The Unspoken Truth About Gun Control

The Unspoken Truth About Gun Control

Gary North - October 08, 2015

Political activists are more entrenched on this issue than any other issue in American life.

Somebody might say that legalized abortion would be the top candidate. I don't think that's the case. Opponents of abortion are not going to change, but the degree of commitment has faded over the last two decades. The futility of trying to stop abortion has generally placed the issue on the back burners of the conservative movement, and also the back burners of most anti-abortionists. They would certainly vote against the extension of abortion, but they're not going to get actively involved in picketing or other anti-abortion activities that were common in the late 1980's and early 1990's. The original Operation Rescue is long gone. The fire has gone out of the anti-abortionist movement. It slogs along.

The fire has not gone out of the gun-control fight.

KNEE-JERK REACTIONS

Every time there is a mass shooting, people who oppose gun control send lots of money to the National Rifle Association or Gun Owners of America. Some also register to buy another gun.

The recent knee-jerk reaction of the President of the United States to insist on some kind of gun-control legislation, which he knows there is not a prayer of getting through Congress, took place within hours. Barack Obama responds faster to a mass shooting than Al Sharpton responds to a race riot.

On no other issue in American life is the knee-jerk reaction on each side of the battle lines so automatic. There is nothing semiautomatic about it.

We all know the arguments never change on either side. I could reproduce a flyer on either side that was printed in 1975, and you would figure these are up-to-date arguments.

I was involved with this back in the late 1960's, when I worked with state Senator Bill Richardson of California. He was the founder of Gun Owners of America in 1975, and he is still actively involved. I can think of no other issue that I actively support that I have actively supported for half a century.

Why is this? What is it about this issue that gets the troops on both sides of the barricades to mobilize?

I think it really is a knee-jerk reaction. Both sides feel that they have to do something to make noise. Neither side believes that any major change is about to take place, and major changes never take place. It is really all at the margins, and in this case, the gun controllers always lose.

Here is the dirty little secret of the Second Amendment movement: we love to see the Left lose.

THE THRILL OF VICTORY. THE AGONY OF DEFEAT

Scenario: there is a mass shooting in some legally gun-free zone.

If I were writing the headline and subhead, you would read this:

Shooter Kills Ten in a Gun-Free Zone.

Gun-Control Organizations Call for a Gun-Free America

I do not write the headlines, sadly.

The Left immediately screams, rolls on the floor, and threatens to hold its collective breath until it turns blue if Congress refuses to pass some kind of gun-control legislation. Congress never does. Then the Left gets up, goes back to the office, and sends out fundraising letters. It's business as usual.

Second Amendment people immediately send a donation to a Second Amendment lobby, knowing full well that Congress will do nothing. Why do we care? Because we love to see the Left scream, roll on the floor, and threaten to hold its breath until it turns blue.

The Left cannot understand why Second Amendment supporters do this every time there is a mass shooting. This lack of comprehension never ceases to amaze me. Don't Leftists understand what a delight it is for us to see their movement stonewalled successfully for half a century? Don't these people understand how much delight they provide for Second Amendment defenders when they go apoplectic every time Congress resists acting in response to another mass shooting?

Don't people on the Left understand how people on the Right enjoy seeing people on the Left bang their heads against a political brick wall, automatically, every time there is a mass shooting? We get to see this every time. We get to see the enormous frustration of the Left on an issue which both sides hold dear. We hold the cards on this one. The Left does not win. It desperately hopes to win because it believes that every crisis should be followed by federal legislation. But on this issue, it never is.

Shelby Foote, the author of the magnificent three-volume history of the Civil War, tells this story. Union troops captured a Confederate foot soldier -- just an average soldier. One of the union troops asked him: "What are you fighting for, anyway?" The prisoner of war offered this answer: "Because you're down here."

This is one of the best answers that anybody can give for resisting any government intervention. When somebody is down here, trying to push us around, and we have a significant possibility of frustrating him, we are going to resist.

The Left is always interfering with our lives. They want to push us around. They want to get Congress to authorize the creation of a new bureaucracy, filled with people who wear badges and guns, and who then interfere in our lives. We get tired of it. We have been tired of it for over 100 years. And on this issue -- this magnificent issue -- we have successfully pushed back. This frustrates the Left to no end. They cannot believe that they cannot push through gun-control legislation. They are outraged by this. They become hysterical. Apoplectic. They go -- I love this word -- ballistic.

We love to see it. There is nothing like watching a hysterical gun controller go into print, or go on television, screaming about the need for the federal government to do something about guns. The Republicans, and lots of Democrats in Congress, then refuse to do anything.

The Left always blames the National Rifle Association. Well, that's politics, baby. That's how it works. Hard-core gun-rights voters send money to politicians, and they make it clear to the politicians that if they vote wrong on this issue, they are not going to be reelected. And what do you know? The politicians get the memos. This frustrates the Left beyond belief, because they want this power, and they want it in every area of our lives except sexual promiscuity. They want Congress to roll over and play dead. But on this issue, Congress knows where its bread is buttered.

On this issue, we've got the votes. We've had the votes for half a century. This is the one issue on which we can tell the Left to take a flying leap at a rolling doughnut. This enrages the Left. That's half the fun for us. Maybe three-quarters.

HUFFPO GOES BALLISTIC

I cannot imagine any outlet of Left-wing opinion that has not run an article on the shootings in Oregon, and how Congress has failed to act. I have selected this example. It was written by Jennifer Bendery, who is all in a dither. She is described as a "White House & Congressional Reporter."

Here is the headline: Despite Mass Shootings, Republicans Won't Touch Gun Laws. This is an accurate headline.

Then the headline writer gets frantic. Background checks won't work. It's Obama's fault. It's a mental health issue, not a gun issue. Any other excuses? As many as you would like.

WASHINGTON -- Last week's mass shooting in Roseburg, Oregon, was the 265th time that's happened in the U.S. this year. It came after the movie theater massacre in Lafayette, Louisiana, in July that left two dead and nine injured, which came after the mass shooting in Charleston, South Carolina, in June that killed nine.

There have been plenty of others. They just didn't make national news.

Through it all, Congress has done nothing about gun violence. The last time lawmakers acted was in April 2013, when the Senate failed to pass a bill tightening background checks on gun sales. The Huffington Post got to thinking: Is there a level of violence that would cause a lawmaker to reconsider his or her opposition to gun control bills? A mass shooting every week? Another attack on an elementary school, this time in his or her home state?

All of the above.

Let me quote one of my heroes, who remained my hero until his death: Bobby Fischer. Fischer would not kowtow to anybody's line. That's why I liked him.

Back when he was 15 years old, he won my heart. He was asked, after he had become the youngest Grand Master in history, what it was that he liked most about chess. He uttered his classic line, "I love to see them squirm."

People on the Left, who live their lives in terms of politics, should understand this attitude in the ranks of Second Amendment defenders. We love to see them squirm.

Maybe this is childish. I don't care. Both sides understand the stakes, which are high, and both sides understand the nature of politics. One side keeps losing. The other side keeps winning. The losers are frustrated out of their minds. The winners are delighted to see the losers frustrated out of their minds.

SILENT LEADERS

This is the unstated truth about the political battle over gun control. The leaders of both sides don't want to talk about this.

Leaders in the gun-control movement have, what they regard as, a moral obligation to go through conditioned apoplexy every time there is a mass shooting, which is followed every time by the unwillingness of Congress to pass gun-control legislation. They don't tell their troops that there really is little possibility that they ever will win on this issue. They need to pretend there is hope in order to keep donations coming in.

Second Amendment spokesmen don't want to admit that they have Congress in their hip pockets. This would be bad form and bad politics. Why state the obvious? They also don't want to admit just how much traction they get out of the fact that they beat the Left every time. They want to keep the argument on the high moral ground, constitutionally speaking.

I am all in favor of the high moral ground. But I love to see the Left squirm.

THE EXCITEMENT IS STILL THERE

Gun control is the one political issue that never ceases to excite both sides. The Left still gets excited about a fight over gun control, even though they know that they are going to lose the fight. Second Amendment folks also get excited precisely because they know they're going to win, and they're going to get to see the Left beaten again. That's what politics is all about: beating your enemy. Why shouldn't we get excited about seeing the Left mobilize, one more time, for another suicidal frontal assault against the Second Amendment?

Those of us on the Right, who used to get excited about the Taft-Hartley law, or right to work laws, don't have any fun anymore. The trade union movement is dying. The Left knows this; the Right knows this. The Left knows that the Democratic Party sold out the union movement when it repeatedly voted for low tariffs and managed trade. That's the dirty little secret of the Democratic Party. The union leaders know about it, but it doesn't do any good to admit it to the troops. Tradition says that union members are supposed to vote for Democrats, and the union leaders don't want to say what they know to be true, namely, that every time the Democrats win, they vote for lower tariffs, and the union movement gets hammered again. So, informed union members hold their noses and vote the straight party ticket, as always.

It's no fun for those of us on the Right to fight the unions any longer. It's no fun because the Left really is not fanatically committed to the unions. This has been true for a quarter century. Norma Rae is on Social Security.

In contrast, the Left deeply cares about gun control. That's why it's so fun to see them squirm.

So, enjoy the show. Donate to a Second Amendment lobby. But don't miss the fun of watching the Left go through its Pavlov-conditioned apoplexy one more time.

http://www.garynorth.com/public/14355print.cfm

HOW TO SPOT A LYING POLITICIAN: A Guide For The Common Man

HOW TO SPOT A LYING POLITICIAN: A Guide For The Common Man

by Dave Daubenmire 

“Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.  And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not. (John 8:44,45)

I am not saying that there is something special about me or that I have a unique gift that others do not have. All that I’m saying is that I cannot believe how easy it is to spot liars, and I can’t, for the life of me, figure out why so many are so easily fooled.

In all of my nearly 63 years of life, I don’t think lying has ever been easier to spot. It is as if all liars hiss when they speak…

What was it George Orwell said? “In a time of universal deceit – telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” I can’t believe the average American can’t see through the deceit.

Nearly everything the Left claims to believe is a lie. I have yet to figure out if they actually believe their lies or if they are simply passing on what their father tells them. Remember, the Devil doesn’t just tell lies…his very nature is to lie. Satan is the originator; the father of lies. He is incapable of speaking the Truth.

And that is what his children do. They lie. They act just like their daddy.

I watched the Jezebel-like leader of Planned Parenthood, Cecile Richards, testify before Congress last week. She is a master deceiver. Lies usually aren’t bold and open, but are typically couched in the corners of an argument—hidden in the dark shadows of relativism. It is the way the Devil operates.

When he lured Eve in the garden, he subtly asked a series of questions designed to lead her away from truth. The Serpent didn’t call God a liar; he merely deceived Eve into questioning what she knew to be true. “Did God really say…?” he hissed at her. “You won’t surely die.”

Lying is most effective when it most closely resembles the Truth. Yes, a woman does have a right to choose, as the pro-aborts love to say, but it is the question that is NOT asked that makes all of the difference. Of course a woman has a right to choose, but does she have the right to choose murder?

Asking the right question is the only way to get the right answer. Does a woman have the right to kill her child? Certainly not, but the enemy is subtle. He simply changes the name “baby” to “fetus.” Negroes weren’t considered people when folks wanted to own them. Jews weren’t considered people when the Nazi’s wanted to burn them. Babies aren’t considered people when people want to abort them.

Choice is an open-ended statement. Choice, by its very definition, implies alternative options. Abortion is not “choice.” Abortion is murder.

I remember watching Bill Clinton when he uttered the famous statement, “It all depends on what the meaning of ‘is’ is.” That was his father speaking. He is masterful at avoiding truth by parsing words. He was the poster-child of a generation of children trained in moral-relativism in America’s Public Fool system.

Bill Clinton hisses a lot. He is an expert at hissing. His wife is as well, but her hissing seems easier to discern.

Obama is a hisser…an expert hisser. Hissing is hypnotic. It often soothes the troubled soul by justifying a deeply held aversion to sin. The Bible calls it “the conscience”. An expert hisser silences the still small voice inside each of our hearts.

·        If you like your Doctor, you can keep your doctor.It’s simply a blob of tissue.,

·        How does my marriage affect your marriage?

·        What difference, at this point, does it make?

·         If it feels good do it.

·        Abortion is healthcare.

·        War on women.

·        Common core.

·        Vaccinations are safe.

·        Planned Parenthood performs mammograms.

·        Graphic abortion images do not work.

·         Islam is a religion of peace.

·        The Pope is infallible.

·        Jews are the most persecuted people on the earth.

·         I was born gay.

·        Bruce Jenner is a woman.

·        Obama is a Christian.

·        We can tax ourselves into prosperity.

·        We can borrow our way out of debt.

·        Christians should not judge.

·        The Supreme Court makes laws.

·        Hillary is honest.

·        Fox News is fair and balanced.

·        Homosexuality is normal and natural.

·        You can’t legislate morality.

·        If only we could get a Republican president.

·        The economy is booming.

·        Unemployment is down.

·        The Rapture is about to sweep us out of here.

·        Paper money is better than precious metals.

·        Christians and Muslims serve the same God.

·        Guns are responsible for the violence in America.

·        Male on male anal sex is safer than smoking.

·         Nancy Pelosi and John Kerry are good Catholics.

·        People hate Obama only because he’s black.

·        Democrats are looking out for the black man.

·        The economy has turned the corner.

·        Your pension is safe.

·        Black lives matter…

·        OJ Simpson is innocent…

Hissss…

The closer you get to THE TRUTH, the more you will recognize the lies.

Read your Bible. Seek Jesus. The Holy Spirit will guide you to all Truth.

We live in a time where deception has never been more prevalent. Turn off the TV. Stop listening to the lies. Clear your head. If you listen closely you can hear the hiss…

25 QUESTIONS: That We Should Demand Be Answered By Our Leaders

25 QUESTIONS: That We Should Demand Be Answered By Our Leaders

By Les Weaver 
Our governments from municipal to federal have grown exponentially since our country’s founding.  That growth is not just in quantity but also in percent of population. Laws and regulations have increased to an uncountable level with many thousands obsolete but not repealed.  Like a cancer, for decades government has even begun to feed on itself.  That cancer first begins by the big fish, (federal) devouring the small fish, (municipal), and then works its way to bigger fish; i.e. County and State Governments.

Every day, more and more questions arise that can be defined as political self-cannibalism of the Federal Government.  The Federal Government just can’t get enough to satisfy its appetite for more power and control.  The menu to satisfy that appetite totally ignores the 10th Amendment to the Constitution, the superior law of the land.  To label the Federal Government as “out of control” is itself an understatement of the fearful obvious.

Our Constitution was intended to guarantee equal justice for all under the law.  The problem is that laws, regulations, ethics and political correctness create confusion about what is or is not permitted on any given day or under a particular circumstance.

That confusion has stimulated me to write out some questions.  I ask my peers, am I missing something about the formation and purpose of our government?  In any event, feel free to add to this list for it is far from complete.  And then, pass it on.

1. Why does this Administration encourage Muslim immigration but not Christian immigration?
2. Why does this government protect the Koran but no longer the Bible?
3. Why are we advised NOT to judge ALL Muslims by the actions of a few lunatics, but we are encouraged to judge ALL gun owners by the actions of a few lunatics?
4. Why are we constantly hearing about how Social Security is going to run out of money but we never hear about welfare or food stamps running out of money?
5. Why are we cutting benefits for our veterans, giving near no pay raises and cutting our military to less than pre-WWII levels but we are not cutting or reducing payments to illegal aliens such as monthly payments for each child, money for housing, food stamps, free education and also college while granting the right to covertly vote?
6. If Black Lives Matter, why do they treat themselves and each other so badly?
7. Why does the administration talk gun control over the mass shooting of ten but not use as example, the killing of 15 in the President’s home town?
8. Why is the motto “Black Lives Matter” but the saying that “All Lives Matter” results in a war between races seemingly stimulated by government?
9. Why does part of the government, (BLM, EPA, etc.) spend millions of tax dollars to protect flora, fauna and fungi while other parts of this same government, (HHS, etc.) grant and spend unaccounted millions of tax dollars to kill unborn humans?
10. Why is it that on the entire globe, the U.S. spends the most per student by far and yet is 20th and below on actual post-graduate knowledge and capability?
11. Why is the term “Domestic Terrorist” accepted but the term “Islamic Terrorist” discouraged and in government circles, even banned?
12. Why do so many persons lose all sense of honor, honesty and integrity once they obtain an office in Washington, D.C.?
13. Why do so many politicians that spew rage that illegals should not take U.S. jobs also vilify strengthening and enforcing E-Verify, and penalizing illegal employers?
14. Why do those congress members that voted for ObamaCare exempt both themselves and their staff from enrolling in what they voted on for the rest of us?
15. Why do so many citizens that claim their disgust at the government continue to perpetuate this same government by returning the scoundrels over and over again?
16. Why are so many blind to laws that are passed to “benefit and protect” the people but include a clause to exempt the very people that created and passed the law?
17. Why was the Democrat Kentucky county clerk, Kim Davis, who refused to issue same-sex marriage licenses because of religious objections, arrested for contempt of court but the chief of the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia, Cathy Lanier, gets a pass for refusing to issue concealed weapons permits to people unless they can arbitrarily show a “good reason,” although not required by law?
18. Why is Harvard considered an Acme of education when of the two alumna that occupy the White House, one believes the U.S. has 57 States and the other believes that all 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence were born outside of the U.S.?
19. After winning an election, what is it about the trip to Washington, D.C. that turns a servant of the people into a tyrannical ruler of the people?
20. Why should the average High School graduate attend further academics when winning an election at any level suddenly advances your mental capacity and ability far beyond non-politicians regardless of their education or experience?
21. Why can members of one party lie and perjure before congress without penalty but members of another party can be jailed for years for the same offense?
22. What is it about the first trip to Washington, D.C. after winning an election that causes the newly elected to suddenly morph from representing constituents to self-absorbance?
23. Why do an increasing number of citizens that once revered this government now fear it?
24. Why is it that only the free speech that echoes the President’s agenda is accepted as having substance while contrary speech may result in arrest?
25. Why is the handout of copies of The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution on campuses of education becoming disallowed?

Remember, please feel free to add to this list in comments and pass it along.

HALBROOK: What made the Nazi Holocaust possible? Gun control

HALBROOK: What made the Nazi Holocaust possible? Gun control

By Stephen P. Halbrook 

We recently marked the 75th anniversary of Kristallnacht, or the Night of the Broken Glass, the Nazi pogrom against Germany’s Jews on Nov. 9-10, 1938. Historians have documented most everything about it except what made it so easy to attack the defenseless Jews without fear of resistance. Their guns were registered and thus easily confiscated.

To illustrate, turn the clock back further and focus on just one victim, a renowned German athlete. Alfred Flatow won first place in gymnastics at the 1896 Olympics. In 1932, he dutifully registered three handguns, as required by a decree of the liberal Weimar Republic. The decree also provided that in times of unrest, the guns could be confiscated. The government gullibly neglected to consider that only law-abiding citizens would register, while political extremists and criminals would not. However, it did warn that the gun-registration records must be carefully stored so they would not fall into the hands of extremists.

 The ultimate extremist group led by Adolf Hitler seized power just a year later in 1933. The Nazis immediately used the firearms-registration records to identify, disarm and attack “enemies of the state,” a euphemism for Social Democrats and other political opponents of all types. Police conducted search-and-seizure operations for guns and “subversive” literature in Jewish communities and working-class neighborhoods.

Jews were increasingly deprived of more and more rights of citizenship in the coming years. The Gestapo cautioned the police that it would endanger public safety to issue gun permits to Jews. Hitler faked a show of tolerance for the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, but Flatow refused to attend the reunion there of former champions. He was Jewish and would not endorse the farce.

By fall of 1938, the Nazis were ratcheting up measures to expropriate the assets of Jews. To ensure that they had no means of resistance, the Jews were ordered to surrender their firearms.

Flatow walked into a Berlin police station to comply with the command and was arrested on the spot, as were other Jews standing in line. The arrest report confirmed that his pistols were duly registered, which was obviously how the police knew he had them. While no law prohibited a Jew from owning guns, the report recited the Nazi mantra: “Jews in possession of weapons are a danger to the German people.” Despite his compliance, Flatow was turned over to the Gestapo.

This scenario took place all over Germany — firearms were confiscated from all Jews registered as gun owners. As this was occurring, a wholly irrelevant event provided just the excuse needed to launch a violent attack on the Jewish community: A Polish teenager who was Jewish shot a German diplomat in Paris. The stage was set to instigate Kristallnacht, a carefully orchestrated Nazi onslaught against the entire Jewish community in Germany that horrified the world and even the German public.

Under the pretense of searching for weapons, Jewish homes were vandalized, businesses ransacked and synagogues burned. Jews were terrorized, beaten and killed. Orders were sent to shoot anyone who resisted.

Today, gun control, registration and prohibition are depicted as benign and progressive. Government should register gun owners and ban any guns it wishes, Americans are told, because government is inherently good and trustworthy. The experiences of Hitler’s Germany and, for that matter, Stalin’s Russia and Pol Pot’s Cambodia, are beneath the realm of possibility in exceptional America. Let’s hope so.

Still, be careful what you wish for.

Stephen Halbrook is research fellow with the Independent Institute and author “Gun Control in the Third Reich: Disarming the Jews and ‘Enemies of the State’” (Independent Institute, 2013).

Politically incorrect but morally correct

Politically incorrect but morally correct

Did Dr. Ben Carson hit a nerve with his politically incorrect but morally correct statement that Americans should be wary of voting for a Muslim president?

Yes, he did.

And the proof is the response from the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which called on him to withdraw from the presidential race.

CAIR is not only a Muslim Brotherhood front group and a darling of the U.S. media establishment. It is also joined at the hip with the terrorist group Hamas. In fact, in the biggest trial in American history on the funding of terrorist groups, CAIR was shown to be a wholly owned subsidiary of Hamas.

As WND has reported and documented, more than a dozen staffers, officials and board members of CAIR have been indicted or convicted of terrorist-related crimes – something the press consistently fails to mention when they gleefully turn to the organization for the "Muslim point of view" on a daily basis.

Years ago, a division of WND exposed CAIR's history and inner workings in a book called "Muslim Mafia." CAIR sued one of the authors who had penetrated CAIR headquarters by posing as a trusted intern and got access to top officials and files. WND has been defending the author and the whistleblower ever since in what has dragged on endlessly as a federal case, even though our legal team demonstrated CAIR was not even a legally incorporated entity when it filed the suit.

CAIR conducts both media jihad and legal jihad against its critics – discouraging any real investigations and exposure of its many alarming tactics inside the U.S.

If the American people had any idea that CAIR is not merely the "Muslim civil rights organization" it claims to be, but rather the most active and well-known Muslim Brotherhood front group in the U.S., they would be up in arms. Yet, the same people, the same institutions, that tried to drive Dr. Carson out of the presidential race for his perfectly sensible and reasonable comments protect CAIR by hiding the truth.

No other news organization in the country has devoted more time, resources and money nor paid a bigger price for taking on CAIR than WND.

At the very least, you owe it to yourself and your country to learn the truth about this insidious group. It's infuriating that CAIR is winning so many converts in America – not converts to Islam, but converts to the notion that Muslims are a badly treated, actively discriminated-against minority group within the U.S.

FBI statistics show that of all so-called "hate crimes" perpetrated against Americans, 60 percent of the victims are Jewish Americans. Muslims don't even show up in the charts. Anti-Semitism is rapidly spreading in the U.S., in part because of groups like CAIR who denounce Israel and "Zionism" at every opportunity.

There was a time when I, as an Arab-American, would be called on by the Big Media to debate officials from CAIR. I must have done too well. Because CAIR has been running wild on the media front for a decade essentially unchallenged. It has become untouchable, unquestioned, a sacred cow for the press.

It's an example of how political correctness turns the victim into the perpetrator.

If you've had enough of subversive groups like CAIR, it's time to fight back. If you've had enough of subversives in the media, it's also time to fight back.

Joseph Farah
Founder, editor and CEO of WND

Why are mass shootings going up at a significant rate? What is the root cause?

Why are mass shootings going up at a significant rate? What is the root cause?

Mass shootings, as most people know and the president confirmed, are going up at an alarming rate. What we don’t see in the media is a useful discussion as to why. The current most predictable action is for one side to jump on gun controls and the other side to defend guns.

None of this discourse is helpful. Why? The only thing being discussed is the means of mass killings and not the cause.  There are some facts that demonstrate that gun control or lack of gun control is not going to help:

1.    The numbers of mass shootings are going up at a disproportionate rate; especially since 2012.

2.    The rate of gun ownership in many studies is linked to increased gun violence. Namely in the cities where the shootings have occurred.

3.    There are many studies of the shooters demonstrating they were on psychotropic drugs during or just before they committed the crimes.

4.    Virtually all the shooters were described by others as having unusual behavior and social problems – pointing to a likely range of mental illness or issues.

5.    Most shootings take less than five minutes and studies indicate the shooters have conducted studies on how long first responders would take to arrive on scene.

6.    Most of the shooters committed suicide before they were shot or otherwise apprehended.

7.    Lastly according to government officials, especially the ATF, current proposed gun restrictions would not have prevented any of the shootings.

The above information would point to the fact we are not examining the root cause of mass shootings.  We are, as the president claimed was necessary, politicizing the issue. This could never be more wrong.

So the question must be asked, why are we as a nation not examining the root cause of these shootings? Guns per capita have not really changed related to the number of the mass shooting increases. Are our politicians and others fearful of looking deeper? Are they not smarter than to not seek out the root cause? They have demonstrated they do not want to take on the gun issue, so why not seek the root cause which is not likely guns? Guns are a means and enable more casualties; we can all understand that.  However, to kill is an individual decision.

My question to you, our leaders and others is why do we have more people making the decision to kill than ever before? What has happened in our society that is enabling that or not allowing people with serious problems to be found out and helped?

History has proven that not pursuing the root cause of a problem leaves us looking foolish attempting apply solutions to symptoms.

Mark Levin Strikes Again - Plunder and Deceit

Mark Levin Strikes Again

Mark Levin's new book, Plunder and Deceit, takes aim at the familiar catalog of destructive Obama Administration policies but with a new twist: He focuses, specifically, on how they harm children and the next generation.

It's quite a catalog beginning with how Common Core compromises educational integrity and quality and proceeds to show how the student loan industry keeps professors overpaid and underworked while it jails our young in a modern debtor's prison of obligations.  He explains how ObamaCare requires the young to pay higher insurance premiums that they should and how Social Security represents a massive robbery of our children to support us in our old age.  Levin chronicles how a host of public services are now being run to fund salaries and pensions of the workers who provide them, not to meet the needs of their intended recipients.  Nowhere is this pattern more blatant than in education where he teachers unions have come to epitomize the famous saying of their founder Albert Shanker who said "when school children start paying union dues, that's when I'll start representing the interests of children."

Ultimately, ObamaCare will squeeze state and local budgets as they struggle to pay for the vast expansion of Medicaid.  By 2020, when the federal subsidies dial back and end, the burden of paying the local share of Medicaid will absorb all state revenues that might have been earmarked for education.  Forget about any teacher pay raises in the future.  The money all went to Medicaid.  We are paying for the health costs of America's poor (but not old) off the backs of our children's education.

But most interesting is the basic question Levin asks: Why are we so protective of our children as parents and so reckless in endangering them as citizens, voters, and taxpayers?  On the one hand, we overprotect our young and on the other, our fiscal policies are the equivalent of telling them to go play in the middle of traffic.

His question is capitalism on its head.  In our economy, we use personal selfish desires to power an economy that benefits us all.  But in this case, we use selfish public policies to screw our own children.

Leave it to Mark Levin to ask why.