Moving The Needle
The President was earnest and emphatic in his address. From his words and voice I could feel he wants to get something done. The question is, are his proposals ones that could bring two sides together?
The problem with guns is there is no easy answer. No one thing that people can look at and say that’s it. We have an estimated 400 million guns in the U.S. When events occur like this past week we want a solution.
Is the solution for 400 million guns or the few crazies that have them? How do you control that?
What the President proposed last night will not fly with the half opposing the President. The issue is far more complex. So what to do?
Here’s a recommendation for the President that goes beyond making a speech and then heading off to Delaware already for the weekend.
Use the power of your office.
Call in the top five leaders from both sides. Add gun advocates and lock the door. Adorn the room with headlines of the mass shootings we have witnessed. Have the message written, we are not here to take guns, we are here to prevent any more of these.
Then take an incident like Sandy Hook and ask what could have prevented it. Go one by one, examine each deranged killer and ask what could have prevented it. We have enough of them to be able to discuss and review.
When you have all the data, then look at the whole and decide what we can do.
We cannot solve this with political talking points and speeches. We need leadership. Stop the words and noise and get to work. if you do this you are going to find a combination of ideas from both sides is the answer.
And, the idea of suing a gun company because someone used their gun in crime is ridiculous. That says you aren’t serious and want to put them out of business. Would you allow a person to sue a car company for a drunken driver? My guess is you would say no, it was the drivers fault. Let’s be serious here.
When you finish that then do the same for illegal drugs. Since that number will be 100,000 this year, it doubles guns. Why do we not discuss that? In fact, almost 3% of all deaths in American are illegal drugs, and that per cent is growing.