On today’s BradCast: While U.S. flags were already at half-staff following last week’s mass killings in Atlanta, another mass shooting erupted on Monday in Boulder, Colorado. On Tuesday, President Biden called for the flags to remain lowered, for the U.S. Senate to pass two bills already approved by the U.S. House to close loopholes in our federal background check system; and to restore the ban on assault weapons that helped keep down such mass casualty events before the George W. Bush Administration allowed it to expire. [Audio link to show follows summary below.]
“We can ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines in this country once again. I got that done when I was a Senator. It passed. It was law for the longest time, and it brought down these mass killings. We should do it again,” the President urged in his brief remarks at the White House. “This is not and should not be a partisan issue; this is an American issue. It will save lives — American lives — and we have to act.”
Today, we cover some of the reaction following the latest mass shooting in the U.S., which took 10 lives at a supermarket in Boulder yesterday. We honor the heroes that include not only the police who responded — one of whom, who had seven children, was killed during the shooting — but also the grocery store workers who courageously helped to save customer lives in the store and, as their union has noted, have been risking their lives for all of us every day over the past year, as essential workers during the pandemic.
We also note the reactions from those who have spent years working to support the ability of terrorists to easily acquire weapons of mass destruction — such as CO’s Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert and the Colorado State Shooters Association — who suddenly feel that this is no time to talk about guns. “Congressman” Boebert, who appears with guns in virtually appearance, says she “refuses” to use this shooting “to advance a political agenda.” And the Shooters Association informs us that “Today is not a day to cloud our remembrance with … emotional sensationalism.”
All of that, after a state judge, just 10 days ago, struck down a law adopted unanimously by the Boulder City Council in 2018 to ban assault weapons in the city, after years of similar massacres in the Centennial State and elsewhere. The Colorado State Shooters Association was one of the plaintiffs in that case, which was “celebrated” just last week by the disgraced, terrorist-supporting NRA, because local laws supported by residents in the CO town were preempted by Big Government at the state and federal level.
But, despite urging from the President on Tuesday, if Republicans won’t even agree to allow an up or down vote on background checks, the lowest hanging fruit when it comes to gun safety reforms, it seems impossible to imagine they would ever agree to restoring the federal assault weapons ban. That, no matter how many American lives it might save, no matter how many of their own constituents continue to be massacred in these tragic events.
In response to GOP intransigence, conservative, institutionalist Democrats in the U.S. Senate late last week and over the weekend, continued to inch toward support for filibuster reform — the only way that gun safety reform and most of the rest of the Democrats’ ambitious, progressive agenda will ever be adopted. So there’s a small amount of encouraging news on another dark day.
Also today, some response from listeners to our interview with Alabama’s former Democratic Governor, Don Siegelman on yesterday’s BradCast and his response — as someone who knows a thing or two about GOP hit jobs on popular Democratic Governors — to the attempted recall of California’s progressive Governor, Gavin Newsom.
Finally, we close with Desi Doyen and our latest Green News Report, as yet another natural disaster befalls Australia; our global climate crisis becomes the top cause for refugees worldwide; and the Biden White House begins to unveil its promised massive, long-overdue, nearly $4 trillion infrastructure (and climate) plan…
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