Wayne? Meet Ryan...

Sometimes, in this world of YouTube and Twitter and Facebook, of 24-hour news cycles and the ten-second sound bite, we occasionally decry the fact that anything and everything can be out there for the world to see and hear nearly instantaneously, and that once it is out there, it's out there forever.

However, there are times when this state of affairs does a service to society, because anyone with access to a computer and the Internet can go back and confirm exactly what was said, and when, and why.

This is one of those time.

As you probably remember, back on December 21, Wayne LaPierre, the executive director of the National Rifle Association, stood up at a news conference and said, "The only thing that stops a bad buy with a gun is a good guy with a gun." Here is the quote, at the 1:11 point in this clip:



Notice the emphasis on the word "only", and the number of times he uses it during this part of his message. La Pierre clearly wants us to believe that more guns are the only answer to things like school shootings.

Now, here is another clip, with two California law enforcement officers speaking in the aftermath of yet another school shooting, just last Thursday, at Taft Union High School, in Taft, California:



In case you didn't hear this story, a student showed up on campus at Taft High oon Thursday morning with a shotgun and a grudge, looking for two other students who he claimed had bullied him. He shot one student, but quick-thinking science teacher Ryan Heber, with the help of another school employee, managed to distract the student with the firearm long enough to let the other students flee the room and then talked the student into putting down his shotgun.

Now, there is another aspect to the story. According to local news reports, there is ordinarily an armed officer on campus at Taft High. Ordinarily. However, that officer was not at the school...some stories have said that he was not able to get to work because he was snowed in. Whatever the reason, he was not there. The teacher was there. The teacher was not armed, and yet he managed to keep that student from using all of the at least 20, according to reports, shotgun shells he had in his pockets.

So, there were injuries. That is indisputable. But, it is also indisputable that Wayne La Pierre's statement, that the only thing that can stop a gunman is a gunman, is inaccurate. One would hope that La Pierre would learn from this that very few things are as absolute as he would have us beleive.

Honestly, I don't hold out too much hope for La Pierre. He is, after all, a shill for US firearms manufacturers, and his plan is clearly a ploy not to protect school children so much as to generate sales for his masters. The take-away for the rest of us, however, should be that the solution to violence is not more violence, and that the solution to guns is schools is not more guns in schools.

I'm not sure why this is such a difficult concept for some people to grasp.

Waving goodbye to 2012...

Out of all the year, this is the week I hate the most.

The week between Christmas and New Year's Day has always seemed to me to be a huge waste of time. It's like the world is holding its breath waiting for the new year to begin. Nothing gets accomplished, really. Human nature being what it is, with two holidays (well, four, since Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve have taken on the status of holidays as well) just a week apart, a lot of people spend the week talking about how their Christmas was and looking forward to whatever big New Year's Eve party they are attending.

It has seemed to be even worse than usual this year, so far at least. I imagine part of that has to do with the fact that I've been sick since before Christmas. I started noticing the first symptoms of the Cold from Hell a couple of days before Christmas, and I'm still sick, although today is the first day that I haven't felt absolutely wretched.

Another factor contributing to my feeling about the week is fallout from being sick: I've spent a lot of time in front of the TV because I haven't felt like doing anything else. It seems like that year-in-review thing that they do in the media in the last couple of days of the year has been going on all week long. At least on MSNBC, which is my cable talking heads channel of choice, that's nearly all they've been doing. Today, of course, they've been forced to report some news, with the drama over whether Congress is going to act in time to avoid the economy going all to hell again, but that has barely slowed down the endless procession of year-end commentary. Although, I have to say that I'm watching "The Last Word" right now, and they've been managing to keep things interesting. Too bad the rest haven't been able to keep up.

Now, this isn't to say that I don't think there are things that went on during the year that bear further discussion. It was an election year after all, with all that entails. I especially think the recent statement from one of Mitt Romney's sons that Mitt really didn't want to run for president at all bears further examination and comment. The war on women was no fluke born of election hyperbole; I don't think it has slowed down at all, and we will need to talk more about that. Partly associated with that, the Tea Party is still with us despite the outcome of the election in November, and they aren't going to go without a fight. We'll be talking about that whole phenomenon further, I'm sure. And then there's gun control. It was the subject no one wanted to talk about during the election campaigns, but because of recent events in Connecticut and in upstate New York most notably among other events, it has become clear that we, as a nation, are going to have to tackle that issue, and soon.

But, my big year-in-review to come before the new year will be my review of the books I read this year. Since Sunday is Music Sunday and Monday is Movie Monday and Tuesday is 2013, I suspect that I'll do that tomorrow unless something happens between now and then that needs attention.

Now, if somebody would do a big show with notable people talking about the best books they're read this year, the best movies they've seen, and the best music they've listened to...I would definintely watch that.