“The father of a 6-year-old girl who was killed in the Sandy Hook Elementary shootings will throw out the first pitch for the Texas Rangers’ home opener April 5,” espn.go.com reports. “The ceremony is part of a league-wide effort by Major League Baseball to honor the victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting during the opening games of the 2013 regular season . . .
“All players, managers, coaches, umpires and on-field personnel will wear a symbolic ribbon patch and, with fans, observe a pregame moment of silence in their opening games in a league-wide effort to remember the individuals who lost their lives on Dec. 14 in Newtown, Conn.”
Quite why MLB is lining-up behind civilian disarmament is anyone’s guess. But one thing’s for sure: with a federal AWB DOA, gun grabbers are growing increasingly shrill. Check this polemic from nydailynews.com‘s Denis Hamil (complete with pic of Sandy Hook victim standing at the plate, as above):
“The morning of Dec. 14 was the last day I saw my son alive,” Heslin said of Jesse Lewis, 6, who was one of 20 children and six adults slaughtered in the Sandy Hook Elementary School.
“My son’s life was taken by a deranged coward with an assault rifle. I ask everyone to stand up and speak up for a ban on these assault weapons,” Heslin said.
The face of this father was a wreath of sadness as he stood in front of Vice President Biden and Mayor Bloomberg and other family members of the fallen of Newtown. But he wasn’t letting his boy die in vain. He was asking for some help from the American people to make the Cowards of Congress end the madness of assault rifles.
After the event was over, a mayor’s aide told me that Heslin was hurting as spring arrived because his kid liked to play baseball and the season was about to start.
It made me think immediately of walking through Newtown Cemetery back in December as funeral bells tolled through this drowsy Connecticut town that was awakened by a monster killing its children and their brave teachers with a weapon of war. As I strolled past fresh graves dug for children and gazed down to my left, I saw a sandlot baseball field as empty as the hearts of Newtown.
I knew that some of the murdered kids had played on spring and summer days on that field of dreams but never would again. Instead they would lie up here for eternity in a field of the dead.
Well, then, let’s ban “assault rifles”! Because, you know, death sucks. And little children being slaughtered sucks even worse. And we have to do something, right?
Arming teachers? No, no, no! That would be like adding a “goalkeeper” anti-aircraft system on Navy ships in case the enemy somehow managed to arm-up and penetrate several layers of security.
We need to do something to prevent these spree killings before they occur. Like making it impossible for them to purchase weapons. Well, a weapon. The AR-15. Which is an extra-special deadly weapon—that somehow got to be law-abiding Americans’ favorite rifle.
And as Heslin spoke in City Hall on Thursday I thought of another kid who loved baseball named Chase Kowalski, who was a star pitcher for a local Newtown team and how, when I walked into his wake, he lay in a closed coffin because the savagery of the AR-15 assault rifle that had killed him hadn’t left enough of his little 7-year-old face for an open casket.
This is the gun the NRA and the Cowards of Congress want to keep legal. A gun that blows the faces and fingers off children, that blows babies into caskets.
As Heslin spoke I remembered speaking to Chase Kowalski’s dad Steve in the back room of the funeral parlor and that his baseball dad’s face had the same stain of indelible anguish that I saw on Neil Heslin’s face in the Blue Room of City Hall.
As opposed to, say, any other gun. Which can also be used to blow the faces and fingers off of spree killers.
Every one of those Cowards of the Congress owes it to those who died in Sandy Hook to go take a stroll through the cemetery. Go with the parents who will be laying flowers on a kid’s grave instead of cheering for a son or daughter on that little baseball field down the hill.
“You don’t think it could happen to your kid in your town,” Steve Kowalski told me at his son’s wake. “But it did. And it can happen to your son as easily as it did to ours.”
I dare the Cowards of Congress to go there before they vote in favor of letting anyone have the right to bear a weapon of war. That’s a vote for another nut with an AR-15 to march into another school and kill more kids.
And while we’re at it, let’s have a roll call of all the politicians who voted for the Gun-Free School Zones Amendment Act of 1990. Or those who continue to support it today.
Meanwhile, rest assured that you’ll be hearing a lot from the civilian disarmament industry over the next few weeks. They are pissed. And they’re not afraid to bring out the big guns to express their displeasure. Rhetorically speaking.
Let me think this one through-If the government is unaware as to who owns guns they know not whom to confiscate from. Mandatory registration would only apply to legally held guns as no self respecting criminal would provide the powers that be with the tools to create a “gotcha” situation. Government has demonstrated the ability to persecute those whom they KNOW own guns. So the masses are expected to trust, when by and large most of the gun control crowd are adamant that guns should be in the possession of ONLY police and military. We should trust when many of the anti-2A persuasion have stated openly that registration and or regulation is only a First Step, sometimes clarifying what the next step is while oftentimes being entirely too vague. I personally am not one to trust away my rights and privileges. Trust far too often leads to betrayal……………
Mr. Heslin has become the poster-boy for the emotional anti-gun crusade, whether he knows it or not. I think he is being used as a puppet. Shame, really. I mean, his child is dead due to the madness of a crazy person, and here he is being used as a convenient shill by those who could care less about him, but moreso in love with the fact his son is dead so they can advance an agenda.
These people have no morals.
My Winchester 94 Trails End Model .357 turned into a safe queen. I took Winnie out shooting just one time. She is too beautiful to take out of my home. Therefore, I have decided (sob) to sell her to a new owner and I hope a good home.
Does Baum have compromising photos of RF? Is RF getting a cut of the royalties? Are they dating? I don’t get it.
Mr. Heslin, seeing how your son liked to play baseball, had a deranged person killed him with a baseball bat…..
Would you be calling for the ban of baseball bats?
Mr. Heslin, dancing on your son’s grave….
You should be ashamed of yourself!
Has any firearm ever just gone off sitting in a safe or drawer? Funny how they only fire themselves when someone is holding it.
i hate when people talk about the MSR like it is the only gun that can be used to kill a ton of people. virginia tech shooter had a 9mm and a .22 with a ten round mag. a columbine shooter had a double barreled shotgun like joe recommends everyone get. a ban on one type of gun, or all guns will do nothing to save just one life.
Timothy McVeigh killed 19 children under the age of six along with 139 adults and injured 680, yet we still haven’t banned ammonium nitrate and diesel fuel. Why? Because like AR15s, ammonium nitrate and diesel fuel have legitimate uses.
As far as MLB, I don’t necessarily equate wearing an armband to remember the victims with calling for gun control. As long as they keep it as apolitical as possible I don’t have a problem with it.
The quote doesn’t make sense. What was he trying to say?
-D
Since I NEVER sell a firearm I have a number of “Safe Queens.”
One Two Three-You all hit the nail on the head.
Those who would take away the rights of others (and thus put more people in harm’s way by taking away their ability to defend themselves) deserve no sympathy for anything that happens to them. I feel for the child, who may have possibly been able to grow up and break away from his father’s leftist brainwashing, but not for Heslin. F- him and all like him, loss of a family member doesn’t permit you to be a tyrant.
I couldn’t care less about the reasons people construct to be oppressive in order to soothe their damaged psyches. All I care about is that this person is willing to oppress and endanger the lives of others because of his own stupidity, weak willpower, or inherent carelessness for others.
After so long trying to defend a basic human right from those who would take it away, I’m through attempting to play nice with these scumbags. Screw ’em all.
The people in this country need to wake up. I’ve got nothing against remembering these victims of the shooting in Newtown but what about others; victims of the wars in the middle east at the hands of our government’s illegal wars or victims of fraudulent banking practices leaving families homeless? Are we doing anything about that? Is anything going to be done? They want to ban the common sports rifle, yet they won’t do anything about the other things that have a much larger impact on society. That and stripping our rights in the name of safety and many other obvious threats to our freedoms has stimulated the desire/need to bear arms.
To claim it’s ninjas is offensive to ninjas.. They don’t use handguns.. they use mind control rays darnit!
Normalcy bias: aka, the “it could never happen here” mentality.
Further proof that the “tolerant” left is by far more prejudicial and intolerant than the opposition.
I wish I had the luxury of safe queens. Absolutely no one in my immediate or extended family is a gun person, so no legacy guns, and as a refugee from NJ with my budget, I have enough trouble just building up a respectable collection of practical firearms.
I detail cars. With a mortgage and a two year old. Nothing superfluous for this guy.
I swear officer, it isn’t mine! I was holding it for a friend! And then these damn ninjas showed up! They shotted me!
and here’s the crux of the issue.
If we have biometric smart guns:
how can owners sell their guns?
how can you take your kids shooting?
how can gun companies make these guns and still price them to be affordable?
how can gun owners afford this?
how can shooting ranges rent guns?
how can we be sure that any of this stops someone from shooting others?
how can we know that this power won’t be abused?
how can we know that these are tamper proof?
of course the answer is that the goal of these devices is to price guns out of existence. Nothing else is taken into account because nothing else matters to antis but making guns less prevalent. Results be damned
None of those talking heads seem to be hitting on one major point:
Our current system in place works. It is frustrating at times for law abiding guns owners who have to work within it, but it works nonetheless.
Adam Lanza tried to buy rifles before going on his shooting spree, but did not want to wait the required waiting period, and then moved on. The current system, in place in CT, worked.
Because it worked, Adam Lanza went ahead and stole the guns he wanted, just like any other criminal. When he blew his own mother away and stole her guns, I doubt very much that he was thinking about undergoing a background check.
What this show covered was once again, the same ol’ prattle about “gun show loopholes”, 40% and 2 million. billion or zillion crooks prevented from getting guns.
Karl Rove was fine but just once I’d like to see somebody mention that there ARE no gun show loopholes, there is no 40% and that most of the rejections are from screwed up Govt records!
Like I’ve said before, if there is to be a “background check” of some sort – which, of course already exists to some extent – we may as well try to control it as best we can. How? Glad you asked..
1/ No general registration of gun or ammo buyers or positive background checks. Negative background checks – in the sense that a potential buyer can be checked against a “prohibited” list done by a third party and no permanent record kept. Whatever list is maintained has to be carefully monitored for mistakes, typos and the usual junk such lists are ‘er to.
2/ No general registration of any item legally purchased and kept for non NFA firearms – all FFL records to be destroyed in due time and any government violation of this rule to be held to strict account.
3/ A mentally disturbed “no sell” list must be carefully controlled by judicial review to prevent any “medical professional” – who may themselves be “disturbed”- or believe anyone owning or wanting to own a gun is “disturbed” – to have such an arbitrary power, a violation of due process.
4/ No restrictions or records of any temporary loans or gifts within families.
What I’d really like to emphasize is Leghorn’s original idea of a “third party” keeping (and destroying) this “Black List’, to insure privacy, accuracy and accessible only through a warrant. This is key.
As far as the “high capacity” mags at virginia tech go, it’s fairly common for institutions like the brady campaign etc, to claim that any number of rounds past a certain number is high capacity. It’s classical bait and switch, claim that they only want magazines that border on impracticality as far as self defence goes while all the while include fine print that covers a huge portion of standard carry weapons.
Hmm, According to Cynthia, I’m mad man because I believe that being a free man is more important than being a servant and outright slave to the state.
Wow! What can be said about this woman is beyond words, but that she is a slave in everyway possible except for wearing physical chains is obvious.
The fact she is black with the history of the first gun control laws to disarm freed blacks is obscene and an abomination.
Am i the only one who puts on a shirt before talking to the cops?
You’ll never get onto the TV show “COPS” with that sort of behavior.
What’s with not naming shooters? What exactly does it accomplish?
The Japanese have 2 terms for Trolls which translate into the following abbreviations NHK and NEET which describe pathology anti-social, unemployed shut ins, young men with NO social skills “who spend much time with tissue in hand”
Of course in Canada they all think they are Jim Cary
People are really jumping on Randwagon!
Not especially useful and not especially original either.
http://www.tuffproducts.com/product.php?productid=16252&cat=268&page=1
On it’s surface this seems like a giant anti-redneck conspiracy, but there may be a couple of logical explanations for this.
First, it would make sense that areas with higher firearms ownership rates would have higher incidences of firearms owners running afoul of federal gun laws.
Second, in cities like Chicago the local and state laws are far stricter than federal laws. Illegal NFA firearms are more likely to pop up in Montana than Chicago. The gang bangers are shooting up the place with perfectly legal (federally) Glocks with 17 round magazines. They’re not too concerned with short barreled rifles or silencers.