A Texas school worker is accidentally shot during a weapons training class. "The class was part of an effort to permit teachers to carry firearms on [Van Independent School District] campuses," the report tells us. See, the person who did the shooting will soon be carrying a loaded weapon to "protect" school kids. This is not off to the best start and you hope against hope that this boneheaded program doesn't lead to a tragic -- and entirely predictable -- end.
The Senate Judiciary Committee delays action on several gun control measures for a week, in order to try to rally support for a renewed assault weapons ban. It doesn't bode well for the AR ban, but other measures seem to stand a better chance. In any case, public support on the issue is high enough to guarantee that this won't be the only chance to get gun regulations through the goalposts. If it's a long trek, then it's a long trek -- but we'll get it done. It used to be that lobbying by state Tavern Leagues kept drunk driving penalties lax, but years and years of pressure from citizens and the stories of family loss got laws against drunk driving where they are today. Defanging the NRA could be a similarly long term -- but eminently doable -- project.
Bloomberg Businessweek apologizes for a seriously racist magazine cover.
Wow. National Review Online writes a sexist and racist rebuttal to a New York Times piece about the struggles of victims of rape in the military. Why? Because it seemed like a good opportunity to attack feminism. I shit you not.
Democratic congressman and civil rights hero John Lewis has a few words for Supreme Court Justice Scalia about freedom, the Voting Rights Act, and Scalia's racist theories about "racial entitlements."
The White House files a brief urging the Supreme Court to strike down California's homophobic anti-marriage equality law.
Ohio dem Senator Sherrod Brown would very much like to begin a much-needed round of trust-busting. Too big to fail = too big to exist.
Wisconsin GOP Rep. Sean Duffy continues to be one of the most clownish House Republicans. Asked if he supported a bill that would require women to undergo completely unnecessary trans-vaginal ultrasounds, Duffy said he didn't know what a trans-vaginal ultrasound was. "I haven't had one," he said.
Family Research Council's Tony Perkins goes fullblown antisemitic. Did I mention that FRC spends a lot of time denying they're a hate group? Yeah, they can go ahead stop that now.
Finally, a conservative polling outfit finds -- as every other poll has so far -- that the public will blame Republicans for the sequester more than President Obama and that the public doesn't have a lot of appetite for deep spending cuts. Comments the pollster, "These are desperate times for fiscal conservatives."
[cartoon via Cagle Cartoons]
