments from this mutant - or human cloned via a Moose- was this offered to the Maine media:

“I am not walking away with my head hung low. I am walking away with my head held high,” 

Whatever. The point is you are walking away with your (Moose?) tail between your legs.

Interestingly, Gibson is said to have made the decision after talking with his family, praying and discussing it with friends and colleagues, including Thomas Martin Jr. of Greene, the GOP contender who entered the 57th District race Thursday.

“It’s the best thing for everybody,” Gibson said. Well it certainly may be\for Martin with whom he "talked it over".  ("Uh yeah, Mr. Moose face, I totally agree it is best to bow out now. Oh, and take your prayers and Moose face with ya!")

As for "prayers' - mayhap Mr. Moose face, errr... Gibson, might still be in the thick of it had he prayed BEFORE he opened up on the two teen Parkland FL survivors. Yuh think?

Gibson has since "apologized" for his comment, but he'll also have to make another one when his Democratic opponent grabs his seat in the Maine House. .