Tears For the Children, All the Children

Dear Mr. President,

The time for platitudes and tears is over. The time for “meaningful action” (your words) is way overdue. An editorial in today’s local paper reads: “This time President Obama had to wipe away tears as he spoke of the slaughter of ‘beautiful little kids’ at a Connecticut elementary school. His White House statement was otherwise indistinguishable from what he said after the carnage in Aurora, Colorado, Tucson, Ariz.; and from various other gun massacres that have become… a part of American life.” Just what does “meaningful action” mean, anyway? Are you finally ready to take a risk and challenge the NRA and the myth they promote that the 2^nd Amendment guarantees the right to own military assault rifles and handguns that fire 6 rounds per second and hold high-capacity magazines? Yesterday, a friend went to a Big 5 Sporting Goods store to buy shoes. At the register, she had to reach over a large display of bullets and pepper spray to pay for her purchase. Big 5’s weekly ad features an entire page of rifles, knives, bullets and scopes on sale this week: a .223 caliber rifle, the same caliber rifle carried by Adam Lanza to Sandy Hook Elementary School, and James Holmes into a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, is on sale for only $339.99; bullets for almost any type of pistol or rifle are on sale too, depending on the caliber and quantity, 30 to 50 cents a bullet. Adam Lanza, James Holmes, Jared Loughner are only the latest in a long list of mass murderers here at home, unhampered in arming themselves for war against the public by any regulation or legislation. Senator Feinstein’s gun control law of 1994, the result of yet another massacre on July 1, 1993, at 101 California here in San Francisco, expired in 2004; Congress failed to renew it and there’s been no public discussion since. The slaughter continues, the same stunned amazement, the same cries of How can this happen? with each shooting, politicians mouthing the same platitudes—and nothing happens as a result. As for those tears you wiped away at your news conference yesterday—I’ll believe they’re not crocodile tears when I see them shed for all the “beautiful little kids” your Hellfire missiles killed in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and Afghanistan. I’ll believe it when I see the wars end, the CIA disbanded and the end of Kill List Tuesdays, when I see military weapons outlawed, and constitutional protections and the rule of law restored. Until then, no more crocodile tears, Mr. President.