CO-04 (Special Election)
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(R) Greg Lopez
(R) Trisha Calvarese
90%
10%
President (To Win Colorado)
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(D) Joe Biden*
(R) Donald Trump
80%
20%↓
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
90%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
90%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(D) Adam Frisch
(R) Jeff Hurd
(R) Ron Hanks
40%
30%
20%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert
(R) Deborah Flora
(R) J. Sonnenberg
30%↑
15%↑
10%↓
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Dave Williams
(R) Jeff Crank
50%↓
50%↑
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
90%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) Brittany Pettersen
85%↑
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(D) Yadira Caraveo
(R) Gabe Evans
(R) Janak Joshi
60%↑
35%↓
30%↑
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
October 09, 2015 01:39 PM UTC
27 Comments
UPDATE:
Stuff Happens.™
The NRA has certainly won me over as I don't really care about these.
DailyKos: Fox News is a Clear and Present Danger to America:
Fox News, and all the radio outlets churniung out similar propaganda hour after hour, turns people into ignorant haters.
Aldous Huxley warned us…then Naomi Klein did the same…are we listening?
Benghazi!!
… Oh, and, Freedom!!!, too!
I think you mean, Freedumb!! And just when the repugnant Modster had mustered the courage to come out from under his rock post-Oregon. With history as a guide, he'll be back after three news cycles.
“‘No Way to Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/09/opinion/moms-and-guns.html?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share
The politics around this issue are rigged, and must be replaced by the personal: Can we look for salvation to the people who know our children best?
Is this intended for informational value or to take guns away from law abiding citizens? The Oregon shooter bought his guns legally, just like the Aurora shooter. What law would have prevented them?
Death penalty for morons..?
Perhaps waiting period
Here's a good article regarding a cultural shift away from guns, rather than policy:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/guns-cigarettes-cultural-shift
I don't know, Bud. Whether guns are "cool" or not totally depends on the parents and community attitudes, in my experience. My own adult children were taught to target shoot very early by my vet ex-husband; fortunately, they were also taught rigorous gun safety.
I like to think that I've also influenced them in that they don't over-value guns, foment conspiracies about someone coming to "take away" their guns, and don't "open carry" in any place other than a shooting range, and are liberal in their politics.
In the rural community where I teach now, gun culture is a big thing, as is being a future farmer, a good person, a good student. Kids routinely hunt, and shoot varmints. The kids defy stereotypes. They are open-minded, curious, and interested in the larger world. As a teacher, I'm working to influence them to develop their critical questioning and thinking about the unceasing conservative propaganda that comes along with gun culture and a rural community.
But I am mindful that, with the easy availability of deadly weapons, it would only take one kid with a mental and/or emotional disorder to wreak havoc on this school and community.
I think that the remedy to gun culture is similar to the new scientific findings about addiction; it's not so much an inherent or inherited tendency as the path of least resistance when relationships to other human beings break down. The cure for the ravages of gun culture is strengthening connections to other human beings.
I shouldn't have to write that I'm also for sensible legal limits on gun ownership: background checks, waiting periods, denying gun purchases to felons and domestic abusers. Gun manufacturers and sellers / resellers should be suable when the purchaser uses the weapon in a crime, if they failed to provide due diligence.
Parents should be liable for neglect / abuse charges when they leave loaded weapons around and let children use them.
I'm kind of lukewarm on trying to ban sales of types of guns and ammo available to the public – although I would be in favor of not allowing anonymous internet purchases of these items. I've shredded targets with semi-auto pistols, and as far as I can tell, it hasn't made me into a violent psychopath.
Guns have no place in schools,unless they are used by security and police officers who have been trained in their use.
Guns have legitimate uses in providing food, fun, and protection; acknowledging this will go a long way in divorcing the uses of a tool from the conservative mystique around it.
Mama I like your style.
Thanks! I also favor new microstamping technology, which will allow law enforcement to solve gun crimes much more easily…imprinting unique IDS on bullets.
I understand that RMGO and the NRA are not fans. It might help cops solve crimes, but it will cut into gun manufacturing profits, and make them more accountable, so of course they're against it.
Yeah, you can't expect RMGO or the NRA to get on board with that. Dudley is shitting where he sleeps now and pissed off too many gun owners in my opinion.
Now, you know my position on guns and it differs from yours a bit
, but I see you as reasonable in your intent and wonder if you have any ideas to prevent gun crimes rather than solve them?
You see, from my perspective, apprehending the culprit in a mass shooting (which is typically when this discussion arises) is relatively easy; he is usually dead right there on the scene or captured so there is really no benefit or advantage linking the gun to the shooter. Suicides have the same result. Both would find little use in knowing where the gun came from in relation to preventing the tragedy from occurring.
My goal focuses more on lowering the death count from gun violence, or preventative rather than punitive measures. I believe that if these mass shootings did not actually occur, less focus would be on law abiding gun owners and this discussion would rarely, if ever, occur.
While I'm here, I would like to inquire about your thoughts on the comments in the news concerning Ben Carson's statement that has seen criticism in recent days about taking action as an unarmed prospective victim in mass shootings. It was my understanding prior to his comments that a paramount idea in favor of magazine restrictions was that it gave people time, albeit very little, to tackle the shooter while they were reloading. Mr Carson suggests his strategy was indeed to fight, unarmed against the shooter, in order to attempt to save his, or others lives, and he is met with mocking critique. It seems to me the (R) behind his name renders the otherwise popular unarmed retaliation(D) theory as impractical as informed gun users suggested all along?
Not trying to be combative just struggle with the logic.
Preventing gun violence? I've delineated the ideas I agree with in my comment above, but will do it again. Background checks, waiting periods, denying guns to felons and domestic abusers, making gun manufacturers and resellers legally liable for ignoring those laws and selling to criminals. Colorado is the only state which actually penalizes families of victims who sue. I agree with what Clinton's campaign advocates for at the national level.
Requiring adults with small children to lock or secure weapons – possibly with the "smart gun" modification, which RMGO and their ilk also hates.
My thinking has changed on the gun magazine size restrictions; I’m no longer convinced that it matters much. Large magazines seem to jam pretty often on their own. I would be in favor of not selling these items on the internet to anonymous users, which is how Holmes obtained his magazines.
My take on the usual gun-rights advocate deflection: "What about Mental Health?" is, as I also delineated above, that "gun culture", advocates weaponry to an unearned status much higher than simple tool for food, fun, and protection. To knock guns off this pedestal, and divorce gun advocacy from the conservative ideologies it has become synonymous with, we have to elevate connections between people, and care for the isolated and disenfranchised, to a value higher than possession of many deadly weapons.
Adam Lanza's mother should have been able to get a team of people to care for her son, preferably in a locked institution. The parents of the Oregon shooter should have been able to get support when they cried out for help. Currently, if a child is psychotic, addicted, in pain, isolated, or homeless, there is fucking NOTHING for help. No one will help family to get appropriate care. Police may lock up for a "mental health hold", but someone will pay through the nose for it. Jail keeps society safe, but does NOTHING to help the mentally ill or addicted person recover.
So that's my rant, which I'll leave there. Connections between people, care for the lost and lonely. Sensible gun laws. That's my prescription to prevent mass shootings.
Thank you mama. I agree with most of what you say, and really appreciate the divorcing of gun advocacy from conservative ideologies, as well as elevating connections between people.
We have seen nearly every mass shooter pass a background check, as well as wait periods, and domestic abusers are currently prohibited from buying guns, so while I personally disagree that this prevents mass shootings, as evidenced by history, I certainly respect your opinion on the matter.
What I find intriguing is that your a teacher, and I want to propose something to you, just because I don't often have the chance and hope you understand my appeal:
Lets just go into a hypothetical condition: There is an active shooter in your school. All stop gaps have failed and how/why/who is irrelevant. He has breached your door and confrontation is eminent.
What is your current school policy for this exercise? Would you change anything?
My son's school policy is huddle in the corner and sing songs. As a parent and gun owner I find this incredibly disturbing, however bringing up "target rich environment", "ballistic penetration" and "shoot through's" to the school principle is equally disturbing and my presence I fear would be less welcome. So I embrace you as a 3rd party in the education system to hopefully start a conversation as to what steps need to occur to prevent my child from being killed when the laws have failed, as they have. Every. Single. Time. Thank you once again.
Your son's school policy is probably more than "huddle in the corner and sing songs". Most schools are locked down during the day, and strangers must show ID and be conducted to the office. Your hypothetical situation has the shooter passing all these barriers, which I think would be unusual. College campuses are not locked, but K-12 schools are locked during the day.
I think every school nowadays should have an armed school resource officer. There isn't funding for this from strapped municipalities. But assume that your son's school has an SRO on site, and that he/she has called for backup. Trained persons will be dealing with the shooter. That is the only thing I have to offer to your kid's school situation; make sure there is an SRO on site, and that lockdown procedures are followed.
I would be locking my door, making my students stay out of shooting range, until the pros dealt with the shooter. I would NOT be concealed carrying myself. Since I have no secure locking storage, I also would not have a locked-up gun.
My job is to teach English, not to shoot people. I already have the default duties of part-time counselor, networker, health consultant, social worker. I don't need to have more unpaid duties as a sniper. The elephant in the room is that teachers are not necessarily perfect, calm,unflappable people whose conduct is always professional. Teaching is one of the most stressful jobs in the world. You do NOT want to introduce packing heat into that equation.
I've had to intervene in several student fights over the years I've been teaching. That is part of the job. So far, none of the assailants has been armed. One child was killed in a gang-related knife fight in a Denver school where I worked in 2003. That was tragic and traumatic; he was killed in a lunchroom packed full of students and adults, and nobody was able to prevent it. In my opinion, which you asked for, packing heat myself would have made all of these situations that much worse.
Thank you. I am by no means suggesting teachers should "pack heat" and I respectfully agree that they have enough on their plate.
And while I do appreciate you offering your SRO and lock down practices, which my son's school has, the hypothetical situation assumes all stop gaps have failed, and the shooter is entering your room, with eminent confrontation. I would at this point add that you are NOT armed, just to agree that arming teachers is not my intended end result.
What do you do?
ammo sales restricted when it is designed to pierce body armor or when it contains too much lead. Illegal in most states to use lead ammo for hunting birds
At Heathrow Airport waiting for my flight home. On the BBC this week was a report about the ten or so knife attacks among teenagers in England so far in 2015. The conservative prime minister wants to do something about it. I guess they consider that too much violence.
I'm sure our ammosexuals would say that they could reduce the number of stabbings by abolishing gun control.
In reply to Negev's hypothetical situation, with an active shooter entering my classroom, having passed all physical barriers and trained police too far away. We have operable windows on the ground floor, so I would have had most students flee to safety by that time. If I were still stuck in the room, I would pick up a table or desk, holding it between us to shield my body, and rush him, try to pin and disarm him. I would guess that some of my athletic students might want to do the same. This would be a last-resort desperate move, which would almost certainly result in death or injury of me or other students. It might or might not work. But that is what I would try to do.
It seems to be the only logical move. That's a tough position to be in. Thank you for your honest and humbling answer.
I'm kinda' waiting for the day that it might be "logical" not to assume so readily that having to face such a scenario was nearly as probable as it seems . . .
Yeah, you and me both. Not holding my breath.