Kathy Szeliga and Wayne Norman support Maryland's Parishioner Protection Act
courtesy Baltimore Sun
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“While I think the idea of arming worshippers is foolish, it’s good to see Republicans reacting in some way to a mass shooting. Being generally complicitous with the NRA, they usually have little to say about the nation’s gun madness. They might offer ‘thoughts and prayers for the innocent victims.’ And they might admonish journalists and political rivals that ‘this is not the time to debate gun control.’ But they don’t talk much about preventing gun violence.” – Dan Rodricks in The answer to gun madness is not more guns [via baltimoresun.com]

 

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34 COMMENTS

    • Especially in the context of concealed carry legality and practice having swept the nation over the past three decades. That’s a helluva lot more gun owners and even gun carriers, and yet, substantially less violent crime. How does that square with the “any guns, crime sprees everywhere” crowd?

      I’m not giving spree shooters a pass and ignoring their devastation; that’s a sick and urgent phenomenon to address, which destroys many lives. Still, not every problem is a national, existential threat warranting massive, unconstitutional countermeasures.

    • The “madness” he’s referring to is the freedom we enjoy as Americans. He’s trying to make a point but all I hear from him is: “property values will drop if we allow them to move in next door”, “if we hire them, customers won’t come in”, “I’d never let my daughter date one of them”, etc., ad nauseum.
      The man is a bigot. His shallow bigotry is all he knows and he has no intention of actually learning anything about the group he hates. In his mind, the only solution is to pass laws restricting, licensing, controlling, and ultimately strongly discouraging people from becoming gun owners.
      Because he hates us.
      🤠

    • It is part of the required coursework for both a communications and journalism major. It is a recommended option for all the communist derived majors.

  1. Well Dan (Rodricks not the one that writes here) there’s a reason pro gunners don’t offer up legislative options after a gun violence outbreak.

    THERE ARE NO LEGISLATIVE OPTIONS THAT WILL PREVENT ASSHOLES FROM SHOOTING PEOPLE!!!!!!

    No matter what you ban or who you ban from owning certain items people will still find a way to acquire or manufacture those items. Did you skip school when they did that whole block of instruction on prohibition or did you just completely fail at anything that could make you seem more intelligent than the average Amoeba?

    You see had you paid attention and had you utilized a modicum of critical thinking skills when given the run down on Prohibition (Government banned booze, people started making their own, gangs took over the booze making and distribution, Government wasted billions trying to shut that shit down, Government failed, Government repeals prohibition) one would LOGICALLY come to the conclusion that an outright ban on anything creates a new class of criminal and a new very lucrative enterprise for organized crime.

    The manufacture, transportation or smuggling, and sale of banned items. One really needs to look no further than the illicit drug trade for a modern example of this fallacy.

    We have banned a shit ton of drugs, yet they are still available and still used. You want to stop gun violence? Start looking at the root cause instead of the tool. Look at the people committing the violence and start to work on changing the conditions that produce people like that. Sure it’s going to suck because causes range from mental illness to generational poverty and encompass everything in between but that is the only way to slow it down, even then expect that it WILL NOT be 100% effective.

    There will always be those that slip through the cracks or those that are just evil and will commit atrocities for no discernible reason.

    • Republicans and the NRA don’t offer up any new laws in the wake of shootings because strangely enough there are already laws in place. How is making murderer more illegal going to stop somebody that wasn’t to turn in the first place? Alternatively allowing people to protect themselves May prevent them from being murdered. When you use legislation to disarm people the only people that are disarmed are those who are law-abiding. Which just increases the potential victim pool. Of course this is good for them because more victims means more sensationalized headlines means easier for them to push their political agenda. if it happens to the result in the death of one more voter who might have opposed this political agenda well those just happened to be the breaks of the game.

    • Recognizing that we will never have a utopia where nothing bad ever happens seems to be hard for liberals. I’m not sure why but it’s quite obvious now that I think about it.

      Their world view is constant “progress” toward some imaginary utopia where everyone is equal and nobody is murdered and people aren’t rude. And when one problem is solved, they look for a less significant problem because nothing seems good enough. At least that’s what it seems like on the more far left.

      • Actually the ‘progress’ they march toward is the utopia where they are in complete control from cradle to grave. Whether or not everyone is equal or not murdered is irrelevant except as window dressing along the way to the ultimate goal. Once they’re in complete control murder rates don’t matter, because the truth is what ever they tell you it is.

  2. Well duh, everyone knows the answer to gunmadness is warm cocoa and hugs. If the parishioners in Texas had just offered that mad mad warm cocoa and hugs they’d still be alive today. Probably singing Kum-by-ya and playing the bongos.

  3. ” An ongoing national survey finds that holders of concealed-carry permits have killed 1,119 people in non-self-defense incidents since 2007. These include 31 mass shootings and the killings of 21 police officers.”

    While I’m sure the “ongoing national survey” is completely unbiased I would like details of the 31 mass shootings and police officer killings by concealed carry permit holders. In today’s world the media would dance on the graves of those victims for weeks beating anti gun drums so I am skeptical.

    Why is arming worshipers is foolish? Having someone or more than one in the congregation who is armed and dedicated to protecting the rest. Like a sheep dog who protects the flock against predators, a good thing. A dog is a predator but can be trained and trusted to protect, unlike the predatory left.

    • I want to see a source on that, too. My first suspicion is they’re playing fast and loose with definitions to get the result.

    • I vote STUPID. Provocative would mean that these morons actually have to have a coherent thought in their BB sized brains. They don’t and I know I just dissed BB’s but at least I didn’t make the .9mm mad.

      They don’t like the thought of Christians with guns. Makes them flash back to the Crusades. You know, that time when The Christians finally reacted to the Muslim aggression almost 500 years later. Cause we all know Christians are blood thirsty unlike our Muslim, peaceful religion and all friends.

  4. Statements like this are why I look at anti civil rights people as stupid, dumb, fools, idiots, people who want to be uneducated when it comes to guns.

  5. Wow, Mark and Gabby sure have taken a turn for the worse. They look totally different from the last time I remember seeing them in public. I guess being liberal takes it’s toll on your body. I can’t tell which one took a hit to the head anymore, they both look a little slack jawed now.

  6. It is so simple to understand.

    More and more gun control laws are necessary to enable the final step. It must be proven that two or three (or how many) additional layers cannot stop the shootings. This strategy is designed to set up a situation (like Obamacare) where all attempts at “common sense” cannot “fix” the problem of spree shooters. Therefore, the only thing left is for Congress to publish a bill repealing the second amendment.

    Once there is energy enough to get the repeal amendment launched and ratified, all things gun-related can be made illegal for sale or possession, without messy court fights over the meaning of the second amendment.

    The anti-gun gang know how to create political theater to desensitize the public to the idea of de facto confiscation. What would be sweeter for gun grabbers than creating a situation where all the privately held guns are neutered, but left in the hands of people who can no longer use them legally, for any purpose?

    The bad guys are always showing something shiny and bright in one hand, while the real action is in the other hand.

  7. “Gun madness” – is that like “mad gun disease”? I’ve only owned one gun that showed any signs of madness – an AK that doubled, but a new sear corrected that.

  8. Little Danny has a great recipe for his word salad. Equal parts bigotry and intolerance with a generous layer of propaganda, sprinkle with lies and top it off with hate-speech. This child has a promising future. If and when he reaches his full potential, he may be qualified to sort clothing donations at Goodwill.

  9. Standing athwart “progress” shouting “Stop!” wouldn’t be nearly as necessary, or valuable, if y’all weren’t so reeactive, stupid n wrong.

    Maybe try proposing things less bad for health, safety, n sanity, and we’ll have time for a conversation about what will actually help. As it is, stopping yoh from making things worse is a full-time job.

    Btw, “pro-gun” folks have tons lf proposals, starting from maybe in a country with 100s of millions of guns(*), with 10s of millions of owners, where we’re not all dead … the issue isn’t guns. Maybe get the wax out of your ears, n you’d hear things. Just a thought.

    (*) These numbers hold for “high power” arms well beyond “Musket” Morgan’s pseudo-comfort zone. And still … we’re not all dead.

    • Reply above is for quote-author Dan.

      Y’all hereabouts get it, excepting Troll-y McTrollenstein, of course. Hey, Bloomie’s bots gotta train up getting out into the world; gotta be ready to spread the turf come “(only the permitted) voice of (only some) people, (through other people’s mouths)” -time the next election.

  10. All of his sources are, unsurprisingly, from anti-gun sources. But I would like to know what the source if for this claimed statistic: “An ongoing national survey finds that holders of concealed-carry permits have killed 1,119 people in non-self-defense incidents since 2007. These include 31 mass shootings and the killings of 21 police officers.” (Aside from the fact that this accounts for 112 deaths per year, and one might assume that at least a portion of these are hunting or other accidents and not intentional killings, such that a CCW is irrelevant.) I have a hard time buying this.

    The fact that armed citizens do not stop “mass shootings” may be more reflective of the fact that most mass shootings are in no carry zone and the relative dearth of licensed carriers both nationally and in the places where mass shootings are more likely to occur–such as our major metro areas.

    • Most (or at least a plurality) non-self defense human deaths caused by CHL holders are suicides. Many of the killings are not done with a firearm. “These include 31 mass shootings and the killings of 21 police officers.” That is probably an outright lie. I’ve never heard of a single mass shooting by a CHL holder.

      “The fact that armed citizens do not stop “mass shootings” may be more reflective of the fact” that it’s not a mass shooting when they stop the shooter before it’s a shooting that can be classified as a mass shooting by any numerical metric.

  11. “There is no sanctuary in America.” Well, duh. There is no sanctuary ANYWHERE. Just ask the Coptics in Egypt who were slaughtered in their churches, or the Christians in Pakistan who suffered nine dead and many wounded when two suicide bombers entered their church today. Or the thousands of Muslims slaughtered by Muslims from other sects in their mosques through bombings and shootings. How many Shi’ia, Christians and Yazidi were slaughtered by ISIS? Religion is no protection from the forces of evil.

  12. Typical liberal point of views and same old shi# that comes out of all their mouths
    You noticed he didn’t talk about Baltimore or any studies that JOhn Hopkins has done on the rise of violent crime on unarmed victims here in the city . People like him live in their imaginary safe bubble and avoid every area here in the city where you might have a confrontation with a criminal

  13. Gee whiz my 43year old son lives in Maryland. Thinks the gun laws are great. I hope and pray my grandkids are safe in the people’s republic church they go to. Doubt anyone is bright enough to carry anyway😖😫😢

  14. 1)any of your illegal types are going to carry any ways. Yes in a church even.
    2)It doesn’t mean anyone can carry in the church. It means that they can be given the option by the parish. This is likely for their security team.
    3)The police seem to be rather effective in getting to these shootings in a timely manner, maybe we should let people be their own first responders?

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