February 28, 2018: President Trump Wants a "Terrific" Bill to Address Gun Violence in America

 

2/28/18: Two weeks since the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglass High. Two days more since the president claimed, if he had been there, he would have rushed in unarmed to try to stop the shooter (see: 2/26/18).

 

A grand conclave at the White House is called to address the matter of gun violence in America. “It’s time to stop this nonsense,” President Trump tells lawmakers and an audience watching on television.

 

Most lawmakers, Trump explains to the American people, are “petrified” of the N.R.A and the gun lobby. Not him. “They have great power over you people,” he tells gathered senators. “They have less power over me.” He wants everyone to know that he is the man to put an end to the carnage.

 

Sen. Cornyn appears doubtful as he listens to Trump.

 

He would have braved gunfire two weeks ago, he has said. Now he wants everyone to understand he’s ready to run through the friendly fire directed at him from the Second Amendment folks. He tells Democrats and Republicans both. He wants “one terrific bill.” He prefers something on the “strong side.” He doesn’t want to nibble at a problem that has baffled his predecessors. “We want to pass something great, and to me the something great has to be where we prevent it from happening again,” he continues, referring to the slaughter in Parkland, Fla., on February 14. “It would be so beautiful to have one bill,” he intones.

 

(Pardon Mr. Blogger’s if he sounds skeptical. He remembers when Trump said repealing and replacing Obamacare would be “so easy.”)

 

The real question was what, exactly, the president wanted included in his one “terrific” bill? And how hard would he fight for gun control measures? Ah, there was the rub. He had hinted at federal action to raise the age to buy an AR-15 style rifle to 21. Stronger background checks? Hard to tell, but Trump seemed in favor. He did say he was against an N.R.A.-backed push to expand concealed-carry protections. As for “red flag” laws, he bemoaned the fact that it was so difficult to take guns away from people who had been identified as dangerous to themselves or to others.

 

“Take the firearms first, and then go to court,” Trump suggested, stopping Vice President Mike Pence in mid-sentence. His second-in-command had been offering up a version of the due-process argument that the N.R.A. and other gun-rights absolutist have used to block reform measures for a quarter century. “You could do exactly what you’re saying,” he told lawmakers, “but take the guns first, go through due process second.” He said again that senators were afraid of the gun lobby.

 

Sen. Ben Sasse, among others, raised alarm, noting that “due process” rights were kind of a big deal.

 

Besides, the N.R.A.’s political wing had spent $42.3 million during the 2016 election cycle to boost Trump’s and Republicans’ chances of winning.

 

Asked afterwards, his impression of the meeting, Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Tex.) was as skeptical as this blogger. “I thought it was fascinating television,” he told reporters.

 

BLOGGER’S NOTE (6/10/2022): In the wake of another mass shooting at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas, we know what happened during the last three years of Trump’s time in office. Nothing, really.

 

The carnage continued unabated. Trump had no more success getting guns out of the hands of crazy Americans than he did getting Kim Jong-un to give up his nuclear arsenal.

March 24, 2018: Hundreds of Thousands Join "March for Our Lives"

 

3/24/18: Hundreds of thousands of mostly young Americans join the “March for Our Lives” in the nation’s capital. They gather to demand action to stem the bloody tide of gun violence that stains America. There are “sibling marches” in 800 towns and cities, including 390 congressional districts.

New York City marchers number 175,000. Paul McCartney is there to remember John Lennon, gunned down by a deranged individual forty years ago.

David Hogg, a survivor, speaks at D.C. rally.

 

The teens who did so much to organize the marches and fuel them with passion lead the way. More than a thousand kids from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, where the most recent massacre occurred, attend D.C. events. Survivors of the slaughter speak eloquently. Emma Gonzalez reads the names of the 17 who died at her school. Then she stands in silence for six minutes and twenty seconds. That’s the same length of time it took one unbalanced young man, armed with an AR-15, to kill or wound 34 of Gonzalez’s teachers and classmates.

 

____________________ 

“I have learned to duck from bullets before I learned to read.” 

Edna Chavez

____________________ 

 

Students from across the nation, who have witnessed the scourge of gun violence play out, speak up. Edna Chavez, 17, from Manual Arts High School in Los Angeles, tells the crowd about her brother, Ricardo, who was shot and killed. “I have learned to duck from bullets before I learned to read,” she explains. Then she leads the crowd in a chant: “Ricardo! Ricardo!” 

Trevon Bosley, a high school student from Chicago who also lost a brother, addresses the crowd. “I’m here to speak for those youth who fear they may be shot [emphasis added, unless otherwise noted] while going to the gas station, the movies, the bus stop, to church or even to and from school. I’m here to speak for those Chicago youth who feel their voices have been silenced for far too long.” 

Other marchers in D.C. and at other locations include parents who lost six-year-old sons and daughters at Sandy Hook, and Lauren Milgram, 12, herself a survivor of that horrific attack. 

Finally, Martin Luther King Jr.’s granddaughter steps to the mike. “My grandfather had a dream that his four little children would not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character,” nine-year-old Yolanda Ree King explains. “I have a dream that enough is enough. That this should be a gun-free world.” 

“Period,” she adds.  

 

* 

THAT MUCH is a utopian dream, but you can hardly fail to be impressed with the spirit of the young who wish to make America a better, safer place to live. Well: unless you speak for the N.R.A. 

The N.R.A. weighs in with this: “Today’s protests aren’t spontaneous. Gun-hating billionaires and Hollywood elites are manipulating and exploiting children as part of their plan to DESTROY the Second Amendment and strip us of our right to defend ourselves and our loved ones.” 

In a video clip released the day before, N.R.A. representative Colion Noir criticizes the Parkland survivors and what he calls “a march for their lies.” The Second Amendment is clearly the only amendment Noir likes. “To all the kids from Parkland getting ready to use your First Amendment to attack everyone else’s Second Amendment at your march on Saturday, I wish a hero like Blaine had been at Marjory Douglas High School last month.”

 

Blaine, in this case, would be Blaine Gaskill, the school resource officer who quickly shot and killed another school shooter at Great Mills High School in Maryland earlier in the week. 

Noir continues angrily, “Because your classmates would still be alive and no one would know your names. And because the media would have completely and utterly ignored your story the way they ignored his.” 

You could easily pick holes in his response. You could start by noting that these kids wish no one knew their names – because their names are written in the blood of dead teachers and friends in the news. You could note that none of the leaders of the “March for Our Lives” had suggested disarming police. You could Google “Gaskill” and find 200,000 stories that mentioned him by name. Then you could mull the unspeakable tragedy of Jaelynn Willey 17, shot in the head and left brain dead by an armed classmate before Officer Gaskill could respond. 

You could ask if perhaps that didn’t prove the Parkland survivors had a point.

POSTSCRIPT: I think you might convince almost all who marched Saturday that it would be great to have armed school resource officers (and let’s be blunt, that means “police”) in every American school. In many cases, you’d probably need more than one per building to be safe. 

There are an estimated 90,000 schools in the United States, so the Big Orange Buffoon could argue that we would be creating at least 90,000 new jobs if he sent cops into every school. 

Say: $50,000 per year and the tab comes to $4.5 billion annually. 

Of course, young Americans, and old, might still get massacred at the mall, at church, in a theater or while attending a country music concert. 

The N.R.A. would very much prefer you don’t think about that.