Tim Murphy ... Shamefully Pandering to the National Rifle Association ... Even Now!

In a slap in the face to a grieving and outraged citizenry, U.S. Rep. Tim Murphy had the audacity to be quoted in a local newspaper as saying that he does not want to “get distracted” by gun control. 

So according to Rep. Murphy, we ignore the menace of a virtually unlimited right to acquire an arsenal of high-powered weapons and ammunition that are designed to mow down human beings in rapid fire, we set aside the notion that high-powered guns helped to facilitate the Newtown, CT atrocity and other such crimes that were perpetrated with similar ease and speed?

Murphy makes the point that deficient mental health is the driver of such heinous crimes, and certainly it is a significant issue among many factors, none of which may be ignored if safety is the goal. Let us look at a host of potential causes of our homicide epidemic: untreated mental illness, the rot promulgated by the “entertainment” industry, which make us a more coarse, crude, and disrespectful society, violent video games which desensitize the player to killing, and absolutely: guns.

If our “leaders” continue to kowtow to the National Rifle Association (NRA) and decline to enact sensible restrictions on high-powered weapons and large-capacity magazines, fail to lower the boom on unregistered sales of firearms from gun shows, and allow gunrunners to distribute large quantities of lethal weapons through imposing no limit on the number of firearms that may be acquired, then the deaths of all of the innocent victims of Newtown, CT will have been in vain.

For better or worse, then-President George W. Bush spoke to the leaders of other nations regarding the war on terror in the aftermath of the dastardly attack on our nation of 11 September 2001, saying,“You’re either with us or against us.” We should now similarly throw down the gauntlet to our elected officials as they react to the Newtown infamy. Do they side with the now curiously-silent and invisible NRA or with those who wish to undertake everything reasonably possible within the Second Amendment to ensure that they and their children can feel safe when venturing to any public place?

To those who claim that raisiing the issue of guns in the days following the massacre is somehow "exploiting" the atrocity, I would ask how attempting to ensure public safety is exploiting anything, and, "If not now, while the iron of outrage is hot, when?"

How would the right of any firearm owner to hunt or to protect his or her home be abridged by enacting modest measures to attempt to ensure that we do not make the task of killing easy for homicidal maniacs?  

Rep. Murphy is a father and a psychologist. His latest instance of pandering should cause him to feel ashamed and the public must not stand for it.