The kerfuffle over Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn’s statement “It’s just a good thing I can’t pack a gun on the Senate floor” continues, with all the predictability of a Swiss train. Today’s the day that professional gun violence victims and gun grabbing orgs expressions of shock and horror hit the net (hey it’s summer). Needless to say, New York Congressional Representative Carolyn “Ban the Shoulder Thingie” McCarthy is the leader of the pity pack. “‘What Sen. Coburn said is absolutely outrageous and unconscionable,’ McCarthy, whose husband was killed and son critically injured in a 1993 mass shooting on the Long Island Rail Road, told POLITICO.” Need some more salt for that wound Senator Cobuyrn? Sure ya do . . .
“Words matter and I don’t think any person who has been or knows a victim of gun violence would find this a laughing matter. Mr. Coburn should issue an apology immediately and be more conscious of the effect the things we say can have on the public,” she added.
Our man Zimmerman said pretty much all there is to say about this storm in a teacup. But not everything. First, I disagree with Senator Coburn: I don’t think it’s a good thing that he can’t pack a gun on the Senate floor.
All joking aside (and Coburn’s remark was a joke), our elected representatives should have the same right to armed self-defense as any other law-abiding, majority age citizen of the United States. Making the Senate floor a gun-free zone, depending on Capitol police for their protection, is just asking for trouble. From terrorists, assassins and . . . fellow politicians. To wit Wikipedia:
Preston Smith Brooks (August 5, 1819 – January 27, 1857) was a Democratic Congressman from South Carolina. Brooks is primarily remembered for his severe beating of Senator Charles Sumner on the floor of the United States Senate with a gutta-percha cane, delivered in response to an anti-slavery speech in which Sumner compared Brooks’ relative, South Carolina Senator Andrew Butler, to a pimp, which Brooks interpreted as a humiliation laden with sexual innuendo. Brooks was cheered across the South, but the episode was used by Northerners to depict the Southerners as violent fanatics, thus pushing the nation a step closer to Civil War.
Second, Coburn should not apologize for his remark—other than echoing this debate-winning statement from presidential candidate Herman Cain.
Nope. Despite the tough talk, Coburn turns out to be just another po-faced back-pedaling pol with the letters CYA tattooed on his chest.
Coburn spokesman John Hart did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but he told CBS News the Oklahoma Republican was “obviously joking” when he made the remarks during public appearances in Oklahoma on Wednesday. Hart said Coburn would “personally apologize to any of his colleagues who were offended.”
And after that he should personally apologize to the people who are offended by his personal apology to people who were offended by his remark. That is, after all, the politician’s way.
For a bunch of people who claim to be educated and enlightened intellectuals, why are they too dense to recognize hyperbole when they hear it? They’re pretty damned ignorant when it’s convenient.
I don’t blame Carolyn McCarthy’s for exploiting her victimhood into an “accomplishment”. If I had gone through what she has, I don’t know how I would deal with it. But she is strictly a one issue pol and if you’re going to put yourself up as the poster-victim of gun violence, you had better know what you’re talking about. If she’s too damn lazy to do her own due-diligence on the subject, that’s a character flaw – and she can count on the flaws in her character being pointed out.
Agreed. All of this manufactured hypersensitivity and feigned outrage is ridiculous. It’s partisan politics at it’s worst and actually stands in the way of getting things done.
It’s all about firing up the base. McCarthy is a champion of the Neo-Soc(ialist), disarmament lobby. Her core supporters are those who are a subset of the Neo-Socs.
Gun owners are a subset of American society, people who actually carry firearms are a small subset of THAT subset. Those who are politically active enough to actually engage elected officials are a small subset of both of those groups.
IOW, 3-5% of gun owners & maybe 4-6% of those gun owners who carry firearms care enough to be politically active. Their demographic – the Neo-Soc, disarmament faction faces similar demographic break down. So it’s important for Neo-Soc. leaders to keep their base fired up to mine as much support as possible off every little thing.
Here, McCarthy is ginning up the 3-5% of the Neo-Soc. & disarmament faction, so they will in turn gin up the Neo-Soc foot soldiers who will try to amplify the outrage and turn it into either money, or a viable political issue, or a viable political opponent for Coburn, etc.
Besides attempting to scuttle our 2nd amendment , what else has the woman done ? Is she there to remind Democrats they are anti-gun still? I guess her moment of glory will come when they move to ban the sale of firearms.
As Pelosi votes, so does she. She’s nothing more than a guaranteed vote for the issue of the day.
I just love how the left appoints their victim representatives. Offended a black guy? Gotta kiss Al Sharpton’s ring. Pissed off some homosexuals? Barney Frank will accept your gift basket. Apparently Ms. McCarthy is the designated victim of gun violence, though I expect her to be replaced by the more memorable Ms. Giffords in the near future. Kabuki is actually less predictable than this.
I don’t know why Coburn should apologize to McCarthy. It’s not like he actually shot the bitch.
Even if he did, I don’t see a need to apologize for anything.
Ok, so now it’s accceptable to call someone you don’t agree with an offensive name on this site. As someone who has had a post deleted by RF (not for name calling, for disagreeing with an editorial comment) I’m just glad to know some of the ground rules.
1. I don’t recall doing that. We only remove posts for editorial content when they’re racist or anti-semitic or stuff like that.
2. Our anti-flaming policy applies to the website, it writers and fellow commentators. Anyone else is fair game. Unless they become a writer or commentator.
Yea, I’m with Robert and Herman Cain on this one. I’m so sick of these idiots standing around waiting to be offended and I’m more sickened by those who apologize to them. Here’s an offense for you, Congressthingie McCarthy, “If your husband would have been packing Coburn’s gun on that train, you just might be sitting down to dinner with him tonight and not finding yourself all up in our warm, moist colons day after day. Good grief, get a life.”
I know you meant to be offensive, so, congratulations, your comments were. Victims do not deserve to be blamed–and while the congresswoman might well hold the wrong view about the connection between guns and violence, “get a life” seems pretty strange since she has run for and won a congressional seat.
I don’t believe the phrase “get a life” is strange at all when applied to the Congresswoman. Many victims choose to continue in their victimhood status in perpetuity; never rising above or recovering from it. They wallow in it and use it only to their advantage. All the while, they recklessly endanger the freedoms of others through their continued emotional, unintellectual efforts.
The fact that the Congresswoman lost her husband at the hands of a law-breaker does NOT grant her a pass for diminishing the rights of the law-abiding from her position of power acquired via her victimhood status.
I’m not blaming her for being a victim, I blame her for wielding her power acquired through victimhood status in an attempt to curtail the freedoms of American citizens. I don’t want her writing gun laws any more than I would want Nicole Simpson’s family writing knife laws. Someone needs to tell the Congresswoman the truth and without apology.
I’ll close with this:
The price we pay to live in a free society often includes tragedies which are impossible to legislate away if freedom is to reign. This is why we CANNOT allow emotional legislators to give us emotional legislation. I don’t give a d*** about someone’s sensitivities when freedom is the cost.
Honestly if it weren’t coming from Congressman McCarthy, the issue would’ve indeed been recognized as a simple joke meant to express his particularly narrow sentiments with the rest of the Senate. But, seeing as how he seems to have a specifically reckless tongue, i.e. saying that President Obama “as an African-American male,” received “tremendous advantage” from government programs,” it can only be taken as what it really is, which is — extremely insensitive, and severely ignorant remarks from a supposedly respected member of the senior chamber of our Congress. #thatisall
What i do not realize is actually how you’re now not really a lot more neatly-preferred than you may be right now. You are very intelligent. You know thus significantly when it comes to this matter, produced me in my opinion imagine it from numerous varied angles. Its like women and men don’t seem to be interested except it?s something to do with Girl gaga! Your own stuffs nice. All the time handle it up!
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