Calloused and single minded assholes like the leaders of the NRA will always tell you that now is not the time, during this great tragedy in which another homicidal maniac unleashed a hail of bullets upon innocents in a senseless slaughter – that now is not the time to talk about gun control.  They couldn’t be more wrong.

While the nation prays and sends it condolences to the victims and community in Newtown, Connecticut, it should also be having a frank conversation about gun violence and gun control while the families and loved ones of the victims grieve together in what what must be an unimaginable hell.  We can offer our heartfelt empathy, but these victims and the inevitable future victims of gun violence in this country deserve more from the rest of us, who at this moment, have the luxury of suffering their tragedy from a distance.  Those of us not directly effected by this current tragedy should have the courage and will power to stand up for common sense gun control, particularly, closing the so called ‘gun show loop hole.’

There are many areas of gun control that need addressing, but I am going to stick to the most obvious, sensible gun control that a simple majority of Americans should be able to agree on.  At the time of this writing, the news continues to change on the facts and details as more information becomes available, but it appears right now, that the guns of the killer belonged to the mother, a gun enthusiast, and that the guns were all legally purchased.  This is surely a fact that right wing nut jobs will jump on, claiming with their typical rhetoric that laws can’t prevent criminals from acquiring guns. Anti-gun people will say that people should not be allowed to own weapons capable of such carnage, by limiting the type of weapon and the ammunition capacity of gun clips, and there is plenty of evidence to argue for this point as well.  But let’s take this moment, while we are reflecting on gun violence as a whole in this country, and focus on what could be done most immediately, such as closing the gun show loop hole.  This may not have prevented this tragedy, but it stands to reason that this simple common sense approach to regulating guns by requiring that anyone who buys one must pass a background check, no bullshit gun show laws tolerated anymore.  This is something that the majority of Americans should be able to agree on as a starting point.  I am including this short, informative, less than four minute video explaining what the gun show loophole is, and hoping that in our emotional and intellectual, philosophical and political conversation, we can at least agree that to some extent, guns need to be controlled.  They should not be readily available and easy to stockpile and wage a one man crazy war against the innocent.  We will never completely cure mental illness and evil in our society, but we should at least be able to limit their access to weapons, as well as limiting the access that criminal gangs and organizations in our big cities and the drug cartels in Mexico enjoy thanks to the gun show loophole.

Please, share this video with friends and family and don’t be distracted by old NRA bullshit about ‘guns don’t kill, people kill,’ or that God allows such violence in schools because officially lead prayer was removed.  We can stand up as a nation to the special interests of the gun lobby and still protect the constitutional right to bear arms without having to let everyone that can spit and drag their knuckles to posses a military grade firearm.

Here is the video, and a special thanks to a politician I admire and respect but sometimes disagree with, Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City, who has devoted considerable time and effort to control the trafficking of illegal guns in our society: