Guns: Stop Pretending That They Aren't Part of the Problem

What do we do about the increasing occurrence of school shootings, as well as other mass shootings?

To start with, no one is suggesting that we ban all guns or that the government confiscate people's guns. No one is suggesting that guns cause these killings. These are strawmen that the NRA-philic are putting forth.

I have heard these reasons put forth by those who would twist logic into a pretzel in order to deflect any role that the availability of guns plays in these shootings:

• It's mental illness. Trump hit this one right off the bat. He conveniently forgot that he eliminated a regulation that would have prevented mentally ill people from owning a gun
• We don't discipline our kids. I believe the Las Vegas shooter, as well as the shooter who killed five police officers last year, were well into adulthood
• No prayer in schools or the shooter hadn't known Jesus
• General decline in society
• Wimpy Hipsters (yes, I heard that one today)

The problem with these so-called solutions is that they're not really solutions, they're excuses, they're distractions from the fact that the common denominator isn't a person's mental state, the way that they were raised, religion or whatever else...it's easy-to-find, easy-to-use...guns. We're not going to eliminate mental illness, we aren't going to guarantee that everyone discipline their children the way you think that they should be disciplined, prayer isn't coming back to public schools and being a non-Christian doesn't make you a bad person, let alone a mass murderer. Saying that these shootings happen for one of the above reasons just serves to take the spotlight off the fact that they were mass shootings. 

I have also heard the following as "solutions":

• Arm the teachers. The same teachers who aren't given enough pencils
• More armed guards, including police and possibly veterans
• Basically, more guns

Among those enamored of the gun culture, the solution to every problem, like the guy who thinks every problem looks like a nail because all he has in his toolbox is a hammer, looks like more guns. Sure, guns have always been part of American life. At one time a large percentage of Americans got their meat by way of hunting and hunting is still an important part of many people's lives. Citizens should be able to be able to protect themselves. In lightly populated areas the police may be an hour's drive away - you'd better be able to defend yourself and your family. But gun culture has evolved way beyond that. Listen to the people who believe that the purpose of having guns is to hold off the government in case...in case what? In case fringe conspiracy theories actually come true? While there's always been hunting rifles in the pickup truck racks and handguns and rifles for self defense, it's only been the last few years where the open carry fetish has gained traction. Now we have opposing groups of demonstrators, who a few years ago might have tussled in the street and thrown a few punches, armed and brandishing their weapons. We had one man fire a shot at another in the Chartlottesville demonstrations earlier this year. We have had anti-Muslim demonstrations by heavily-armed men outside mosques. It's gun porn. 

Ask law enforcement what they think about "good guys with guns" and how difficult it would make their jobs if everyone was firing at the "bad guys". Ask teachers what they think about being asked to arm themselves in the classroom. Armed guards? There have been armed guards at several schools where these shootings have taken place. 

Gun rights supporters, at least those who are extremist in their views, will always frame solutions in a way that results in more guns. And they will always misrepresent their opponents' arguments as "they're coming for our guns".

Whether it's mentally ill people using guns to kill large numbers of people, radicalized domestic terrorists using guns to kill large numbers of people, jilted lovers using guns to kill large numbers of people, disgruntled former employees using guns to kill large numbers of people, people who received no discipline as kids using guns to kill large numbers of people, or people who wouldn't have killed large numbers of people if only there had been prayer in schools, the common denominator is guns being used to kill large numbers of people. However crazy, however radicalized, however disgruntled, however divorced from morality, these shooters would have been hard pressed to kill large numbers of people without weapon that was designed to easily kill lots of people very quickly. 

The counter argument is that someone who wants to kill will find a way. But what are the alternatives? Knives are deadly, but how many people can you kill with a knife in the 3-5 minutes that these mass shootings take? What about a bomb? It's happened, but you generally don't go to a bomb show and buy a bomb. You have to construct your own, which takes time. A newly popular method of mass murder seems to be running over people with a car. Already barricades and bollards in public places minimize the damage that a car can do. It isn't even arguable that a semi-automatic weapon can do the most damage and can be operated by someone with scant training. 

Then there's the "good guy with a gun" theory. Search long enough and you will find examples of a shooter being stopped by an armed bystander, but you'll not need to search for very long at all to find examples where shooters went on a rampage even though there were people nearby who were armed, even many situations where there were specifically trained and armed security officers on site. The short time frame in which carnage can be meted out makes the "good guy" solution not much more than wishful thinking. In addition, if everyone is opening fire, how does law enforcement weed out the "good guys" from the "bad guys"? And how do we avoid "good guys" from killing other "good guys"?

One of the gun fetishists' arguments lately has been to use Israel as an example of a heavily armed populace where there are few mass shootings. What is glossed over is that the majority of civilian gun-owners in Israel have had military training. There are intensive background checks and universal registration that must be renewed every three years. Non-military veterans cannot own a gun until reaching the age of 27. So it's not just that they have a lot of guns, they are responsible about it. Everyone who wants to carry a gun is vetted...extreme vetting if you will. And a big difference between us and Israel is that in Israel, gun ownership is regarded as a privilege, not a constitutional right. Our Second Amendment has been an idol which has been mindlessly worshiped. 

The gun rights people are right, guns aren't to blame for these killings. Guns don't cause people to kill. But unlimited access to weapons that have no purpose other than quick, efficient killing does contribute to the ease with which these killings take place. It's about time we end our idiotic love affair with unrestricted gun ownership, stop mis-characterizing those who want to do something about it and take some god damn action. 

North Korea

With Trump as President we move from one crisis to the next with barely any breathing room in between. We are alternately entertained or horrified by his buffoonery and utter lack of understanding of how anything outside the realm of Manhattan real estate works. It wasn't all that long ago that a nuclear exchange with North Korea felt, not only possible, but probable. Yet today, despite nothing of substance having changed, we don't hear anything about North Korea, other than its participation in the Olympics.

North Korea has long been a state that ignores the norms of international relations, in many ways their foreign policy can be boiled down to one word: paranoia. North Korean leaders, including Kim Jong-Un, the current leader, make protection of their country from the United States a high priority. Whether this is simply a way to rile up the masses, the way many dictators use foreign threats to cement their power over their own people, or a sincere belief that America will attack, is difficult to ascertain. But the United States' insistence that North Korea not be allowed nuclear weapons plays into this paranoia and confirms widely held suspicious about America. From North Korea's perspective, nuclear weapons are the best, if not only, sure defense against an America that North Koreans are sure wants to annihilate them. Trump's incendiary language only further confirms their fears.

American foreign policy regarding North Korea has long involved preventing its development of nuclear weapons and missiles that could deliver them. North Korea has made it a top priority to make those very things a reality. They don't trust us any more than we trust them. Furthermore, they have seen what has happened to Libya and Iraq when they gave up their weapons of mass destruction.

Over the years our approach to North Korea has been a mix of diplomacy, including aid and sanctions. Sanctions don't work because North Korea's leaders have no problem with letting their people suffer, possibly because it gives them propaganda points against the United States. And there's always some country willing to do an end-run around the sanctions. Diplomacy doesn't work either, it generally gives North Korea breathing room to continue its nuclear research.

So along comes Trump, who jumps up and down and beats his chest, making threats of "fire & fury", trading juvenile insults with Kim Jong-Un. He rails against former presidents whom he calls ineffective and weak. He tweets that we will never accept a nuclear North Korea and makes more threats of military action. But what does he actually do? More toothless sanctions that are undercut by his buddies in Russia. More talk. Insulting nicknames.

Guess what? North Korea has nuclear weapons and the missiles that can get them to the United States mainland! And they reached their final stage of production during Trump's presidency.

Am I glad that we're not engaged in a nuclear war (or any other kind of war) with North Korea? Yes I am. But I find it singularly ironic that all that Trump is doing to prevent something that he insisted was unacceptable was more of what he claimed didn't work, was weak, was ineffective. More talking.

Colluder-in-Chief

Do I know how the Mueller investigation will end up? No - and do you know why? Because Mueller isn't a paranoid publicity hog, tweeting his every thought whose thoughts are shaped by "Fox and Friends". Mueller is methodically looking into every aspect of the Russia election interference. Some say that the indictment of thirteen Russian nationals this weeks confirms the attempted election influencing. The fact that Russia worked to prevent Hillary Clinton from being elected and that they favored the eventual Republican nominee, Donald Trump, was confirmed with high confidence by the three intelligence agencies that looked into it and approved by the Director of National Intelligence. This, by any objective standard, should have beyond any doubt a year ago, despite our president calling it a hoax and "fake news". The indictments of the thirteen Russians does not allege that they were successful in changing the election results, the indictments also do not conclude that there was collusion or coordination between these Russians and the Trump campaign. This is very different from concluding that there was no coordination or collusion, and it certainly does not conclude that the Russians were unsuccessful. It does not address those issues.

Keep in mind that these thirteen indictments do not exist in a vacuum. Four Trump associates have been charged or indicted so far, including Trump's former National Security Advisor and first campaign manager. There has also been a parade of campaign advisors, White House staffers and ad hoc associates who have been questioned as part of the investigation. There have been so many Trump people who have lied about their illegal or improper contacts with Russians that they'd likely fill the phone book for a medium-size city.

We don't know where this investigation will go, but we know this: it's not a hoax, or "fake news".

Guns: Stop Pretending That They Aren't Part of the Problem

What do we do about the increasing occurrence of school shootings, as well as other mass shootings?

To start with, no one is suggesting that we ban all guns or that the government confiscate people's guns. No one is suggesting that guns cause these killings. These are strawmen that the NRA-philic are putting forth.

I have heard these reasons put forth by those who would twist logic into a pretzel in order to deflect any role that the availability of guns plays in these shootings:

• It's mental illness. Trump hit this one right off the bat. He conveniently forgot that he eliminated a regulation that would have prevented mentally ill people from owning a gun
• We don't discipline our kids. I believe the Las Vegas shooter, as well as the shooter who killed five police officers last year, were well into adulthood
• No prayer in schools or the shooter hadn't known Jesus
• General decline in society
• Wimpy Hipsters (yes, I heard that one today)

The problem with these so-called solutions is that they're not really solutions, they're excuses, they're distractions from the fact that the common denominator isn't a person's mental state, the way that they were raised, religion or whatever else...it's easy-to-find, easy-to-use...guns. We're not going to eliminate mental illness, we aren't going to guarantee that everyone discipline their children the way you think that they should be disciplined, prayer isn't coming back to public schools and being a non-Christian doesn't make you a bad person, let alone a mass murderer. Saying that these shootings happen for one of the above reasons just serves to take the spotlight off the fact that they were mass shootings. 

I have also heard the following as "solutions":

• Arm the teachers. The same teachers who aren't given enough pencils
• More armed guards, including police and possibly veterans
• Basically, more guns

Among those enamored of the gun culture, the solution to every problem, like the guy who thinks every problem looks like a nail because all he has in his toolbox is a hammer, looks like more guns. Sure, guns have always been part of American life. At one time a large percentage of Americans got their meat by way of hunting and hunting is still an important part of many people's lives. Citizens should be able to be able to protect themselves. In lightly populated areas the police may be an hour's drive away - you'd better be able to defend yourself and your family. But gun culture has evolved way beyond that. Listen to the people who believe that the purpose of having guns is to hold off the government in case...in case what? In case fringe conspiracy theories actually come true? While there's always been hunting rifles in the pickup truck racks and handguns and rifles for self defense, it's only been the last few years where the open carry fetish has gained traction. Now we have opposing groups of demonstrators, who a few years ago might have tussled in the street and thrown a few punches, armed and brandishing their weapons. We had one man fire a shot at another in the Chartlottesville demonstrations earlier this year. We have had anti-Muslim demonstrations by heavily-armed men outside mosques. It's gun porn. 

Ask law enforcement what they think about "good guys with guns" and how difficult it would make their jobs if everyone was firing at the "bad guys". Ask teachers what they think about being asked to arm themselves in the classroom. Armed guards? There have been armed guards at several schools where these shootings have taken place. 

Gun rights supporters, at least those who are extremist in their views, will always frame solutions in a way that results in more guns. And they will always misrepresent their opponents' arguments as "they're coming for our guns".

Whether it's mentally ill people using guns to kill large numbers of people, radicalized domestic terrorists using guns to kill large numbers of people, jilted lovers using guns to kill large numbers of people, disgruntled former employees using guns to kill large numbers of people, people who received no discipline as kids using guns to kill large numbers of people, or people who wouldn't have killed large numbers of people if only there had been prayer in schools, the common denominator is guns being used to kill large numbers of people. However crazy, however radicalized, however disgruntled, however divorced from morality, these shooters would have been hard pressed to kill large numbers of people without weapon that was designed to easily kill lots of people very quickly. 

The counter argument is that someone who wants to kill will find a way. But what are the alternatives? Knives are deadly, but how many people can you kill with a knife in the 3-5 minutes that these mass shootings take? What about a bomb? It's happened, but you generally don't go to a bomb show and buy a bomb. You have to construct your own, which takes time. A newly popular method of mass murder seems to be running over people with a car. Already barricades and bollards in public places minimize the damage that a car can do. It isn't even arguable that a semi-automatic weapon can do the most damage and can be operated by someone with scant training. 

Then there's the "good guy with a gun" theory. Search long enough and you will find examples of a shooter being stopped by an armed bystander, but you'll not need to search for very long at all to find examples where shooters went on a rampage even though there were people nearby who were armed, even many situations where there were specifically trained and armed security officers on site. The short time frame in which carnage can be meted out makes the "good guy" solution not much more than wishful thinking. In addition, if everyone is opening fire, how does law enforcement weed out the "good guys" from the "bad guys"? And how do we avoid "good guys" from killing other "good guys"?

One of the gun fetishists' arguments lately has been to use Israel as an example of a heavily armed populace where there are few mass shootings. What is glossed over is that the majority of civilian gun-owners in Israel have had military training. There are intensive background checks and universal registration that must be renewed every three years. Non-military veterans cannot own a gun until reaching the age of 27. So it's not just that they have a lot of guns, they are responsible about it. Everyone who wants to carry a gun is vetted...extreme vetting if you will. And a big difference between us and Israel is that in Israel, gun ownership is regarded as a privilege, not a constitutional right. Our Second Amendment has been an idol which has been mindlessly worshiped. 

The gun rights people are right, guns aren't to blame for these killings. Guns don't cause people to kill. But unlimited access to weapons that have no purpose other than quick, efficient killing does contribute to the ease with which these killings take place. It's about time we end our idiotic love affair with unrestricted gun ownership, stop mis-characterizing those who want to do something about it and take some god damn action. 

Bonuses, Jobs and the Tax Cuts

Let's start off by pointing out that the Republican so-called tax reform, that was supposed eliminate countless loopholes and deductions, succeeded only in eliminating a few individual income tax deductions and no corporate deductions.  The eliminating of deductions was supposed to offset the reduction in corporate rates. Let's also point out the one-time repatriation of foreign funds rate reduction. It may have had the immediate effect of bringing some billions of dollars into the country and therefore subject to United States tax, but it did nothing to prevent the practice of "offshoring" cash from continuing. Trump and his Congressional toadies have been selling this as a middle-class tax cut and trumpeting supposed benefits to working Americans, but is it true?

Starting with the actual tax rates and brackets, I did the math on this in another post a few weeks ago:  http://tjpolitics.blogspot.com/2017/12/massivebelieve-me.html, so I won't replay my points, but basically some Americans will see modest decreases in federal taxes, while many, especially those with two or more children, will see increases. The elimination of individual deductions was supposedly offset by an almost doubling of the standard deduction, making it unnecessary for some married couples filing jointly to avoid the paperwork involved in itemizing. (A married couple filing jointly who had between $12,700 and $24,000 in deductions would see this simplification). But households itemizing more than $24,000 would lose some deductions. The almost doubling of the standard deduction doesn't look so good when you factor in the loss of the personal exemptions ($4050 per person). Even those seeing tax cuts aren't seeing that much of a tax cut.

Since Trump and his sycophants can't really brag about the increase in take-home pay, especially after Paul Ryan was caught tweeting about how great a $1.50/week bump was (my take home increased by $5.97/week) they have started crowing about the companies that have been paying bonuses and giving out raises. The main question that I have for the companies that have legitimately given out bonuses (the figure of $1000 per worker has been thrown around a lot) is how a tax cut that takes effect in the 2018 tax year, is causing companies to give out bonuses in 2017, since most of these bonuses were year-end 2017. How many were in the works before the tax bill? Of course, since this tax change benefited large businesses, it would be in their best interest to claim that the bonuses, as well as additional investment and hiring, were a direct result of the corporate tax cuts.

Aside from the tax cuts, what is the overall state of the economy? Pretty good...for big business. We've been on a positive trend since around 2010, in general we recovered fairly well from the recession. Demand for goods and services is up and unemployment is down. Trump's excision of many regulations is good news for the bottom line watchers in corporate towers. Businesses are making money. But I mentioned unemployment. While low unemployment is usually considered a positive, especially by those who are looking for work, it is not necessarily positive for employers. When unemployment is low the job seeker has the upper hand in the labor market. It becomes harder to find qualified employees. Companies have to raise wages in order to stay competitive. The company that I used to work for realized in 2014 that the reason their locations were understaffed wasn't incompetence on the part of their Human Resources Managers and Store Directors, or an insidious plot to keep labor costs in bonus territory, it was because, due to extremely low unemployment, the pay scale was not competitive. ( Human Resources Managers and Store Directors knew this a year earlier, but it's only a good idea when the big boys think of it). They raised their pay scales, not because they cared about their employees, or because they altruistically wanted to share their profits, but because that was how they were going to find and retain good employees.  I can't believe that every other company in the country doesn't think the same way.

What about bonuses? Why are we hearing so much about bonuses and not more about pay increases? Bonuses are a one-time payout. They aren't "the gift that keeps on giving", like a pay increase. They look impressive. A $1000 per person bonus appears to have a bigger impact than a 50¢/hour raise, even though the raise will result in $1040, and will carry through to the next year...and the year after. A one-time bonus with no guarantee of future bonuses protects the company in the event that revenues decline. According to USA today, https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/01/11/list-companies-paid-bonuses-boosted-pay-since-tax-bill-passed/1023848001/ "more than 125 employers" have announced plans for bonuses and pay increases". Not really a huge amount.

Factor in Trump's penchant for taking credit for all the positives and ignoring or blaming someone else for the negatives. While a lot of companies are paying out bonuses, some companies, sometimes the same companies are engaged in layoffs and plant closings. This article in Money & career Cheat Sheet lists some:  https://www.cheatsheet.com/money-career/these-companies-started-firing-employees-right-after-getting-tax-cuts-from-trump.html/?a=viewall

Through all of this, it's evident that Trump does not understand the economy and what he does understand, he lies about. His happy dance about the stock market betrayed an abysmal ignorance http://tjpolitics.blogspot.com/2018/01/trump-and-stock-market.html and his recent tweet that "the stock market" was "wrong" when the Dow Jones Industrial average dropped several thousand points after supposed good news.

As the November elections get closer we're going to hear a lot about how well the economy is doing and how Trump's tax cuts are the reason.

Don't be fooled