How about a modest, commonsense solution to gun management? Not the hysterical right-wing bogeyman of confiscation of guns, deprivation of rights or border invasions.
Something simple like the drivers license system: Screening, training, testing, time-limited permits subject to review and potential termination.
Instead, the gun zealots in Texas have eradicated as many restrictions as they could, legislated their own version of “open borders” on guns, and spread hysteria about the scary border.
And Attorney General Ken Paxton, who knows just enough about the law to wield it as a weapon in lawsuits against the government, wants teachers to be armed (already on the books). A reporter asked him, “More guns (instead of fewer)?”
Small comfort that the Uvalde murderer was a U.S. citizen, because if he had been undocumented, the right wing would unleash hysteria on an even more unhinged scale.
John Garza
McAllen
Cruz, guns
condemned
While looking for information on mass killings in Texas, I looked up the word “liar,” and there was a picture of Ted Cruz. Is there any lie you would not tell to protect the gun lobby? So far you have received $442,000 from the gun lobby and you defend their exemption from responsibility in mass shootings. And you went to the NRA convention in Houston so you could beg for more money.
There are ways to stop the mass murders, but it would eat into the profits of the gun manufacturers. That is a thing they pay to stop.
If the American people want to stop the mass shootings, campaign finance reform could do that. Look up “Political Party Financing in Canada.”
In 2020, shortly after a gunman shot and killed 13 people in Portapique, Nova Scotia, Canada banned more than 1,500 models of “assault-style” firearms and components, and set limits on how destructive bullets could be. Canada’s rate of firearm homicides is 0.5 per 100,000 people, versus the United States’ rate of 4.12.
“The American gun lobby is treated in an entirely different manner, as lobbies are essentially given authority and legitimacy resulting in the power to block legislation. Lobbies in the United States are characterized by their significant financial power and their capacity to utilize those finances to both dictate the conversations and legislation seen in government.”
I will never vote for a politician with a high NRA rating. My child’s life is much more important than that.
Hank Shiver
Mission
No real
solutions
Just a little opinion on the mass shootings at our schools and markets, etc. They always blame mental illness or criminal background; this 18-year-old didn’t have a criminal record, so if there was a background check he would’ve passed it.
No me, they should just raise the age limit to the mid-20s to buy a rifle, and same with ammunition; limit ammo to maybe 500 rounds per year. Also, limit the sale of those kinds of assault rifles to two or three. Why do they need more than that?
Just saying.
I listened to Greg Abbot. He never mentioned anything about controlling guns; just mental illness, no solutions.
The solution they came up with was comical; they said schools with one door. God forbid if there is a fire — then what?
Those are the people who represent us. Wow.
Jose Rodriguez
Weslaco
