NYU media critic and professor Jay Rosen cut to the chase in his tweet: “Exact quote just now from the NRA press conference. ‘This is the beginning of a serious conversation. We won’t be taking any questions.'”
The only thing that might have made the NRA’s post-Newtown “major press conference” this morning — during which they had promised earlier this week to unveil their “meaningful contributions to help make sure” a mass shooting like the one at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, one week ago today, “never happens again” — would have been if someone had actually opened fire there.
Tragically, that appears to have been happening in central Pennsylvania at almost the exact same moment as NRA CEO, Executive Vice-President and chief liar Wayne LaPierre was offering his remarks at the D.C. presser. According to a WPXI reporter, the suspect “went up & down a rural road in Altoona & shot victims.” Four people are said to have died in that shooting, and three state troopers were injured attempting to stop the shooter.
“To be fair to the NRA,” observed Media Matters’ Jamison Foser, “YOU try to hold a press conference that doesn’t coincide with a gun killing in America. It ain’t easy.”
All the while, LaPierre was instructing the gathered media today that the problems we are facing, the epidemic of mass shootings and gun violence, is due to video games, the news media, lack of armed security guards at elementary schools, mental illness, and even Barack Obama. It has, apparently, nothing whatsoever to do with guns in any way, shape or form, if LaPierre’s 24 minutes of prepared remarks (full video below) are any indication.
“THIS is the mighty NRA? The group that supposedly rules all of Washington, DC? THESE nut jobs??” quipped Media Matters’ Eric Boehlert, adding a few minutes later: “If nut job LaPierre held a ‘press conference’ every Fri, sweeping gun control would be passed by February”…
During the first five minutes of his remarks, LaPierre called for a “national database of the mentally ill”, before the first of two protesters from CODEPINK to interupt the press conference took his place, silently, directly in front of the NRA’s CEO, for quite some time, holding a large sign that read “NRA IS KILLING OUR CHILDREN”. LaPierre simply kept speaking from his prepared remarks, even from behind the sign. The protester was eventually removed.
The problem is also “violent video games,” LaPierre explained, referring to the same games played all around the world in countries which, for some unexplained reason, do not have anywhere near the level of gun violence found in the U.S.
Also, the news media is to blame, because they demonize gun owners and “don’t know what they’re talking about,” he explained.
A few minutes later, another CODEPINK protester with a sign reading “NRA BLOOD ON YOUR HANDS” stood up in the crowd with a cry to “ban assault weapons now!”
After a minute or so, and once again without comment to the protester, LaPierre continued. “The only way to stop a monster from killing our kids,” he instructed, “the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.”
That argument, of course, is quickly debunked by the video we posted this morning from ABC News in 2009, demonstrating how even trained marksmen are little use during a sudden shooting in a room full of people. Watch that video. It’s worth it, as long as folks like LaPierre have a bully pulpit to lie to and confuse the American people.
The Brady Campaign’s Sarah Brady, wife of Ronald Reagan’s Press Secretary James Brady, who was shot in the brain and almost killed during the 1980 assassination attempt on the President, also took to Twitter to help to debunk LaPierre’s point by responding: “Wayne, a gun in the hands of Secret Service didn’t stop Hinkley from wounding Pres. Reagan and 3 others including my husband.”
She later retweeted someone else who snarked: “The only thing that can protect a school from a bad guy with a lobby is a good guy with a lobby.”
LaPierre continued with more strawman arguments, asking, for example: “Since when did the gun automatically become a bad word? … Why is the idea of a gun good when used to protect our President, or our military, but bad when it’s used to protect our children in our schools?”
He offered no “major contributions” to the question of what, if anything, should be done to regulate access to combat-styled fire arms, ammunition or high-capacity magazines used in so many mass shootings of late. Nothing. No changes. No additional safety regulations. Not even the minimal, very reasonable gun safety regulations that the vast majority of NRA rank and file members (if not their con-men leadership) are calling for by huge numbers.
Instead, he said, we need to put armed guards in every school in America. Oh, it’s also Barack Obama’s fault as well, because, says LaPierre, he “zeroed out” money for emergency school security in the last budget.
“With all the money in the federal budget,” LaPierre asked, “can’t we afford to put a police officer in every single school?”
Well, there’s a plan that “Small Government” “conservatives” should love. Did you like the way the U.S. hyper-militarized airports and nearly everything else after 9/11? If so, you “conservatives” will love the NRA’s suggestions to help keep our schools safe after Newtown.
LaPierre then announced what, it seems, was the promised “meaningful contributions to help make sure this never happens again.”
“The NRA’s gonna bring all its knowledge, all its dedication and all its resources to develop a model National School Shield Emergency Response program for every single school in America that wants it. From armed security, to building design, and access control to information technology, to student and teacher training, this multi-faceted program will be developed by the very best experts in the field,” he explained.
It is to be headed by former Rep. Asa Hutchinson (R-AR) and funded “with a budget provided by the NRA of whatever the task requires.”
A man who should know about how these things work out, George W. Bush’s speech writer David Frum, noted in response: “NRA ‘shield’ plan, if taken at all seriously, means TSA everywhere, forever.”
“If we truly cherish our kids more than our money,” continued LaPierre in front of a plain blue curtain, “more than our celebrities, more than our sports stadiums, we must give them the greatest level of protection possible. And that security is only possible with armed good guys.”
Is that a threat, Mr. LaPierre? It almost sounded like one. This commenter’s reaction after the presser ended — without questions from any of the gathered media — fairly well summarizes the thoughts of many who were watching today, we suspect:
It seemed more a threat than any kind of understanding that we need real action and that means some restrictions.
But watch the entire bizarre presentation and decide for yourself. It’s posted below in its entirety. (Alternately, if you prefer, the full text transcript is here.)…
UPDATE 12/22/12: Well, the reviews are in. And it’s not just us panning LaPierre’s circus for a change. The New York Times editorial board offered an unambiguous response, writing that they “we were stunned by Mr. LaPierre’s mendacious, delusional, almost deranged rant.” Even the Right-leaning Washington Post editorial board, while predictably offering their usual false equivalence, found room to be dubious of LaPierre’s schemes today.
But, more surprising than all of that, take a look at how the NRA’s Con-Man-In-Chief is being char-broiled on the cover of the New York Post today. Yes, Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post!
La Pierre said this as a call to action:
“I call on Congress today to act immediately, to appropriate whatever is necessary to put armed police officers in every school “” and to do it now, to make sure that blanket of safety is in place when our children return to school in January.”
OK, so how are we going to pay for the increase in security for our schools and public places. The money should come from (sin) taxes put on the items that contribute to the problem: guns, and violent movies/video games that glorify shooting others. Chris Dodd of MPAA has stepped up to the plate to help, why not the NRA?
Like many other things in our society the munnitions companies want to privatize the profits and socialize the losses. If their industry contributes to the problem they should help pay for the solution.
1. Put a 1-10 cent tax on all bullets, $20+ tax on all magazines over 10 (with and progressive tax for the higher bullet magazines), and a $50 tax on the automatic and semi-automatic weapons (that can easily be converted to automatic). The proceeds from this tax go to pay for security at public places.
2. Require insurance for all guns purchased. Cars are not deadly if used correctly, yet in most states not only to they require a license but proof of insurance in order to drive. If guns had insurance coverage (with proceeds going to compensate victims of shootings as well as to help fund public place security) the free market would help determine which guns are more affordable, because the insurance companies would charge ridiculous rates for weapons most commonly used in crimes.
You’re asking us to view the entire clip and decide for ourselves….I could not sit through the live feed of this psycho pig. Had to turn it off halfway through.
In addition to his crazy talk, his body language was disingenuous, rehearsed, phony, alarmingly nasty.
He’s crazy, and for some reason, America is trying to make sense of a psychopath’s words.
He basically says that bullets are the answers. If I wrote that here, you’d boot me off. But a psycho can get on national TV and proudly proclaim it…and with an American flag in the background.
We have an endless stream of rich and famous psychopaths ruling over us.
And I have no idea on how to turn it off.
LaPierre isn’t going to back down, he personally pulls in a mil a year from the dupes…
Did they really sweep the press for guns before allowing them into the news conference?
I promise that I will not vote for anyone that is in the NRA. That is my promise and I will work to get other people to make the same promise.
I’ve never read such a load of BS in my life, you post one video of an immature kid in a firearms training class and think you’ve actually ‘debunked’ something? I bet you’re one of the people that think Obama is ‘giving’ us health care, I pity Americans such as yourself.
Guns for everyone will clearly not be enough.
We should also have minefields placed around every school, residence, and business. Machine guns should be mounted on every motor vehicle. But still that won’t be enough.
We must develop new technology that will turn TVs and other household appliances into assault weapons or perhaps low yield nuclear bombs. We need this as an added protection against home invasion to guard against the intruders YOU KNOW ARE COMING getting control of our arsenals.
We should have tanks for everyone who wants one. Only makes sense if you want to be safe.
We must also start weaponizing our pets to make sure they are not used against us. But that still won’t be enough.
We must have plastic explosives surgically implanted in all our bodily organs so that the bad guys won’t be able to use our own bodies against ourselves by harvesting our organs. But still that won’t be enough.
We need to have space lasers capable of targeting anything that moves on earth and start using them 24/7 so the bad guys don’t try anything. If you don’t move, what do you have to worry about? But still that won’t be enough.
And that’s the problem. I don’t see what could ever be enough for these advocates of control through the capacity for ever greater violence. The mindset requires us to perpetually up the ante.
Almost enough to make one wish the world DOES end today. Save everybody a lot of endless fear and trouble.
Let’s ignore, for the moment, the correlation between the number of guns and the number of homicides, as documented by the Harvard School of Public Health.
Let’s ignore, for the moment, that the murder rate in Chicago, where gun control is virtually non-existent, is 19.4 per 100.000 inhabitants. That figure is more than 13.8 times greater than the murder rate in London (1.4 per 100,000 inhabitants) where there is strict control.
Let’s ignore, for the moment, the fact that the presence of armed police officers on campus did not prevent the respective slaughters at Columbine HS and VA Tech.
Here’s just one more little fact that demonstrates why LaPierre’s call for more guns (and more profits for the domestic small arms industry) is not simply immoral and repugnant but remarkably stupid!
Go back and review the list of mass murders since 1966 that I recently provided. They didn’t just occur in schools and colleges campuses. They occurred in post offices, at places of employment, inside a fitness club, in shopping malls, markets, theaters and restaurants, in a law office, on the Long Island Railroad, inside police headquarters, on a military base, in a Cal Trans Maintenance Yard, inside the Capital building in Washington DC, in a church library, inside a Sikh Temple, on the streets and inside homes.
Even if we were to illogically assume that armed cops on campuses would decrease rather than increase the likely carnage, if we were to follow LaPierre’s logic (or lack thereof), armed police officers would have to be everywhere and anywhere, even inside our homes.
Oh, one other point, for those who’ve never served in combat. Ever hear of the danger posed by “friendly fire?”
Enjoyed your play on the absurdity, David Lasagna @7.
But if we really wanted bring denial of the need for gun control to the ultimate reductio ad absurdum, we could simply arm all the 6-year-olds with a nuclear trigger and a T-shirt that reads, “Shoot me and we all die!”
Tsb2011 said @ 6:
Uh…apparently you didn’t actually bother to watch that video, didja? Yup, if I were you, I’d hide behind a pseudonym too. That way, only you know who the guy is who made that really embarrassing comment.
Dude. You’re 0 for 2. Wanna play some high-stakes poker? I’m in!
Ernie Canning said @ 9:
Yeah, maybe. But you’re forgetting that London has no access to video games, Hollywood movies and that there are not now, nor have there ever been, mentally ill people who live there. Try to keep up, Ernie.
Yup, your right Brad. “There has never been a psychotic killer in London” according to Jack the Ripper.