The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Logical steps to address gun violence
We send our love, support and prayers to the students, staff, first responders and community members of Parkland, Florida, who have been impacted by the devastating school shooting yesterday.
Here in Newtown, we endured a similar day of terror due to a gunman with an AR-15 and high capacity magazines — weapons that belong in wars and not in the hands of civilians.
Like the students in Parkland, our children were petrified, on lockdown, hid under desks and in bathrooms, and ran out of a blood-soaked building with hands on each other’s shoulders. Parents struggled to find their children. Neighborhoods were on lockdown.
The Parkland school shooting incident was the 18th since January 1, 2018, and the 291st since the Sandy Hook tragedy.
We have repeatedly warned other communities that if it could happen in Newtown, then it can happen anywhere.
Americans should not be shocked when these mass shooting incidents occur in their communities.
The elected leaders in the majority of statehouses, Governor mansions, U.S. Capitol Building and the White House have failed to pass gun control legislation to end gun violence in America since the Sandy Hook tragedy.
Until more Americans hold their local, state and federal elected representatives accountable, our children are not safe in our schools or in any public space. The current president and the Republican members of the 115th Congress have demonstrated that they will not take any action even after two of the deadliest mass shooting incidents in America’s modern history that occurred in the last five months.
Any elected official who only sends thoughts and prayers after this latest shooting are willing to sacrifice our children to protect the gun industry profits and they should be voted out in 2018 and 2020.
Nothing is more despicable and dishonorable than elected officials who say “now is not the time to talk about gun control” and blame only mental illness for these school shootings. The time to talk about gun control was after all previous mass shootings and after bloody weekends in Chicago and other urban communities. People in other nations suffer mental illness but there are virtually no mass shooting incidents or daily gun violence in their nations, due to strict gun control. Americans are 25 times more likely to be killed by guns than people from other industrialized nations. As a nation, we should be embarrassed that we do nothing in this nation to protect our precious children from gun violence.
We know that our elected leaders can do more to end gun violence in America.
State legislators can pass laws similar to the ones passed in Connecticut after the Sandy Hook tragedy. Congress can reject the egregious NRAsupported Concealed Carry Reciprocity, the guns for anyone everywhere bill, and pass the following gun control measures.
⏩ Background checks on sale of all guns
⏩ . Close the Charleston loophole or ‘delayed denial’ where federally licensed dealers can sell guns if three business days pass without a verdict from the FBI
⏩ Fix the National Instant Criminal Background Check system (NICS)
Mandatory waiting period for gun purchases
⏩ Gun violence restraining order/extreme risk protection order to temporarily prohibit an individual deemed by a judge to pose a danger to self or others, from purchasing or possessing firearms or ammunition and allow law enforcement to remove any firearms or ammunition already in the individual’s possession ⏩ Handgun licensing, permitting, training, and registration
⏩ Ban bump-fire stocks and other dangerous accessories
⏩ Ban future manufacture/sale of assault weapons, regulate existing assault weapons under the National Firearms Act of 1934, and initiate a federal gun buyback program
⏩ Limits on high capacity magazines
⏩ Make gun trafficking a federal crime
⏩ Repeal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) to eliminate the corporate gun industry special protection from civil justice law that no other industry enjoys
⏩ Restrict and penalize firearm possession by or transfer to a person subject to a domestic violence protection order or a person (including dating partners) convicted of a domestic violence misdemeanor
⏩ Prohibit firearm sale or transfer to and receipt or possession by an individual who has: (1) been convicted in any court of a misdemeanor hate crime, or (2) received from any court an enhanced hate crime misdemeanor sentence.
⏩ Repeal Dickey Amendment to adequately fund government research on gun violence
⏩ Child access prevention/safe storage requirement
Provide resources for people with mental illness
⏩ Enhance accountability of federally licensed firearms dealers
⏩ Microstamped code on each bullet that links it to a specific gun
⏩ ‘Smart guns’ with Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) or biometric recognition (fingerprint) capability
⏩ Limit gun purchases to one gun per month to reduce trafficking and straw purchases
⏩ Prohibit open carry
Digitize ATF gun records
⏩ Require licensing for ammunition dealers
Since the Sandy Hook shooting tragedy, more than 500,000 Americans have been killed or injured by guns and there have been more than 1,500 mass shooting incidents.
Like the opioid crisis, gun violence is a public health emergency.
Too many Americans are getting killed in public spaces. With 300 million guns in circulation and weak gun laws, all Americans should ask themselves ‘who’s next?’”