#680 – Greg Halbert: "The Right to Keep and Bear Arms"?

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Banana Clip AR, as seen Jan 22, 2013, in Minneapolis MN at the Seward Cafe


Dick Bernard: The Gun Issue is on the table, and that is good. Unfortunately, much of the conversation is as much based on reality as the above painting, which I saw in the Seward Cafe on Franklin Avenue in Minneapolis today. The painting does get at a reality, however…. The ladies in the below photo (same place and time) were having a civil conversation “under the gun” so to speak. If only we all could approach the gun conversation in the same civil manner.
There is lots of good information available, if one is interested in learning. The following is an example.
Recently I had occasion to send around to my own e-list a “Was the Second Amendment Adopted for Slaveholders?“, by MinnPost columnist and long-time well respected writer on Government issues Eric Black. The column links to a longer academic paper by Carl Bogus.
Both are worth a read. At minimum, read the last two paragraphs of Black’s commentary.
Greg Halbert, a good friend, fellow church usher and retired prosecutor, is on my list, and read the items, and provided his own summary view, in a note to Mr. Black.
Here is Greg’s note to Eric, with an appended additional note to myself.
I encourage you to read the Eric Black column and his accompanying links as well.
Greg Halbert to Eric Black Jan 19:
Very much enjoyed your article on the Second Amendment; you educated me greatly, as I am sure it educated many other people who read your piece.
There is another point regarding the right to possess firearms that troubles me. I receive numerous emails from conservative people who claim they have a right to possess a firearm for possible use if and when government becomes tyrannical.
Nothing much, that I have come across, is discussed regarding this claim. Our Revolutionary leaders believed the British government had become tyrannical so they launched the Revolutionary War. But, in doing so they committed treason against the king. Fortunately they won the war and gained independence from Great Britain. Had the British won the war, George Washington and others could well have been executed.
So here we sit in 2013 with certain citizens of the United States fearful the U. S. government will become tyrannical, so they possess firearms and ammunition for use if such tyranny develops.
The difficulty I have is just how is this tyranny defined? How will you, me and others know when our government becomes tyrannical? It is left unsaid, but I presume gun toters think they as individuals will determine when the government has become tyrannical. Then what?
Do these Second amendment worshippers actually think they will take on city police departments, county sheriffs, the national guard, FBI, etc?
Do people who assert this right to possess firearms for use against a tyrannical government understand that treason is another word to describe their actions if they ever come to that?
This tortured line of thinking has escaped any careful examination.
Greg Halbert to Dick Bernard Jan 19:
These so-called super patriots fail to appreciate they are really contemplating treason with this talk that they need arms and ammo to be prepared for response to a tyrannical government. Who determines the government is tyrannical? Anyone? Isn’t that anarchy? Sorry, I am running low on question marks so will close.

#678 – Dick Bernard: Anniversary of a Retirement

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It was thirteen years ago today, January 18, 2000, that my staff colleagues at Education Minnesota bid me adieu at my retirement after 27 years attempting to do my best to represent teachers in a collective bargaining state.
I was not yet 60 when I cleaned out my office, handed in my keys and walked out the north door at 41 Sherburne in St. Paul.
It had been long enough.
Even so, I had purposely fixed my retirement date to accommodate the statutory deadline for contract settlements that year: January 18, 2000.
My job back then was an endless series of negotiations about anything and everything: elementary teachers had differing priorities than secondary; that teacher who’d filed a grievance, or was being disciplined for something, had a difference of opinion with someone. Somebody higher up the food chain had a differing notion of “top priority” than I did….
So it went.
And negotiations was a lot better than the alternative where the game was for one person to win, against someone else who lost.
It was one of many lessons early in my staff career: if you play the game of win and lose, the winner never really wins, at least in the real sense of that term, where a worthy objective is for everybody to feel some sense of winning something. Win/Lose is really Lose/Lose…everybody loses.
We are in the midst of a long-running terrible Civil War where winning is everything; where to negotiate is to lose.
We’re seeing the sad results in our states, and in our nation’s capital, and in our interpersonal communication (or lack of same) about important issues, like the current Gun Issue, Etc.
Thirteen years is a while ago.
I brought my camera along that January 18, 2000, and someone took a few snapshots (at end of this post). Nothing fancy, but it is surprising how many memories come back:
There’s that photo of myself with the co-Presidents of Education Minnesota, Judy Schaubach and Sandra Peterson. Two years earlier rival unions, Minnesota Education Association and Minnesota Federation of Teachers, had merged after many years of conflict.
I like to feel that I played more than a tiny part in that important rapprochement, beginning in the late 1980s in northern Minnesota.
Both officers have retired. Sandra Peterson served 8 years in the Minnesota State Legislature.
Leaders don’t stop leading when they retire.
February 28, in Apple Valley, Education Minnesota’s Dakota County United Educators (Apple Valley/Rosemount) will celebrate 20 years from the beginning of serious negotiations to merge two rival local unions.
I was there, part of that. And proud of it.
There’s my boss, Larry Wicks, who many years earlier I’d practiced-teaching-on at Valley City State Teachers College. I apparently didn’t destroy him then; he’s currently Executive Director of the Ohio Education Association.
And my work colleague and friend Bob Tonra, now many years deceased, who somehow took a fancy to my Uncle’s WWII ships, the battleship USS Arizona and destroyer USS Woodworth and painstakingly made to scale models, behind me as I type this blog.
And of course, colleagues – people in the next office, across the hall, other departments, etc. Or Karen at the Good Earth in Roseville – “my” restaurant for nearly its entire existence. They gave me a free carrot cake that day….
That January 18 I finally cleared the final mess from my office and took a few photos of my work space, across the street from the State Capitol building. On my office door hung a photo from the Rocky Mountain News in Denver, April, 1999, a few days after the massacre at Columbine.
That young lady in the picture is granddaughter Lindsay, then 13. She, her parents and I walked up that Cross Hill on a rainy April day, and saw the stumps of the two crosses one Dad had cut down – the ones erected by someone else to the two killers, who had killed themselves. They lived then, and now, scarce a mile from the high school….
All the memories.
Let’s all learn to truly negotiate and to compromise on even our most cherished beliefs.
Such a talent is our future. Indeed our world’s only chance for a future.
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Judy Schaubach, Dick Bernard, Sandra Peterson Jan 18, 2000


In Gallop Conference Room at Education Minnesota Jan 18, 2000


Karen Schultz and server at Good Earth, January 18, 2000


Bob Tonra with his model of the USS Arizona ca 1996


Larry Wicks (at left)


Cross Hill above Columbine High School, April 1999, granddaughter Lindsay by the crosses, late April, 1999

#677 – Dick Bernard: President Obama's Moment

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In my opinion, Wednesday, January 16, 2013, will go down as President Obama’s John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King moment.
It took an immense amount of courage for him, January 16, 2013, to confront our nations culture of violence, particularly the fringe – it’s really only a fringe – which worships the unrestricted “right to bear arms” – all and any kinds of arms.
(The Second Amendment, ratified Dec. 15, 1791, says this in its entirety “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” The reader can, of course, choose which words to emphasize…or ignore…in that amendment.)
President Obama, his supporters, advisers and the Secret Service, know the personal risks of what he did yesterday.
I believe President Kennedy, and I know Martin Luther King, knew the risks of witness for a better society and world. They both fell to rifle shots from hatred, 1963 and 1968.
Any of us around then – I was a school teacher when the announcement over the intercom came that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas – know more than we want to know about how hatred and threats such as we are now seeing spewed by folks tend to trickle down to madmen who are more than willing to do the dirty work of killing the messenger. The NRA is, I believe, wittingly facilitating this hatred.
The vast majority of us, I believe, are with the President on his initiative to change the sick system which enabled Newtown and other tragedies.
But we can’t be sitting quietly in the background in our circles as this debate moves forward.
We need to supportively encircle the President and help him move forward in the many ways available to us. We need, particularly, to support our legislators who support change, and encourage those who are reluctant to see a civilized world in a different way than through a gun sight.
Yes, this is a complex issue.
Personally, I don’t own or plan to own a weapon, but neither am I anti-gun for the traditional uses I grew up with. Gun ownership is a privilege with great responsibility. Sadly, legislation is about the only way to increase responsibility.
I see something of a continuum in the debate which is now officially beginning.
At one end of the continuum is true religious model, best stated in the “beat their swords into plowshares” citation (Isaiah 2:3-4). Arbitrarily, I’ll call that end zero.
At the other end is the “man’s home is his castle” philosophy which, played out to its illogical end, allows anybody to do anything with any killing device. I’ll call that ten.
Somewhere in between those poles is common sense in a “free State”, as stated in that Second Amendment.
We are – all of us – the “State” referred to in that Second Amendment. We are “the people”.
The collective “we, the people of the United States” share responsibility to “insure domestic Tranquility” (the Preamble of the Constitution), and tranquility doesn’t come at the end of a gun.
(On that continuum, above, I’d put myself at a four or less.)
Our World is our Castle.
We all live together in that Castle. We depend on each other; not only on ourselves.
Get involved, and don’t quit. Be willing to negotiate, but carefully. It is hard to negotiate with someone who refuses to negotiate.
On this and other issues, learn both sides and stick with it. It’s a crucial issue at a crucial time.
Here’s the complete U.S. Constitution: Constitution of U.S.001
Recent previous posts on this topic are here, here and here.
UPDATES:
From Will:
Some blogger yesterday had a great juxtaposition of King and Obama: “I Have a Dream” vs. “I Have a Drone.”
Dick, to Will: Yesterday, I seem to recall, the President mentioned that there had been 900 or so gun deaths in the U.S. in the month since Newtown. Perhaps you could tell me how many deaths from Drones in the same month? How many Iraqis died in a typical month in the Iraq War when it was raging back in the good old days of 2003-2008? How many war dead in Afghanistan in a typical month?
The United States is a nation that almost worships violence. And the gun issue is a perfect place to intensify the conversation on the role of violence in our society.
The President is already on record asking Congress to help adopt rules for use of Drones. It isn’t as if he’s been silent.
Over 50 years ago I edited a small college newspaper, and I’ve always been intrigued by this item we printed in one issue of the paper, sometime in 1960-61.
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Viking News, Valley City (ND) State Teachers College, May 24, 1961


Bruce, Jan 17:
Excellent blog.
I concur with you in that it took tremendous personal courage for Obama to take his position on gun control. The president’s life is always in danger for any political act he does, but this one is exceptionally dire. If he is successful in facing up to the NRA and it’s rabid fringe followers, his life will be at risk even after he leaves office. That is the level of emotion on this issue. It may be equivalent to Lincoln and slavery, which brings me to an article I read in the last couple of days on the 2nd Amendment. It’s point is the 2nd was ratified to preserve slavery. I think it goes to ” the man’s home is his castle” doctrine. That is the basis for a person has the right to protect his property with violence, if necessary. The most valuable property in the 18th century in America, when the Bill of Rights was ratified, was slaves. Slavery was legal, and there were slaves in all of the states. The national economy depended on the institution of slavery. In order for the Bill of Rights to be ratified the south needed a compromise which protected their property(slaves) from abolitionists thus preserving their police state(slave patrols). I think, Tom Hartmann, the author of the article, has a good analysis. Protecting the institution of slavery was at the heart of the 2nd amendment. With the Emancipation Proclamation, the 2nd Amendment should have been eliminated. There was no longer a reason for it except for protecting the profit of fire arms manufactures. I can’t help but think it’s exceptionally poetic that it’s the first “Black” president that is facing down the gun lobby. I think it scares the hell out many. In the Tarrantino movie Django, Django must remind many, unconsciously if nothing else, of Obama. It’s a very violent movie, but I recommend it, especially after you read this article.
Another lobby that is as powerful as the NRA is AIPAC. Obama is standing up to that lobby, too. He is putting forth all his political might to show down these two lobbies. With the nomination of Hagel, he has pick a fight with AIPAC. He has brought it out into the light, and now with the backing of Senator Levin(MI) a powerful supporter of AIPAC, he may have won that fight. See here.
The president has guts and resolve. That is what makes him dangerous to the forces that these two lobbies represent. Liberating the country from the oppression of these two lobbies is no small feat, and as you have stated, we need to help this president and protect his back.

#676 – Dick Bernard: The Gun "Conversation" one month after Newtown.

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This is the one month anniversary of Newtown CT massacre. It seems a good time to look back, and ahead.
The day of Newtown – it was a Friday – I wrote a blogpost in this space, which was also carried in the local Woodbury Patch. There were 45 comments on that post. They speak for themselves.
A few days later I did a second post, with some recommendations. It is here. I included in the post the following graphic, which is very pertinent at this point in the conversation about guns.
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Handout from a circa 1972 workshop.


This old graphic demonstrates a general truth: if you seek change – good or evil – after a crisis, there is a narrow window of opportunity. If you wait for the perfect moment to act, the opportunity is lost, since people have a short attention span. Both heroes and villains need to pay attention to this.
I could give many examples from both good and evil, but these would deflect attention from our need to act on this issue, now.
There are so many opinions already out there, another one may seem superfluous, but here are some very brief thoughts:
1. Attempting to introduce more arms into any setting, especially schools, is insane. More weaponry simply introduces more possibilities for more tragic mayhem. If one only considers schools, in the United States there are about 14,000 school districts, 133,000 schools (ranging from one room rural, to immense structures serving thousands); with 55,000,000 or so students and perhaps 5-6 million staff, mostly teachers.
Solving this problem with more lethal weapons is no solution.
The NRA attempted to exploit post-Newtown hysteria on this.
2. The National Rifle Association (NRA) does not deserve the power it attempts to exercise.
It is useful to learn about the NRA. Here is an article that seems to summarize the bases well, though not from the official NRA perspective.
NRA claims to enroll about 4 million members at $35 dues. This translates into approximately one NRA member per 60 adult Americans, and by no means do all NRA members subscribe to the credo of the current leaders.
If we look at NRA leadership as it is, rather than what it pretends to be, it is nothing more than a “skinny 90 pound weakling” who, exposed, is no more powerful than the exposed Wizard of Oz. It has only the power the rest of us choose to give it.
NRAs big money backing may talk, but only possesses the same single vote influence that every one of us has with the people we elect to represent us. We have the power on this issue, if we choose to exercise it.
3. Those who demand the right to be armed and dangerous are fools, exposing their short-sightedness and, yes, impotence.
I am trained in firearms – Army years. But I’ve never owned a gun, and I have no intention to get one now.
In a ‘gunfight at the OK Corral’ I would be un-armed and dead.
I don’t need to go to the OK Corral, but if I did, and I was killed, my problems would be over, but my well-armed assailants problems would just be beginning.
Last I looked we have little laws in this country which frown on murder. And we have technology with which to find murderers that wasn’t available during the OK Corral days.
Someone lethally armed is potentially more a danger to him or herself than to any intruder or the hated government.
I don’t need to list examples. They abound.
The struggle for sanity in gun ownership is by no means over. It is just beginning.
Be on the court.
It is your legislators, national and state, who will have to enact the policies that are needed. They depend on you.
UPDATE:
from Peter Jan. 14:
Well since you put it that way…
Just guessing you should strengthen the connection between NRA-fear and legislators. They are the ones who are afraid of NRA, because it looks as if it can get them un-elected if they don’ play along. Also it would be well to look into the history of that, has anybody been un-elected by the NRA? Cause they sure have swung a lot of weight in DC. Power in DC is a very individual matter. Relationships between less than three or four people can have the effect of thousands of votes. NRA is probably as hollow as you say, but to let the air out of them you have to expose this, and that means revealing the actual mechanism of how this (tax exempt!) outfit pulls the strings it pulls, and what those strings are made of.
I don’t actually believe the rank and file membership does a whole lot in the way of lobbying. Lobbyists are all presenting themselves as representing a lot of voters, or a lot of jobs in your district. But day-to-day they don’t really have to trot them out. It’s like the filibuster.
Dick, to Peter, and all: If one feels they have no power, they have no power. We are far more powerful than we think we are; and the adversary is far weaker than it would admit it is….
From Phyllis Jan 15:
Good article! I honestly think most of our senators and congressmen are wimps/weaklings when it comes to the NRA. I wish they would all get a spine!! They cannot answer yes or no, but dance around a question when it comes to gun safety. So they get a F rating from the NRA, who really cares….and what does it mean to have the A+ rating??? Does that make them a better person?? Just asking….

#666 – Dick Bernard: Newtown, to those who'd like to help change the conversation about Guns in America

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If you’re interested in making a difference in this guns-in-America conversation, here are some thoughts:
Yes, it is Christmas time, and preparations take center stage such as each of us prepare for our own family rituals at this season.
Christmas is often a confusing time, desperately depressing for many, far too much ‘noise’ and competing priorities. We each have our own narrative. “Christmas shopping” is a major one.
Today and forward, the funerals continue in Newtown CT.
This morning some adult men were joking about going out to buy guns before they were made illegal; I had just read an excellent commentary in the Minneapolis Star Tribune from someone with Asperger’s Syndrome about sensitivity to those with such ailments. I wondered if the guns-trumping-everything bunch can see themselves as mentally ill….
As we continue to be overwhelmed by the horrific facts of Newtown, it is easy to become paralyzed into inaction, or, equally terrible, to rigidly refuse to consider other points of view. Neither mitigate towards change in the status quo that led to all of the hideous acts, Newtown only the most recent.
This is an opportunity for deep conversation and some change in course in our country, state and community in many areas: guns, mental health (including every single one of us), video games, sanctioned bullying demonstrated by adults in sundry ways… Even in my small corner of the communications universe, my first post on this topic last Saturday brought some comments (added at end of this post); and the same column used in the Woodbury (MN) Patch has ignited some continuing conversation [44 comments as of early Dec. 19].
Here are some other ‘threads’ not commonly seen to consider as this conversation hopefully continues.
1. The Status Quo is Very, Very Powerful
Newtown is not the first gun crisis we have experienced, and it won’t be the last. Those who do not want meaningful change know the simplest tactic is to simply wait out the initial turmoil – and life will go on, unchanged. Relevant, I think, is this handout from a workshop I attended perhaps 40 years ago which demonstrates the dynamics of response to a disaster. I prefer to leave it in its original form. It speaks for itself. This is a flow chart to spend some time contemplating, in my opinion.
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Worksheet from workshop circa 1972


We are the politics we like to criticize and judge, more so than the politicians. Change is possible, but takes lots of work, and persistence.
Ditto to the crisis sequence is the very real problem of instituting real and continued Change. Another old handout I have from the same time years ago showed what we all know is true: change is exceedingly difficult, even if one knows that beyond the resistance to change is a better something Change001. We embrace the status quo (think over-eating, etc) because it is very hard to change behaviors. The initial response to change is reduced efficiency (or pleasure, etc), which is why most of us do not actually change those behaviors we know that we should.
2. We will not Rid Our Nation of Guns. The best we can expect is a much healthier attitude towards them.
The guns the Connecticut Mom apparently kept to protect her from potential hostile others, ended up being the instrument of her own death, and of many others….
I have never owned a gun, and never will. I qualified as expert with the M-1 in the military (WWII vintage, something like a deer rifle with a small ammo clip).
A recurring image is at my 87-year old Uncle’s farm house this Fall. He showed me his guns. He had, if I recall correctly, six of them, including 30.06 and 12-gauge shotgun and some old-timers from his Grandpa’s day. My Uncle is no gun nut, and the guns were not for self-defense. He occasionally hunted for deer or for pheasants on his own property – that was it. He didn’t keep a stash of ammo. If he needed a box of shotgun shells, that’s what he bought – not cases.
He and I didn’t talk about the National Rifle Association (NRA), to which he belonged, off and on. It is pretty clear to me, though, that he has not much time for the present NRA.
3. The NRA and the Gun Industry Needs to be Called to Account.
This, too, will be hard. Our weapons industry provides lots of jobs. Think the problem of change.
The current version of the NRA is not all that old. When I first became teacher union staff in 1972, I can remember the first visits to our national headquarters in Washington DC. Across 16th Street, then, about a mile north of the White House, was an old standard issue office building housing the then-National Rifle Association. That NRA was a very different organization than todays version.
4. Is Change Possible? Yes. Is It Easy? No. Can it be Delegated to Someone Else? No way. It’s in each of our courts.
Some years ago I happened across a wonderful book, “Why We Can’t Wait”, written by Martin Luther King Jr in 1963-64 about 1963 in America. It remains in print and available. I highly recommend it.
MLK was then 34 years old. In his final chapter, “The Days to Come”, he talks a lot about political engagement and political leaders like Eisenhower, Kennedy and LBJ. At page 132-33, commenting on JFK’s assessment of the importance of Bull Connor to the Civil Rights successes, King says this: “It was the people who moved their leaders, not the leaders who moved the people.”
This is the powerful message to anyone who wants to impact change. It is the responsibility of each one of us to make our small bit of difference. It takes more than just signing a petition, or saying something else should do it. It is solely up to each and every one of us.
COMMENTS FROM THE PRECEDING POST ON THIS ISSUE:
From Mary Dec. 15:
I attended a workshop yesterday by Noel Larson who is expert in treating people damaged enough to do these acts….and heard about Connecticut there in a large room filled with people dedicated to providing therapy to heal from abuse and perception of constant danger…ironic – if payment is available they have guarantee of work – very difficult work.
I am very sad.
From Jeff Dec 15: watched Congr. Carolyn McCarthy on MSNBC this morning. She is an RN, lost her husband and her son was terribly injured in a Long Island shooter incident in the early 90’s.
She should be watched, she is plain spoken and like most nurses, direct and doesn’t pull punches.
She and another panelist said we have to admit that gun owning is a right, the Supreme Court has determined that. We need to do something about automatic weapons, multiple bullet clips, closing the gun show loophole and strengthening background checks. Find common ground with responsible gun owners , sportsmen that can overturn the perversity of the extreme NRA views. (our political system is gerrymandered under our house districting system to allow the NRA to bully reps)
Michael Bloomberg is putting his money in the fight to find districts where tipping points can be influenced. That is a good thing.
The other thing Cong. McCarthy said is we need to emulate the campaigns against smoking, for seat belt use….long term changing of a culture and mindset by stigmatizing parts of the gun culture are necessary. So gun responsibility, gun safety should be the buzzwords… not gun control. (I note that both George Lakoff, and Nate Silver wrote about this terminology in the past few days).
Bob reminded me of his post from June 29, 2009, here.
From an elementary school teacher in MN: My principal was in the air force and today he talked about wanting to get a gun permit for conceal and carry in the school to protect everyone (which didn’t go over well at all given that everyone is so emotionally raw right now and does not want anything except stricter gun controls) Oh well……..he thinks he personally would save all of us and all 770 students. A little of his ego is involved here I think. Alot more discussion to follow.
From Carol Dec 15: “This morning, a madman attacked more than 20 children at an elementary school in China. As of this writing, there are no reported fatalities.
A few hours later, a madman attacked an elementary school in Connecticut. As of this writing, 20 of those kids are dead.
The difference? The weapon. The madman in China had a knife. The madman in Connecticut had three semi-automatic guns.”

Already you’re hearing the excuses: Timothy McVeigh didn’t need guns to kill all those people, the terrorists on 9-11 didn’t need guns to kill all those people, yadda yadda. As though a 20-yr-old living with his mother could have pulled off a massive truck bombing or flown planes into buildings. An unstable 20-yr-old needed guns.
I’m not going down the rabbit hole of Patch comments, etc. again. Nothing changes with these idiots. Somebody by now has probably claimed that if some kindergartener’s mom had only packed heat in their lunchbox, they’d all be safe.
From Barbara Dec. 15: I am totally freaked out about this. It must be because of the little kids. Little kids, for God’s sake. Evil, evil, evil.
I am on a massive personal inventory about my complicity via relative silence, and how to mitigate against that going forward.
For starters, Heather Martens and Protect Minnesota have infrastructure in place (and have had for years) about guns and violence. So in MN, there’s a foundation in place.
From Jeff Dec 15: This thing has made me numb… and I can still not comprehend it.
Something has to be done to question the ethic of violence in our society, from these types of murders, to video games, to movies to our own govts reliance on violence to pursue its foreign policy.
Merry Christmas.
From Will Dec 15: Dear Folks: I just finished writing the President most of you voted for plus my Congresspeople urging them to stand up to the NRA and immediately introduce much stricter controls on those types of weapons that are most frequently used in massacres such as at Newtown CT and the others.
My heart wasn’t in this next part but I suggested if they focus on assault weapons, maybe their constituent voters who murder only animals aka “hunters” will not be vindictive at election time. After all, some of these Congresspeople do some good work even though they’re Democrats and need to be dragged much farther to the left such as The Green Party or Workers International League/SocialistAppeal.org.
When I wrote Mr. Obama, I noticed his list of subjects, like my Sen. Amy Klobuchar (but unlike Sen. Al Franken and Rep. Betty McCollum) did not include guns nor gun control. So, flustered, I hit the Homeland Security button which promptly was refused and I tried a few others (Drone, Rice, Boehner, Bachmann) before finally managing to sneak under the wire with “other.”
From Greg Dec 15: Regarding a comment in the Gail Collins column that if more good people carried guns they could respond when a person starts killing. A number of years ago I read a story that I wish I had saved.
It occurred outside a county court house in a rural Texas county. A man accosted his ex-wife as she was about to enter the court house, I believe for a post divorce hearing.
The man started shooting at her. Nearby an uninvolved man saw what was happening. he drew his gun and began shooting at the first man who then began firing at this second man. Result: the second man, a good Samaritan, was shot and killed.
At Sandy Creek school and at the theater in Aurora the shooter was said to be clad in protective armor. Thus not only must a person be able to draw and fire at the attacker, but must connect with a head shot … virtually impossible in those circumstances.
The proposal for rifle storage and usage [Rabbi Michael Lerner of Tikkun] tracks closely my experience in the 1970s while on U. S. military duty in then West Germany. Gun clubs existed in cities where people could store their weapons under lock and key and go to shoot at targets. Seems like a reasonable approach.
People who think they are protecting themselves by keeping a loaded gun in their homes may wish to reflect on the experience of the Rochester Minnesota minister who accidentally shot his grand daughter after mistaking her for an intruder.
From Jeff Dec 15: People who want to reform the gun madness have to start from the premise that gun owning is in the constitution and the Supreme court has recently upheld individual rights to own guns and been very hesitant to strike down certain limitations or restrictions.
aa) change minds with spending money on the same campaign that reduced smoking and diminished it to nearly pariah status… enlists teachers, doctors, police, military men , actors, hunters, religious, etc. to work on changing the gun culture, and part of that will have to be rewarding positive gun ownership
bb) work on closing the gun show loophole, work on passing the ban on automatic weapons, multiple ammo clips,
cc) strengthen and bring technology to bear on background checks
dd) allow pediatricians to ask parents if they are gun owners and how they store their guns
ee) increase funding for mental health, and remove the stigma attached to mental illness (remember Paul Wellstone)
Find common ground with gun owners and sportsmen…they are parents and grandparents too.
Jeff Dec 16: we need to ask ourselves what would our governments and our fellow citizens be doing now if the Newtown killer’s name was Abu Abdallah? I can only imagine the actions that would follow, the unmitigated demands for investigations , etc. Yet a madman takes his gun owning mothers automatic weapons and kills 28 people and we as a nation wonder what our elected reps might be able to do? The Patriot Act was forced down our throats as a result of 9/11, the HSA is one of the largest departments of the govt ,,,, yet it seems every week we endure shootings like this.
Paul Dec. 16: Here is another strong voice in support of the commitment of teachers to their students. The bravery of the Sandy Hook teachers in the face of an unimaginable nightmare is astounding.
From Judy Dec 16: This is wonderful.
From Flora Dec 17: My heart is heavy from the tragedy at the elementary school in Connecticut.
This Wednesday, Jefferson High School will show a film made by last year’s senior from Edina High School, called “Minnesota Nice”. It is the film on bullying, followed by homeroom discussion. I hope every effort matters in making the schools a better place for everybody.
Wishing for Peace everywhere,
From Norm: Excellent piece Dick.
I singled out the following ready to send around because where ‘serious’ can’t do the trick maybe a little
tongue-in-cheek will work:
A safe society is one where everyone packs heat all the time: wouldn’t it build character for citizens to learn their responsibility early on? There’s no problem finding a firearm for
small hands: if every one of them had had a piece in his desk, and opened up on Lanza from all directions right away, only a few more would be dead now, maybe even fewer, and the survivors would have learned about pride and self-sufficiency instead of fear and surrender. We have fire drills; don’t we care enough about our kids to give them rapid-fire drills? And come to think of it, kindergarten is not too young to learn freedom through armed revolt (see lesson one above): what more oppressive, authoritarian institution is there than a school to its students? K-12 students with suitable weapons could be learning to fight tyranny before the school crushes their spirit and turns them into slaves of big government.
From Greg Dec. 17, to his Church in Minneapolis: Many people are probably like me, we want to do something tangible for the dear people of Newtown Connecticut. I think it was upon the death of Princess Diana that a book of condolences was placed in the Minnesota Capitol rotunda. People were able to come and sign their names as a demonstration of their sorrow and desire to connect with the people of Great Britain. I did.
In the news coverage of events from Newtown I’ve seen a number of images from St Rose of Lima Church and its pastor.
Let’s place a book of condolences on a pedestal at the crossing next Sunday for people to sign. Priests can make an announcement this Sunday so people will be aware of this opportunity to connect with our sisters and brothers in Connecticut.
Thanks.
Greg

#665 – Dick Bernard: When will we learn? Thoughts immediately after Newtown CT

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Friday morning we took a quick trip over to an area shopping mall to watch our 7th grade grandsons school band do a half hour mall concert. I’m always proud watching kids perform, and watching the teachers work their magic with those kids, and this concert was no exception. This band was a unit, playing a medley of Christmas songs for quite a throng of us, likely heavily sprinkled with parents and grandparents and other family of the students (our grandkid also had his aunt there. His Mom and Dad were at work, his Mom as a Middle School Principal a few miles away.)
(click to enlarge)

Concert at the Mall December 14, 2012


December 14, 2012


Enroute home we stopped at a store on busy France Avenue to pick up some items, and decided to have lunch in a casual dining place across the drive. Meal over, we walked past one of those ubiquitous flat screen TV’s on the wall, sound off, closed captioning on.
I noted something about a shooting in a school, and the view of the top of a school somewhere provided by a news helicopter. We stopped until the closed caption at least identified where the breaking news was taking place, and saw it was in Connecticut, and drove home.
The rest is history, and as we all know, the massacre at the Newtown CT elementary school became the story of the day, and will now dominate for awhile the public and perhaps even the political conversation – and it is a conversation we all need to be involved in about our American reverence for rights, freedom and guns, regardless of deadly capacity.
We’ve had plenty of warning and even practice in this conversation: Not long ago was the Aurora theatre; followed by the assault on the Sikh Temple; followed by the attack on the business in Minneapolis; the Portland Mall…and on and on. There were similar events before; others still to come. Pretty uniquely American….
Random acts of violence involving guns. We know that such events trigger similar events. Someone, somewhere gets an idea….
The debates again beginning will be predictable, I fear.
After Aurora the on-line Patch newspaper editor in Eagan started a poll/conversation on gun control. I had joined the conversation thread then.
Consistently about 60% of respondents were against any kind of gun control, and were passionate about it; the rest of us were more or less evenly divided in favor of gun control, or of restrictions on guns and ownership.
Aurora passed, and on life went, but the poll remained and I was still on the list to receive comments. After each of the above incidents the comments began again. I just looked (early a.m. on Dec. 15) and there are 684* comments, with the percentages consistent with my above comment.)
I’m guessing that sometime today the poll will return to my inbox, with the predictable passions continuing.
Of course, the 60% against gun control is reflective only of those who take the time to present their point of view in a non-scientific poll. It is just a poll, and is so acknowledged there.
But at least respondents present a point of view, even though it is one I have always disagreed with.
If there is to be a change in gun policy in this country, it is going to have to be from the people, including the many who think they can’t do anything, and complain that it’s up to the politicians.
Not so.
WE are the politicians in this and so many ways.
A wrong position on guns has for far too long been a political death sentence for our political leaders, and if we don’t like that, we’re the ones who will have to be, as Gandhi said, “the change we wish to see”.
Those middle schoolers at the suburban mall went home safely yesterday; 26 people, mostly tiny children, in a Connecticut town didn’t….
POSTNOTE: My favorite blogger has a good summary of yesterdays news about the CT massacre and the politics here. A pull quote from William Saletan included in this post: “This morning, a madman attacked more than 20 children at an elementary school in China. As of this writing, there are no reported fatalities.
A few hours later, a madman attacked an elementary school in Connecticut. As of this writing, 20 of those kids are dead.
The difference? The weapon. The madman in China had a knife. The madman in Connecticut had three semi-automatic guns.”
* UPDATE Dec. 19, 2012: I had wondered when the first comment would be added to the 684. I note that the article itself remains focused on the more recent Minneapolis shooting, but this comment appeared overnight from “Terry the Terrible”: “Bla, bla, bla. They already tried a ten yr experiment banning extra capacity mags, bayonet mounts(??? Musta been afraid of drive by bayonetings) and such and it did absolutly nothing twards reducing crime so we know another ban on (so called) assult weapons would be useless and stupid. Also. All of you folks that think taking all of our guns will solve every little thing need to be educated and taken to the range for a day of learning about and shooti.g yourself. You may even find that it is FUN! O.k., sorry for the rant. Peace… all you wicked and violent sounding gun grabbers. Leave us alone already- one of us might save your lives someday.”

#603 – Dick Bernard: End of a week after the Aurora massacre during Dark Knight Rises. Part Three

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When I awoke last Friday morning, and saw the first news of the carnage at the movie theatre in Aurora CO, the first thing that came to mind was the horror at Columbine High School in 1999. It became the basis for my post one week ago today.
As I write media is beginning to go silent on the tragedy at Aurora. Over at the Eagan Patch non-scientific online poll, the number favoring no gun control still dominates, but the percentage has hardly changed since the beginning. The thread of comments seems to be ending, but the emphasis has seldom been the tragedy inside the theater, rather the unfettered right to have guns*.
So we live.
Monday, mostly out of curiosity, I went to Dark Knight Rises at the Woodbury Theatre. The film isn’t my normal fare, but I felt it was well done, deserving its four stars (highest rating).

Woodbury Theatre July 22, 2012


The film kept attentive a fairly full Woodbury theatre audience of teens and adults, and it had strong take-away messages for anyone caring to ponder such things as good and evil.
There were no armed guards at the theatre, or unusual precautions I could notice. Staff were polite as always. Going to the Woodbury Theatre is always a pleasant experience.
In the theatre, I would guess that most of us were thinking about what happened a few days earlier in Colorado.
I certainly noticed my own feelings at the approximate half-hour mark, the point in the movie when the carnage took place in Aurora.
It was heart-warming to notice a couple of days later that Batman himself, Christian Bale, had showed up at the hospital in Aurora. It is hardly worth being shot to meet a movie star, and President Obama came to Aurora as well, but the in-person presence was a nice touch nonetheless.
Of course, death is something we all live with. Aurora was only a spike.
Out of curiosity I looked up death statistics.
On a normal day in the United States, nearly 7,000 people die. About 100 of these die in automobiles; perhaps 25 or so die in shootings; twice as many die through gun accidents or suicide with a gun; (far more are injured and terrorized in these shootings.)
World-wide, that Friday in July, 2012, about 156,000 people died from all causes.
So, should we even care about a few wasted lives in that movie theater in suburban Denver?
Yes, we should.
They are unnecessary deaths, due strictly to allowing someone “freedom” and “liberty” – “the right” – to purchase and then use deadly weapons to take away others freedom and liberty.
The thread of the community newspaper poll went on. The most recent comment count I have is nearing 300.
Monday, at 11:16 a.m. I entered my second and last personal response to the thread:
“I’ve followed this thread since almost the beginning – my computer says 163 posts so far. I wonder how many have experienced the reality of guns person-against-person. It makes a big difference. When I filled in the questionnaire which brought me here, I marked ‘sometimes’. In my comment, I said I qualified as expert marksman in the Army, but I have never owned a firearm and don’t intend to.
I was in the Army 1962-63. Volunteered for the Draft (ever fewer know what that is). Turned out I was assigned to an Infantry Company in a newly reactivated Infantry Division preparing for duty in a place that was abstract to most of us – Vietnam. We played a lot of war in my two years, up close and personal, with real primitive M-1 rifles (blank ammo), bayonet training, and the like. We crawled under barbed wire under a fusillade of machine gun fire. We experienced tear gas. We did maneuvers in several states.
Even playing war was dead serious. You found out it wasn’t a video game or a theory. You could get killed more easily than you could kill. Having a gun, and doing target practice isn’t the real deal, rest assured. In the chaos of that theater on Friday night, the worst thing to happen would have been a gunslingers duel. My opinion: authorize everyone to have a machete, and banish guns, period. Yes, a fantasy. But makes more sense than assault weapons on every corner. And check out “On Killing” by David Grossman on Amazon. Somebody earlier referred to him.”
There were no responses on-line, but the conversation continued on other topics.
Maybe it’s a good time to review Columbine and that movie the gun-folks love to hate: Bowling for Columbine. It’s free for viewing on-line, here. And here’s Michael Moore on the issue. He’s paid his dues.
If my math is correct, since Columbine there have been over 100,000 violent person-against-person gun deaths in the United States.
If you think policy makers need to pay attention to our being awash in deadly weapons, don’t go silent, as the news media leaves Aurora for the next deal. Stay with it. The Brady Campaign is a good ongoing resource.
Gandhi had it right: “we must be the change we wish to see in the world”.
* – Here’s the last comment on the Patch poll, at least by 11:15 p.m. Thursday, July 26.
Carol Turnbull: “This is from An Arms Race We Can’t Win, one of the links posted above, for those who didn’t bother to check it out: “The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence has compiled a 62-page list of mass shootings since 2005. What’s striking is that there isn’t a single example of a concerned bystander with a concealed-carry permit who stopped a mass shooting… “We’re also excessively pessimistic about our ability to control firearms in the United States. Since 9/11, federal officials have done an excellent job of restricting the fertilizers and chemicals required to produce homemade explosives.””

#601 – Dick Bernard: Dark Knight Rises: In the wake of the Aurora tragedy. Part Two.

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UPDATE July 23, 5:15 p.m.: I went to Dark Night Rises this afternoon at the Woodbury Theatre, where it is showing on three screens, thirteen times today. I admit that had the tragedy not occurred, I probably would not have gone to the film. But it did, and I did. Of course, everybody is entitled to their own opinion. In mine, the film deserves the four stars (out of four) it received. It is well worth the nearly 2 1/2 hours. You decide.
Friday I remembered Columbine, as experienced 13 years ago by a grandparent nearly a thousand miles away.
I also noted the reality of any tragedy: there is a short and definable life to any crisis, and then people move on. It is a survival strategy. We react, then retreat.
Only if a Crisis is kept in mind to carry on year after year, will it be much remembered after a few months.
For now we are all in Aurora in one sense or another. We have things to learn from Aurora, but it will take stamina to keep it from disappearing from view, as have all the others.
A local friend in law enforcement noted this morning that his sons good friend was in the Aurora theatre, was shot, and for a time was in critical condition (he’s doing okay). He tweeted “the first half hour of the movie was great”, or words to that effect…. Another friends daughter lives in LA, and one of her friends was in the Aurora complex the night of the killings.
In this global age, “six degrees of separation” is very much alive and well. We can’t build walls to keep people out. There are no borders. We’re on one earth.
Now comes the matter of the future after the news media depart Aurora. What will happen to the necessary conversation among ourselves, about violence in word and deed*, about deadly weapons and such? It is an essential conversation that deserves to live on.
I noted in the local Patch on-line newspaper yesterday a survey about Gun Control. Normally, I don’t take the bait for these, but yesterday I did, filing the following comment.
Posted 7:40 a.m. July 21, 2012, on Eagan Patch
Dick Bernard: “I follow and support the Brady Campaign. At upper right on the home page of their website is an ongoing tally of people shot in America each day. About 1 a.m. today, for today, the tally was 8; at 7:30 a.m. it was 84. Tally for the year thus far over 54,000…. In your poll I voted “Sometimes”, though I don’t hunt, have never owned a gun, and qualified as expert as a marksman in the Army. There is no need or excuse for weapons of mass destruction in circulation in a civilized society. Last I heard we don’t need machine guns to hunt deer; and the self-defense argument can easily be reduced to absurdity. But this won’t be dealt with in the next four months before the election. People need to have the stamina of the NRA to change course on this insane business of guns in this country.”
Right before commenting, I’d chosen the “sometimes” response about “Should gun ownership be tightened?” in this “non-scientific” poll. (“Sometimes: Some guns—those primarily used for hunting or personal protection—are fine. But weapons primarily designed for violence shouldn’t be available.”) (The other options were Yes, No and Unsure.)
At last reading, 55%s of the respondents want no gun control, so the comments are quite predictable. 26% say “yes”, 17% “Sometimes” and 1% unsure.
I found the observations interesting, and rather than try to summarize them, here** is the entire thread, which is now up to 147 comments.
Where do you stand on this. This deserves deep face-to-face conversation neighbor to neighbor.
Final post on this thread here.
UPDATE:
From Greg: Here’s the problem: we have allowed the NRA to be taken hostage by people who demand absolute right to bear arms, all types, all amounts, all time and all places.
The solution is so obvious: right thinking people need to pay their dues, become members and take back the NRA from the radical fringe for the benefit of us all! Imagine what the next NRA convention would look like: the exhibitor’s hall full of vendors selling the latest in new orchids, quilts, hiking tour organizers, etc. It can happen, if we make it happen.
The Twin Cities as with most other large cities has a problem with certain night clubs attracting violent people who consume ample amounts of liquor and then begin stabbing and shooting people. Each of these establishments has an occupancy limit. If hoards of 7-Up drinking people fill these problem-causing establishments early in the evening, order rounds of 7-Up and engage in quiet conversation the violent people would never be able to enter.
Why, we could call these events Rosa Parks Parties in honor of that great lady from Montgomery Alabama.
Remember, all that is needed for evil people to succeed is for good people to stay glued to their computers.
From Bruce: “Gun Insane” by Darcy Burner, listed numerous shootings over the last 23yrs [see it here: An Adult Conversation about Guns. I most certainly agree that it is a horrible shame these happened, and that we need to have an adult gun control conversation in this country. I hope its raised in the 2012 election cycle, but I’m not sure either candidate want to go up against the mind set in this country that sees these senseless killings as the price we pay to protect our freedom with guns. For the NRA and the patriots on the right, a little loss of life is an acceptable price, and the answer is more guns with conceal and carry hand gun laws to protect us from these crazy killers. Its insane, and this is where we live.

#416 – Dick Bernard: The Downside of Belief.

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The Minneapolis Star Tribune accompanied us enroute to our vacation on July 23. The front page headline said it all, “TERROR IN NORWAY“, recounting the heinous attack by a lone Norwegian which included over 90 deaths, mostly young people at a youth camp and in Oslo itself. I had read the entire article early that morning, and on page A4, in a sidebar, was a note that “A Twitter account for [the killer] also surfaced, with just one post from July 17, which was a quote from philosopher John Stuart Mill: “One person with a belief is equal to the force of 100,000 who have only interests.”
The gunman survived, and seemed rather proud of his accomplishment – often that is how an eruption of anger feels: “they got what they deserved”. He now has a lifetime, short or long, to consider the wisdom of his actions. Thankfully, most likely his role modelling will not encourage others.
Thankfully, the Norwegian responses, officially, and through the public, seems not to be to exact revenge and thus compound the problem.
I bring this incident up as we are a society that has become more and more prone to substitute a dangerous combination of belief and supposedly righteous anger for reason.
“I don’t believe that human behavior has anything to do with climate change”; “I don’t believe that our country is collapsing due to our own actions, personal and collective”….
“I just believe [whatever it is]. I don’t want to hear any other view.”
Of course, there are pesky things called “facts” which sooner or later come calling, interfering with those beliefs of ours:
The credit card gets maxed out and the clerk says “sorry”; after a lifetime of smoking, that pesky cough turns into something far worse; the job we thought we’d have as long as we wanted it disappears….
That law we didn’t think we’d need, and got rid of, becomes personally very important…after its been repealed.
The government itself, which represents stability, is cast as the enemy of the people, because government is bad, or so we’re convinced to believe.
We forget that that awful U.S. Congress that we all hate, or our State Legislature, is really a creature of our own making. We forget to consider that not one single one of those Congressmen or women would be in office were it not for our vote, whether informed, uninformed or not voting at all….
They are, in fact, representatives of us, individually and collectively.
We are, it seems, a bunch of people who have trouble thinking beyond the immediate; and we are notoriously unwilling to be accountable for our cause in the matter of the huge problems we have brought upon ourselves over the past years. We’d like to have the fantasy that what is bad will be fixed, and we don’t need to exert any effort or make any sacrifices to do the fixing.
The guy in Norway bought the argument that the enemy was “them” – people who weren’t Norwegian – and went on a killing spree where all of the victims, to the best of my knowledge, were his fellow countrymen. Rather than solving his fantasy problem, he simply damaged his own people.
Like our ‘armed and dangerous’ society, he felt he was a law unto himself.
The Norwegian (who purposely remains nameless in this post) may well be one of those isolated nut-cases that do these heinous things, but he and others like him are just visible indicators of our lack of a greater and longer term vision, and our own inhumanity towards each other.
Just a thought.

#97 – Dick Bernard: Killing a civil society

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On the afternoon of November 4, 1995 – it was a Saturday – I was on the way to afternoon Mass at my then-Parish, St. Peter Claver in St. Paul MN.  Nearing the church, an announcement came over the car radio: Israel Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin had been shot.  I passed the word along to the Parish Priest Kevin McDonough, who blanched, and as I recall, I was allowed to announce to the congregation what I had just heard on the radio.
At the time of the announcement we weren’t certain of any details, including who had shot the Nobel Prize winner, or even if he had died.  By the time Mass was concluded we knew Rabin had been assassinated, and soon learned that his killer was a radical right-wing Israeli Jew, at the far fringe of those incensed that Rabin was working for a durable peace with Palestine.
As it happened, two and a half months later I was with a group that visited Rabin’s still-fresh grave in Jerusalem.  I still see it all.
This vignette comes to mind because of a September 29, 2009, column by Thomas Friedman in the New York Times.  The NYT column headline is “Where did “we” go“, and opens recalling Friedman’s visit with Rabin in Jerusalem shortly before the assassination.  He says, early on, “extreme right-wing settlers…were doing all they could to delegitimize Rabin…They questioned his authority.  They accused him of treason.  They created pictures depicting him as a Nazi SS officer, and they shoulted death threats at rallies.  His political opponents winked at it all.”
Of course, the story ended with a righteous crazed zealot killing Rabin.  A single murderer, but endless accomplices who in effect encouraged the insane act.
Friedman goes on at length in his column to raise the parallels he sees in today’s United States of America.
We see hate speech being legitimized in our country, and outlandish behavior being sanctioned as simple political free speech.  All of this is duly reported (if not encouraged) by news media, legitimate and not so legitimate.  And unlike in Rabin’s day, the means of technology for disseminating hate and outrageous and deliberate lies is much more sophisticated than it was only 14 years ago.
One can only wonder what Rabin and others could have accomplished in Israel/Palestine had he lived.
The merchants of hate won, and everyone (including the hate merchants) lost.
If you can, read Friedman’s column.  For a limited time it is available on the web. Here’s the link: #mce_temp_url#
If you’re one who’s amused by, or admires, the politics of hate and deceit, get over it.  If you despise this kind of behavior, call ’em out whenever you witness it.
Change needs to happen person-to-person.