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Home Page > Blogs > News blogs > Periscope > Gun toll; America 9,369 dead, Great Britain 14 -- get the picture? Obama should attend all the funerals in Newtown after massacre

Periscope by Niall O'Dowd

Gun toll; America 9,369 dead, Great Britain 14 -- get the picture? Obama should attend all the funerals in Newtown after massacre

Posted on Sunday, December 16, 2012 at 07:21 AM

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A vigil was held in front of the White House on Friday night for the victims of the Connecticut shooting.

Here are the statistics; Murders with a firearm in one year: Great Britain, 14; Australia 59; Canada, 144: USA, 9,369.

Are we crazy or has the rest of the world got lucky?

The fault lies in ourselves it seems. Gun violence is out of control.

I think President Obama should attend the funeral of every one of the 27 killed in Newtown, Connecticut.

That way he might show he is serious about efforts at gun control.

His spokesman Jay Carney made one of the dumbest comments in presidential press secretary history when he said on Friday, the day of the tragedy, that this was not the day to talk about the guns issue.

If not Friday, when? Before the next massacre happens?

At a time when the very heavens are screaming for action, Obama and his risk averse staff don’t get it.

The country wants action on this issue and they want it now.

It is appalling to see foreign leaders including the Queen line up and offer sympathy to the U.S. government.

I understand a gesture like that after 9/11 but the foreign leaders should be saying, “Hey America, get your gun house in order.”

The killer had legally held guns, he broke no law. We gave a complete psycho free access to guns -- where did we go so badly wrong?

That is the lesson here, the image of the U.S. worldwide once again is of a cowboy nation where they shoot school children, don’t they, in defense of their Second Amendment rights, a Second Amendment by the way, that is heavily qualified by its caveat sentence at the beginning.

I don’t think Thomas Jefferson and company intended for the right to kill little innocent children to be part of the plan. Amazingly, we have been suckered in these past few years into that position.

But it is time to cry halt now, before another lunatic somewhere decides he wants to top what happened in Newtown and kill even more of our children.

Obama must know there are issues that he must tackle before they fester and bleed and damage America’s soul even more.

The gun issue is now the key one of those.

He should listen to Mayor Bloomberg, the voice in the wilderness these past few years, and follow his plan.

At least then we might have some common sense applied.

The murder of more children seems to be the trade-off for keeping the gun lobby happy.

Can we really live with that? We know this country can do a lot better.

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kaydog1 | Dec 31, 2012, 07:17 AM EST

It would take a colossal amount of gall for the very President who sent thousands of automatic weapons down to the Mexican Drug Cartels as part of "Operation Fast and Furious" and "Operation: Gunwalker" to show his face at the funerals of ANY victims of gun violence. This President's gun gifts to the Mexican narcocartels have been proven as used to kill thousands of innocent Mexican Citizens, and at least three US law enforcement agents that we know of - where are the President's tears for THEM and their family members? How about a few tears from Obama for the so-called 'collateral damege' from all the drone strikes he has been illegally unleashing upon the citizens of governments we are NOT at war with? No, if Niall wants to paint Obama as 'the Prince of Peace'in the gun-violence debate, then Niall is going to have to use a lot of blood-red paint, as Obama's hands are drenched in the stuff, from murdered Middle-Easterners to aborted babies, the man is awash with other people's innocent blood. Please spare me the hypocritical crocodile tears. The problem with Obama-supporters (like Niall), is that they will NEVER criticize this President, or hold him responsible for ANY of the evils he has done. The rest of us, however, have no such indifference to his transgressions. Put your idol back on your own altar, Niall, we won't worship him with you.

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SherLinton | Dec 20, 2012, 02:11 PM EST

Yeah - Odumba should attend the funerals of the thousands of children and women that he helped to kill with drones in a war that will NEVER end in the Middle East. Cry for those children that have been systematically drugged out and sent into society as zombies - not able to interract with society. Big Pharma has done a great job of creating drugs with suicide and violence written into them. Why so much violence in the USA? The never ending drug ads are coming from a government that is the biggest DRUG CARTEL in this part of the world! They run drugs across the border at an astounding rate and our own border guards are being killed by guns provided by Pistole and Strap on Janet. The USA has a corrupt Communistic gov't and will be overthrown by citizens of the USA who still uphold the Constitution and the Bill of Rights given to us and bequeathed to us by GOD - Yaweh, Yashua - not by the Communists. Communism never worked any place so why are we being subjected to destruction because this fake pres has gone insane with the thought of World Domination. We want Washington out of our lives and out of our wallets. The middle class is dying and it's Washington's fault.

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SingleDonald | Dec 19, 2012, 07:07 PM EST

I agree with shop tom & dublinduke! I can only accept abortion if the baby has Downs Syndrone, or other serious pre natel defect. Then, the procedure should be performed as early as possible-certainly not at the 6 month mark, or beyond! Concerning guns, I would like to see a ban on the assault weapons. These are made to kill people, NOT to hunt animals. I am anxiously awaiting the NRA's statement, to be issued on Friday. I sense they will soften up their position, ever so slightly, in the wake of the tragedy in Connecticut. Interestingly, a high school classmate posted an interesting statistic, on Facebook. Where guns are illegal, an average of 22 deaths occur, before the police are able to arrive, to stop a mass murderer. Where guns are legal (such as Texas), an average of 2 deaths occur. Doesn't this tell us something? It takes time for someone to call 911, and for the police to arrive on the scene. However, with ordinary citizens being able to carry arms, it wouldn't be long before the demented person would be shot by a good samaritan! Also, that nut likely wouldn't go on his killing spree in the 1st place, knowing that he would likely be shot soon after his shooting began!

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seanomelb | Dec 19, 2012, 06:42 PM EST

shop tom has conceded defeat on this debate by his silly puerile comments.

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DanOLoingsigh | Dec 19, 2012, 05:51 PM EST

If the citizens of any country think the periodic slaughter of innocent children is a ‘price worth paying’ to preserve their gun-owning rights, that’s their business…they just need to pray that the next maniac, or the one after that, doesn’t turn up at the gates of their child’s school…

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shop tom | Dec 19, 2012, 04:58 PM EST

Why is it that those that are so against the right to own guns are also the same that are so for the right to kill babies in the womb?

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seamus60 | Dec 19, 2012, 02:55 PM EST

Seano. The gun lobby know less guns is less bucks to all the backroom recipients. Thats all that matters to them.

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seamus60 | Dec 19, 2012, 02:26 PM EST

Very very sad to all concerned. Yet just another groundhog day in America. No doubt we will have many more articles of this nature. Just imagine if that nutter Timothy Mc Veigh had of got his hands on an assault rifle.

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olovely | Dec 18, 2012, 08:31 PM EST

Put children before political ideologies. Start with a ban on assault weapons.

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seanomelb | Dec 18, 2012, 06:50 PM EST

The gun lobby know less guns will mean less deaths.They use the "mental health"issue as a crutch to defend the indefensible.

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eiriamach | Dec 18, 2012, 06:08 PM EST

@darragh S, maybe he didn't just snap. Jason Sickles, writing on Yahoo: "In stockpiling ammunition, smashing his computers and killing his mother as she slept, Adam Lanza undertook considerable preparation before shooting up an elementary school on Friday, a former FBI profiler said. 'He didn't just snap. This takes a lot of planning,' said Mary Ellen O'Toole, who worked for 15 years in the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit where she studied psychopaths and helped capture killers. 'It's time we stop putting out the mental health issue as an excuse that he didn't know what he was doing,' she said. O'Toole said people with Asperger's [Lanza had this neurological syndrome] ... aren't known to commit such violence and that too much is being made about Lanza's mental health."

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eiriamach | Dec 18, 2012, 05:42 PM EST

If everyone had to submit to real psychiatric testing before purchasing a gun, the NRA would have no gun-toting members left to pay dues. Not one of those "guns and God" people could pass a real test.

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sirpeter | Dec 18, 2012, 11:39 AM EST

I bet Thomas Jefferson & company never thought flintlock muskets would end up as semi-automatics.The right to bare arms..As Dr Phil would say..How's that working out for ye?

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southside77 | Dec 18, 2012, 11:19 AM EST

Please remember Obama is a first class atheist. Not only does he not go to church he views those as do as simple minded nitwits. So you will not see him in a church any time soon.

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JayFay | Dec 18, 2012, 04:30 AM EST

Darragh, he snapped and had easy access to a gun. If he had snapped and didn't have access to a gun, things would have been very different. This thing isn't complicated you know.

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