Good God! The idiots really don't get it, do they?

[LoveLife&Laughter]

Bill Bennett, Former Education Secretary, Says Schools Should Consider Arming Employees

Good Lord

[Dennis Barsten]

Gun tooting teachers...Love it...

[exedir]

We are obviously going to get this as a part of the aftermath of the event in Newtown.  Gun control and gun limits will be back as a matter of discussion but whether it will make it to some sort of new legislation in congress is doubtful as the winter and maybe the spring will be taken up with economic and financial issues.  As to mental health it is much more complicated as to how and how much can done that deals with the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of violent behavior in individuals.  As to any cultural changes, forgetaboutit.  

What will happen is a change in security in schools and other public places.  Access will be more carefully controlled, attack schemes will be prepared and practiced and there will be some emphasis on police and security personal being placed in schools, actually, more schools in that many urban schools particularly high schools already have police presents on an ongoing basis.  New alert and reaction mechanisms will be installed and surveillance devices placed in many schools and public buildings,  Screening devices might be a part of prevention but the use and effectiveness is going to limited in schools below 7th grade.  The worse that will happen is further administrative interventions based on zero tolerance favoring even the more absurd implementation of policies.

Overall, freedoms to be and act will be lost, the form and mechanics of security and surveillance will multiple and yet more Americans will be afraid and have fears making our society more closed, more divided and more suspicious of each other.      

[LoveLife&Laughter]

Either that or the Republican way: arm them, bring God into the classroom, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition, but...

God is All-Powerful.  If we just bring God back into the classroom, we shouldn't have to arm the teachers and we can unlock the doors again.  Or does Westboro Baptist have it right ... it's a Gay problem?

Keeping up with Right Wing solutions is hurting my brain...

[LoveLife&Laughter]

[ProblemAgain]

so that's a new duty for teachers? gunslinging to protect their students? and does that mean the schools provide the arms and ammo or do the teachers have to cough up for them as more 'school supplies'? i was just reading about a plan to 'harden' all the school campuses to protect the students by installing more armed police and metal detectors etc.....so does THAT come out of the education budget? pretty soon you won't have much to utilize for the actual educational process will you?

[grammyk]

Very well said, exedir!

[LoveLife&Laughter]

I fear our "corroded society" is more a "Toxic Culture" with more thanks to the WingNut and WhackJob extremism  such as the Religious Right, the ARA, and the NeoCon / White Power culture of narcissism and bigotry.  

[exedir]

First off, this is not a political issue at the heart of what we have as security in our schools and our nation.  Second, if it is security we want, then we will want to give up a number of our freedoms to act and do what we as individuals want and would do otherwise.  

We have come from an era where self-discovery and self-actualization has lead us to the idea that the self is of greater importance than the importance of others.  This is not a matter of guns or other weapons, it is a matter of what an individual can do and think in our society.  To stop what we have seen, we have to stop the people that want to do this and yes, remove the access to weapons.

How is that to be done?  With the greatest difficulty and a high price, higher than most of us are willing to pay as a country, community and as individuals.  

What will be done and proposed will not make us safer in the end.  What it will do is to make us feel safer on the streets, in public venues and going about our business, all commendable, but not stop this from happening again, some where, some time.  

The root cause is we live in a corroded society, saturated in violence and disrespect and suspicion of others, people we fear and that is what will be added to by the event in Newtown, fear.

[LoveLife&Laughter]

School massacres and dead children good for business. US gun sales hit record highs.  

[ProblemAgain]

when will people get it? the nra is actually a lobbying group for gun MANUFACTURERS...everything else is staging and costumes .....

NRA Takes Aim at Weapons Treaty

The powerful American gun lobby worries about the reach of a global pact on conventional arms.

Delegations from almost 200 countries convened at the United Nations this month to come up with a new treaty that would regulate international trade in conventional weapons. The effort, supported by the Obama administration, has very vocal opposition: the American gun lobby.

Proponents of the Arms Trade Treaty argue that inadequate controls over the international arms market result in armed violence against civilians by human rights violators, criminals, gangs, warlords, and terrorists. The treaty would require governments to deny weapons transfers to states that fit certain criteria, and to develop national laws and regulations governing imports and exports.

[READ: Russia's About-face Could Mean Syria's Assad Is on His Way Out]

The United States, the world's top importer and exporter of conventional weapons, already has a comprehensive tracking and export control system. "We're simply bringing other countries up to our standards," says Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association. "This treaty, in all likelihood, will not require the United States to do anything more than it is already doing."

But the American gun lobby says the ATT represents a threat to the Second Amendment.

"Depending on the scope of this treaty, it could impact gun registration requirements in the United States, it could enact a ban on commonly owned firearms, it could require tracking and registration of ammunition purchases, and it could create a global gun control bureaucracy within the U.N.," says Andrew Arulanandam, director of public affairs at the National Rifle Association. Arulanandam says the NRA will lobby the Senate to reject ratification if the president signs the treaty.

Kimball says the regulation of domestic gun possession is totally outside the scope of the treaty. Sarah Parker, senior researcher with the Switzerland-based Small Arms Survey and an adviser to the Australian delegation to the ATT talks, agrees. "There is no attempt in the Arms Trade Treaty to control the internal regulation of weapons, only international transfers," she says. Both experts say there is misinformation about the effort.

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/07/09/nra-takes-aim-at-wea...