Tag: gun lobby

3% of Americans own half of America’s guns

If you’re wondering how small the demographic that the NRA and other gun lobby groups are fighting tooth and nail to protect against people who want common-sense gun safety legislation, it’s a very small demographic. It’s not quite as small as the demographic that has an obscenely large portion of of our nation’s wealth, but it’s pretty close to being as small:

Half of America’s civilian-owned guns are owned by only 3% of American adults. Here’s some more detail about the very small gun hoarder demographic in this country:

Americans own an estimated 265m guns, more than one gun for every American adult, according to the most definitive portrait of US gun ownership in two decades. But the new survey estimates that 133m of these guns are concentrated in the hands of just 3% of American adults – a group of super-owners who have amassed an average of 17 guns each.

The unpublished Harvard/Northeastern survey result summary, obtained exclusively by the Guardian and the Trace, estimates that America’s gun stock has increased by 70m guns since 1994. At the same time, the percentage of Americans who own guns decreased slightly from 25% to 22%.

I’m not advocating for taking guns away from law-abiding citizens, but it makes absolutely no sense for a person to hoard dozens of guns.

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Kathleen Vinehout for Governor of Wisconsin? NO WAY!

It’s become public knowledge in Wisconsin political circles that State Sen. Kathleen Vinehout (D-Alma) really wants to run for the Democratic nomination for Governor of Wisconsin in 2018.

However, Vinehout is not a progressive, and, in fact, her views on some political issues are in line with far-right Republicans like Scott Walker.

Prior to being elected to the Wisconsin State Senate, Vinehout was a member of Democrats for Life, an anti-abortion organization. As a Wisconsin State Senator, Vinehout voted with Scott Walker and the gun manufacturers’ lobby for legislation designed to make it easier for off-duty and former police officers to carry out school shootings in Wisconsin public schools. While Vinehout is great on most economic issues and issues related to ending corruption in politics, her views on social issues are very right-wing and more in line with Republicans like Scott Walker.

While I will not move to Wisconsin to run for governor myself, after this year’s general election, I will write a blog post strongly criticizing a second potential Democratic candidate for Governor of Wisconsin. Make no mistake about it, the individual who I will criticize is the embodiment of a Scott Walker Democrat, and, if the individual were to run for governor, the individual would have a lot of support from the Democratic establishment, but I will not provide any more clues as to who the individual is at this time.

Hillary Clinton suggests going too far on gun safety

Hillary Clinton, whether she knew the fact that Australia instituted a mandatory confiscation of assault weapons in the mid-1990’s or not, stated that “Australia is a good example” to model a federal gun buyback program after, and that a federal gun buyback program is “something worth considering”.

I want to make two points about this.

First, the gun proliferation lobby is, not surprisingly, attacking Hillary over her remarks right away. However, they’ve distorted Hillary’s words to make it look like she fully supports a mass confiscation of guns in this country. In reality, she’s not yet outright supported a mass confiscation of guns, but she did say that she would be open to the idea of supporting a federal gun buyback program of some kind. If the NRA starts running ridiculous spoofs of the “How to Speak Australian” Foster’s beer commercials, you’ll know that the NRA has no fucking clue as to what the fuck they’re doing.

Second, if Hillary does decide to fully support an Australian-style mandatory assault weapon confiscation, she would be running head-first into opposition from virtually the entire Republican Party and a large chunk of the Democratic Party. There’s two reasons for this. First, supporting taking legally-obtained firearms from law-abiding Americans is extremely unpopular in this country, even among Democrats and with gun safety being a major political issue in this country. Second, unlike the Australian Constitution, which has no provision banning the Australian Parliament from enacting a mandatory gun buyback program, the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution would be interpreted by most judges, even many liberal judges, as banning the enactment of a mandatory gun buyback program in this country.

Make no mistake about it, I am not a gun nut or a puppet for the gun lobby. I support universal background checks, closing the gun show loophole, banning the sale of assault weapons, requiring gun owners to report lost or stolen guns to law enforcement, and enacting a gun registry. These are my views, and they do not necessarily line up with those of any presidential candidate.

While my political views may not line up 100% with those of Bernie Sanders on every single issue, he’s the only reasonable person running for president when it comes to gun safety, and his views on guns are the closest to mine. He supports background checks, ending the gun show loophole, and banning the sale of assault weapons. Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, has suggested the idea of taking legally-obtained firearms away from law-abiding Americans, something that I think goes too far.

The last progressive victory of 2014: Far-right Obama judicial nominee Michael Boggs will NOT be confirmed or re-nominated

Michael Boggs, a former right-wing Democratic Georgia State Representative (yes, there used to be right-wing Democrats in office in Georgia and other Southern states), will not be confirmed by the U.S. Senate and will not be re-nominated by President Barack Obama to a lifetime term to a federal judgeship on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.

While this isn’t a pretty victory by any stretch of the imagination, since there’s still a large number of federal judicial vacancies, this is a progressive victory because Boggs would have been a rubber stamp for the Republicans’ far-right agenda had he been confirmed as a federal judge.

When Boggs ran for and won a seat in the Georgia House of Representatives, Boggs campaigned as an ultra-conservative, supporting the gun lobby’s dangerous agenda, the Confederate flag, and school prayer and opposing openly-gay Boy Scout leaders, reproductive rights, and marriage equality. During his 2000 campaign, Boggs’s campaign distributed this flyer touting his pro-discrimination and anti-equality views on social issues and stating that he was running as a Democrat simply to get a committee chairmanship and advance far-right legislation (at the time, Democrats controlled the Georgia House of Representatives). More importantly, as a Georgia State Representative, Boggs built up a right-wing, pro-discrimination, and anti-equality voting record that is far out of line with what is expected of Democrats of today’s Democratic Party.

Michael Boggs’s bid to be a federal judge is, at least for the next two years, is over, and this is the last progressive victory in 2014. While I expect very few progressive victories in 2015, given that Republicans will have increased power in Congress and in numerous state governments, I hope that us progressives score some victories, and I wish everyone a safe and happy New Year.