Another group grieves
I suppose a lot of us cried ourselves to sleep after the shooting on Newtown, Conn. And will perhaps more nights to come.
But, grieve for one group I haven't even seen mentioned: the grandparents.
Thankfully our grandchildren have all reached adulthood. But we would be devastated if something happened to one of them.
Those who haven't been a proud, doting grandparent, may not understand. Pray that if you get to be one, you won't have to grieve like the ones in Newtown are doing now.
God bless the little children. And comfort the grieving survivors.
CHARLIE WEAVER
Winston-Salem
Two points
I would like to raise two points in regard to the editorials in the Dec. 15 Journal. First, in regard to “Out of outrage should come action” and addressing violence, you say that “… what is certain now is that nothing is working.” But, in fact, there are programs that are working and we need to build on those.
Most of these incidents involve people with mental-health problems. Yet North Carolina cut funds for teaching assistants who can work with individual students for early intervention. And North Carolina cut funds for mental-health programs. Let's change our priorities and expand and support those things that are working to give individuals the help they need.
Second, in regard to “Focus must turn from growth to helping students graduate,” you note that, “The UNC system is also going to add incentives for better performance that will tie funding to each university's ability to meet certain criteria ...” Let's make sure that those funds are used to help the weaker programs strengthen and not punish them for not meeting the criteria by withdrawing funds and rewarding the programs that already are stronger, ala “No Child Left Behind,” so that they slip even farther behind.
EDWARD O'CONNOR
Pinnacle
Part of a solution
We are all very saddened by what happened in Newtown, Conn. The question the president raised is very important. We know from the war on drugs and prohibition that we are not very good at regulating or prohibiting the purchase of stuff people want. I think the lesson from tobacco might be the wiser approach.
Impose a very large and substantial tax on any gun that can shoot more than two bullets without reloading. Make this tax $2,000 or $3,000 per gun payable at sale, and have it involve all gun transactions — even to family members. If a gun is found where the ownership transferred, without tax payment, both the owner and seller should pay triple the tax. In addition, tax bullets at $50 per bullet.
All the proceeds from the tax would be used to pay for mental-health services and increased protection in schools.
This will not fix the problem, but it should be considered part of a solution. What we do know is that taxes influence behavior.
None of us want another Newtown and we must deal with the arms race within this nation soon, before it consumes us.
PAUL McLAUGHLIN
Winston-Salem
Two for tragedy
Evolution is a slow process. Let's start with restrictions on graphic violence as a form of overtly innocuous entertainment for the young and also restrict automatic weapons. Those two add up to tragedy — it seems that almost if not all of the massacre perpetrators loved these video games.
Everyone has too easy access to weapons of mass destruction to indulge a violent impulse — especially teenage boys who have more testosterone than they will for the rest of their lives.
These games are made to reach deep in our brains. I've only played one, and the lights flickered in my head for the rest of the day. I've watched kids play them, nonchalantly, as if killing a human was a walk in the park.
TONY TAMER
Winston-Salem
Protection
I am mourning, with most of America, the recent murders of 20 children and six adults at the elementary school in Connecticut. The media at first stated the killer used two semi-automatic pistols and the police found an "assault rifle" in the shooter's mother’s car. There will be a call for banishment of all "assault weapons" now.
If this happens who will protect the individual homes? Most would say law officers. When is the last time a law officer has been present at a crime as it is being perpetuated?
Every weapon in the hands of a mentally disturbed individual is an "assault weapon." The last four school and movie-theater shootings were done by mentally disturbed individuals. The day weapons are confiscated will be the day the federal bureaucracy will start overturning the Constitution.
Think about it: The last four shootings were at locations where firearms were banned.
JOHN A. REDDING
Lewisville
"Think about it: The last four shootings were at locations where firearms were banned."
ReplyDeleteJOHN A. REDDING
Lewisville
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Mr. Redding, come on now. Don't try to objectively examine the evidence and facts before you make a decision. You've got to fly off the handle, and let your emotions dictate what you think is the appropriate action on the recent shooting. That's what Democrats do. So, that has to be the proper course, right?
It would be simply just sad if it were just this one incident that liberals/Democrats make these type of decisions. But it happens over and over and over. From Obamacare......to welfare.....to food stamps.....it's essentially the same type of emotional decisions that are made by those people.
Throw an emotional event into to a dopey, liberal mind, and out pops a dopey subsequent reaction.
Think about it:
DeleteWayne Lapierre says guns defend us against "criminal class." We mostly use them to injure ourselves and/or our intimidate family. Firearms also tend to escalate ordinary quarrels between neighbors into violent conflicts.
Let's hear it for the gun!
Yayyyyyy!!!
DeleteSince Bucky is incapable of making sense, we can help him by mentally substituting the word "Bucky" for the words "liberal", "Democrat", "dopey", "nitwit", whatever cheesy term he uses.
DeleteVoilà...makes sense now.
You just described your whole schtick, Tim. As GG once said of Roblo58, you're a strange little man.
DeleteI've always given you credit for being just a little smarter and more savvy than the rest of left leaning crowd in here Arthur. But apparently you're from the same mold.
DeleteI still think you'll grow out of the deabilitating condition.
(CNN) -- The National Rifle Association's Friday press event has received almost uniformly negative reviews.
Delete______
Even the liberal press realizes they aren't being fair.
"Real change can happen only when we commit ourselves to rebuilding civil society in America, meaning a society based on family, religion, civic and social institutions, and peaceful cooperation through markets," he continued. "We cannot reverse decades of moral and intellectual decline by snapping our fingers and passing laws."
DeleteRon Paul
_________
I agree Mr. Paul. The War on Religion(s), the forced acceptance of sexual perversion, ......the country is in a moral mess.
CNN was not editorializing or apologizing...they were simply reporting the news, which is that virtually everybody, even most Republicans, finds the NRA proposal stupid...except, of course, for you and three other guys who also live in their mommas' basements and are fantasizing about going out and shooting up someplace except they haven't got the get-up-and-go to get-up-and-go over to Chick-fil-A Mountain and buy'em some guns...plus their mammas wouldn't sign for their CCW permits anyway.
DeleteHow our nation has reached this point of stasis?
ReplyDelete“Every day, man is making bigger and better fool-proof things. Every day, nature is making bigger and better fools. So far, I think nature is winning.”
-Albert Einstein
:D Albert could have left out the "I think".
Deleteyep. GG I remember...talked to her a few times off forum. Somebody the other day mentioned John G. I remember the name but I don't know why.
DeleteJohn G. was similar to Bucky in that his "ideas" were loony, but he was way smarter, so somewhat interesting. At least he knew how to construct a logical argument.
DeleteHe's the one who was always insistent that there was no difference between alimony and slavery.
I'm smart enough to cause you quite a bit of consternation, you liberal NW.
DeleteJohn G was crazy, but quite articulate.
DeleteYes...John G. would throw out one of his convoluted arguments...you could post your response...he would rebut...you would rebut...he would start shape-shifting the argument and continue that until cornered, at which point he would simply disappear.
DeleteBucket does not have the sophistication to do that...he simply throws out some crude non sequitur, then disappears, to pop up elsewhere with yet another bit of mindless mumbo jumbo.
I like to keep the topics and conversations moving. Nobody wants to get bogged down with your nonsensical jibber jabber.
DeleteIt won't be long until 'ol Bev gets the boot! And none too soon either. She almost took the state over the permanent, physical cliff.
ReplyDeleteGetting rid of Kay Hagan in 2014 will be fun too.
My friend at the library sometimes passes on e-mails to me. Here is a good Christmas one:
ReplyDeleteJewish Family Christmas
The teacher asked young Patrick Murphy, "What do you do at Christmas time?"
Patrick replied, "Well Ms. Jones, me and my twelve brothers and sisters go to midnight mass and we sing hymns; then we come home very late and we put mince pies by the back door and hang up our stockings. Then all excited, we go to bed and wait for Father Christmas to come with all our toys."
"Very nice Patrick," she said. "Now Jimmy Brown, what do you do at Christmas?"
"Well, Ms. Jones, me and my sister also go to church with Mom and Dad and we sing carols and we get home ever so late. We put cookies and milk by the chimney and we hang up our stockings. We hardly sleep, waiting for Santa Claus to bring our presents."
Realizing there was a little Jewish boy in the class and not wanting to leave him out of the discussion, she asked, "Now, Isaac Cohen, what do you do at Christmas?"
Isaac said, "Well, it's the same thing every year...Dad comes home from the office...we all pile into the Rolls Royce; then we drive to Dad's toy factory. When we get inside, we look at all the empty shelves and begin to sing, 'What A Friend We Have in Jesus'.
Then we all go to the airport and fly to Tahiti for the holidays."
As to the moral climate, yes, those declining morals will get you every time.
ReplyDeleteBy the 1670s, the Indians in Massachusetts were fed up with being abused by the Puritans, so they united under Metacom and began what came to be known as King Phillip's War. Despite being outnumbered 55,000 to 12,000, they nearly succeeded in driving the Puritans into the sea.
When they failed, the Puritans decided that god was punishing them for something, so began casting about for someone to blame. The Massachusetts General Court came up with a list of causes. Among my favorites:
1. Some young men had begun wearing their hair too long.
2. Some single men and women had been going on unsupervised horseback rides.
3. Some people had begun dressing above their station in life--thus breaking the sumptuary laws that dictated exactly what they were supposed to wear.
4. Quakers blasphemed, simply by existing and speaking their heresies. Originally, the Puritans had simply hanged them. But lately they had gotten soft, to the point that some Quakers were merely tarred and feathered and given a rail ride out of town. Back to the gallows.
One comforting thing in life is that the fools will always be the fools, whether they live in 1676 or 2012.
I tell you, maintaining morality is damned near a full time job.
Good afternoon folks! It was a tremendous pleasure getting to meet all y'all at The Big Event on Saturday. Perhaps we can have another get together if we can coordinate our schedules. At least next time, Whitewall will know our faces and will be able to join us at the table :)
ReplyDeleteLTE 1: Repeat from last week
LTE 2: Saving pennies to throw away dollars (and lives)...that's our NC legislature. With the new crop coming in, it's only going to get worse. You would think the importance of mental health and education would eventually be recognized, but perhaps not.
LTE 3: There are nearly 300 million guns already in the hands of the public, so gun bans are useless. The only proposal to help slow the madness that may work is to begin imposing high taxes on ammunition.
LTE 4: Violence has been a part of our entertainment for as long as there has been civilization. Young people have also been settling arguments with fights for the same amount of time. The difference is the weapons available today have the capacity to do far more damage than at any other time in history. Looking at the sales of games such as Call of Duty which bring in more than blockbuster movies, the market place is clearly favoring the continuing sale of these types of games.
LTE 5: Why does someone need an "assault" weapon or semi-automatic to protect one's home? Those who are mentally deranged do stop to think whether or not a place is a "gun free zone". Columbine had armed security, and it didn't make a difference there. "The day weapons are confiscated will be the day the federal bureaucracy will start overturning the Constitution." - if Mr. Redding is that paranoid about our govt, then why is he still living here? I'm still mystified that there are so many who think a gun will protect them against any person or any govermental force.
LTE 5: Why does someone need an "assault" weapon or semi-automatic to protect one's home?
Deletedotnet
____________
Ask people in Kosovo, Bosnia, Serbia, Syria, the Sudan, Somalia, or the Congo and others, in many other countries that question. Or what about after the Los Angeles riots when African Americans went nuts after the Rodney King verdict? Or what about after a huge natural disaster?
Of course, liberals are so utterly shallow, and mentally challenged, they never think about those the expansive and complex circumstances.
Well, I had to go get out my atlas, but as far as I could tell, and please correct me if I am wrong, Kosovo, Bosnia and Serbia are still in Europe, not in the USA. I have to say that that is a relief, because if whole countries and regions ever start illegally immigrating, we are up the creek without a paddywack.
DeleteI mean, where would we put them? Kosovo is not very big, so we could probably slip it into some corner of Texas and nobody would notice, especially if we trained the citizens to wear cowboy hats and boots and brag a lot.
And we could probably put the other two in Utah. If we renamed them all "Romney" people would just think that they are Mitt's grandchildren.
And yes, Syria is still in Southwest Asia, although the way things are going, that might not last long. And the Sudan and Somalia are still in Africa, as is South Sudan, whatever that is. Probably something like South Carolina.
I couldn't find the Congo, but I have a friend who lives there, so I e-mailed her. She reports that the Congo is right there where it has always been, although much of what used to be there, primarily gold and diamonds, had been moved some time ago to Belgium for safekeeping.
She also explained why I couldn't find it on the map…because having once been the Belgian Congo and later Zaire, it is now called the Democratic Republic of the Congo…so I was looking under "C" when I should have been looking under "D". I didn't know that so many Democrats lived there…I though most of them lived in California. My friend, BTW, is a Christian Libertarian/Socialist.
As to the LA Riots (Part III), I would have sworn that all that hubbub occurred in retail areas in Koreatown. Of course, I could be wrong. If anyone who lives in Lewisville or Clemmons or Kernersville or King suffered a home invasion during the riot, please let me know. I do like to keep up with what is going on.
"The only proposal to help slow the madness that may work is to begin imposing high taxes on ammunition."
Deletedotnet
_______
Liberals want to legalize a mind altering drug (marijuana) that obviously will cause many deaths from driving under the influence and other problematic conduct. But yet they want to tax people that own guns, the majority of which are law abiding, that want to target shoot or hunt with their guns?
Makes perfect sense to a liberal. Pathetic.
As always, the forum fool is more than willing to entertain us with his vast circus of ignorance.
DeleteInstead of seeking valid information, thinking rationally about that information and forming a reasoned opinion, he is inclined to just blurt out whatever first comes to mind. And since there is actually no mind for it to come from, the conclusion will always be wrong.
Had he bothered to actually examine the literature on marijuana use, he might have discovered that there is a significant amount of information available. Recently, the National Institute of Health published an analysis of the major marijuana studies conducted in the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, including comparisons between alcohol and marijuana. some of the findings:
1. Both alcohol and marijuana cause physical and neurological impairment. But the effects are quite different in each case.
2. Alcohol drinkers tend to underestimate their own level of impairment, which leads to speeding and aggressive behavior such as lane switching, tailgating and risky passing, the principal cause of accidents.
3. Marijuana users tend to overestimate their own level of impairment, thus tend to drive more slowly and avoid aggressive driving.
4. Every study of alcohol impaired driving has shown a high correlation between alcohol and accidents.
5. Studies of marijuana impaired driving have ranged from studies that show a lower than average accident rate to no effect to a slightly elevated accident rate. So far, the studies are inconclusive, but it is obvious that alcohol is a much bigger problem than marijuana, simply because of the differences in driving attitude.
Of course, the fool also assumes that legalization of marijuana will lead to higher consumption. Again, he demonstrates an inability to think through any problem, plus a vast ignorance of marijuana culture. Both Colorado and Washington commissioned studies of just that possibility well before considering placing the marijuana legalization issues on the ballot. Had the studies shown that legalization would significantly increase marijuana use, the issues would have never been placed on the ballot because it would have meant political suicide. Of course, the studies found that there would be no significant increase, for several reasons.
1. After thousands of centuries as a legal substance, marijuana was outlawed, due to the efforts of the christian moralists after they lost the prohibition battle, in the 1930s. By god, they were going to outlaw something!
2. At first the laws provided draconian penalties, as much as 20 years for simple possession in some states. Over 70+ years, the penalties have risen and fallen and risen and fallen, but one thing has stayed the same. Every study of marijuana use conducted over that time has shown that the penalties have no effect on marijuana use. While Texas (you knew it would be them) was handing out long prison sentences in the 1960s, marijuana use in Texas went up. When, at about the same time, Montana tried lowering the penalties, marijuana use in Montana went down.
3. Marijuana use nationwide is currently at slightly below saturation level, which means that most people who are going to smoke marijuana are already smoking it. Since marijuana smokers have demonstrated total indifference to the laws, it is highly unlikely that every Tom, Dick and Bucky in the nation will suddenly take up the weed.
People who live life only through their own fantasies tend to have a highly distorted idea of reality. I could name you any number of prominent citizens of the Triad from all walks of life who take a hit every now and then, but I won't, because it is none of your business what people do on their own time. Unfortunately, people like the fool, meddlers all, think otherwise.
MYOB, and dance clown dance. The king commands it.
I might add that the only part of the above post that I wrote was the first and last two paragraphs.
DeleteWe are not quite done with our "holy night" outing, so still going at my loft.
The above was written in under five minutes by two brilliant women, both psychiatric professionals. Unlike me, they didn't even have to look anything up...they already knew it all, because they are way ahead of the game.
I won't tell you what their diagnosis of the forum fool is...just that he should seek immediate help.
Some interesting news has broken in the wake of the latest push for gun control by President Obama and Senate Democrats: Obama sends his kids to a school where armed guards are used as a matter of fact.
ReplyDeleteThe school, Sidwell Friends School in Washington, DC, has 11 security officers and is seeking to hire a new police officer as we speak.
If you dismiss this by saying, "Of course they have armed guards -- they get Secret Service protection," then you've missed the larger point.
The larger point is that this is standard operating procedure for the school, period. And this is the reason people like NBC's David Gregory send their kids to Sidwell, they know their kids will be protected from the carnage that befell kids at a school where armed guards weren't used (and weren't even allowed).
Shame on President Obama for seeking more gun control and for trying to prevent the parents of other school children from doing what he has clearly done for his own. His children sit under the protection guns afford, while the children of regular Americans are sacrificed.
AWR Hawkins
__________
Don't you just love liberal hypocrisy?
Bucky, Sidwell school is a different case since it is attended by the children of less than ordinary people and they have a different need for security due to our society's obsession with celebrities.
DeleteNew Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) has come out against posting armed guards in schools, telling reporters Friday that it would not make students safer.
Armed guards would not be effective, he said during an event in Newark, as reported by the Bergen Record, unless they were in every classroom. “Because if you just have an armed guard at the front door then what if this guy had gone around to the side door? There’s many doors in and out of schools.”
As Christy stated the number of guards required would be more that tax payers are willing to fund to be effective. It's difficult to get tax payers to fund teachers let alone security in each classroom. The parents at Sidwell can afford the security and because of their status their children probably require in order to keep the school free of celebrity seekers.
We can have teachers or guns. Not both. I choose teachers and you choose guns.
Again let's hear it for the Gun.
Yayyyy, guns!!!
DeleteChristie is right, one of a growing number of sane Republicans who are trying to take their party back from the loonies.
As I asked yesterday, how many guns will it take to protect a single school...a squad, a platoon, a company?
Since the first known American school shooting in the 1760s, the average attack has lasted less than 30 seconds. Even if there had been a sworn LE officer in the room, s/he would not have been able to prevent the killings. S/he would have simply been the first to die.
Ha, ha! With each post, the forum fool digs his hole deeper, but hey, ignorance is next to godliness, right?
DeleteWhen Jimmy Carter was elected President, he wanted to avoid being seen as an elitist, so he sent his daughter Amy to a public school near the White House. That turned out to be a disaster, because no public school in the country is equipped to handle the pressure of daily Secret Service presence and the high level of security that that involves.
Amy could not go outside at recess, nor could she accompany her classmates on field trips. And the Secret Service had to commit more resources than it should have to protecting her. At the end of the year, on the advice of the Secret Service, Amy transferred to Sidwell Friends. Why?
Because Sidwell has long experience in hosting children who are at risk of being attacked or kidnapped by loonies like the forum fool. President Nixon's daughters, Chelsea Clinton and Al Gore III attended Sidwell, along with dozens of sons and daughters of Senators and Congresspersons and Generals and Admirals and other people with special reasons to fear for the safety of their children. It's not surprising that losers would have no idea how anyone else is forced to live.
And before you start spouting your tax whiny BS, let me save you the embarrassment of yet another foolish statement by pointing out that the Obamas pay their girls' tuition and other expenses out of their own pockets.
Quaker schools have always been superior to others in this country, because they are based on Quaker ideals…strict attention to the task at hand, tempered by a nurturing environment second to none. In the era when slavery was the basis of the economy and women were little better than slaves, Quaker schools were all coeducational, and many became stops on the underground railroad. Many of the women who led the battle for women's rights were from Quaker homes and schools.
Today, many of the best colleges and universities in the US began as Quaker institutions: Swarthmore, Haverford, Bryn Mawr, Cornell, Earlham, Johns Hopkins, Whittier (Nixon's alma mater), even our own Guilford College in Greensboro. Both Brown University and the University of Pennsylvania, which is not a state school, were heavily influenced by Quaker thinking.
Among great Americans who emerged from the Quaker educational system are Susan B. Anthony, Edmund Bacon (architect), Joan Baez (singer), John Bartram (botanist), Daniel Boone, James Dean (actor), Nathanael Greene (Major General in the Continental army), jan de Hartog (playwright), Herbert Hoover, Johns Hopkins, Dolley Madison, Dave Matthews (musician), James Michener (novelist), Lucretia Mott (abolitionist and suffragist), Edward R. Murrow, Samuel Nicholas (1st commandant, US Marine Corps), Thomas Paine, William Penn (founder of Pennsylvania), Bonnie Raitt (singer/songwriter), Joseph Taylor (Nobel Prize winning physicist), Benjamin West (painter), Jessamyn West (novelist), Walt Whitman, John Greenleaf Whittier…many more, but that was all that we could think of off the top of our heads.
Again, written by my guests in just minutes, mostly women who are laughing at you Buckboy, with only a few edits by me. Of course, I'm sure that Buckboy has a long history of being laughed at by women.
This comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteBillions with an s, that is. typo
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteJohns Hopkins was a fascinating man. Baltimore born and bred, he was always an entrepreneur, building his uncle's single store into an empire. He sent wagon trains into the Shenandoah Valley in the early 1800s, trading goods for corn whiskey, which he then sold as "Hopkins' Best" in Baltimore. But his big bucks came from his early investment in the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, which made him one of the richest men in America. At his death in 1873, his estimated net worth was about $10 million, more than 1% of the US GDP that year.
DeleteHe founded Johns Hopkins Hospital, Johns Hopkins University, Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and Johns Hopkins School of Public Health…not bad for a humble Quaker boy.
Oh, and he was a rabid abolitionist to boot.
The Johns Hopkins School of Public Health changed its name about ten years ago to the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health because of Michael Bloomberg's generous support.
The Bloomberg Scholarships are the best available at JHU…highly competitive but a nearly complete free ride, based on need. If loans are required they average only $1500 per year and are interest free until payoff time comes. Can't beat that, except at Davidson and a few other schools where financial aid is loan free.
My friend Fam's son is the associate director of research at JHU School of Medicine's clinical research office. He gets to spend much of his time with brilliant medical researchers. Lucky boy.
Wordly, apparently you didn't read the entire article. It said that the school (Sidwell) has armed guards 'all' of the time, regardless of whether or not a president has children attending the school.
DeleteNew Jersey is full of gun hating liberals. Christy had to make that statement. Besides, I'm not all that impressed with him anyway. I'm not like you lemming liberals. I examine every politician, Democrat or Republican, and make my own decision as to if I can support them or not.
Another tid bit, Rosie O'Donnell also is against guns, yet she has a concealed carry permit.
Liberal hate continues:
DeleteNewspaper Publishes Gun Owners’ Names and Addresses
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2012/12/newspaper-publishes-gun-owners-names-and-addresses/
We are back from our annual "holy night". Love Feast at Calvary Moravian, followed by drinks on Trade Street. We even got the bar folks singing Christmas carols. By the time we left it looked and felt like a California love-in from the 60s. Nothing better than people having fun.
ReplyDelete