Too not speak out in favor of stronger gun control laws will cost us all our nation!

Um...you are aware that violent crime has been in decline for years and that incidents like Aurora, while heart-rending, are statistically trivial, right?

Hyperbole doesn't help.

100% of someone's children were killed in this incident.

But the point is that incidents like this are a very poor basis upon which to base policy dicisions...and in no way indicative of something that will "cost us our nation." The malfeasance of Wall Street and the rest of the corrupt, greedy financial industry is astronomically more likely to "cost us our nation" when it finally manages to bleed teh economy into collapse. Statistically rare shooting sprees are trivial in comparison to that level of harm to the nation as a whole.

So, are cars going to "cost us all our nation"?
Heart disease kills EXPONENTIALLY more people every year than people using guns. Is McDonald's going to "cost us all our nation"? What, exactly, is your criteria for what is going to "cost us all our nation''?

take their guns ...

But no. Attitudes change, and we need to keep pressing on these gun control issues, and not be bullied or sit cowering in the corner.

No one thought even 5 or 6 years ago that we would see the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell and a fairly widespread acceptance of same sex marriage, which continues to become legal across the states. We will see a vast change in attitude about things like the Assault Weapons ban and ammunition sales restrictions and gun registration and background checks and eliminating stand-your-ground laws. But not if we timid out.

Timing is everything.

Remember, most people don't start paying any real attention until after Labor Day. This tragedy is happening too early to influence most people or cause them to link it to the Presidential election. Unfortunately, many people will have forgotten this by November.

I doubt....

This is not the type of society I wish to have my grand children grow up in. Something is drastically wrong, when in America you feel compelled to carry a lethal weapon just to walk down the street.

When did we become so distrustful of our fellow citizens? When did we become Weenies?

NRA Repbulicans are coming out after this tragedy with really idiotic statements about the "freedom" to have 100 round clips, etc. After such a horrible event people see that as irrational.

The NRA has some really unreasonable views on gun rights. I believe most people want sensible gun control laws. When they learn just how far-right most Repubs are on gun control it could be a turn off for voters.

I'm not saying Dems should politicize this tragedy at all. Let the Rethugs speak for themselves and the NRA as well. Then simply point out what they've said and where the NRA really stands.

People need to know just how out there the right-wing gun opinions are and contrast that with Democratic opinions on common sense gun control.

Bet on that.

So any "talk" of anything happening is moot. If anything, the states have a better shot at it than at the federal level.

Fuck no.

nt.

and it actually helped his numbers.

That said - I have no doubt that this will not be discussed until January.

We're not at that point yet, but when these situations start happening weekly or even monthly, there will be a great push to roll back the 2nd Amendment. Unfortunately, a lot of people will lose their lives before major change occurs. Also, by the time people wake up, there will be metal detectors EVERYWHERE!

Americans don't care. They'd rather hump their weapons.

Lyndon Johnson said the Dems would lose the South when he signed the civil rights legislation, and he was correct, but it was still the right thing to do.

We've had one of these mass killings about once a year for many years (and lots of smaller workplace "going postal" events), and as the graphs show, its been pretty much a steady decline - with a few bumps - in support of gun control. I don't get it why a lot of people here think that the Colorado mass killing is going to mark a turning point.

manufacture a majority.

/assault rifles are automatic: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_rifles. They "confused" it with assault weapons. Or rifles painted black.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_in_the_United_States

I searched on "20" and in the date column noted which ones occured in the year 20..

I haven't checked each and every one if they were gun shootings, but most of them were. Meanwhile, throughout all of this, both graphs show a fairly steady decline in support for gun control.

I don't think, umm, "doing the right thing" will end up with the right results -- a 7:2 Supreme Court conservative majority is not likely to get us to the promised land, hell, it will be about impossible to vote and it isn't going to do much for civil rights. Well, maybe getting rid of Medicare and replacing it with vouchers might work out real well for the youngest and healthiest of the elderly, though. I wish our "pure and wonderful" faction would, oh, never mind.