Credit here credit is due. I’ve flamed Manchin on numerous occasions, but he might be the vanguard of a change in thought about gun control:
West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin — who has an “A” rating from the NRA and is a lifetime member of the pro-gun rights group — said Monday that it was time to “move beyond rhetoric” on gun control.
“I just came with my family from deer hunting,” Manchin said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “I’ve never had more than three shells in a clip. Sometimes you don’t get more than one shot anyway at a deer. It’s common sense. It’s time to move beyond rhetoric. We need to sit down and have a common-sense discussion and move in a reasonable way.”
Two things- Manchin is the guy who used a rifle in a commercial to shoot climate control legislation. Second, if you watch the clip, Manchin seriously looks like he is about to cry. He’s not that skilled a thespian, so I think it is legit.
gogol's wife
Hold his feet to the fire.
General Stuck
He just won big, and has six years till the next election. Maybe that has loosened his political sphincter a bit.
Roger Moore
@gogol’s wife:
Let’s try some positive reinforcement, too. Let politicians know that they’ll get public praise and campaign cash for coming out for sensible gun regulation, and maybe more of them will do it.
chopper
wait, did he just misuse the word ‘clip’? OH NOES
Davis X. Machina
@General Stuck: He was fine either way. If the Democrats had lost the Senate, he’d be a Republican today.
MattR
And of course the WV GOP is already bashing Manchin for “politicizing” the tragedy.
Maude
@chopper:
I was waiting for this. LOL
Manchin will be a help in the Senate.
Why is the NRA quiet?
Did they take down their fb page?
I haven’t heard the House Republicans yell about freedom after this horrific event.
EconWatcher
I think something is going to happen. Not enough, but something significant will happen.
When the NRA folks try to demonize some innocuos legislative effort (as they will; they cannot help themselves), they will look like monsters. People are going to remember thos dead kids.
This will sound crass, but the prior gun massacres, as horrible as they were, were nothing new. Twenty little kids shot at their school with an assault rifle–that’s something new, and feeds into the deepest fears of every parent.
This isn’t going away. Not this time.
JWL
I believe it likely that the congressional republicans will vote to defeat Dianne Feinstein’s resubmitted gun control legislation.
Although it was the law of the land for 10 years, during which a dystopian fate of dog-eat-dog was somehow avoided by Americans in every state of the Union, the republican party will nonetheless goose step as one to defeat any and all attempts to effect a junction of gun control and common sense.
GregB
The thing is now the NRA and the rest are going to be out on the edge of the diving board with Glenn Beck and the rest of the Apocalypse preppers and society doomers.
The sensible folks need to get law enforcement on board and need to lash the NRA and the GOP to the lunatics that make up the base of the limitless gun fanatics.
The NRA has set the parameters for discussion for a long time and it is time they got pushed back into the dingy corner where they belong.
West of the Rockies (formerly Frank W.)
Every once in a while, they step out from behind the curtain and are honest about matters. Would that this sort of thing (the honesty, that is) happened more often. Now, whether a Bachmann or Steve King can ever be honest is another thing, but I have a bit of respect for Manchin after this appearance.
LanceThruster
@chopper:
Some people are outraged when “incorrect” usage enters the lexicon, but I feel generally that ‘common usage’ reflects how peoplle talk and is valid to cite.
The term clip is commonly used to describe a firearm magazine, especially in newspapers, movies, and on television. Because of this usage, the Merriam-Webster dictionary now defines a clip as “a device to hold cartridges for charging the magazines of some rifles; also :a magazine from which ammunition is fed into the chamber of a firearm”.
Violet
As much as it pains me to say it, I thought Joe Scarborough’s change of heart was good too. Credit where it’s due.
That doesn’t excuse the fact that it takes a bunch of young children to be killed in school to get these guys to change their minds. Zero ability to see things unless it afffects them personally. In Scarborough’s case, he’s got kids that age and one has Asperger’s, so now it’s personal. WTF is wrong with Republicans that they can’t empathize until it somehow affects them personally?
But I digress. More people who support better gun controls are better than fewer, no matter how they got there.
Just Some Fuckhead
He called it a clip! LOLZ! He’s not a real hunter!
Rational Subjectivist
To hell with the NRA. My grandpa was a hunter and a life member, and quit over their opposition to the assault weapons ban.
I say we politicize the hell out of this and refuse to be cowed.
If Manchin is out in front he’ll take a ton of flack. If he’s one of many, the abuse gets spread out.
It’s been argued that in most places Dems aren’t getting much support from the 2nd Amendment absolutists anyway so why treat them with kid gloves? Manchin may be one of the few for whom this would matter with his constituents and I’m glad he’s standing up for reason on this issue.
Violet
OT–Senator Daniel Inouye has died from respiratory complications.
Dan
Don’t worry libs, McMeggan is on the case: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2012/12/newsweek-wins-worst-newtown-reaction-award.html
Anya
@JWL:
Let them vote against it. Let Scott Brown vote against it.
Ksmiami
@GregB: I am done with the NRA and the lunatic right. I am tired of their radio stations preaching civil war. I am tired of their delusional fantasies And I am sad and enraged as a parent. They cannot rob us of our civic society and I will do everything I can to marginalize them and melt their assault weaponry.
MazeDancer
@Violet:
Scarborough was excellent. There are 3 words I never thought I’d type.
This morning I didn’t watch the show, as I do sometimes to check the GOP party line, because I thought I could just not bear to hear “Freedom” slandered by the right wing. So missed Joe’s announcement live. But when heard about it went to msnbc.com to the Morning Joe site for the clip.
It was a good speech, well said. Also applaud his wearing a nice suit and tie to mark the solemnity.
And following that with Joe Manchin appearing absolutely genuine about change was a remarkable morning.
Diane Feinstein said corporations were calling her – she mentioned Sony – saying how can we help you in her fight to reinstate the assault weapons ban. If corporations get involved, that could make a difference.
Gwangung
@Roger Moore:
Yeah. Don’t send mode messages. Send positive reinforcement as needed,
Maude
@General Stuck:
Obama is not going to rush a gun control law. Probably the Supreme Court decision and how to get around it.
Who’s going to yell, he’s caved, first?
A Lutheran charity has sent Golden Retrievers to comfort the survivors.
Robin G.
I scoffed at someone on Friday who said that this time might stick and replied that in a week and a half we’d be back to having vapors over the fiscal cliff. I’m starting to think I might have been wrong. God, I hope so.
By the way, we can complain about the fact that it took twenty very young, white, upper-middle class victims to make a difference (when if we were missing any one of the trifecta characteristics this would pass by a lot faster), or we can take these Come to Jesus moments and run with them. I’m voting for the latter.
PeakVT
“I’ve never had more than three shells in a clip. Sometimes you don’t get more than one shot anyway at a deer. It’s common sense.
Maybe limiting clip size will be easier than I thought.
pseudonymous in nc
Whatever you think of Manchin, it shows that the old conversation, the one that perpetuated extended fapping about armed heroes in malls and movie theatres, has met a big hard dead end when contemplating loaded handguns in kindergarten teachers’ desks.
People like him who want to start a new conversation, one that untangles the different strands of gun ownership that the NRA has tried to knot over the past few decades, are to be welcomed. You’ll see the die-harders whine about the terminology, but they’re not relevant here.
Dan
…if you watch the clip, Manchin seriously looks like he is about to cry. He’s not that skilled a thespian, so I think it is legit.
Think you might be bringing some of your own baggage to that. Didn’t see it.
WarMunchkin
Doesn’t he mean 3 shells in a magazine? NOT A REAL HUNTER.
evodevo
@Violet: What is wrong with conservatives in general that they cannot empathize/relate unless it involves they or theirs? I have seen this again and again, both with those in the public eye (remember James Kilpatrick? Anti-abortion until his niece? was raped!) and with conservative friends/co-workers, who rail against gubmint until THEY have need of a service (take your government hands off my Medicare, etc.)
It’s a mindset, and it takes a tragedy like this to bring it home to them. We libs have much better imaginations, I guess, and foresight.
? Martin
It’s been difficult to tell what West Virginia liberalism looks like any more. The state is 54-29 registered Democrat, but you sure as fuck couldn’t tell looking at the presidential race. Remember the federal inmate who took 41% of the primary vote (and won 10 counties) against Obama this year?
This could be illustrative.
MattMinus
None of this matters. There are too many culture warriors in congress to effect any change, and even if you could, the supreme court would likely overturn it.
This is a red meat, us vs them issue. Any republican voting for even mild gun control WILL be primaried, and we’ve seen they’re all shit scared of that.
WereBear
Everyone else is just whining and making it up so they can mooch.
They are upright gawd-fearin’ people who have obviously made all the right choices in their lives, so if something bad happens to them, it’s got to be something that needs fixing!
Roger Moore
@evodevo:
I think the biggest difference between a liberal and a conservative is empathy. Conservatives simply lack empathy for anyone who isn’t very much like them, and being told they ought to makes them angry enough that they deliberately do the opposite.
JenJen
I know this isn’t an open thread, but on topic: HOLY SHIT, wait until DougJ gets a load of what McMegan has to say about the Newtown tragedy:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/12/17/there-s-little-we-can-do-to-prevent-another-massacre.html
ETA: Kind of relieved I wasn’t the first to stumble upon the latest McMegan Atrocity.
Keith
@Dan: Suitably absurd comment on McCardle’s opus: “Or go Magruber and dance across the lockers with a celery stalk in their ass.”
pseudonymous in nc
@Dan:
Shorter McArdle: I propose the tactics that worked so well to minimise casualties at the Somme.
? Martin
@MattMinus:
They’ve only ever overturned wholesale bans of all guns. Even Scalia has asserted that the 2nd amendment allows for regulation. Ignore SCOTUS on this issue.
SiubhanDuinne
@chopper:
@LanceThruster:
@Just Some Fuckhead:
LOL. I thought y’all were talking about this:
when all the time, you were talking about this:
Todd
@PeakVT:
Don’t kid yourself. The paranoids are overloading my Facebook feed with a bunch of secessionist talk.
peorgietirebiter
I see that CharlieP isn’t impressed with either Joe M. or Joe S.
He’s waiting for them to denounce the NRA’s fear mongering and demand that current board resign before he takes them seriously. Hard to say until the first round of push back comes from the nutters.
General Stuck
@Maude:
I do think, and hope, that Obama and dems push hard for funding enforcement of laws already on the books as per creating the national data bases for background checks of those forbidden to have guns. I think he will push for re authorizing the assault weapons ban, and high capacity clips. But not much more than that. Almost every meaningful gun law on the books now, or that could be passed that are sensible, will take a bunch of cash to fund for meeting their mandates. That has been how gun rights activists have virtually halted any meaningful gun regulation, like a lot of other passed laws with no funding.
Gex
@EconWatcher: A political movement that has beat everyone else up by crying “What about the children” with respect to drug policy, media and video games, women’s health care, gays, sex ed, etc. better be held to that same standard on this issue after this.
Rational Subjectivist
The NRA’s power comes from being single minded and persistent. They do one thing these days: fight any and all gun laws and any politicians who are soft on the 2nd Amendment. No shades of gray for them and no backing down.
It’s been effective but becomes a liability if they’re seen as enabling mass killings. There’s no way to sort of agree with them if you think controlling guns would lead to fewer shootings.
This could be a turning point for a lot of people.
Gex
@Violet: Nor does it excuse the fact that he, up until this point, was part of the movement that created this very problem: maximal gun rights as a matter of principle and pissing off liberals.
dmsilev
@Dan: Holy fuck that’s asinine, even by McArdle’s low low standards. “Just charge at the guy blazing away with the rifle”? Seriously? Did she expect a bunch of six year olds to reprise Pickett’s Charge or something?
You first Megan. You first.
Roger Moore
@dmsilev:
I believe the phrase is “Thanks for volunteering, Megan.”
Violet
@Gex: Yep, exactly. Only because he can imagine his own kids in that classroom (same age and all) and he has a child with Asperger’s (the killer is rumored to have had Asperger’s) does he NOW decide that maybe, maybe these assault rifles aren’t such a good idea. So sorry about all those other times I said guns weren’t the problem.
Ugh. People who align with the conservative movement really do make me sick. It’s all about them, always, all the time.
PurpleGirl
@PeakVT: The rifle I used for target shooting could hold 17 rounds in the magazine. The firing range I shot at had signs all over the place that you could only load 10 rounds at a time.
dmsilev
@pseudonymous in nc: You’re actually giving her too much credit, sad to say. At the Somme, both sides had weapons. She’s more proposing to reprise some of the uglier incidents from the African colonial period.
Whatever happens, we have got:
The Maxim gun, and they have not.
and all that. Except that ‘we’ would be on the other side this time.
Paula
@Robin G.:
Well, to be fair, people said this about Columbine, too, but look at how that turned out.
I think that it’s the age of the victims. They aren’t going to be obscured in debates about trench coats and violent video games like HS or college students.
I’m finally trying to parse actual gun nut logic after years of ignoring them, and so much of it is disingenuous bullshit. What’s wrong with schools, what’s wrong with mental health care providers, what’s wrong with our culture? Never, ever anything wrong with the sheer volume of guns and how easy it is to get them, despite all the evidence that this is precisely what makes our situation so dangerous compared to other developed nations.
I get really crazy every time pro-gun people talk about how we’re responding hysterically to rare occurrences. It’s not rare anymore when you include people like Trayvon Martin or kids in South L.A. neighborhoods who have gotten caught in gang crossfire. Or those households where some kid accidentally shoots himself.
jl
I don’t care whether Manchin looks like he is going to cry in the ‘clip’ (Did I use the word right? Am I banned forever from an opinion on the wisdom of allowing machine guns and RPGs for sale at corner stands? Whatever…)
I don’t care if Manchin is ‘legit’ on the issue.
I care about getting a critical mass of politicians to start push back against insanity. I’ve heard enough goofball politicians (Hey Louie, how you doin’?) issuing lunatic (A Gohmert approved legal term BTW) drivel about the need to eliminate the remaining Godless commie peacenik ‘gun free zones’ in the US to think that anyone who is not an enemy on this topic is a friend right now.
If only those misguided liberals in Hangtown, Tombstone, and Abilene had understood the wisdom of Louie, we would be a great nation, and player on the world stage by now. But no. We even make our soldiers (Edit: Warriors, sorry, ‘soldiers’ is softie loser commie talk) follow softie gun safety rules. Ho wonder we lose all the wars we get into.
celticdragonchick
@JenJen:
I just read it. Actually, she makes some intelligent points, which came as a bit of a shock.
That is unfortunately true.
The killer came with more guns than he actually needed (2 handguns and a rifle…and he left a shotgun in the car). If all semi auto weapons vanished tomorrow and we were left with bolt action or lever rifles, pump action shotguns and revolvers, he could have taken two .38 or .357 revolvers and a pump action 12 gauge and still achieved a horrific body count (once the gunman gets into a class and is blocking a door, what the hell are the people inside going to do? Most classrooms have only one exit).
We will not be able to completely stop this insanity. There is something deeply, deeply wrong with our society and I wouldn’t even begin to know how to deal with that. We can manage to reduce the carnage somewhat.
For starters, how about a tax on ammo and weapons that pays for school guards? Even Grover Fucking Norquist can’t stop that one.
JenJen
@dmsilev: Hey, training children to bum rush a gunman has GOT to be easier than teaching them how to whip up a perfect mirepoix using her Thermomix.
And you’ve got to love her thesis that responding to Newtown with laws banning assault rifles or high-capacity clips is exactly like the Iraq War!! It would be EMOTIONAL, says Megs.
I seriously want to punch her in the throat after reading that piece. Is that bad?
@celticdragonchick: I agree that we’ll never be able to completely stop shooting rampages. But, if we could stop even one, or minimize the carnage, it will be wholly worth it. Assault rifles are human killing machines and that is precisely what they were designed for. There is no reason for anyone other than soldiers and law enforcement to possess them.
Baud
State of the union address is coming up in January. I would be surprised if Obama didn’t propose legislation at that time.
JenJen
@celticdragonchick: And what do you make of her syllogism argument, something she obviously rejected at the time as a supporter of the Iraq War and which isn’t remotely analogous to the topic at hand? Or the wisdom of training children to bum rush gunmen? She was completely serious about that one. Or the fact that she fully cops to not really understanding very much about weaponry in a piece about, you know, weaponry?
jl
@celticdragonchick: Sorry, disagree. I wasn’t impressed with that column, any of it. I was a facile list of obvious strawmen.
Hell yeah you can do plenty of things to reduce the toll. The argument that no set of measures will eliminate every tragedy like what happened last week is a silly argument, that let’s the perfect be the enemy of the good.
A person does in fact need certain types of weapons to make killing a lot of people quickly easier than it should be.
McArdle’s facile column is Brooks worthy. Which is a step up for her, I admit, but not much.
Note how she assumes only the most extreme remedies will do any good at all, then very artfully argues that the most extreme remedies are impossible or flunk some cost benefit test (Edit, and are in fact, scarily EXTREME!), assuming that nothing else will work. Problems with too many guns, then only solution is to ban them and round them up, but that is impossible. Problems with access to mental health treatment in the U.S, well, you are not proposing we just start locking people up right and left, are you?
A worthless foolish column from start to finish. If she came close to 1 plus 1 equals 2 reasoning in isolated bits and pieces of it, that is a very small redeeming feature, just as it is with a Brooks version.
Mnemosyne
@JenJen:
The funny part is, McMegan’s knee-jerk “nothing can be done” reaction is just as much of an emotional reaction. I mean, saying that a group of seven-year-olds should try and swarm an armed gunman is supposed to be the rational decision? Really?
TooManyJens
@Roger Moore:
“Please proceed, Ms. McArdle.”
celticdragonchick
@JenJen:
Yeah, she plowed into the ground at mach 3 with that one. She has an inveterate need to dispense 3 really fucking stupid sentences for every half decent sentence. I withdraw my previous statement and replace it with “She had one halfway accurate thing to say”.
RedKitten
@evodevo:
It’s called empathy. We’re able to envision ourselves in someone else’s shoes. A lot of conservatives are only able to envision how someone else’s choices affect THEM.
JenJen
@Mnemosyne: Well, precisely! “Nothing Can Be Done!!” And yet, every other civilized nation seems to have done something.
And the bum-rush suggestion? Tell that to the principal and school psychologist. Josh Barro on Twitter immediately suggested that the bum-rush Megan is likely conjuring “worked” on United 93 because the terrorists were armed only with box cutters, not guns. Never mind that 9/11 was such a unique one-off that it’s irrational to even bring it up, even if she didn’t, but, c’mon…
Oh, gawd. We should drill a dangerous and foolish action into the heads of young people, even though she has no idea if it would work, but hey, it sure would be better than legislation, she knows that much for certain!
Gex
@JenJen: It is interesting how, if we don’t really understand what’s happening, that WE can’t think of any reasonable solutions, but somehow McArgleBargle not only can, but her’s is the obvious solution to boot.
gelfling545
@Paula: Well with our schools & mental health & culture so screwed up and all as they say, you’d think they’d see the sense in having fewer weapons available for the screwed up to get hold of. But no. It’s our schools, culture, etc. are a mess but I know what will fix it. More guns!
JenJen
@Gex: Well, of course!! And have you ever tried the carrot soup her Thermomix made with just one push of a button? No? Rube.
Shalimar
@Dan: You can always visit McCardle when you want a sociopath’s view on an issue.
Whidby
3 “shells” in a “clip”, eh?
sheithappens
lol…once again fat bastard Christie lover Cole shows just how tone deaf he is.
Once a Republican always a Republican. Just like a problem drinker. Even if you don’t drink anymore you are still an alcoholic.