Uncle Bill
We have a gun loving guy at the Beauty Shop who pitches a wall eyed snot nosed hissy fit any time I mention that Jim Bob does not need an AK47.
Even though I am a gun owner – a rifle – he thinks I’m what’s wrong with Texas and why Democrats can’t win here.
He goes by the handle of Uncle Bill—-
I got this comment from him on this post shortly after the shooting started this morning
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. It would seem from the comments here that democrats are as closed minded as the republicans. Do y’all really want to define the party as just against that “evil black rifle” the governor owns. If you assume that only republicans enjoy the shooting sports, you are making a mistake. A democrat can’t even be elected dog catcher in most of Texas now and you folks want to alienate another voting group. It’s going to take a diverse party to make Texas a two party state again and that is not going to happen by calling an inanimate object “evil” because the governor owns one or because a nutcase uses one for evil. Let the flaming begin!!
I did not approve it because I didn’t think it was appropriate while little helpless children in America were dodging bullets at school.
But, Uncle Bill was not to be deterred. Thirty minutes later I get this from him as a comment.
LOL!! Censored me!! How democratic of you!!
Children were being shot and killed.
I emailed him at the email address on his comment at 12:01.
There is a gunman in an elementary school this morning shooting at little children. No, I will not publish your asinine comments while children are being shot. If it takes losing Texas elections to save the lives of innocent shoppers and little kids, then enjoy your damn victory.I am a gun owner and a fifth generation Texan. This is my microphone. I paid for it. Shove it.
He sent another comment at 12:20
Way to go, you are doing a great job keep Texas a red state. Never mind that the governor has messed with birth control, poor people and kids education. The best you can do is piss off a large number of democrats who don’t buy into the idea that they would be safer with a knife than with a gun. For a group that claims to be educated, you don’t seem to understand that the more people you are willing to throw under the bus, the fewer people who will support you.
Don’t worry, I won’t bother trying to voice an opinion on this forum again. I have learned my lesson. It’s funny, when I go to the range and tell my shooting buddies that I voted for Obama, they tease me, but we are still friends.
Uncle Bill
He has been put on the blacklisted list.
These gun nuts are nuts.
We have no choice but to fight them before they kill us all, and say it’s for freedom.
Nick Anderson / Houston Chronicle
When I see news about another shooting rampage in this country, I turn the page. I just can’t keep getting worked up every week about yet another mass murder. All it does is raise my blood pressure.
I’m sorry for the victims and their families and friends, but this will stop when Americans want it to stop and not before.
1I am convinced that the media attention given to these murderers is a huge draw for the scum. They think they will be idolized, like Billy the Kid. They’ve been fed the milk of human ego, and weaned on “self esteem”. They should have been disciplined: some of them should have been starved. Short of pre-emptive murder, what can we do?
2Bud likes the part about “shove it”.
3How many small children have to die every year for Uncle Bill and his easily frightened little friends to feel all masculine?
We also own guns, have no problem with requiring background checks, think it is a waste of bullets (and inept skills) to use large clips, and believe training is essential. Wayne la Pierre can go pound sand.
4Ah, JJ, I live in western Connecticut, less than an hour from where this is going on. The Uncle Bills of the country are shrieking already that teachers need to have guns. That’s just wrong! Guns would have to be locked up anyway around children. I feel so sick. 18 LITTLE kids killed. Until we can get the guns away from the crazies, maybe we need to set up metal detectors. I can’t get into the county building to pay my business taxes without going through a metal detector.
5Which gun nuts? Uncle Bill didn’t do this and just expressed his opinion on the politics of Democrats vs Guns. Is he one of “those gun nuts”? Am I? Are you going to fight me and Uncle Bill before we “kill you all”?
To TexasEllen: I am nobody’s “easily frightened little friend” and don’t feel “all masculine” upon the murder of innocent children in a school by a twisted fruitcake. How dare you.
The source of the problem is not guns, it is crazy people. Start now, this instant, to debate how to identify and defang these monsters rather than defame people you dont know and we will all be better off.
6The 2nd amendment as I understand it was meant to be a defensive measure, and I have no problem with people who defend the amendment on that basis. When people want to talk about their right to bear arms after a school shooting, an elementary school shooting – – it’s just offensive.
7We just seem to be doing a really piss poor job…… of keeping guns out of the hands of people who have no business in the world with a gun……..
And letting responsible gun owners hunt quail, duck, deer, whatever….
Until we get that part figured out……. maybe desperate times do call for some desperate measures ……. so that elementary school kids don’t get murdered….
I don’t know the answer. I do know the question is: “How many more people have to die….. before something is done?”
Is it really anybody’s Second Amendment right to murder innocent children???
8I am quoting a comedian (maybe Chris Rock) who said, fine, everyone can have a gun, but make bullets cost $5000. a piece! There will be no “accidental” shootings. No spraying the cafeteria.
9I own a gun and I’m responsible with it. I have no issue at all with governmental controls — just like there are controls with another lethal machine, the automobile. License, registration on the gun, license and registration on the owner. Chris Rock has an idea worth considering — make everybody own a gun but charge $5,000 each for bullets.
10This was yet another in a long string of situations brought on by unassuagable anger and frustration, and probably helplessness. The alleged perpetrator is 20 years old and probably was in a custody/child support battle. 27 to the nth families are grieving. Christmas presents will never be opened and have to be dealt with. Some are now orphaned. This is because we won’t pay a living wage, we won’t help these people that are a crisis looking for a venue, and why? So that rich people can get richer and gloat. So CEOs can make 500 or 600 times what their underlings make.
I don’t know what the answer is but it’s not more guns. And it’s not extending tax cuts for people who think their sh@t is gold plated either. And I think the Church ALMOST had it for a shining moment – and lost it again. It’s not hate; it’s not self centered consumerism. You can’t buy it and you can’t legislate it. All of a sudden I am very sad and weary…
11Someone on Twitter made this good point: ONE jackass tries to light his shoe & every American has to take their shoes off at airports. Mass gun violence & there’s nothing we can do
12By now you all must know the shooter is a Ryan Lanza from New Jersey, 24 years old … not 20 … his mother was killed and then he turned the gun on her classroom children … children 6 to 10 years old were killed … 18 of them! Someone at the family home was also killed … I don’t know who that was … perhaps the father … I don’t know.
It is a sad day for this country and it just gets sadder with every murdering rampage that goes on and idiots like Uncle Bill do not help the matter one iota!
President Obama cried as he addressed the nation over this tragedy … I cried and I was not the only one who has cried for the senselessness of what is going on in this country and around the world!! Gov. Hickenlooper in CO is to speak to whomever regardling some kind of gun control today … but the Righties in CO will go down clutching both their guns and their Bibles … It is a sad, sad day!!
13I just heard on the TV that it is 20 children, 6 adults and the shooter himself = 27 all toll!
14Just had this conversation with a coworker. She doesn’t want any gun control (because then only criminals will have guns). I said that I want to minimize the damage that idiots will cause. I want a waiting period with proper vetting and areas that you are not allowed to concealed carry in. I want the internet ordering taken away. I want some type of check so we can weed out the obviously irresponsible (if not outright dangerous) folks out. We can’t control everything, but we can minimize the damage. That’s what gun control is. It’s not gun banning (though I see no need for folks not in a combat situation to have fully automatic heavy weapons). She was equating gun control with gun banning, and when I explained what I want, she agreed.
Why can’t we have some control of guns without a cracker Uncle Bill screaming “No, no, I wants them my precioussss! You can’t take its away from me, no you cants my preciousss! You can’t tell me what to do with my precioussss!” Why can’t we find a local lava pit to dump these losers into?
15In a civilized society, guns would not be needed….unfortunately we are not civilized.
It is estimated that 99.9% of all species that have ever lived on this planet have gone extinct. I do not see us doing anything to better those odds.
16Sorry … now I just heard someone else on TV say that it is 18 children, 6 adults, and the shooter plus the body of whomever it is at the family home. Two children are at the hospital and, I believe I heard the speaker say these two did not survive … it is just too gruesome!
Sorry to take up so much space …
17Oh noes, Uncle Bill…Censorship! I want to whine, I want to say stupid things and you won’t let me do it on your website…You’re undemocratic for telling me to shut up by not approving whatever I write.
18Yeah, Cal, if you believe we can keep semi-automatic weapons out of the hands of crazy people, then you are a gun nut. Or maybe just a plain nut.
Why don’t we let everyone have nuclear material? It’s safe as long as it’s in good hands. You can’t blame the nuclear material possession laws if someone lets it out in a school yard. Or how about smallpox? Let’s let everyone have a box of smallpox. It can’t hurt people and we have a right to it.
How thick is your skull? Why the hell do you need an automatic weapon?
19I agree with grammy97. We put so much media attention on the perpetrator that some see glory. We must wait for the police to do thier jobs so we have some sense of what happened. Grieve for the lost lives now. Come up with solutions when we have a good plan and clear heads.
20It is obvious to anyone who isn’t in full denial mode that we can not stop lunatics from shooting up schools, shopping malls, theaters, and anyone who their delusional psyche thinks is behind the voices in their heads unless we stop lunatics from obtaining rapid-fire/semi-automatic weapons and magazines that hold more than half a dozen rounds. Furthermore, since there is no way to tell when someone who seemed to be normal a few minutes ago will turn into a stark, raving, shooting lunatic then all of us as citizens have to agree that such weapons are not covered by the 2nd amendment anymore than Juanita Jean’s tactical nuclear warhead is.
But you can be sure that the NRA (a.k.a. the National Gun Manufacturers Association) will surely be out there — probably on tonight’s news but certainly no later than tomorrow — telling us that the faculty should have been armed so that they could have shot back at the lunatic.
21This has to be addressed.
22Not today and maybe not tomorrow, but no more crap from the NRA and republicans.
They are the death panels in this country. They are condemning all of us that want to live safely and quietly in this country at risk so the Uncle Bob’s of this country can wave their yahoos and feel like men.
My yellow dog Democrat cousin in west Tayuksis has guns and is a member of the NRA. We just don’t talk about it. We had guns on the ranch but just for shootin’ varmints of the four legged variety. I don’t know what we ever did with the guns but they didn’t make it to town with us.
23My news feed is slow 🙂 Brine CS y’all! The first swing was 20 years old from NJ and his kid was among the victims. Strike one: all wrong! So we now have a 24 year old from new jersey whose mama and most of her little charges have been executed, plus a nameless other person. Thanks for the corrections, I’m sure KBTX will get more soon. The rest of my sad little rant still stands. And Cal may be ok but Uncle Bill is just a nasty provocateur no matter who he voted for. But @Cal, I just don’t think people outside of a well regulated militia ought to have these killing machines. You know, with proper training and all that stuff? And regular practice? Perhaps we can discuss it. But I know an awful lot of guys that use their big loud trucks and their fancy guns as some sort of prop to their manhood, so ease up on TxEllen already – maybe VT men are different; I hope they are smarter!
24JJ: I fully agree – your site & you can block anyone you feel is inappropriate. “Shove it” works.
My father-in-law gave me a .22 pistol & taught me to shoot back in 1966… just in case one of those Black Panthers busted through the door. Later I joined a ROTC Rifle Club at the University & got to be a pretty good shot, but never owned one nor went hunting. I gave the pistol back because it was just too tempting to kill my cheating husband with it. Never occurred to me to use a knife, which was much handier, and that was when I realized that a gun carries out a vast array of emotions… unrelated to hunting or defense of hearth & home.
There’s a simple reason that U.S. gun sales have skyrocketed since Obama was elected – FEAR. Whoever said we “have nothing to fear, but fear itself” was absolutely correct.
25Btw… my EX-husband’s father was a member of the John Birch Society. My Ex hated guns & hunting, but now he owns semi-automatic pistols & an AR-15 & never goes anywhere without one on his person (with a CCW permit) – because he’s 70 & full of fear. Funny, when we lived in the midst of rioting for civil rights, he wasn’t scared at all!
26@Don A – Yes, the NRA will probably think arming the teachers is a great solution to the problem. Maybe they can also donate body armor for every child of school age to wear, so the kids won’t be wounded in the crossfire.
27Hello, Juanita Jean. I am neither a gun nut nor a plain nut. I wish I had taken rhetoric and logic courses when I had the chance years ago because to my untutored eye, some of the things said so far would not bear scrutiny in a reasoned forum. Not yours, certainly, but the one that must come if we are to progress beyond heated words and pointless invective. My skull isn’t any thicker than any other liberal Democrat in my neighborhood. And I never spoke to my need for an automatic weapon.
Thank you for your limited endorsement, Aggieland liz. For my part, training and better screening tools for prospective gun owners would be a good thing in my view. Perhaps Juanita Jean can put us in touch!
Don A, the NRA needs to stop stirring caca and going to conventions on corporate jets to get drunk and stoned and coochied and get talked nice to by fat cat big shots in swell hospitality suites, all on the memberships dime, and start spending their money on training regimens and certifications and national licensure and take the lead on this crap.
And TexasEllen, you should know that Mrs. Cal thought I should not have talked rude to you this afternoon and so I apologize. Your voice is important, too.
Now it’s off to Mrs. Cal’s work Christmas party where I am sure many opinions will be shared. See all y’all later!
28Random thoughts…
Crazy people and criminals will find a way to hurt people. This is true. However, with lesser weapons, they will hurt fewer people, work harder to do it, and get caught faster.
A reasonable background check and waiting period would cut down on impulse murder. By the time a gun could be obtained, a first fit of temper should have passed, for sane people, leaving only the crazy people and criminals. Wouldn’t this be a good first step? If I can’t get the perfect, I’ll take the good.
Nobody ever died of a drive by knifing.
As a society, we’re insanely obsessed with fame. Watch reality tv, if you’re in doubt. How many of these are plotted and done for the notoriety? And why don’t we ever notice that the notoriety only lasts a few weeks? The perpetrators remain in death the pitiful nonentities that they were in life, save the 15 minutes until they’re knocked off the news by a pantyless starlet or a monkey in a shearling jacket. Stop watching and perpetrating this stuff, and let it die of lack of ratings.
29I don’t believe that shooters who also shoot themselves are looking for fame. They are generally on something or in need of psychiatric care and/or anger management. The unfortunate thing is that they can still get guns. If we did away with all of the guns in this country, people like this shooter would still kill others. I am not pro-gun. I abhor the idea of everybody in America packing heat and openly. I don’t believe that ordinary citizens should be able to purchase AK-47’s and other weapons of a similar nature. But I also believe that the kind of unbalanced mind that sets out to shoot up a school or shopping mall is almost impossible to identify before the horrifying event occurs no matter how many “little” signs have been visible. The disturbing thing to me is how many of these unbalanced minds are among us these days.
30How long before some gun nut says that if the kindergarten kids could pack heat they could have protected their teacher? Wait for it – it’s coming.
31JJ, your 4:27 post hits the nail, if not square on the head, just enough to keep the lid down tight.
Ellen: I agree with you & expect TV to provide quite a few psych experts to opine on the matter… once again, as if they didn’t already cover that issue following the Aurora shooting.
Dysfunctional minds come in all forms from all types of families. My heart goes out to the shooter’s family because they will suffer the rest of their lives, wondering if, when & how they could have prevented such a tragedy at the hands of THEIR loved one.
Bottom line here is – guns kill as do knives & blunt objects; however, automatic weapons kill greater numbers of people at one time. So perhaps we could address that issue first for purposes of a more reasoned discussion of what needs to be done as a matter of priority.
32My firstborn, a “former” Marine trained in lots of weaponry, is a teacher. This hurts in deep places.
33Oops… meant Judith, not JJ, @ 4:27. Gettin’ old is hell!
34As for pricing bullets at $5000, I suggested that once and was told that bullets aren’t that hard to make in a home workshop.
Guns don’t kill, people do– guns just make it easy.
35The NRA’s twitter feed has fallen silent as of 6 hours ago. Surprisingly, they’ve left up some recent comments – –
36https://twitter.com/NRA/status/279595831961722880
I believe in owning guns. I do not, personally, see the need for owning big guns but I have friends who do. They enjoy firing them on their own property at inanimate objects with a berm behind them. They have no near neighbors and they clean up after themselves to protect the land.
I do not believe guns should be owned without education. You have to take a test to drive a car, why not for gun ownership?
It’s been 30 years or so since I fired any of my guns. Hope I never have to since the one most likely to be fired is next to my bed for possible intruders (I been the victim of a stalker twice). When I was shooting, it was at paper targets and tin cans. My daddy taught me range safety before I was even allowed to touch one, and more lessons before I was allowed to move up to the next gun. Even toy guns were never pointed at people.
Many of my friends believe differently than me. It encourages lively discussion. The day of a mass murder is not the day for such a discussion. My God look after the families and may the media stop sensationalizing them.
37Well, Uncle Bill would be comforted or confounded by me, wouldn’t he? I DO prefer knives. They don’t make noise and alarm the neighbors when used on an asshat sneaking into your house at night WITH a gun….but not many brains.
I have a septic tank, too.
I am so sick of any kind of nutcase being able to pursue their happiness or lack thereof by killing people so easily.
38There is no way in hell we are ever going to have any kind of gun control. There are already too many guns in too many places, who knows where.
39These mass shootings are the result of some kind of mental disorder that is unknown to the family and community who knows the murderer. I have believed for years that the citizens of the USA are in the grips of some mass mental illness. Instead of pissing in the wind for something that will never happen, why don’t we educate ourselves and our families and friends on recognizing mental illness?
We talked about this at work. No one, not even the Rs, could figure out what anyone needs with an assault rifle.
I just found out I have relative in Newtown with kids in that school. All physically safe, fortunately.
40Our safety is not determined by how well armed we are, but how well armed our enemies are.
If we can’t disarm the enemies of civility, we can never be safe no matter how well armed we are.
41What I like is how the NRA is stepping right up to deal forthrightly with today’s tragedy – http://www.nra.org.
Oh … you say that you checked out the NRA link and didn’t find anything there? Hmm … isn’t that interesting …
42I taught school for 35 years and have substituted in kindergarten classes since my retirement. Unless you have stood in front of a classroom with 20 five year olds sitting at your feet, you can’t understand the horror of what happened today. If you can feel what I do right now, there won’t be any argument that we have to do whatever it takes to stop this violence against our children. They were babies. There can be only one side in this discussion. All our hearts should be broken as mine is.
43Obviously, what we need to do is to make sure every kindergarten kid carries a handgun in their backpack and has a second one in their desk. That way, they could have been armed and protected themselves from this nut…..arm everyone! There’s an answer that I expect all the Tea Party nuts to promote. Didn’t we have an item here from some Vermont nut advocating a new tax on people who refuse to carry guns earlier this week. He claimed they cost us money by not having guns. So, let’s extend his stupidity to five year olds.
44Some decades ago, when my town was going through a growth spurt, and we were all in the midst of the Bush the First depression, I had just moved into a run-down house in a neighborhood that held promise of gentrification.
Our town police department was understaffed. I was sitting in the parlor one cold winter evening, reading, when someone (probably a homeless person) tried to break into the house through the window. (The details are very funny–but lengthy so I won’t get into them here.) I called 911 and got a busy signal.
The next day I bought a .38 revolver. We’ve always owned guns in my family, and if I couldn’t stop somebody with a .38 I’d feel too incompetent to own a gun.
45This may be a simple, and not a complete solution, but outlaw bulletproof vests. There is no reason for anyone other than military or law enforcement to own one.
46When the Second Amendment was written, the weapon of choice was a musket. Yep, the one you had to load with a ramrod after every ball was shot from it. I suggest we go back to that, ban everything but one-shot weapons, and leave the automatic stuff to the military and the police.
I am not, and never have been, a parent. That doesn’t mean I can’t put myself in the place of those tonight having to arrange funerals for their babies. I have too many friends who have had to do that, for a variety of reasons and at a variety of ages–from stillborn to adult. Could there be anything worse? I don’t think so. To cause that kind of misery–deliberately–is beyond my comprehension.
47I would say someone is a gun nut if they say the solution is more guns. Having guns and training did not help the four cops killed by Maurice Clemmons.
How about more services for the mentally ill? It seems like every time there is a mass shooting, it turns out the guy had some serious problems. I am sure that a lot of conservatives would say it socialism, but then to them what isn’t? Why do some people think that “more guns” is the ONLY answer?
48I first heard about this at lunch today. I had 20 minutes to get it together before I picked up my class. Later I looked at all my precious 8 year olds working on their math papers and the enormity of today just hit me. I started to cry—told the kids I had allergies. They all got big hugs from me today and I told them their teacher loved them.
49I have a cousin who claims to have been diagnosed with bipolar disorder – she got a concealed carry license in Texas. I have no clue what the requirements are to acquire a license, nor am I interested in getting one, but this is wrong on so many levels. I find the “need” to carry a weapon on one’s person ludicrous, that is just my personal opinion, but for someone with a diagnosed imbalance of brain function to LEGALLY have one on their person is insane. I’m with crone!
50