On her MSNBC program last night, Rachel Maddow warned people who were personally affected by the mass murder in Newtown, Connecticut that they might want to change the channel as new information has been made public about the tragedy. Via The Raw Story:

The Hartford Courant reported Wednesday that the shooter, Adam Lanza, fired a total of 152 bullets in less than 5 minutes, killing 20 young children and 6 adults. Lanza used a Bushmaster AR-15 semiautomatic rifle and had 30-round magazines. As Maddow noted, he only needed to reload his weapon four times before killing himself with a pistol.

“Had he only had access to ten-round magazines instead of 30-round magazines he would’ve had to reload 14 times,” she continued. “He would’ve needed 14 spare magazines beyond the one in the gun with the extra round in the chamber. Reloading 14 times. You think he would’ve still pulled off the whole thing in less than five minutes?”

Contemplate that for a moment. I don’t ever think there’s ever going to be a time when guns won’t be a part of American life, but this cuts straight to the heart of the matter about allowing semi-automatic weapons as a society.

As someone who was born and raised in rural West Virginia, I grew up in a household where there were guns. Guns for protection, my father isn’t a hunter. He’s not really a gun “enthusiast” in any way, really, but he’s got a few. Considering where my parents live, it did then and it still makes total sense to me why my father would want to have a gun around the house for an emergency situation—it would take the sheriff at least 30 minutes to get to their house. In a life or death situation, frankly, I can well understand wanting to own a firearm for protection, but especially if you live way out in the boonies.

In the American spectrum of opinion, on most matters, I would describe myself to the far, far left. On the matter of gun control, however, I’d describe myself as almost “neutral,” but can anyone tell me why in the world any civilian would need to own an weapon that can fire a fucking 30-round magazine for ANY PURPOSE OTHER THAN KILLING A LOT OF PEOPLE IN A VERY SHORT TIME FRAME?

I’m truly not an anti-gun person, but the NRA and its little bitches, the GOP, have got to scale one hell of a logical precipice to make a better argument than is made here.  I mean, seriously, come the fuck on, WHO NEEDS A BAZOOKA???? This is getting ridiculous…

I think Michael Moore is right: If the country saw photos of those dead kids in CT, the ban on semi-automatic weapons would be all but assured and there would be nothing the NRA or the Republicans could do about it.
 

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