Would The Parents Of Newtown Shooting Victims Just Shut Up Already
You know what's annoying? People who stand up for things. People who think something should be a certain way, and when their state's lawmaking body holds a public hearing, they show up and try to explain what they want, like idiots.
The Connecticut General Assembly put together one such gathering of Believers In Things yesterday, on the topic of gun control. You would not believe it, but one of the people who had an opinion about gun control was the parent of a child killed at Newtown. THE NERVE. There was only one course of action, obviously: Heckle him.
Indeed. If a guy's kid gets shot a half-dozen times by an assault rifle, and he goes to a hearing about assault rifles, and says he's not really a fan of assault rifles, the only option for people who like assault rifles is to interrupt him :
"The Second Amendment!" was shouted a couple of times by as many as a dozen gun enthusiasts in the meeting room as Neil Heslin, holding a photo of his slain 6-year-old son, Jesse Lewis, asked why Bushmaster assault-style weapons are allowed to be sold in the state.
COOL YOU GUYS. Good argument. A guy with a dead kid is participating in the democratic process, and you cover your ears and yell because you think Barack Hussein wants to take away your SIG. He probably deserved it though — I mean, just look at his crazy lib-talk:
"There are a lot of things that should be changed to prevent what happened," said Heslin, who said he grew up using guns and was undisturbed by the interruption of his testimony.
"That wasn't just a killing, it was a massacre," said Heslin, who recalled dropping off his son at Sandy Hook Elementary school shortly before Lanza opened fire. "I just hope some good can come out of this."
What an asshole. Especially compared to the awesome argument from the other side:
Some warned that gun ownership is a check on governmental tyranny and charged that Obama has an agenda to disarm them and take away rights guaranteed under the state Constitution and the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
See? It'sgovernment tyrannywe have to be afraid of. Take your dead kid elsewhere, we're scared of the National Guard, and definitely of the foreigner in the White House.
It doesn't matter that Obama has not actually announced any plans to take anything away from anyone, because heclearly wants that. Sure, maybe his executive orders are very clear and simple and in no way infringe on anybody's right to any gun they want ever, but being scared and stupid is not a fact-based endeavor, right?
It doesn't matter, because this is a serious political argument, and the only way to have one of those is to be as crude, simplistic, and insulting as possible, and sometimes that means yelling meaningless phrases at a man whose first-grader was killed a month ago. For freedom.
[ Connecticut Post ]
At long last, they have no shame.
The state legislatures weren't starting with a blank slate, they were starting from standing English common law. So if you're right, and you probably are, it's not proof of the relative importance placed on theft vs. murder, merely a demonstration that the value we place on possessions relative to each other (e.g., horse versus table) changes more often than the value we place on life.
But yeah, 3/5, fugitive slave acts, voting restricted to property owners, death penalty for counterfeiting or aiding a runaway slave, etc. Those are the big banner announcements of where early post-Independence Americans' priorities lay.