February 21st-22nd, 2017. It's been 466-467 days since the Nov 8, 2016, election of some rich asshole, no. 45, and 394-395 days since the Jan 20th inauguration.
POLITICS
NRA Goes On Offense In Wake Of Florida Shooting
Two of its top officials deliver fiery speeches at an annual gathering of conservatives.
NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. ― The National Rifle Association usually maintains a large presence at the Conservative Political Action Conference, an annual political confab that draws thousands of conservative activists from across the country.
Some speculated, though, that the nation’s most powerful gun lobby would lower its visibility at this year’s CPAC, which began Thursday, given that a gunman armed with an assault-style rifle murdered 17 people last week at a high school in Parkland, Florida.
Whenever a mass shooting occurs, for example, the NRA goes quiet. And no officials from the gun lobby appeared on a publicly released schedule of CPAC speakers online ― a curious omission for an organization that pays for top billing at the gathering.
But after NRA spokeswoman Dana Loesch was jeered by thousands of people over gun control at a CNN-sponsored town hall on Wednesday in Florida, she and the top NRA official not only appeared at CPAC Thursday, but they went on the attack ― blasting Democrats, the media, and the FBI over its failure to act on tips that may have stopped the shooter in Parkland.
The shameful politicization of tragedy — it’s a classic strategy, right out of the playbook of a poisonous movementWayne LaPierre, NRA’s CEO, on those pushing for stricter gun laws.
“Each and every member of the National Rifle Association mourns the loss of the innocent,” NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre said in a speech that was carried live by all three major cable news channels. But he quickly added that “opportunists wasted not one second to exploit tragedy for political gain.”
LaPierre warned that growing calls from students for stricter gun laws would lead to a European-style “socialist wave” that would strip law-abiding citizens of their firearms.
Referring to politicians who back stricter gun laws, he said, “They hide behind labels like Democrat, left-wing, and progressive to make their socialist agenda more palatable, and that is terrifying.”
“The shameful politicization of tragedy — it’s a classic strategy, right out of the playbook of a poisonous movement,” he said.
Those pushing for more gun control in the wake of the Parkland massacre, he said, “want to sweep right under the carpet the failure of school security, the failure of family, the failure of America’s mental health system, and even the unbelievable failure of the FBI.”
He also took a clear swipe at the FBI over the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election, saying, “What is hard to understand is why no one at the FBI stood up and called B.S. on its rogue leadership. I mean, really, where was the systemic resistance?”
Many in legacy media love mass shootingsDana Loesch, NRA spokeswoman.
“Many in legacy media love mass shootings,” Loesch claimed to a standing ovation. “I’m not saying you love the tragedy, but you love the ratings. Crying white mothers are ratings gold.”
Her comments echoed a video that NRA-TV released Wednesday, which slammed the mainstream media for being the “casting call for the next mass shooting.”
In a sign of the NRA’s status among conservatives, the group received two top speaking slots ― LaPierre and Loesch addressed attendees immediately prior to Vice President Mike Pence.
The gun lobby’s outsized influence also was evident in the halls of Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center, the massive compgolex that has hosted CPAC in recent years and where conservative stars like Ben Shapiro and Sebastian Gorka mix and mingle with selfie-seeking students and other activists. The NRA occupies the largest space among exhibitors at the event. It even offers where attendees can practice shooting firearms.
But while the NRA officials resisted the prospect of additional laws regulating firearms, congressional Republicans and President some rich asshole were entertaining other ideas ― a sign that political pressure for bigger changes is building in the wake of the Parkland shooting.
the rich asshole on Thursday met with state and local officials at the White House to discuss solutions to address gun violence. The president reiterated his support for raising the age when Americans can buy assault weapons such as the AR-15. The 19-year-old charged in the Parkland shooting was able to purchase an AR-15 rifle in Florida.
“It should all be at 21,” the rich asshole said at an event at the White House. “And the NRA will back it.”
“They’re very close to me. I’m close to them. The NRA wants to do the right thing,” the rich asshole claimed. “I’ve spoken to them often in the last two days. It’s not a battle — I think the NRA wants to do the right thing.”
Raising the minimum age for purchasing assault weapons could gain momentum in Congress. Republican Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Pat Roberts of Kansas have expressed interest in the proposal this week.
“Certainly nobody under 21 should have an AR-15,” Roberts said Thursday.
Some CPAC attendees who support gun rights agreed.
“I think raising the age is not a bad thing, it’s a good thing,” Marie Zare, a New York commercial real estate broker, said.
Zare, who recently obtained a gun permit for the first time, said she would also support arming some teachers in schools, another of the rich asshole’s proposals.
“We have, what, 340 million guns in this country?” Zare said. “You’re not getting rid of them. They’re not going away.”
the rich asshole hits CNN as ‘fake news’ over Florida student's claim network gave him scripted question
BY JACQUELINE THOMSEN - 02/22/18 08:45 PM EST
President the rich asshole went after CNN over a Florida school shooting survivor’s claim that he didn't participate in a CNN town hall because the network wouldn’t let him ask his original question and replaced it with a scripted one.
“Just like so much of CNN, Fake News. That’s why their ratings are so bad! MSNBC may be worse,” the rich asshole tweeted Thursday.
“School shooting survivor says he quit @CNN Town Hall after refusing scripted question.” @TuckerCarlson. Just like so much of CNN, Fake News. That’s why their ratings are so bad! MSNBC may be worse.
CNN quickly replied to the rich asshole's tweet, reiterating its past denial of the student's account.
"There is absolutely no truth to this story -- and we can prove that. CNN did not provide or script questions for anyone in last night's town hall, nor have we ever. Those are the facts," the network tweeted at the president.
“School shooting survivor says he quit @CNN Town Hall after refusing scripted question.” @TuckerCarlson. Just like so much of CNN, Fake News. That’s why their ratings are so bad! MSNBC may be worse.
There is absolutely no truth to this story -- and we can prove that. CNN did not provide or script questions for anyone in last night's town hall, nor have we ever. Those are the facts. #FactsFirst
the rich asshole appeared to have been responding to a segment on Fox News' "Tucker Carlson Tonight" featuring the student, who reiterated his previous claims.
Colton Haab, a survivor of the mass shooting at a Parkland, Fla., high school last week, said earlier Thursday that CNN had initially asked him to "write a speech and ask questions” for the town hall but that the event “ended up being all scripted.”
He said his question was about using veterans as armed security guards at schools.
“I expected to be able to ask my questions and give my opinion on my questions," Haab said.
"I don't think that it's going get anything accomplished," he added. "It's not gonna ask the true questions that all the parents and teachers and students have."
CNN disputed Haab’s account.
"There is absolutely no truth to this," Richard Hudock, CNN's senior manager of public relations, said in a statement provided to The Hill. "CNN did not provide or script questions for anyone in last night's town hall, nor have we ever.”
"After seeing an interview with Colton Haab, we invited him to participate in our town hall along with other students and administrators from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School," Hudock said. "Colton’s father withdrew his name from participation before the forum began, which we regretted but respected."
the rich asshole has repeatedly attacked CNN and other networks, including MSNBC, since his presidential campaign and into his administration.
Updated: 9:33 p.m.
Manafort 'confident he will be acquitted' of all charges
BY MAX GREENWOOD - 02/22/18 08:30 PM EST
Paul Manafort is "confident he will be acquitted of all charges," his spokesman said Thursday, after special counsel Robert Mueller unsealed new charges against the former the rich asshole campaign chairman.
"Paul Manafort is innocent of the allegations set out in the newly filed indictments and he is confident that he will be acquitted of all charges," Jason Maloni said in a statement.
"The new allegations against Mr. Manafort, once again, have nothing to do with Russia and 2016 election interference/collusion," he added. "Mr. Manafort is confident that he will be acquitted and violations of his constitutional rights will be remedied."
A grand jury in Virginia returned a 32-count superseding indictment on Thursday charging Manafort and his business associate Richard Gates with bank and tax fraud.
Manafort and Gates were first charged as a result of Mueller's investigation in October, but new charges in the case have been expected for some time. Both men have pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Manafort and Gates are also facing other charges, including money laundering.
Mueller's team is investigating Russia's role in the 2016 presidential election and whether members of the rich asshole campaign conspired with Moscow to help disrupt and sway the race. But the special counsel also has a broad mandate to pursue any alleged wrongdoings that may be uncovered as a result of the Russia probe.
The new charges against Manafort and Gates came less than a week after Mueller unsealed indictments against 13 Russian nationals and three Russian companies accused of meddling in the 2016 U.S. election.
the rich asshole prefers 'hardening' schools over holding active shooter drills
BY BRETT SAMUELS - 02/22/18 01:05 PM EST
President the rich asshole on Thursday said he is opposed to active shooter drills in schools and prefers “hardened schools" with increased security in the building.
“Active shooter drills is a very negative thing ... I don’t like it,” the rich asshole said during a meeting with local officials on school safety.
“I’d much rather have a hardened school ... I think it’s crazy. I think it’s very hard on children,” he added.
Earlier in the meeting, the rich asshole reiterated his support for arming some teachers to prevent future school shootings. He suggested it would be difficult to hire enough security guards to properly protect a school, but allowing some teachers to carry concealed handguns could help solve the problem.
“I want certain highly adept people, people who understand weaponry, guns,” the rich asshole said, suggesting teachers would receive “rigorous training” and could earn bonuses.
“If you harden the sites you’re not going to have this problem,” the rich asshole said.
the rich asshole's comments echo those made earlier Thursday by National Rifle Association (NRA) CEO Wayne LaPierre. Speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference, LaPierre said increased security is the best defense against future school shootings.
“Evil walks among us, and God help us if we don’t harden our schools and protect our kids,” LaPierre said.
“Every day young children are being dropped off at schools that are wide-open, soft targets for people bent on mass murder. It should not be easier for a madman to shoot up a school than a bank or a jewelry store or some Hollywood gala.”
The top NRA executive promised his organization would provide "immediate assistance” to schools for security consulting free of charge.
The president's idea to arm teachers has faced opposition from educators and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.
The meeting at the White House Thursday was the second panel in as many days in response to last week’s shooting at a Florida high school, where a gunman killed 17 people and injured more than a dozen others.
the rich asshole signals shift on guns
BY JONATHAN EASLEY - 02/22/18 11:26 AM EST
President the rich asshole on Thursday signaled a dramatic shift on guns a day after he held an emotional listening session in the Oval Office with the families of victims and survivors of a mass shooting at a Florida high school.
In a torrent of morning tweets, the president for the first time expressed support for a range of policies that will put him at odds with the National Rifle Association (NRA), the powerful gun lobby that spent more than $30 million to help elect him in 2016.
the rich asshole said he wants a total ban on bump stocks, the rifle attachment that allow guns to fire like automatic weapons. The president said he supports raising the age of purchase for long guns from 18 to 21 and that he will be “strongly pushing” for comprehensive background checks.
“Congress is in a mood to finally do something on this issue – I hope,” the rich asshole tweeted.
It’s still unclear just how far the rich asshole intends to go and the policy that seems to energize him the most — arming school officials who have been trained to handle firearms so they can shoot back at potential gunmen — is highly controversial.
But the president was clearly moved to action by his meeting with those who experienced the horror of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School massacre in Parkland, Fla., which left 17 dead and more than a dozen wounded.
“I will always remember the time I spent today with courageous students, teachers and families,” the rich asshole tweeted. “So much love in the midst of so much pain. We must not let them down.”
the rich asshole will meet on Thursday with local law enforcement and government officials about school safety.
The latest school shooting has provoked an outpouring of outrage over the nation’s gun laws. The surviving students have flooded state capitols, cable news and social media, demanding changes and dramatically altering the politics around the debate over guns, which had otherwise become routine.
But even as the president expressed support for new gun control measures, the NRA received a hero’s welcome at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) north of Washington, the premier annual event for grassroots conservatives.
Many on the right believe the new contours of the debate have finally exposed the left’s true intentions — the confiscation and destruction of all guns, an idea that was an applause line at a CNN town hall debate about guns on Wednesday night.
Conservatives are certain that gun control activists have awoken a sleeping giant and that gun owners will flood to the polls for midterm elections to defend their Second Amendment rights.
“We’re here. We’re not going anywhere,” NRA spokeswoman Dana Loesch thundered to huge applause.
Moments before Loesch took the stage, the rich asshole tweeted out praise for NRA officials Wayne LaPierre and Chris Cox — even while seeming to ramp up pressure on them to bend to his will and “do the right thing.”
“They love our Country and will do the right thing,” the rich asshole tweeted.
But in a fiery speech at CPAC, LaPierre dismissed calls for new legislation, saying they come from people who “fantasize about more laws stopping what other laws fail to stop.”
Polls show broad support for some changes to gun laws, like comprehensive background checks, and Republican lawmakers are feeling pressure to act.
At the CNN event, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said some of his views on the matter had changed. Rubio came out in support of an age requirement to buy guns and said he is open to reconsidering magazine sizes, both of which are opposed by the NRA.
Rubio was booed at times by the audience but was praised by pundits and his colleague, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), for having the courage to enter hostile political territory at a time when emotions over the gun debate are running hot.
“American politics is the only part of our lives where changing your mind based on new information is a bad thing,” Rubio said.
the rich asshole is similarly changing his mind after campaigning as a Second Amendment absolutist.
The president said Thursday that he supports “comprehensive” background checks.
The NRA is supportive of legislation approved by the House that would incentivize state and federal agencies to submit conviction records into the national background checks system for gun purchases, which is aimed at bolstering — rather than expanding — current law.
It’s unclear whether the rich asshole supports expanding the current system, but it sounds like the president is willing to go further than what the NRA wants, potentially opening the door to background checks for private transactions.
The NRA is openly opposing the rich asshole’s proposal to raise the age of sale for long guns from 18 to 21, which is fast gaining steam among Republicans on Capitol Hill.
Rubio and Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Az.) have voiced support for new age restrictions in recent days.
And the rich asshole has announced that he supports a full ban on the sale of bump stocks, days after instructing Attorney General Jeff Sessionsto work with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to review whether new regulations are warranted.
The NRA has said it supports a review of whether bump stocks should be subject to new federal regulations but does not support banning them outright, as the rich asshole is now calling for.
Meanwhile, the rich asshole is also setting himself up for battle with gun control activists by calling for school officials to be armed.
The president insists that he doesn’t want to indiscriminately arm teachers, but is calling for those with military or other special training to be able to carry concealed weapons on school grounds.
Conservatives have long said gun-free school zones are prime targets for shooters who can rampage knowing that they won’t be in a firefight until the police arrive.
the rich asshole leaned into that argument over Twitter on Thursday, saying the nation “must be offensive, defense alone won’t work.”
“Look at the possibility of giving concealed guns to gun adept teachers with military or special training experience — only the best. 20% of teachers, a lot, would now be able to immediately fire back if a savage sicko came to a school with bad intentions,” the rich asshole tweeted.
“Highly trained teachers would also serve as a deterrent to the cowards that do this. Far more assets at much less cost than guards. A ‘gun free’’ school is a magnet for bad people. ATTACKS WOULD END!,” he said.
The NRA on Thursday backed the rich asshole’s proposal to protect schools with guns, although there will be little appetite among gun control activists for increasing the number of guns on school grounds.
“Everyday young children are being dropped off at schools that are wide-open, soft targets for people bent on mass murder,” LaPierre said. “It should not be easier for a madman to shoot up a school than a bank or a jewelry store or some Hollywood gala.”
Obama praises 'fearless' Florida shooting survivors: 'We've got your backs'
BY BRANDON CARTER - 02/22/18 11:17 AM EST
Former President Obama praised survivors of last week’s school shooting in Florida for speaking out following the attack, calling them “smart” and “fearless” and promising “we’ve got your backs.”
Young people have helped lead all our great movements. How inspiring to see it again in so many smart, fearless students standing up for their right to be safe; marching and organizing to remake the world as it should be. We've been waiting for you. And we've got your backs.
Obama joins his wife, former first lady Michelle Obama, voicing support for the students. On Wednesday, Michelle Obama tweeted she was “in total awe” and pledged she and Barack Obama were “behind [them] every step of the way.”
Former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton also defended the Parkland, Fla., survivors on Twitter on Wednesday, saying they have "shown so much courage in standing up for the truth" in the face of conspiracy theories that some of them are in fact "crisis actors."
Survivors of the deadly shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School have emerged as strong advocates for gun control following the attack.
Some of them have traveled to Florida’s state capitol to encourage lawmakers to take up gun control reform, and many are also planning a march later this year in Washington, D.C., to demand action on gun violence.
The students also took center stage at a CNN town hall Wednesday, questioning lawmakers on the future of gun control legislation and pushing them to refuse future donations from the National Rifle Association.
Barack Obama pushed for stricter gun control laws during his administration, particularly after the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, but struggled to get measures through Congress.
NRA's LaPierre warns conservatives of 'socialist state'
BY BRETT SAMUELS - 02/22/18 10:36 AM EST
National Rifle Association (NRA) CEO Wayne LaPierre on Thursday warned conservatives that socialists are smearing gun rights advocates and seeking to eliminate their rights.
“Socialism is a movement that loves a smear. Racists, misogynists, sexists, xenophobe and more. These are the weapons and vitriol these character assassinations permanently hang on their targets because socialism feeds off manipulated victims,” LaPierre told the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).
LaPierre claimed "European socialists” are taking over the Democratic Party. He also named the “Occupy” movement, Black Lives Matter and antifa as examples of social groups that he claimed promote “uncivil discourse” and aim to "eliminate due process."
“The elimination of due process is the very gold standard of the socialist state,” he said.
LaPierre’s remarks come as gun control advocates, Democratic lawmakers and some Republicans have called for legislation to curb gun violence in the wake of a shooting last week at a Florida high school that left 17 dead and several others wounded. Some Republicans have cautioned against moving too quickly on legislation as a reaction to the incident.
Earlier in his speech at CPAC, LaPierre called proposals to limit the amount of weapons available to Americans “completely ridiculous,” and said more security would help prevent future school shootings.
President the rich asshole on Thursday morning tweeted that he will push for comprehensive background checks “with an emphasis on mental health,” and has said he supports raising the age requirement to purchase a weapon. Those positions put him at odds with the NRA.
NRA chief: Security, not gun control, is answer to school shootings
BY BEN KAMISAR - 02/22/18 10:17 AM EST
National Rifle Association (NRA) CEO Wayne LaPierre on Thursday said suggestions to limit guns are “completely ridiculous,” arguing more security measures is what is needed to increase safety in schools.
“Evil walks among us, and God help us if we don’t harden our schools and protect our kids,” the NRA leader told the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).
“Every day, young children are being dropped off at schools that are wide-open, soft targets for people bent on mass murder. It should not be easier for a madman to shoot up a school than a bank or a jewelry store or some Hollywood gala,” he said.
The top NRA executive promised that the group would provide "immediate assistance" to schools for security consulting free of charge.
“The whole idea from some of our opponents that armed security makes us less safe is completely ridiculous. If that’s true, armed security makes us less safe, let’s just go ahead and remove it from everywhere. Let’s remove it from the White House, from Capitol Hill, and remove it from all of Hollywood,” LaPierre continued, prompting some cheers from the crowd.
LaPierre’s comments come eight days after a gunman opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., killing 17 people and injuring several others.
The incident has prompted renewed calls for legislation to curb gun violence, with many Stoneman Douglas students leading the call for change.
The NRA had been silent in the days following the shooting, but Thursday marked its return to the offensive, as representatives passionately defended the Second Amendment in front of the friendly crowd at the conservative conference.
LaPierre criticized the calls for new legislation, portraying gun control activists as those who “fantasize about more laws stopping what other laws fail to stop.”
He blasted the FBI for being culpable in the Florida tragedy. The bureau admitted last week that it failed to follow up on a tip about the man who is charged in the shooting.
“They want to sweep right under the carpet the failure of school security, the failure of family, the failure of America's mental health system, and even the unbelievable failure of the FBI,” he said of those advocating for more gun control.
“I can understand a few bad apples in an organization as large as the FBI, but what’s hard to understand is why no one at the FBI stood up and called B.S. on its rogue leadership,” he said.
LaPierre’s remarks received support from the crowd, which applauded his main points. But he largely received a more muted response from the crowd than the one it gave Dana Loesch, the NRA spokeswoman who gave a fiery speech minutes before LaPierre took the stage.
But the top NRA executive received a standing ovation as he ended his speech with a familiar call to those who support gun rights.
“To stop a bad guy with a gun, it takes a good guy with a gun,” he said.
– Brett Samuels contributed
Updated at 11 a.m.
the rich asshole vows to push comprehensive gun background checks: 'Raise age to 21'
BY MALLORY SHELBOURNE - 02/22/18 08:35 AM EST
President the rich asshole said Thursday he will push for comprehensive background checks “with an emphasis on mental health” for gun sales, saying that the age of purchasers should be raised to 21 and bump stocks should be banned.
“I will be strongly pushing Comprehensive Background Checks with an emphasis on Mental Health,” the rich asshole wrote on Twitter. “Raise age to 21 and end sale of Bump Stocks! Congress is in a mood to finally do something on this issue — I hope!”
I will be strongly pushing Comprehensive Background Checks with an emphasis on Mental Health. Raise age to 21 and end sale of Bump Stocks! Congress is in a mood to finally do something on this issue - I hope!
Lawmakers and activists are pushing for gun control after 17 people were killed at a school shooting in South Florida last week. The 19-year-old suspect in the shooting allegedly used a legally purchased AR-15 to carry out the attack, placing the rifle in the center of the debate.
During a listening session at the White House on Wednesday, a parent of one of the survivors of the shooting asked the rich asshole to enact age restrictions for gun purchases, a move the president is reportedly considering for weapons like the AR-15.
the rich asshole on Tuesday directed the Justice Department to put forward regulations to ban bump stocks, a device used to increase a semi-automatic rifle’s rate of fire.
Fla. shooting survivor says CNN rejected town hall armed guards question: 'It ended up being all scripted'
BY JOE CONCHA - 02/22/18 08:27 AM EST
A student survivor of last week's mass shooting at a Parkland, Fla., high school said he was asked by CNN to "write a speech and ask questions" for a town hall but declined to attend the event after "it ended up being all scripted," a claim the network is pushing back on.
"CNN had originally asked me to write a speech and questions and it ended up being all scripted," Colton Haab told WPLG-TV, an ABC affiliate in Miami.
"I expected to be able to ask my questions and give my opinion on my questions," said Haab.
The WPLG-TV report said that Haab wanted to ask a question about using veterans as armed security guards as a deterrent to school shootings.
CNN aired the live town hall, "Stand Up: The Students of Stoneman Douglas Demand Action," from the BB&T Center in Sunrise, Fla., on Wednesday night. The discussion included Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), Rep. Ted Deutch (D-Fla.) and NRA spokesperson Dana Loesch.
"There is absolutely no truth to this," said Richard Hudock, CNN's senior manager of public relations in a statement provided to The Hill. "CNN did not provide or script questions for anyone in last night's town hall, nor have we ever.
"After seeing an interview with Colton Haab, we invited him to participate in our town hall along with other students and administrators from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School," Hudock said. "Colton’s father withdrew his name from participation before the forum began, which we regretted but respected.
"We welcome Colton to join us on CNN today to discuss his views on school safety," he said.
Haab is a member of the junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps (JROTC) and shielded other Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students while the shooter went on his rampage, according to a CNN report after the massacre last week.
Haab reportedly "ushered 60 to 70 people to shelter in an open Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps room" and used "Kevlar sheets generally used for the Junior ROTC marksmanship program" to hide and shield those in the room the shooter and possible gunfire.
"We took those sheets, and we put them in front of everybody so they weren't seen, because they were behind a solid object and the Kevlar would slow the bullet down," Haab told CNN at the time.
"I didn't think it was going to stop it, but it would definitely slow it down to make it from a catastrophic to a lifesaving thing," he added.
Haab said he also believed that assistant football coach Aaron Feis, who was killed in the shooting while shielding students from the shooter, could have "stopped the threat" if he was armed.
"If coach Feis had had his firearm in school that day, I believe that he could have most likely stopped the threat," Haab told Fox News on Feb. 17.
Updated at 8:37 a.m.
the rich asshole emphasizes arming teachers and cracking down on violent movies as response to school shootings
President some rich asshole. (NASA/Aubrey Gemignani)
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U.S. President some rich asshole on Thursday emphasized that he wants to see trained teachers able to carry concealed guns to ward off potential school shooters, and said he has recently spoken with the National Rifle Association about his ideas.
During an hour-long meeting with state and local officials on school safety in the wake of last week’s mass shooting in Florida, the rich asshole brushed aside a suggestion of mandatory active-shooter drills for schools, and said he did not like the idea of having more armed guards in schools.
the rich asshole also said he wanted to explore the idea of reopening closed mental institutions and said violence in movies watched by children should also be examined.
the rich asshole: I never said 'give teachers guns'
BY REBECCA SAVRANSKY - 02/22/18 07:55 AM EST
President the rich asshole in a series of tweets early Thursday denied that he suggested giving teachers guns to prevent mass school shootings, instead saying he would consider giving trained teachers concealed weapons.
the rich asshole said he suggested at a White House meeting giving concealed guns to "teachers with military or special training experience," adding that a gun free school is a "magnet for bad people."
"I never said 'give teachers guns' like was stated on Fake News @CNN & @NBC. What I said was to look at the possibility of giving 'concealed guns to gun adept teachers with military or special training experience — only the best," the rich asshole tweeted.
"20% of teachers, a lot, would now be able to immediately fire back if a savage sicko came to a school with bad intentions. Highly trained teachers would also serve as a deterrent to the cowards that do this. Far more assets at much less cost than guards. A 'gun free' school is a magnet for bad people. ATTACKS WOULD END!"
He added that "highly trained, gun adept, teachers/coaches" could serve as a deterrent to prevent future school shootings.
"History shows that a school shooting lasts, on average, 3 minutes," he tweeted. "It takes police & first responders approximately 5 to 8 minutes to get to site of crime. Highly trained, gun adept, teachers/coaches would solve the problem instantly, before police arrive. GREAT DETERRENT!" he said.
"If a potential 'sicko shooter' knows that a school has a large number of very weapons talented teachers (and others) who will be instantly shooting, the sicko will NEVER attack that school. Cowards won’t go there...problem solved. Must be offensive, defense alone won’t work!
....immediately fire back if a savage sicko came to a school with bad intentions. Highly trained teachers would also serve as a deterrent to the cowards that do this. Far more assets at much less cost than guards. A “gun free” school is a magnet for bad people. ATTACKS WOULD END!
....History shows that a school shooting lasts, on average, 3 minutes. It takes police & first responders approximately 5 to 8 minutes to get to site of crime. Highly trained, gun adept, teachers/coaches would solve the problem instantly, before police arrive. GREAT DETERRENT!
....If a potential “sicko shooter” knows that a school has a large number of very weapons talented teachers (and others) who will be instantly shooting, the sicko will NEVER attack that school. Cowards won’t go there...problem solved. Must be offensive, defense alone won’t work!
The tweets come after the rich asshole held a listening session Wednesday with students and teachers who survived the Florida high school shooting last week, which left 17 people dead.
During the session, one parent brought up the controversial idea of arming teachers and administrators with concealed guns, which the rich asshole said is "certainly a point we will discuss."
The president also asked for a show of hands in the room to see who supports and opposes such a proposal.
“If you had a teacher who was adept at firearms, that could very well end the attack very quickly,” the rich asshole said.
“We’re going to be looking at that very strongly. And I think a lot of people are going to be opposed to it. I think a lot of people are going to like it.”
Since the Florida school shooting, students have become vocal advocates for gun control, demanding that lawmakers act to prevent future shootings.
the rich asshole's plan for Energy Star sparks industry uproar
BY TIMOTHY CAMA - 02/22/18 06:00 AM EST
President the rich asshole is facing strong opposition in his drive to eliminate federal funding for the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) popular Energy Star program.
With the Department of Energy’s help, the voluntary Energy Star program sets efficiency benchmarks for appliances, electronics, building materials, lighting and other products, and lets companies use the Energy Star label on products that meet the specifications.
In his budget request to Congress for fiscal year 2019, the rich asshole asked lawmakers to eliminate the $42 million in federal funding for the program. He instead proposed allowing the EPA to fund the energy efficiency certification through fees charged to companies that use it. The idea has been pushed in conservative circles for years.
The rich asshole administration and supporters of the plan say it would shift the burden for its costs to the companies that benefit from it.
“By administering the Energy Star program through the collection of user fees, EPA would continue to provide a trusted resource for consumers and businesses who want to purchase products that save them money and help protect the environment,” the agency told lawmakers in its budget request.
“Entities participating in the program would pay a fee that would offset the costs for managing and administering the program.”
But groups that represent manufacturers, retailers, utilities, environmentalists and others who benefit from the program are lining up against the rich asshole’s plan.
They cite, among other things, the estimated $30 billion in energy savings that users of Energy Star products achieve each year, arguing that it’s a hugely successful program that should be embraced.
“Placing the burden solely on the manufacturers that use the label isn’t really fair,” said Kateri Callahan, president of the Alliance to Save Energy, which counts among its members appliance makers, utilities and others interested in energy efficiency.
“The ultimate beneficiaries of this are the consumers who are saving money,” Callahan said, adding to the list states with efficiency standards, schools and building owners.
“The beneficiaries are so wide. And we’re all benefitting when we’re avoiding greenhouse gas emissions.”
“The beneficiaries are so wide. And we’re all benefitting when we’re avoiding greenhouse gas emissions.”
Lowell Ungar, senior policy adviser at the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, said the proposal is “highly problematic.”
“We’re glad that they’re not proposing to eliminate the program. That’s certainly a step forward,” Ungar said, pointing to the rich asshole’s previous budget request, which sought to abolish Energy Star altogether.
“Certainly the concern is whether this is a viable business plan, when there is no business plan,” Ungar said. “Can they actually raise enough money to run the program? Who’s going to pay for it? How is this going to work?”
Any change to the fee structure would require congressional action. The EPA said it would then go through a regulatory process to set the fee structure in a way that’s fair and takes into account various stakeholder concerns.
the rich asshole’s proposal last year to eliminate Energy Star was also met with significant backlash. More than 1,000 companies and groups signed onto a letter in April to leading congressional appropriations leaders supporting the program.
The House ended up voting to preserve Energy Star, but cut its funding to $31 million. The Senate never voted on an appropriations bill for the EPA.
Energy Star has long enjoyed bipartisan support among lawmakers, who see it as a boon to consumers, retailers and manufacturers in their state, all at a relatively low cost to the government.
Rep. Betty McCollum (Minn.), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee’s subcommittee that oversees the EPA’s budget, pledged to fight for Energy Star.
“Energy Star is a win-win for businesses and consumers that has saved Americans more than $400 billion on their utility bills over the past 25 years. I’ve heard from builders, realtors, manufacturers, and retailers and they all support this important program,” she said in a statement.
“It is deeply disappointing that the rich asshole administration wants to discontinue direct funding for Energy Star, increase costs for consumers, and make it harder for our country to conserve energy and protect natural resources.”
Sen. Tom Udall (N.M.), the top Democrat on the Senate's EPA funding panel, said he is "skeptical at best" about the rich asshole's idea.
"The Pruitt EPA appears determined to undermine the EPA in every way possible, so it's not surprising that they even took aim at the popular, bipartisan and consumer-friendly Energy Star program," he said.
The program’s backers are also worried that switching to a reliance on industry funding would erode its standing as an objective certification.
“One of the main strengths of the Energy Star program has been independence and the integrity that the government brings,” said Noah Horowitz, director for energy efficiency standards at the Natural Resources Defense Council.
“If Energy Star is dependent on industry funding, that could create some difficult situations where the independence of the program could be challenged.”
But conservative advocates who want the government out of the energy efficiency business say the rich asshole’s proposal is a step in the right direction.
“If companies want to contribute some sort of fee to fund the general awareness of the savings associated with energy conservation, that’s fine,” said Nick Loris, an economist at the Heritage Foundation.
“I would still question why it needs to be overseen by the federal government in an era when we have more access to information than ever for when companies want to promote their energy efficient appliances.”
Loris conceded that the $42 million price tag for Energy Star is not the main driving factor behind his opposition. He said the government simply has no place in advocating for energy efficiency.
“I think there’s a whole range of reasons why a household may not choose to purchase the most energy efficiency light bulb or appliance or invest in energy efficient windows,” he said.
Myron Ebell, director for energy and environment at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, agreed that the rich asshole’s proposal is a good first step.
“The companies that benefit from Energy Star labeling should pay for the program,” he said. “The next step would be to privatize Energy Star. There are many similar successful programs funded by the affected industry that provide independent testing, monitoring, and labeling of products.”
Dems want gun control, but worry it could cost them midterms
BY AMIE PARNES AND MIKE LILLIS - 02/22/18 06:00 AM EST
Democrats mulling how to approach gun control on the campaign trail this year are weighing their tough history on the subject against the burning politics of the moment.
The killings of 17 people at a Florida high school has led to an outpouring of student protests and new energy for the gun control movement. Polls show almost unanimous support for an expansion of background checks.
But the issue is a delicate one for party leaders hoping to flip both chambers in this year’s midterm elections by defeating Republicans in conservative-leaning districts where tougher gun laws can be radioactive.
“It's certainly more of a base issue than in years past,” said one Senate Democratic aide who works for a senator who has been mentioned as a 2020 presidential candidate.
But the aide said the strategy wouldn’t be effective everywhere.
“It’s not going to be a top-down, every-state strategy. Some places it will work — Illinois, Florida and Colorado suburban districts,” the aide said. “And other places it won’t, like North Carolina.”
Democrats paid a steep political price after championing an assault weapons ban in 1994 and are wary of energizing the GOP base.
One former Democratic leadership aide put it bluntly: “How do you keep from having a conversation about sensible changes be turned into ‘They want to take your guns away'?”
Meredith Kelly, spokeswoman for the House Democrats’ campaign arm, said the party has no plan for a national messaging strategy on gun reform, citing the “geographically and culturally diverse House battlefield.”
“For some candidates, gun violence prevention could be a much-discussed issue, particularly in the suburbs or where there’s sadly been a recent gun-related tragedy,” she said. “For others, it’s just not part of the local conversation and it won’t necessarily be the first foot they put forward in terms of messaging.”
Rep. Henry Cuellar (D), a Texas Blue Dog who took the lead on a House-passed bill strengthening the background check system, acknowledged the difficulties in confronting some voters who want to paint all gun reforms, no matter how narrow, as akin to confiscation.
“That message about Democrats trying to take guns away — Obama trying to take guns away, [House Minority Leader Nancy] Pelosi trying to take guns away — that’s a message that’s been repeated over and over and over again,” Cuellar said Wednesday by phone. “You’ll get some of those extreme positions, but you’ve got to stay strong and kind of keep going and explain the situation.”
Cal Jillson, a professor of political science at Southern Methodist University, said the assault weapons ban passed during the Clinton administration made Democrats “gun shy” on the reform question — and continues to do so even decades later.
“Democrats became increasingly concerned that they were on the wrong side of the gun debate and on the Second Amendment debate,” she said. “Every time there's a major event, from Columbine to Connecticut to this most recent one in Florida, they always say we’ve got to consider some reform, but they never put their shoulder to the wheel."
Yet some Democrats think gun reform is a political winner on any stage, pointing to recent polls showing overwhelming support for new gun restrictions like background checks, even among Republicans and members of the National Rifle Association (NRA), the country’s largest gun lobby.
Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.), who heads the Democrats' gun-violence prevention task force, said he wants to keep the issue at the forefront of all voters’ minds heading into November — and he’s offering his services to do just that.
“I’m open to coming into any community to talk about gun-violence prevention,” said Thompson, a Blue Dog and Vietnam War veteran. “If a mayor, county supervisor, state legislator wants to invite me into a district that’s represented by a Republican who won’t coauthor the background check, have plane ticket, will travel.”
Echoing that message, Democratic strategist David Wade pointed to the Long Island railroad shooting in 1993 that became a galvanizing issue for Democrats to win back suburban voters.
Wade says he sees a similar movement now on the heels of last week’s tragedy at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., where the authorities say a lone gunman killed 17 students and educators with a military-style rifle.
“In many places we may now be watching a rebirth of that activism and this may become an issue helping to drive our turnout and enthusiasm at the polls,” Wade said. “We shouldn’t be afraid of the issue.”
Former Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.), who has a book coming out in April called “Big Guns,” said Democrats should rely on micro-targeting in various districts and states.
“I think smart micro-targeting will elevate the issue in some districts and keep it where it is in other districts,” Israel told The Hill.
A wildcard in the debate will likely be President the rich asshole. On the campaign trail, the rich asshole had aligned himself squarely with the National Rifle Association and gun-rights advocates, arguing that gun violence “has nothing to do with guns.”
Since the Florida shooting, however, he’s expressed a new openness toward tougher firearm rules, endorsing bipartisan legislation to bolster background checks and directing the Justice Department to ban bump stocks — devices that allow semi-automatic rifles to fire with automatic speeds.
For Democrats hoping to run on gun reform — or for those simply trying to avoid an anti-gun label — the rich asshole’s support for new restrictions would provide crucial “air cover,” in the words of the former leadership aide, against attacks from the powerful gun lobby. It’s cover the Democrats did not enjoy under President Obama’s failed effort to enact tougher gun laws in 2013.
“For a Democratic administration to push hard on guns was incredibly difficult. But if this administration chooses to do some sensible things, then they’ve got some room to do that,” the aide said.
“Like Nixon went to China. … It becomes doubly hard to accuse you of doing something when [the rich asshole] is doing it.”
some rich asshole has cheapened the whole idea of the presidency
President some rich asshole (AFP Photo/Thomas COEX)
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Presidents’ Week only serves to remind me that this is a very difficult time to be a presidential buff. I have been one since 1955 when President Eisenhower graciously responded to my “get well” letter following his heart attack. Not only did I receive a beautifully embossed card, which I actually thought he penned personally, but news of my card from the President was announced on the school “loudspeaker” as we called it back then.
After that I was hooked on presidents. All presidents. As evidence that my obsession never faded, I have so far passed it to my kids and grandkids. In fact, even I was surprised (and proud) when my then 8 year old grandson told me a couple of years ago, out of the blue, that he thought that “Jane Appleton Pierce” (the 14th first lady) had “such a sad life.” The “Appleton” part astonished even me.
Naturally I have been to most of the presidential museums and libraries and have lots of presidential memorabilia around the house. Fortunately my wife has come to share my passion.
One might say that I love all presidents. But I don’t. I am a liberal Democrat and although my favorites includes a few Republicans, most are progressive Democrats like FDR, Clinton,JFK and Obama. But I am fascinated by them all and enjoyed my visit to the Coolidge homestead in Plymouth Notch, Vermont as much as I did the LBJ ranch in Johnson City, Texas.
That is until now.
For me, some rich asshole cheapens the whole idea of the presidency. No, not just his politics which I abhor, but no more than I did those of Reagan or George W. Bush.
For me, it the rich asshole’s coarseness that demeans the presidency. I understand that some previous presidents used foul and ugly language. Certainly Richard Nixon did, as we know from the tapes, but never in public. He had no expectation that his tapes would ever come out and, if they hadn’t, we would have no first hand record of his manner of speaking. In public he was proper, even prim, and no one had to worry that the kids might be negatively influenced by seeing him on television.
Nixon, despite his colossal faults, respected the office he held, the office he had sought his entire adult life. He would not sully it, in public anyway. This is true, more or less, of every one of the 44 men who held the office (with the possible exception of Andrew Johnson, the president who most resembles the rich asshole).
But the rich asshole seems to have little if any respect for the office, demonstrated over and over again in his tweets. Particularly repellent is the rich asshole’s endless vilification of whoever offends him at the moment. From Mexicans, to the disabled, to the family of a fallen Muslim soldier, to Democratic members of Congress, the rich asshole’s spewing of hate, along with his endless mockery of those who merely disagree with him, slimes not just him but the presidency. As for his attacks on Hillary Clinton, there has not been a single previous president who relentlessly and personally attacked his opponent in the election that brought him to the presidency. Just suggesting the idea of President Eisenhower name-calling Adlai Stevenson or President Kennedy publicly obsessing on Richard Nixon or, President Nixon endlessly reviling Hubert Humphrey, is as absurd as is imagining any previous president constantly tweeting. No, they didn’t fail to tweet only because the technology didn’t exist. They would not have imagined setting U.S. policy in 280 character comic book word balloons.
Nonetheless, every one of our former presidents is retrospectively tainted by the rich asshole’s presence in the office. After all, how literally awesome can the presidency be if the rich asshole achieved it. Think about Theodore White’s classic history of JFK’s election, The Making of The President 1960. That book made for riveting reading decades after Kennedy’s presidency. How did this 42-year old Catholic do it? What brilliant political strategy, and personal qualities, brought him to the presidency? The same questions were addressed about the election of Barack Obama, the first African American president, and Ronald Reagan, who went from being a B actor to a very credible president.
These questions are no longer particularly interesting. Nor will they be after we elect the first woman, as exciting as that will be. After all, if the rich asshole can be president, anyone can. That is if he is rich and a celebrity.
Of course, in the end, I won’t really give up my passion. I will just treat the rich asshole as a terrible anomaly. Otherwise, how can I justify my upcoming trip to Lawnfield, the James Garfield National Historic Site in Ohio.
M.J. Rosenberg is a Washington D.C.-based writer, and worked for twenty years as a speechwriter and legislative aide at the House, Senate, and State Department.
This article was originally published at History News Network
Executive producer reveals Dana Loesch begged to star in sitcom as ‘hot young mom who does far-right radio’
NRA spokesperson Dana Loesch (Photo: Screen capture)
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A writer and executive producer of television and films revealed on Wednesday that NRA spokesperson Dana Loesch, a former right-wing radio host, asked him if she could star in a comedy show about a “hot young mom who does far right radio.”
As Loesch was attending a CNN town hall on the mass shooting in Parkland, Florida on Wednesday, Geostorm writer Paul Guyot noted on Twitter that the one-time radio host had made the request but he turned her down.
“Dana Loesch came to me 10yrs ago pitching a sitcom starring herself: ‘A hot young mom who does far right radio show,'” he revealed. “Said her age & looks would make 1 side hate her & 1 love her so everyone would watch. Was obsessed w the potential fame & money. I turned her down.”
At the Conservative Political Action Conference on Thursday, Loesch told the crowd that she had accepted a job hosting a one-hour, commercial-free program on NRA TV.
New the rich asshole plan would give teachers bonuses for carrying guns in class: report
some rich asshole (AFP Photo/Timothy A. Clary)
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President some rich asshole is reportedly proposing a plan that would award teachers with bonuses if they carried guns with them in class.
According to Bloomberg reporter Justin Sink, the rich asshole plan would act as an incentive for teachers to get training in using deadly weapons.
Trump proposes paying bonuses to teachers who carry guns, @JustinSink reports
According to Sink, the rich asshole floated the idea of giving teachers “a little bit of a bonus” for carrying guns with them during a meeting with school safety officials.
Earlier on Thursday, the rich asshole sent out a long, rambling tweet storm defending his plan to arm some school teachers.
Among other things, the rich asshole argued that shooters are attracted to places where people are not armed with deadly weapons.
“A ‘gun free’ school is a magnet for bad people,” he said. “History shows that a school shooting lasts, on average, 3 minutes. It takes police & first responders approximately 5 to 8 minutes to get to site of crime. Highly trained, gun adept, teachers/coaches would solve the problem instantly, before police arrive. GREAT DETERRENT!”
the rich asshole then suggested that mentally unstable people would never attack a school if they knew they would be met by armed teachers capable of taking them down.
“If a potential ‘sicko shooter’ knows that a school has a large number of very weapons talented teachers (and others) who will be instantly shooting, the sicko will NEVER attack that school,” he wrote. “Cowards won’t go there… problem solved. Must be offensive, defense alone won’t work!”
MSNBC hosts shut down NRA’s ‘disgusting,’ ‘garbage’ attacks
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The NRA spokesperson's attack on the media is being called out for the "disgusting" smear it is.
National Rifle Association spokesperson Dana Loesch let her extremism show Thursday morning, in a horrific attack on the media, and she was promptly shamed for it.
At Wednesday night’s CNN town hall on gun violence, Loesch managed to keep her unhinged ideology mostly contained.
But during her speech to the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) Thursday morning, it all came out. She hijacked the Parkland survivors’ rallying cry to attack gun control advocates. She smeared the students in the town hall crowd as dangerous. Then she set her sights on the media.
“Many in the legacy media love mass shootings,” she said. “I’m not saying that you love the tragedy, but you love the ratings. Crying white mothers are ratings gold.”
As Loesch left the stage, MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle immediately called out that smear.
“No. No one thinks that is ratings gold. No one is celebrating it,” Ruhle said.
“Just like you probably don’t celebrate the boost in gun sales after a shooting,” she added. “It’s just a reality. A reality that we’re addressing.”
Then Ruhle handed over her coverage to Hallie Jackson for the next hour. “I know you don’t celebrate covering mass shootings.”
“Let’s just call that what it is,” Jackson said. “That’s disgusting, it’s untrue, and it’s ridiculous. Complete garbage, total trash.”
Loesch’s overnight change is similar to the rich asshole’s, who, after leading a “listening session” at the White House during which he adopted a sympathetic posture, threw a tantrum Thursday morning and defended the NRA.
Despite desperate posturing to appear reasonable in the face of intense public pressure, the rich asshole and the NRA can’t help but show their true colors. But the American people, and the media, see right through them.
Survivor’s family targeted after he refuses to be silenced by smears
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First, the right-wing started smearing a Parkland shooting survivor. Now his family is receiving death threats.
Right-wing media didn’t wait long to start spreading ugly conspiracy theories about Marjory Stoneman Douglas High shooting survivor David Hogg. Now his family is receiving death threats.
Hogg’s mother, Rebecca Boldrick, told the Washington Post her family is receiving anonymous threats online after her son became an overnight advocate for gun control.
“I’m under so much stress. I’m angry and exhausted,” she said. “Angry, exhausted and extremely proud.”
The smears about Hogg started at far-right outlets like Gateway Pundit, and later spread through viral YouTube videos and Russian bots. Conspiracy theorists claim Hogg is not a real student, but a “crisis actor” trying to distract people from the FBI’s failure to investigate the shooter.
Hogg brushed them the lies. “The only time you’re ever doing anything that matters is when people try to stop you,” he said.
Hogg is one of several teenage shooting survivors at the forefront of the post-Parkland youth activism to stop gun violence.
“What we really need is action,” Hogg told national reporters last week, powerfully shaming GOP politicians who “pray” for shooting victims but nothing else. “We’re children. You guys are the adults.”
Hogg also made the news for refusing to attend the rich asshole’s “listening session” on gun violence Wednesday. the rich asshole ignored calls from students like Hogg for more gun control. Instead, he proposed arming school faculty, something he repeated in an unhinged Twitter rant Thursday morning.
Despite the toxic threats and pushback, as well as attempts by some local officials to curb school protests, the activism of Hogg and his fellow students seems to be turning the tide.
The newest polling shows an astonishing 97 percent of Republican voters want to expand some gun laws.
Hogg will not be silenced. There will be no turning back for the Parkland students, and no respite until elected lawmakers do their job.
‘Absolute madness’: Watch a Parkland shooting survivor demolish the rich asshole’s plan to arm teachers
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student Sam Zeif talks with CNN (Screen cap).
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Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student Sam Zeif on Thursday tore apart President some rich asshole’s proposal to solve school shootings by arming some teachers with guns.
When asked by CNN’s Alisyn Camerota to comment about the president’s latest tweets calling for arming the most “talented” teachers in schools across the country, Zeif simply called the plan “absolute madness.”
“Teachers go through emotions every day, just like students do, just like mentally ill people do, just like everyone,” he said. “Teachers are faced with a responsibility every single day of molding young lives and mentoring them and being there for them. Why should they have to be faced with the responsibility with whether they’re going to have to kill them that day?”
Nicole Hockley, a gun control activist who lost her son in the massacre at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012, similarly told Camerota that the rich asshole’s plan was a nonstarter.
“I don’t think it’s a reasonable suggestion at all,” she said. “I don’t think it’s something the politicians should be talking about. Ask any teacher — teachers have no desire to be armed… in terms of arming them and asking them to make that sort of decision in a crisis moment, that’s unacceptable.”
Watch the video below.
the rich asshole on verge of firing national security adviser after he admitted Russia’s role in US election: report
Herbert Raymond McMaster, National Security Advisor. Photo via MSC.
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President some rich asshole could fire his national security adviser, Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, after he said that evidence of Russia’s interference in the 2016 U.S. election was “incontrovertible.”
Sources close to the White House told CNN that Pentagon officials were “quietly” trying to find a job for McMaster in the Pentagon.
“Several sources told CNN that the push for a replacement comes after months of personal tension between McMaster and the rich asshole,” the report said.
According to CNN, the desire to fire McMaster as national security adviser was reinforced after his recent remarks about Russia’s role in helping the rich asshole to get elected.
“As you can see with the FBI indictment, the evidence is now really incontrovertible and available in the public domain, whereas in the past it was difficult to attribute,” McMaster said at a security conference this month.
the rich asshole responded with a tweet.
“General McMaster forgot to say that the results of the 2016 election were not impacted or changed by the Russians and that the only Collusion was between Russia and Crooked H, the DNC and the Dems,” the rich asshole complained. “Remember the Dirty Dossier, Uranium, Speeches, Emails and the Podesta Company!”
Sources told CNN that the rich asshole prefers to be briefed by CIA Director Mike Pompeo or Defense Secretary James Mattis, “who patiently answer his questions, regardless of the premise.”
“McMaster, meanwhile, is the person who delivers the news that the rich asshole doesn’t want to hear on a daily basis,” CNN reported.
Here are 5 places hypocritical Republicans ban guns for their own personal safety
Congressman Paul Ryan (Tony Alter/Flickr)
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After every mass shooting, a portion of this country insists the real problem is that there aren’t enough guns. The group that pushes this absurd lie includes Republican politicians, many of whom fear that admitting otherwise would drive away NRA donor funds. There’s been a lot of recent discussion about how GOP legislators do nothing in response to gun massacres, but a 2016 Harvard Business School study proves that’s not quite true. In states with overwhelmingly Republican legislative bodies, after mass shootings, “the number of laws passed to loosen gun restrictions [increases] by 75 percent.” Despite being counterintuitive and demonstrably dangerous, more firepower is the GOP’s go-to solution because “something something don’t tread on me.”
It’s a bad-faith proposition. A party that truly believes guns are the way out of this thing, and that an even more heavily armed populace will ensure American safety, would make different personal choices. In fact, we can gauge GOP disingenuousness on the gun issue just by noting all the places Republican politicians frequent where weapons are banned. Pointing out their hypocrisy has never helped to shame the GOP into decency, but it’s worth a review nonetheless.
Here are five places hypocritical Republicans ban guns in order to ensure their own personal safety.
1. The White House
Along with making Mexico pay billions for a wall it opposed and never taking a golfing vacation, the rich asshole promised on the campaign trail to legislate a future in which guns could legally be brought into every kindergarten classroom and nursery. “My first day, it gets signed, okay? My first day,” the rich asshole told supporters in Vermont in 2016. “There’s no more gun-free zones.”
While it’s true no president could unilaterally scrap federal law, it’s also true that the rich asshole’s complicit Republican Congress would probably greenlight any pro-gun horrorshow he could dream up. Yet, in the year since he took office, the rich asshole has not spoken out once—even via his digital bullhorn at Twitter—against the anti-freedom gun ban at the White House. What better way for this president to signify his wholehearted support for gun-based lifestyles than by letting White House visitors from around the world—especially those who live under the tyranny of gun control abroad—bring all the guns they want into the People’s House?
Or maybe the rich asshole hasn’t brought up the matter because he doesn’t actually want strangers bringing guns into the White House, seeing as they can and do kill people at the squeeze of a trigger.
2. The Republican National Convention
The quadrennial gathering of this country’s most dedicated Republicans should be a place where GOPers can briefly escape oppressive gun-free “safe spaces” and live on their own gun-riddled terms. Attendees should be permitted—nay, required—to come armed to the teeth. Downtime convention activities should be strictly gun-focused. (Think ball pits, only filled with guns. Cocktail hours, only the drinks are all guns.) At the very end, instead of confetti, the audience should be showered in loose ammo.
But instead of a three-day orgy of gun lust and ammosexuality, the Republican National Convention is a gun-free zone. Guns were banned at the RNC in 2008, 2012 and 2016, and that’s not for lack of trying by those who bothered to petition for bringing guns to the party. For some strange reason, the RNC keeps choosing venues that explicitly ban guns, almost as if it was looking for a convenient excuse. The Secret Service keeps banning guns from the events, almost as if it knows the whole “good guy with a gun” claim is a just a myth. And not a single Republican politician has raised their voice to demand guns be allowed on the convention floor, almost like they’re tacitly admitting to being iffy on the whole “responsible gun owners” thing.
3. Mar-a-Lago
A staffer told ABC News back in 2016 that guns were banned from the rich asshole’s Palm Beach golf property, where the president spends so much time it’s hard to know when he’s doing the actual job of presidenting. That policy appears to still be in place, according to a Politico report from late last year. “Pocket knives, laser pointers, pepper spray, and any other items deemed to be a safety hazard are not permitted on property,” a letter the club sent to members cautioned. “Any items surrendered will not be returned.”
4. The U.S. Capitol Building
Surely, a Congress that has steadfastly refused to pass gun legislation is cool with guns in the Capitol building, if only to make a patriotic point. Why not let the Senate and House galleries double as shooting galleries, since guns are such a national point of pride? When are the gun-loving legislators of Congress, who believe that murdered 6-year-olds are just the price of freedom, going to change the rules so the U.S. Capitol building can become the guntopia it’s meant to be?
The short answer is never. Guns are banned on the Capitol grounds and inside the building itself, which includes the House and Senate galleries. Visitors are also warned against bringing “black jacks, slingshots, sand clubs, sandbags, knuckles, electric stun guns, knives (longer than 3”), martial arts weapons or devices…razors, box cutters, knives, knitting needles, letter openers…mace and pepper spray.”
Which all raises the question: what kind of heartless, cruel and immoral people consistently vote against gun control for most Americans’ work lives, but cynically keep guns far away from their own place of business?
5. Republican Town Halls
In early 2017, when Republican legislators realized that angry crowds were showing up in town halls to speak against repeals of the Affordable Care Act, they found two ways to avoid those meetings. The first was to label their own constituents “paid protesters.” The second was to demonize civically engaged voters as violent mobs. It was all for show, of course. In fact, as Talking Points Memo notes, “guns are frequently prohibited at GOP congressional town hall meetings, especially after the shooting of former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in 2011. Even stalwart conservatives like Rep. Paul Ryan and former Rep. Allen West opted to ban firearms at their town halls.”
Texas Republican Louie Gohmert even went so far as to invoke Giffords as a political prop to get out of being berated by the people he supposedly serves.
“At this time there are groups from the more violent strains of the leftist ideology, some even being paid, who are preying on public town halls to wreak havoc and threaten public safety,” Gohmert claimed in a statement. “The House Sergeant at Arms advised us after former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords was shot at a public appearance, that civilian attendees at Congressional public events stand the most chance of being harmed or killed—just as happened there.”
Giffords, incredibly, had to release a statement encouraging Republicans to do their damn jobs.
“To the politicians who have abandoned their civic obligations, I say this: Have some courage,” Giffords’ message said. “Many of the members of Congress who are refusing to hold town halls and listen to their constituents’ concerns are the very same politicians that have opposed common-sense gun violence prevention policies and have allowed the Washington gun lobby to threaten the safety of law enforcement and everyday citizens in our schools, businesses, places of worship, airports, and movie theaters.”
In an interview later, Giffords stated, “If you don’t have the guts to face your constituents, then you shouldn’t be in the United States Congress.”
And maybe, if you don’t have the guts to deal with the laws you force the rest of us to live under, you for sure shouldn’t be involved in making them.
Kellyanne Conway slams critics of the rich asshole plan to arm teachers: It’s ‘disrespectful’ to school shooting victims
Kellyanne Conway (Fox News/screen grab)
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White House counselor Kellyanne Conway on Thursday blasted critics of President some rich asshole for focusing on his plan to arm teachers in an effort to prevent school shootings.
During an interview on Fox & Friends, Conway praised the rich asshole for hosting a “listening session” with survivors of school shootings.
“This is a president who doesn’t just listen, he acts,” she said. “So, I predict on his watch, things will change. And people will feel like school safety and public safety are much enhanced because he is the president.”
Conway complained that some were spending too much time talking about a “small discussion” in which the rich asshole proposed asking 20 percent of teachers in the U.S. to carry guns at school.
“The small discussion yesterday about the possibility of allowing some educators and administrators to be armed at some schools, to focus on that alone today is disingenuously covering the fuller discussion yesterday,” Conway remarked. “And frankly, it’s disrespectful to the people who are in that room raising any number of different issues.”
“I think it benefits us all that you have a non-politician in the White House behind me because he can see this with a certain clarity that others perhaps cannot,” she concluded. “There cameras were on the whole time too and everybody should appreciate that.”
Watch the video below from Fox News.
NRA shill Dana Loesch steals rallying cry of teenage shooting survivors
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The NRA's spokesperson couldn't come up with words of her own, so she stole the rallying cry of the Florida teens pushing for gun reform.
NRA spokesperson Dana Loesch stole the rallying cry of Emma Gonzalez, one of the teenage survivors of the massacre at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida to attack politicians pushing for reform.
Loesch warmed up the crowd at the annual right-wing convention CPAC ahead of her boss, NRA president Wayne LaPierre.
Loesch railed against politicians she claimed were “exploiting a tragedy for an agenda.”
The term originated from the impassioned speech Gonzalez gave after the shooting at a rally for gun control.
“Politicians who sit in their gilded House and Senate seats funded by the NRA telling us nothing could have been done to prevent this, we call B.S.,” Gonzalez said.
It was an accurate accusation, calling out the NRA and its advocacy for doing nothing time and again in the face of gun violence.
The NRA spokesperson was not nearly as fiery and venomous when she had to face Gonzalez face to face at CNN’s town hall on the topic of the shooting the night before.
Instead, when asked if her organization would support a ban on the purchase of semi-automatic weapons, Loesch attempted to filibuster the teen with a monologue about safety.
Cowardly as always, the NRA’s spokesperson returned to her standard position in the safe space of CPAC, where she would not be challenged to defend the indefensible. She attacked the media and gun control advocates and showed no remorse for the violence her organization has enabled.
Using Gonzalez’s battle cry to attack those trying to make the country safer is a sign of how potent the teenage survivors’ message has been. Even the NRA wants to be as strong as them.
But as Loesch’s rhetoric shows, they just end up failing.
‘My daughter had rights — they’ve all been terminated’: Parkland dad destroys obsession with 2nd Amendment
Fred Guttenberg (MSNBC)
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A grieving father who emotionally confronted Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) about gun safety said his daughter’s rights were “terminated” by a gunman wielding a weapon of war at a Florida school.
Fred Guttenberg, whose 14-year-old daughter Jamie was gunned down last week at Douglas High School in Parkland, told MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that the NRA’s broad interpretation of the Second Amendment should not override other basic civil rights.
“My daughter had rights more than just the Second Amendment — they’ve all been terminated,” Guttenberg said. “That’s what I say. I’m a believer in the Second Amendment, assault weapons are simply allowed through an interpretation of what the Second Amendment is, okay? I say we need to be real, we need to be realistic.”
“I wanted my kid to live out all of her rights,” Guttenberg added. “I sent my son out to go shooting with his grandfather about a month ago. I have no issue with any of that, but we shouldn’t put in place a process that makes it so easy through some bastardized interpretation to get these weapons. I’m sorry, to the core of my being, I just can’t agree.”
Guttenberg said “somebody needs to be fired” by the FBI for failing to investigate a tip about the alleged gunman who killed 17 students and teachers last week, but he said gun laws should be changed to restrict access to the most deadly weapons.
“Unlike in past shootings, these kids are at an age where they can verbalize and fight — and this shooting was caught on video, the cell phones came out,” he said. “You can’t hide from what happened, and because of that and the fight in these kids and fight in me, I have hope. I think this time was different, and I think we’re going to get something done.”
“It may not happen tomorrow,” Guttenberg added. “It should, but it’s going to happen.”
the rich asshole shows more sympathy to NRA than studentswho survived shooting
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the rich asshole seems incapable of expressing genuine sympathy for the victims and survivors of the Parkland shooting — or standing up to his NRA masters.
After the NRA’s spokeswoman was jeered, booed, and mocked during a nationally televised town hall meeting on gun control Wednesday night, the rich asshole rushed to the gun group’s aid Thursday morning.
What many people don’t understand, or don’t want to understand, is that Wayne, Chris and the folks who work so hard at the @NRA are Great People and Great American Patriots. They love our Country and will do the right thing. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!
After initially going into hiding following the massacre at Majory Stoneman Douglas High School, which claimed 17 lives, the rich asshole emerged on Twitter to lash out at the grieving community.
“So many signs that the Florida shooter was mentally disturbed, even expelled from school for bad and erratic behavior,” he wrote. “Neighbors and classmates knew he was a big problem. Must always report such instances to authorities, again and again!”
At a White House listening session with Parkland survivors Wednesday, the rich asshole needed a cheat sheet to help remember to convey sympathy for the community.
The next morning, he was bowing down to the NRA, which spent at least $55 million during the 2016 election cycle, with some insiders suggesting the figure was closer to $70 million.
“Even the reported figures show that the group doubled down, literally, on its previous spending in a presidential election cycle. The $55 million is more than twice the $22 million the NRA spent overall in 2012 and more than four times what it spent in 2008 and 2004, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics,” McClatchy reported.
Additionally, the FBI is reportedly investigating whether Russian operatives funneled millions of dollars to the group in 2016.
The NRA has completely dictated the rich asshole’s radical gun agenda.
Last year, the rich asshole’s Justice Department purged tens of thousands of people who had previously been labeled fugitives from the FBI’s background check system.
Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress are trying to make it easier for consumers to buy silencers for their guns. And last year, they voted for a radical, NRA-sanctioned and the rich asshole-approved bill that would allow people to carry concealed weapons across any state line, even if local state law forbids carrying concealed guns.
Meanwhile, the White House’s latest so-called budget proposal cuts millions of dollars from the country’s background check system.
Last December, in a craven display of collective indifference, the rich asshole hosted NRA boss Wayne LaPierre at the White House on the anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary School gun massacre.
Now following the Parkland mass murder, the rich asshole’s again showing that his love of the NRA take precedence over concern for the fallen.
the rich asshole denies wanting to arm teachers, advocates for arming teachers in same tweet
He can backtrack all he wants.
On Thursday morning, President some rich asshole sent out a series of tweets attempting to defend a point raised in another tweet from 2016 that suggested he was not in favor of arming teachers as a solution to school shootings.
In his Thursday morning tweets, however, the rich asshole still proposed arming teachers, with the caveat that they must be “adept” and have “military or training experience.”
the rich asshole added that a “‘gun free’ school is a magnet for bad people. ATTACKS WOULD END!”
To the president, arming teachers is the way to solve the nationwide epidemic of mass school shootings.
It is the same solution he gave to the victims and their families of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting during a listening session at the White House Wednesday.
“This would be obviously only for people who were very adept at handling a gun, and it would be, it’s called concealed carry, where a teacher would have a concealed gun on them. They’d go for special training and they would be there and you would no longer have a gun-free zone,” the rich asshole said. “Gun-free zone to a maniac — because they’re all cowards — a gun-free zone is ‘let’s go in and let’s attack because bullets aren’t coming back at us.”
the rich asshole added that only 20 percent of teachers would be armed.
Not everyone at the listening session agreed with this approach.
Nicole Hockley lost her six-year-old son in 2011 during the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. She told the president she would rather prevent school shootings from happening in the first place, without the use of firearms.
“Let’s talk about prevention,” Hockley said. “There is so much we can do to help this person before we reach this point.”
Opponents of arming teachers are right to criticize the approach — because it doesn’t work.
A comprehensive study by the Violence Policy Center found guns “are rarely used to kill criminals or stop crimes.” In 2012, “for every justifiable homicide in the United States involving a gun, guns were used in 32 criminal homicides,” researchers concluded. Another study by the University of Pennsylvania found that someone carrying a gun is “4.46 times more likely to be shot in an assault.”
Training and providing 1 in 5 American teachers with a gun is expensive too. According to analysis from the Washington Post, providing robust training for 718,000 teachers would cost roughly $718 million dollars. Adding in the cost of a Glock G17, heralded as the “world’s most popular pistol,” for 718,00 teachers would bring the total to just over $1 billion dollars.
Teachers themselves don’t want to be armed either. Josh Grubbs, a gun aficionado assistant professor of psychology at Bowling Green State University, posted a series of tweets laying out his concerns.
President the rich asshole ended his Thursday morning Twitter rant by stating he supports raising the age of eligibility to buy an AR-15 style weapon from 18 to 21 and banning bump stocks. The president also tweeted he is in favor of comprehensive background checks with an “emphasis on mental health,” despite rolling back an Obama-era regulation aimed at keeping guns out of the hands of mentally ill individuals during his second month in office.
Global human rights are under siege in the rich asshole era
The good news: activists are fighting back.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — An era of hate-filled rhetoric and global insecurity has endangered human rights around the world, spurring an extraordinary wave of social activism.
Those are the underlying findings of Amnesty International’s (AI) annual State of the World’s Human Rights report, released for the first time on Thursday. Spanning more than 400 pages, the report covers 159 countries and, according to AI, delivers the most comprehensive overview and analysis of human rights around the world today.
Its overall conclusions are grim: In 2017, human rights suffered tremendous setbacks as the “politics of demonization” become increasingly mainstream. That’s true in nations across the world — including the United States.
“One year ago, millions of people were watching anxiously to see what a rich asshole presidency would look like,” Amnesty International Secretary General Salil Shetty told reporters during a press briefing Wednesday. Shetty highlighted the dramatic shift ushered in by the rich asshole administration as campaign pledges turned into policies.
“What we find in 2017 is that hateful rhetoric crossed over into hateful reality,” he said.
The report also noted several troubling global trends that followed the rich asshole’s election. “What happens here [the United States] has resonance for the rest of the world,” Shetty said.
Shetty and other speakers specifically pointed to a number of White House policy decisions with severe implications for people both inside and outside of the country. At the forefront of the discussion were the president’s travel bans targeting refugees and citizens from a range of predominately Muslim-majority nations (the first two versions of the ban exclusively targeted citizens from these countries along with all refugees). The “Muslim ban” divided families, shut out asylum seekers, and caused mass-panic and confusion at airports around the country.
The AI report also calls attention to the rich asshole’s long-proposed U.S.-Mexico border wall and his attempts to take away health care access for millions of people, as well as protections for LGBTQ workers and students. A decision to proceed with the Dakota Access Pipeline, which threatens the water source of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and other indigenous communities, is also cited in the report.
the rich asshole is not the only offender cited in the AI report. Myanmar (also called Burma) was singled out for its mass atrocities against the Rohingya Muslim minority population, actions which have alarmed human rights advocates around the world. Since late August 2017, some 655,000 Rohingya have fled to neighboring Bangladesh, hoping to escape years of state-sanctioned apartheid and discrimination.
While Myanmar’s crackdown has targeted one particular group, other countries are facing more widespread unrest. In the Philippines, President Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal war on drugs and crime has sparked a crisis, with extrajudicial executions and summary killings haunting the country. Duterte has also imposed martial law on the island of Mindanao and targeted members of the press — the president has accused journalists of spreading “fake news,” borrowing a phrase from the rich asshole himself. Standing next to the rich asshole last November, Duterte referred to reporters as “spies,” a comment which drew laughs from the U.S. president.
Leaders in a number of countries — including Libya, Syria, and Venezuela — have similarly followed suit. Polish President Andrzej Duda shared his own anti-media bonding moment with the rich asshole last July, nodding as his U.S. counterpart slammed the press during a televised meeting. He later echoed the rich asshole’s “fake news” refrain in a tweet.
Poland’s growing struggles with human rights are reflected in the AI report — the country’s far-right government has targeted the judiciary, in addition to rolling back abortion access in the overwhelmingly Catholic country. Nationalism, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and anti-refugee sentiment are also on the rise. In November, 60,000 people participated in an Independence Day march widely seen as an endorsement of white supremacy.
“[Last year] brought into sharp focus [the reality that] fear and hatred is a recipe for nothing but violence,” Shetty said.
Despite the gloomy outlook, there’s some good news: According to the report, social activism has surged across the globe, even as state-sponsored hate has risen. Massive protests in Poland, Venezuela, and Iran have demonstrated the power of popular dissent. Many of those movements have been driven by some of society’s most vulnerable members.
In 2017, “[the world saw] ordinary people — particularly youth — stand up,” Shetty said.
That’s held true in the United States as well. As Shetty spoke on Wednesday, teen activists were busy staging a protest in front of the U.S. Capitol building and the White House, demanding an end to gun violence. They reflect a nationwide, predominately student-led movement formed in the aftermath of a deadly mass shooting at a high school in Parkland, Florida last week. Seventeen people — most of them younger than 18 — were killed when a lone gunman entered the Marjory Stoneman Douglas campus and opened fire. As students in D.C. protested, others rallied at the Florida State Capitol in Tallahassee with similar demands. Around the country, teenagers led walkouts and rallies.
Their protest is part of a larger wave of activism born in the wake of the rich asshole’s election. AI’s report specifically points to the massive Women’s March, demonstrations against the rich asshole’s travel bans, and the growing #MeToo movement as a sign of things to come.
“We are witnessing history in the making as people rise up and demand justice in greater numbers,” Shetty said in a separate press release. “If leaders fail to discern what is driving their people to protest, then this ultimately will be their own undoing. People have made it abundantly clear that they want human rights: the onus now is on governments to show that they are listening.”
Whether or not those governments are listening is unclear. Activist movements are off to a strong start — but only time will tell if they can endure. Tirana Hassan, AI’s crisis response director, said on Wednesday that the “paralysis that plagued the international community” can only be combated by activism and civic dissent.
“Without ordinary people pushing their leaders to take action,” she said, “we will continue to see this paralysis.”
‘Sicko will NEVER attack!’ the rich asshole continues rant about arming ‘very talented teachers — and others’
some rich asshole (Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr)
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President some rich asshole went on a long rant on Thursday morning about his plan to arm some teachers as a measure to prevent school shootings.
While the president initially denied that he ever proposed arming teachers on Thursday morning, his denial eventually turned into a rambling defense of arming some teachers to take out shooters at their schools.
Among other things, the rich asshole argued that shooters are attracted to places where people are not armed with deadly weapons.
“A ‘gun free’ school is a magnet for bad people,” he said. “History shows that a school shooting lasts, on average, 3 minutes. It takes police & first responders approximately 5 to 8 minutes to get to site of crime. Highly trained, gun adept, teachers/coaches would solve the problem instantly, before police arrive. GREAT DETERRENT!”
the rich asshole then suggested that mentally unstable people would never attack a school if they knew they would be met by armed teachers capable of taking them down.
“If a potential ‘sicko shooter’ knows that a school has a large number of very weapons talented teachers (and others) who will be instantly shooting, the sicko will NEVER attack that school,” he wrote. “Cowards won’t go there… problem solved. Must be offensive, defense alone won’t work!”
Neil Gorsuch is about to pay back the people who got him a sweet job in Washington
Republicans are poised to use their stolen Supreme Court seat to break public sector unions.
Two years ago, many public sector unions were on a collision course with the Angel of Death. All five Republicans on the Supreme Court appeared ready to cut off a major source of union funding and encourage public employees to become free-riders who enjoy all the benefits of unionization without paying for it. Then, death came for Justice Antonin Scalia instead, and Republicans lost their majority on the Supreme Court.
The case that would have undercut public sector unions evaporated with four justices on either side of the case.
But history repeats itself, first as tragedy, and then as an even bigger tragedy. The role of the missing conservative firebrand justice, once played by Scalia, will now be performed by Neil Gorsuch. Senate Republicans held Scalia’s seat open for a year until some rich asshole could fill it with Gorsuch. And now Gorsuch is all but certain to hand Republicans a major victory at the expense of unions.
The free-rider problem
The central issue in Janus v. AFSCME is fees, often referred to as “agency fees” or fair share fees,” which unions collect from non-members to reimburse the union for the cost of services provided to those non-members. The Court will hear oral arguments in Janus on Monday.
By law, unions are required to bargain on behalf of every worker in a unionized shop, regardless of whether each individual worker chooses to join the union. And these non-members typically receive significantly benefits from the union they choose not to join. One study found that workers in unionized workplaces are paid nearly 12 percent more than similar workers in non-union shops.
The problem with this arrangement is that it creates a free-rider problem. If a particular worker will gain the benefits of unionizing without having to pay their share of the costs, many workers will become free-riders. Eventually, the union could collapse for lack of funds, leaving no one with the benefits of unionization.
To prevent this problem, union contracts frequently include a provision requiring non-members to pay agency fees, which reimburse the union for the cost of bargaining and otherwise advocating on behalf of these non-members. Meanwhile, a frequent tactic deployed by anti-union lawmakers is to ban contracts providing for agency fees — that’s what so-called “right to work” laws accomplish, they prohibit labor and management from negotiating a contract which uses this common method to ward of free-riding.
The lawyers behind Janus hope to impose a “right-to-work” regime on every public sector union in the country, and they rely on a rather creative understanding of the First Amendment to get there.
Unmanageable workplaces
“Bargaining with the government is political speech indistinguishable from lobbying the government,” a team of lawyers led by the anti-union National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation write in their brief on behalf of the Janus plaintiff. Because agency fees effectively require non-members of a union to pay for bargaining on matters they may disagree with, these fees amount to compelled speech, according to the lawyers seeking to eliminate these fees, and that’s not allowed under the First Amendment.
There are a number of problems with this argument, including the fact that it lacks a limiting principle. If the First Amendment governs workplace bargaining, then many relationships between government employees and their managers could become completely unworkable. Consider a hypothetical proposed by, of all people, Justice Scalia, in a similar case attacking agency fees.
Suppose you have a policeman who — who is dissatisfied with his wages. So he makes an appointment with the commissioner, police commissioner, and he goes in and grouses about his wages. He does this, you know, 10 or 11 times. And the commissioner finally is fed up and tells his secretary, I don’t — I don’t want to see this man again. Has he violated the Constitution?
If you take the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s argument seriously, the only intellectually honest answer to this question is “yes.” If there is one thing that the First Amendment absolutely does not permit, it does not allow police commissioners to declare certain kinds of speech out-of-bounds and to forbid individuals from engaging in that speech.
But that’s not just an absurd result, it is one that could prevent government employers from functioning effectively. How can an employer manage their employees when they aren’t allowed to tell them that certain topics will be discussed at certain appropriate times, and not whenever the employee feels like griping about how they feel mistreated?
This is why the Supreme Court has traditionally given the government more leeway to manage its own employees than it has when it tries to regulate the public at large. As Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the Court in Garcetti v. Ceballos, “government employers, like private employers, need a significant degree of control over their employees’ words and actions; without it, there would be little chance for the efficient provision of public services.”
Without this leeway, a public school wouldn’t be able to fire an American History teacher who decides to spend all of their classroom time teaching about their favorite episodes of Star Trek.
Picking partisan winners and losers
Unions are an ideological bête noire of the Republican Party. The party of capital will naturally resent organized labor.
But the GOP also has a very direct stake in undermining organized labor. The Constitution forbids unions from using agency fees to “contribute to political candidates and to express political views unrelated to its duties as exclusive bargaining representative” — only workers who elect to join the union contribute to the union’s political activities. But the entire purpose of a right-to-work regime is to undermine unions and prevent them from thriving.
In the likely event that the Supreme Court sides against unions in Janus, that decision is likely to wreak havoc on union membership. And that will, in turn, undercut a major prong of the Democratic Party’s political infrastructure. Among other things, unions provide thousands of volunteers to mostly Democratic political campaigns. Without those volunteers, Republicans will be more likely to prevail in elections.
Janus, in other words, should not simply be understood as an effort to advance conservative economic policy. It also needs to be lumped in with cases like Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, which permitted a common method of voter suppression, Shelby County v. Holder, which struck down a key provision of the Voting Rights Act, and Vieth v. Jubelirer, which allowed partisan gerrymanders to thrive, and Bush v. Gore.
By stealing control of the Supreme Court, Republicans did not simply capture a branch of government that could implement some of their preferred policies and prevent Democrats from implementing many of theirs, they regained the ability to shape elections themselves.
the rich asshole denies saying teachers should have guns — and then says some teachers should have guns
President some rich asshole (AFP / MANDEL NGAN)
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President some rich asshole lashed out at media coverage of his proposal to arm some teachers by denying that he ever made it.
“I never said “give teachers guns” like was stated on Fake News CNN and NBC,” the president wrote on Twitter.
However, the rich asshole then seemed to undercut his own point by saying that some teachers should actually be armed.
“What I said was to look at the possibility of giving concealed guns to gun adept teachers with military or special training experience – only the best,” the rich asshole wrote. “20% of teachers, a lot, would now be able to immediately fire back if a savage sicko came to a school with bad intentions.”
The president also said that armed teachers would “serve as a deterrent to the cowards that do this” — and he said that arming teachers would be a much cheaper option than paying for armed guards.
“Far more assets at much less cost than guards,” he said. “A ‘gun free’ school is a magnet for bad people. ATTACKS WOULD END!”
the rich asshole pitched his plan to arm teachers during a “listening session” with students on Wednesday, and such plans have been regularly pitched by the National Rifle Association as a potential solution to school shootings.
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has yet to send transgender guidance to the rich asshole
U.S. Secretary for Defense, Jim Mattis, sits opposite Britain's Secretary of State for Defence, Gavin Williamson, before a meeting at the Ministry of Defence (MoD) in central London, Britain November 10, 2017. REUTERS/Simon Dawson
Carla Babb
Posted with permission from Voice of America
U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has yet to send guidance to President Donald Trump on whether transgender troops should serve in the military, according to the Pentagon. The deadline for his recommendations was set for February 21.
Last September, the Pentagon said it began studying how to implement a directive by Trump to prohibit transgender individuals from serving.
On Wednesday, Pentagon spokesman Major Dave Eastburn told VOA that Mattis "has his recommendation for the president but has not provided it yet."
"When he's ready to provide it, he will," Eastburn added, noting that Wednesday's deadline for submitting a plan was one made within the Department of Defense and not one set by Trump.
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis speaks during the daily news briefing at the White House in Washington, Feb. 7, 2018.Eastburn said the Pentagon anticipates Trump's policy announcement on transgender service members "no later than March 23."
Trump tweeted his desire to ban transgender people from serving in the military in a string of Twitter comments in July. He said he was ordering the armed forces to stop allowing transgender individuals to serve after consulting generals and military experts.
He also tweeted: "Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail."
Hours later the U.S. military's top general stressed to Pentagon leaders that there had been no change to the military's policy on transgender personnel despite Trump's announcement on Twitter.
"There will be no modifications to the current policy until the President's direction has been received by the Secretary of Defense [Jim Mattis] and the Secretary has issued implementation guidance," the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Joseph Dunford, wrote in a memo obtained by VOA.
Federal courts rejected parts of Trump's proposed ban, which sought to overturn an Obama administration policy that said transgender troops could apply to join the military, serve openly, and seek medical care.
Recruiting of transgender troops began January 1, after Trump's administration decided not to appeal federal court rulings that rejected the administration's request to put on hold a judge's orders requiring the military to begin accepting transgender recruits.
The RAND Corporation has estimated that the number of transgender individuals currently serving in the active component of the U.S. military is between 1,320 and 6,630 out of a total of about 1.3 million service members.
Jimmy Kimmel eviscerates some rich asshole Jr. for supporting conspiracies about Parkland students: ‘Your brain is not functioning’
Jimmy Kimmel (Photo: Screen capture)
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During his opening monologue Wednesday, late-night host Jimmy Kimmel highlighted the thousands of high school students across the United States walked out of classrooms.
Kimmel noted it was “on the day after the Florida State House refused to even debate a bill to ban assault weapons and large capacity ammunition.”
Students even indicated that while they flooded the halls attempting to speak to legislators, the public servants avoided them. Alfonso Calderon told CNN’s Don Lemon after the town hall Wednesday that he finally cornered the president of the state senate only to be given the run-around.
“The NRA can only do so much,” Calderon said. “We are the people of America. We the people are the ones who change this country. We the people are the ones this country is made and run for. We the people elect who they pay to stay in office. They need to remember that. Because they can fight now. They can fight for years. But change will come.”
Kimmel argued to his audience that these phenomenal students that are standing up just days after they were afraid for their lives should be applauded.
He brought up those far-right Republican activists questioning the legitimacy of the students. Not all conspiracy theorists are people like Limbaugh or Alex Jones, however. Former Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA) made news this week when he called the students “liberal stooges.”
“Yes, there are always crackpots in situations like this who come out of the woodwork with these irrational — this paranoia-fueled nonsense,” Kimmel acknowledged. “The far right wing thrives on conspiracy theories. Global warming is a conspiracy. The Russia investigation is a conspiracy. [Former President Barack] Obama’s birth certificate was a conspiracy. And those are just the big ones. There are hundreds of others.”
In this case, however, there are known people, Kimmel said. “People like some rich asshole, Jr., the president’s least favorite son, perpetuating this kind of stuff.”
Meanwhile, Ted Nugent, who promised he would change his discourse after GOP officials were shot at, shared a story on his Facebook attacking one of the survivors of the shooting. Kimmel also noted that Nugent is on the board of the NRA, which he didn’t think spoke very highly of the organization.
“The kid who just watched his friends die is a puppet, according to Ted and it’s a puppet show,” Kimmel said. “Is that OK? Should the person who is actively a member of your board if you are a reputable organization?”
Kimmel looked straight into the camera and asked the rich asshole supporters and NRA members if they truly believe that the students are actors, “who are part of some deep state, left-wing conspiracy.” If anyone believes that, Kimmel wants them to know “you’re crazy” and “your brain is not functioning.”
For those that aren’t crazy, Kimmel told them that they have a duty to speak out against those crazies who are making things up about the kids.
Watch the commentary below:
Parkland, Florida student rails against NRA’s Dana Loesch at town hall: ‘How does she looks in the mirror’
Cameron Kasky and Marco Rubio (Photo: Screen capture)
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Parkland, Florida student Cameron Kasky railed against the National Rifle Association and the spokeswoman Dana Loesch during CNN’s town hall Wednesday.
He was there to ask a question of Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and hold his feet to the fire on guns. However, at one point Kasky said that he wished the “NRA lady” was still there so he could ask her a question.
“I would ask her how she could look in the mirror considering the fact that she has children,” he said. “Maybe she avoids those.”
He went on to demand that Rubio pledge not to take a single dime from the NRA for his reelection campaign. Rubio tried to give him a song and dance about the influence of the NRA and those who agree with it being a large constituency. Kasky asked if he could come up with the same amount of money the NRA gives if Rubio would refuse the NRA money. Rubio never gave an answer.
Watch the full exchange below:
the rich asshole’s solution to school shootings: More guns in schools
The president said he is willing to consider a proposal to arm teachers.
As students across the country continue to advocate for gun control in the wake of last week’s shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, President some rich asshole said Wednesday that he would consider a proposal allowing teachers and other school staff to be armed.
At a White House listening session that featured students and parents of shooting victims, the president said arming teachers would allow them to stop school shooters before there were significant casualties, despite there being zero evidence to show that more armed personnel in schools helps with safety.
“If [football coach Aaron Feis] had a firearm he wouldn’t have had to run [at the shooter], he would have shot him and that would have been the end of it,” the rich asshole said. “This would only obviously be for people who are very adept at handling a gun… They’d go for special training and they would be there and you would no longer have a gun free zone.”
the rich asshole also seemed to advocate for veterans being used as armed security guards in schools. “They may be Marines that left the Marines, left the Army, left the Air Force, and they are very adept,” he said. “You’d have a lot of them and the would be spread evenly through the school.” At the same time, the rich asshole offered only vague promises for more concrete policy solutions, like raising the minimum age for buying an AR-15 or improving the background check system.
The proposal to arm teachers has been consistently advocated by right-wing pundits like Newt Gingrich and Fox News’ Judge Napolitano. It’s also a top NRA talking point, with executive vice president Wayne La Pierre famously stating “the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” The NRA, and its Republican allies, have also consistently backed proposals to repeal the 1990 ban on guns in schools.
But the idea that a “good guy with a gun” is the only way of stopping an active shooter has been consistently shown to be wishful thinking. During a mass shooting in Colorado last November, police investigations were hindered by the number of witnesses at the scene who were also carrying firearms. In 2012, a study by the Violence Policy Center found that someone carrying a gun was 4.46 times more likely to be shot in an assault. Nonetheless, the rich asshole tried to use the “good guy with the gun” myth after the Sutherland Springs, Texas church shooting last fall to pivot away from discussing genuine gun control measures.
“Fortunately somebody else had a gun that was shooting in the opposite direction, otherwise it [wouldn’t have] been as bad as it was, it would’ve been much worse,” the rich asshole said. “But this is a mental health problem at the highest level.”
Members of the audience at Wednesday’s listening session pushed back against the rich asshole’s suggestion, including Mark Barden, whose seven-year-old son Daniel was killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School.
“My wife Jackie could not be here because she is a schoolteacher… She has spent over a decade in the Bronx. And she will tell you that schoolteachers have more than enough responsibilities right now than to have to have the awesome responsibility of lethal force to take a life,” Barden said. “A deranged sociopath on his way to commit an act of murder in a school with the outcome — knowing the outcome is going to be suicide, is not going to care if there is somebody there with a gun.”
Students from Parkland, Florida, site of the latest school shooting, weren’t exactly keen on the rich asshole’s proposal either.
“I feel like arming teachers is just like fighting fire with fire, I feel like we won’t get anything done if we just continue to pile on the amount of firearms that we’re selling and giving out to people,” student Isabella Barry told CNN’s Jake Tapper. “I just feel that that’s just not needed.”
Everything you need to know about the absurd ‘crisis actor’ conspiracy theory
What it is, where it came from, and what Big Tech is trying to do about it.
Imagine being a teenager still reeling from the trauma of surviving a school shooting. Imagine being so infuriated and grief-stricken that you and your classmates decide to demand action on gun control. Then imagine being smeared by trolls on the internet as a liar and pawn in a Deep State conspiracy to deprive Americans of their inalienable right to an AR-15.
This is the reality that survivors of last week’s Parkland, Florida mass shooting are currently facing. As students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School speak out against politicians’ cowardice on gun control, they are increasingly the target of far-right conspiracy theories claiming that they are so-called “crisis actors,” paid by the left to vilify gun ownership. The claims that students like David Hogg and Emma Gonzalez are crisis actors have spread rapidly across several social media platforms in the past few days alone. (On Wednesday morning, a video claiming Hogg was an actor was the top trending video on YouTube, with over 200,000 views.)
Conspiracy theories about “crisis actors” have been around for a long time. But in recent years these attacks have been used by the far-right to smear mass shooting survivors and throw debates about gun control off-balance, similar to the strategy used by the far-right during elections in America and Europe. What’s more, major social media platforms — despite their repeated promises to tackle fake news — continue to fall short and allow these theories to propagate.
Temporarily got off Facebook because there’s no character count so the death threats from the @NRA cultists are a bit more graphic than those on twitter. Will be back when I have the time for it. Busy getting my feelings hurt by fellow teenagers at Br**tb*rt
A history of the crisis actor conspiracy theory
The crisis actor conspiracy theory is rooted in the claim that mass shooting victims are actually paid actors, brought in by liberal Deep State backers like George Soros, to make mass shootings appear worse than they actually are — or, in the case of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, completely fabricated. These actors are trained on pro-gun control talking points which, ultimately, will help subvert “traditional American values” and usher in some sort of Deep State takeover — or so the theory goes.
This cruel trolling tactic has been around for more than a decade but started gaining significant traction in the wake of the Sandy Hook mass shooting in 2012. Fringe conspiracy theorists, including Infowars’ Alex Jones, combed through media coverage to find supposedly contradictory pieces of information which they claimed exposed that the shooting was staged. Parents of the children who died that day have since been targeted by conspiracy theorists who insist the parents are crisis actors lying about the tragedy.
Since Sandy Hook, the crisis actor conspiracy theory has emerged, like clockwork, after nearly every mass shooting. When 58 people were killed in an October mass shooting in Las Vegas, Nevada, members of the far-right started pushing simultaneous conspiracies that the killer was a left-leaning Democrat, and that the shooting had also been exaggerated by crisis actors. After 26 people were killed in a Sutherland Springs, Texas church in November, rumors swirled online that the attack was a “false flag” operation.
There has never been a shred of evidence to support these claims, and the rumors quickly lose traction once the media loses interest in the latest mass shooting. Despite this, the crisis actor theory emerges over and over again.
Did a quick periscope for @BuzzFeedNews about this whole thread with some more context. pscp.tv/BuzzFeedNews/1…
The creator of Dilbert is spreading a rumor that Stephen Paddock's brother might be a crisis actor pic.twitter.com/idhiiMuz5r
How the crisis actor theory is weaponized by the far-right
From afar, these repeated cries of “crisis actor” might seem like an absurd fringe conspiracy, but they actually serve a wider purpose in enabling the far-right to sow disinformation and plant seeds of doubt that are later picked up by more mainstream right-wing news outlets.
What’s especially worrying is that it’s proven to be an incredibly effective technique, as a November study by researchers at the University of Alabama, Cyprus University of Technology, University College London, and Telefonica Research discovered. The researchers found that there was a direct path from rumors that originated on 4chan, The_Donald subreddit, and other right-wing echo chambers to mainstream news and social media sites, and concluded that “‘fringe’ communities often succeed in spreading alternative news to mainstream social networks and the greater Web.”
An example of this percolation could be seen on Fox News’ The Five Tuesday, when Greg Gutfeld suggested students protesting in the wake of the Parkland tragedy had been “co-opted.” It was a toned-down version of the Gateway Pundit’s smear, which suggested that student David Hogg was a FBI puppet and that students were being used as “marionettes by the far left and deep state.”
Sowing disinformation in this way allows the far-right to distort and disrupt the tragic narrative that occurs after every mass shooting, where the perpetrator, often a young man, legally acquires a high-powered weapon and murders people at will in a school, office, or another public venue. By focusing on crisis actors and conspiracy theories, the far-right confuses and obscures the calls for sensible gun violence prevention measures.
These disinformation techniques are also similar to those used by the far-right in certain political campaigns: An October study by the Institute of Strategic Dialogue noted how the far-right had organized across country borders and were using social media and “staging sophisticated operations in the style of military psychological operations… to disrupt the democratic process in Europe.”
What is Big Tech doing about it?
When contacted by ThinkProgress, both Facebook and YouTube said Wednesday that they had taken steps to remove the crisis actor content from their platforms. “Hoax images that attack the victims of last week’s tragedy in Florida are abhorrent,” Mary deBree, Facebook’s head of content policy, said in a statement. “We are removing this content from Facebook.”
YouTube said the viral video purporting to show David Hogg as a crisis actor “should never have appeared in Trending.”
“Because the video contained footage from an authoritative news source, our system misclassified it,” a spokesperson for Google said. “As soon as we became aware of the video, we removed it from Trending and from YouTube for violating our policies. We are working to improve our systems moving forward.” In a later statement, YouTube added that it updated its harassment policy last year to include the victims of hoax videos, “but in some circumstances those changes are not working quickly enough.”
But that’s the problem. Because YouTube’s Trending Tab is curated by an algorithm, owed to the sheer number of trending topics all over the world, humans aren’t involved in tracking which videos are popular, and are not able to immediately catch and flag problematic content.
Google’s search bar has the same issue. As of Wednesday morning, Google’s top suggested search when you type in “crisis actor” is “crisis actor parkland”. When you type in the name of student Emma Gonzalez, “Emma Gonzalez Actress” is the third suggested search. (There is an IMDB page for Emma Gonzalez, but she looks nothing like the student she’s accused of being, and was writing TV shows the same time the student Emma was in her early teens. Despite this, rumors are still circulating on 4chan that they’re the same people.)
Social media giants like Facebook and Twitter have instituted a slew of changes in the last year after it became clear just how vulnerable their platforms are to manipulation and abuse. Facebook tightened rules on advertising content, rolled out third-party fact checkers, and said it’s changing its newsfeed to prioritize posts from friends and family.
However, the rapid spread of crisis actor conspiracy theories shows how tech companies are effectively playing whack-a-mole with fake news. Whenever an algorithm gets tweaked, or an extra content policy is created, disinformation finds a new way back into your newsfeed. This points to the scope of the problem that tech companies face. But despite repeated instances showing how they spread misinformation after mass shootings, their only answer for now seems to be “change the algorithm” for trending topics on their platforms.
Shooting survivors push for action in the rich asshole meeting
BY MELANIE ZANONA - 02/21/18 06:01 PM EST
Students who survived last week’s school shooting in Florida took their calls for action to the White House on Wednesday, as President the rich asshole grapples with how to prevent future gun massacres.
One of the solutions the students from Parkland, Fla., pushed for during an emotional meeting with the president is raising the minimum age to purchase firearms — an idea that is picking up some bipartisan support in the Senate.
The young students have quickly emerged as powerful voices in the heated gun control debate, with lawmakers saying the students have kept an extra layer of pressure on them to tackle the thorny political issue head-on.
But the grassroots student movement, dubbed “Never Again” on social media, has already suffered its first setback in the Florida state legislature and faces attacks from right-wing conspiracy theorists.
Still, the widespread national attention and White House visit underscore the growing role that the student activists are playing in the national conversation surrounding gun violence. But it’s unclear whether the movement will actually make progress in the Republican-controlled Congress.
“I was born into a world where I never got to experience safety and peace,” Justin Gruber, a student who survived the school shooting, said at the White House. “There needs to be significant change in this country, because this has to never happen again.”
the rich asshole hosted a “listening session” on Wednesday with students and teachers who survived the shooting rampage at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School last week, which left 17 people dead.
Also in attendance were representatives from advocacy groups formed after the school shootings at Columbine High School and Sandy Hook Elementary School, as well as Vice President Pence and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos.
Survivors, parents and victims’ family members took turns sharing their stories and offering potential solutions as a somber the rich asshole nodded along in the State Dining Room.
“I’m pissed,” one emotional father whose daughter was killed in the Parkland shooting told the rich asshole.
Another parent who lost a child implored officials to consider their own children when considering options to curb gun violence.
Some called on the president to impose age limits on firearm purchases and increase funding for mental health and school training, while others thanked the rich asshole for his recent steps to ban the so-called bump stock devices that were used in the 2017 Las Vegas shooting.
“Some of your suggestions, I’ve heard some of them. We’re going to do something about this horrible situation that’s going on,” the rich asshole said. “I want to listen. And then after I listen, we’re going to get things done.”
One parent brought up the controversial idea of arming teachers and administrators with concealed guns, which the rich asshole said is “certainly a point we will discus.” The president also asked for a show of hands in the room to see who supports and opposes such a proposal.
“If you had a teacher who was adept at firearms, that could very well end the attack very quickly,” the rich asshole said. “We’re going to be looking at that very strongly. And I think a lot of people are going to be opposed to it. I think a lot of people are going to like it.”
The meeting was dramatic, but it was less combative than the interviews and speeches that some of the shooting survivors have been giving on television and at rallies over the past week.
Following last week’s horrific massacre, the Florida students have taken the gun control fight into their own hands and forced lawmakers to reckon with gun violence.
The students have met with elected officials to demand tougher gun access laws, appearing on national television with their passionate calls for action and organizing a series of marches, walkouts and rallies.
The grass-roots movement has inspired students to take similar action around the country. Hundreds of students in Maryland walked out of class and marched on Congress and the White House to demand action on gun control on Wednesday.
The emotional pleas from students appear to be having a moving impact on the rich asshole, who has voiced support for some narrow gun control measures on Capitol Hill in recent days. The president will also huddle this week with state and local officials to discuss school safety and mental health issues.
“We’re going to be very strong on background checks,” the rich asshole said Wednesday. “There are many ideas I have, there are many ideas that other people have, and we’re going to pick out the strongest ideas, the most important ideas.”
“It’s not going to be talk like it has been in the past,” he added.
the rich asshole spoke Friday with Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), the Senate’s No. 2 Republican, about supporting a bipartisan bill in the Senate to improve the federal background check system for gun purchases.
the rich asshole also announced Tuesday that he has directed the Justice Department to propose a ban on bump stocks, which allow semi-automatic weapons to fire much more rapidly, reinvigorating a ban push that has been stalled for months since a mass shooting at a Las Vegas concert.
GOP leaders and the rich asshole had embraced such a ban after the device was used in the Las Vegas shooting last October, but the effort faded amid disagreements over whether Congress or the administration was better suited to make the change.
Lawmakers and aides alike pointed to the grass-roots student movement as one reason for the growing sense of momentum.
But the students have already learned a tough, early lesson in the gun control fight. Florida state lawmakers on Tuesday refused to consider a bill to ban assault weapons, despite student marches in Tallahassee supporting the legislation.
The movement could also face similar political realities in Congress, where calls for federal gun reform have long gone unanswered, even after mass shootings like the ones at a Texas church, an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., and a congressional Republican baseball practice.
The students have also become the subjects of right-wing conspiracy theories aimed at discrediting them. Fringe blogs have made unfounded claims that the kids are paid “crisis actors” planted by the left to push for stricter gun laws following tragedy.
The far-right conspiracy theories have been repeated by some more high-profile conservatives, including former Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.), in an effort to dismiss the calls for action.
“The well ORGANIZED effort by Florida school students demanding gun control has GEORGE SOROS’ FINGERPRINTS all over it,” tweeted former Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke Jr., a prominent pro-the rich asshole media figure, in a reference to liberal billionaire George Soros.
The backlash to the conspiracy theories about the students has been swift.
An aide to a Florida state Republican was fired after suggesting that two students whose impassioned response to the shooting went viral are actually “actors that travel to various crisis when they happen."
The grieving students have vigorously rejected the notion that they are being coached to fight for gun reform after the tragedy that took the lives of their classmates and teachers.
“I figured why not stand in front of these cameras and show them exactly how I feel, show them that I am not a crisis actor, that I am not going off of these pre-written speeches given to me by another person,” Delaney Tarr, one of the student survivors, said during a press conference on Wednesday. “Because speaking from the heart is what we do best.”
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