Let's get the Ban together

Like you, I find myself still reeling from the tragic events of last Friday.

I don't even know where to begin.
The tears come easier than the words.

If you don't have children you can never understand what it's like when you do. And if you do have children you can never understand what it's like when suddenly you don't have them.

Nobody should have to cross that threshold.

Sadly, there are many of those shattered parents grieving in Newtown, Connecticut.

Even sadder, there are empathetic folks walking around today, going about their business, sending their kids to school, who will be in that same exact boat, weeks or maybe months from now, when another miscreant straps on the cammo vest and gets all locked and loaded.

I often look at the dysfunctional Middle East and the constant turmoil in Egypt, Syria, Libya, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen and think to myself, "What the fuck is wrong with these people? Why can't they learn to govern themselves and get their culture moving in the right direction?"

Today, I'm sure many in first world countries like Japan, England, and Sweden, are looking at us and asking the same questions.

I'm no political activist. And haven't a clue about being a community organizer. But I do have a tool, this blog. And a demonstrated willingness to take pen to paper. So I'm going to do what I do best and start prodding our public servants to start serving the public.

This was a missive I dashed off Friday night to several prominent politicians who are in a position to make some change:

I want to know what you are doing?

I want to know what you have done to amend this country's gun laws?

I want to know what you have done since the mass shootings in Aurora, CO?

In Wisconsin?

In Oregon?

And what you plan to do after today's senseless killings in Connecticut?

You are my employee.

You work for me.

If I were running a business and an employee of mine had ignored a customer or failed to come through on an assignment, multiple times, I would fire that employee.

Twenty innocent children have died today and some of that blood is on your hands.

And the hands of your colleagues in the Senate and the House.

How hard can your job be?

If it is too difficult or there are too many other priorities, perhaps you are not best suited for this kind of work.

I'm not interested in a form letter from your office.

Or any mealy-mouthed response.

I'm interested in action.

On this.

On the fiscal cliff.

On the very fate of our nation.

Get to work or we will find someone else to do the job you clearly are not doing.

How warped is the situation we find ourselves in today?

Consider this. In 1963, following the assassination of President Kennedy, Congress was debating the legality of rifles like the single-shot, bolt action Carcano M91/38. 

"We do not think any sane American, who calls himself an American, can object to placing in this bill the instrument which killed the President of the United States." 

That came from Franklin Orth, Executive Vice President of the NRA.