Gun Control, #ThemeSong, and #QuoteOfTheDay

This article was originally published on 26 May 2022.

My #ThemeSong today is "Get up off of our knees" by a 1980's post-Smiths band called The Housemartins. I remember the first time I heard this song - I immediately wanted to learn the lyrics. They spoke to my soul.

"Famines will be famines, banquets will be banquets
Some spend winter in a palace, some spend it in blankets
Don't wag your fingers at them and turn to walk away
Don't shoot someone tomorrow that you can shoot today

Time to end the praying
Listen what they're saying

Get up off your knees
You can wag your finger till your finger's sore
Shake your head till it shakes no more"

But every time I try to stand, it seems I find myself on my knees again. What can those of us who are fortunate do besides acknowledge the truth and speak it?

My #QuoteOfTheDay is from Jonathan Safran Foer's award-winning novel, Here I am.

“It’s easy to be close, but almost impossible to stay close. Think about friends. Think about hobbies. Even ideas. They’re close to us—sometimes so close we think they are part of us—and then, at some point, they aren’t close anymore. They go away. Only one thing can keep something close over time: holding it there. Grappling with it. Wrestling it to the ground, as Jacob did with the angel, and refusing to let go. What we don’t wrestle we let go of. Love isn’t the absence of struggle. Love is struggle.”

Though we try to avoid toxically struggling relationships, it is easy to forget the fact that "We like someone because; we love someone although." ~Henry de Montherlant.

Without struggle, we'll walk away at the first challenge, never develop a history; and, therefore, never know or care about one another.

Given the literal repeat in Texas this week of the mass shooting of young children and adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School (which was a repeat of many US school shootings before), we must struggle *right now* to express our love of one another by ensuring meaningful gun control. If a person has a gun that he isn't registered as owning, then he has broken the law and must be punished for it at least the same as if he possessed an illegal drug like heroine (which can also kill people or ruin their lives) - or at least as much as if he were driving without a license. 18-year-olds who can't even drink are allowed to own guns. We don't consider them responsible enough to drink, but they can own a weapon that enables them to kill people, no problem. How is that remotely rational? (I suppose many gun-supporters would rather drop the legal drinking age than prohibit kids/young-adults from owning guns, but that's no reason not to push the issue.)

At the very least, all assault rifles - anything that remotely enables rapid fire - should be made illegal except for presumably rational exceptions, who should be held even more accountable for the high-powered weapons they own (like locking them in a safe when they are not in use). If you sell your gun, you must change the name of the owner in the digital registry or face severe fines for not doing so. You couldn't sell your car without changing the government's record of ownership, so why can you sell your gun without doing so? (Perhaps owning a gun should also require insurance, just like owning a car.)

If our president had Biden's sentiments but Trump-Republican tactics, he would figure out a way to exert executive power, declare an emergency (the US has lost equivalent or more lives to gun violence within our country than to many wars), immediately assert buy-back of all assault rifles out there (owning one after that point would be a felony), and impose implementation of the same process used for car ownership on the owners of all guns. If you own a gun, you'd have to register it by a certain date and get a gun license, which you'd have to carry on your person whenever you are carrying a gun and for which you must provide your social security number); if you are busted with a gun but without a license, you will get a ticket and have to go to court (just like if you get busted driving a car without a driver's license).

The new historical movie about Dick Cheney, entitled Vice, shows exactly how this was done by the last Bush administration.

Whether gun-control supporters like it or not, Trump Republicans (which means, effectively, the whole Republican party) have set the rules of the game with their aggressive and, quite frankly, bullying tactics - and Republicans, themselves, call Democrats weak when they lack the arguably democratic immorality to do likewise. If we don't start playing by their rules, no matter how much we wish we didn't have to do so, we are going to continue to lose over and over again.

Come on, Biden (and Kamala) grow some balls!!

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More Children Have Been Shot Dead in 2022 Than Police in the Line of Duty: https://www.newsweek.com/american-children-shot-dead-more-police-2022-line-duty-school-shootings-gun-crime-1710684?amp=1

Guns Became the Leading Cause of Death for American Children and Teens in 2020: https://time.com/6170864/cause-of-death-children-guns/

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Seth Meyers’ has expertly summed up the problem with Right-wing elected officials who have prevented the U.S. from any meaningful gun control legislation. It is long past time for the Democratic party to *make* gun control happen.

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