Saturday, March 31, 2018

BRAVO: 13 COMPANIES WITHDRAW ADVERTISING FROM LAURA INGRAHAM SHOW


  
Thirteen companies have heeded Parkland survivor’s (David Hogg) call to withdraw advertising from the Laura Ingraham show after she belittled Hogg’s being turned down by colleges. You don’t get much lower than Ingraham’s decision to go on national television and ridicule a 17-year-old survivor of a school shooting. When is Fox news going to fire her?

Here are the 13 companies who have withdrawn advertising from her show:

            1.  Wayfair
            2.  Expedia
            3.  NestlĂ©
            4.  Atlantis
            5.  Stitch Fix
            6.  Hulu
            7.  Trip Advisor
            8.  Nutrish
            9.  Liberty Mutual
            10. Johnson and Johnson
            11. Office Max
            12. Jenny Craig

            13. Ruby Tuesday

Thursday, March 29, 2018

BOYCOTT ALL ADVERTISERS OF LAURA INGRAHAM'S SHOW


Apparently after getting a ticket for double-parking her broom, Laura Ingraham (vacuous radical right-wing extremist) took her anger out by belittled the fact that Parkland school survivor, David Hogg, was turned down by four universities. When you have limited ability to reason, no moral compass, andA  low IQ, what is left—only sarcasm as well as ridicule of a high school boy and survivor of a high school shooting. Here is her tweet:

David Hogg Rejected By Four Colleges To Which He Applied and whines about it. (Dinged by UCLA with a 4.1 GPA...totally predictable given acceptance rates.)

Please boycott all sponsors of the Laura Ingraham show who have not withdrawn their advertising:
Sleepnumber
AT&T
Nutrish—withdrew advertising
Expedia—withdrew advertising
Allstate
Bayer
Rocket Mortgage
Wayfair
Liberty Mutual
Arby’s
NestlĂ©—withdrew advertising
Huhu
Trip Advisor—withdrew advertising

   

Saturday, March 24, 2018

MY COMMENTS TO THE MARCHERS TODAY IN KILMARNOCK

MARCH FOR OUR LIVES
David Cariens
March 24, 2018
Kilmarnock, Virginia

Thank all of you for coming today in support of the Parkland students’ initiative to stop gun violence and the horrific epidemic of school shootings plaguing our nation.

The students at Parkland are inspiring; they are showing us the way. The students at Parkland are right; we have failed to keep our schools safe—we have failed miserably. Time and time again, we have wept, we have wrong our hands in disbelief, but we have done little to keep guns out of the hands of those who are threat to themselves and others. As a result, the bodies pile up—students, faculty, concerts goers, and moviegoers—the carnage continues and the self-proclaimed greatest nation on earth sits on its hands seemingly paralyzed and incapable of action.

From Columbine, to the Appalachian School of Law, to Virginia Tech, to Sandy Hook, to a nightclub in Orlando or a concert in Las Vegas, and now a high school in Parkland, Florida, the killings multiply.

While gun manufacturers and the National Rifle Association buy our politicians and stifle laws to make our schools safer, other nation’s act. Australia, Canada, and Great Britain all have laws to keep guns out of the hands of those who are a threat to themselves and others, to keep weapons away from terrorists—and make no mistake about it—shootings in schools or any public place are a form of domestic terrorism. The countries I just mentioned are not dictatorships—their citizens have the same rights we have. And most important, these countries have a fraction of the gun violence we have.

Don’t believe the lies spouted by the Second Amendment extremists. Sensible gun laws are compatible with our freedoms. I would remind you, all the Amendments to the Constitution have limits—we are guaranteed freedom of speech, but I cannot stand here and swear like a drunken sailor—the law does not permit it. Nowhere does the Second Amendment give anyone the right to take someone else’s life just for the hell of it. Nowhere does the Second Amendment give anyone the right to take a gun, and because of real or imagined insults, go into public spaces and slaughter people.

Furthermore, other Amendments to the Constitutions are not used to guarantee profits for any industry—only the Second Amendment is exploited to spur gun sales and make wealthy gun manufacturers richer.

There is an unhealthy obsession with gun rights in this country and after each massacre the media concentrates on the rights of citizens to own guns. Rarely is there talk about the rights of those who have been killed. What about their rights? If you want to talk about the rights the founding fathers gave us, then ok let’s talk. What about the opening line of the Declaration of Independence laying out the rights we all have, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by the Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

There is a saying, “Thinking is hard work, that is why so few people do it.” Those words fit people who want unbridled access to guns, especially automatic, rapid-fire weapons of war. How can the Wayne LaPierres of this world ignore the anguished cries of the parents at Sandy Hook and elsewhere? How can people ignore the fact that almost 100,000 Americans are wounded or killed by guns every year? How can any thinking person ignore the fact that since the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963, more Americans have died by American gunfire than perished on foreign battlefields in all of the 20th Century?

I would like to specifically address the men listening to me. Men commit over 95 per cent of the mass killings in this country. This epidemic of gun-related violence is a male problem and men need to fix it. Gentlemen, you manhood is not measured by the size of your weapon; it is measured by the size of your backbone and your willingness to stand up and be counted in the effort to help stop this carnage.

To paraphrase a Parkland student, regardless of race, religion, or ethnicity, we all bleed the same red blood; we suffer and feel pain equally. Yet we have failed to come together stop gun violence. If you are a Democrat, a Republican or member of the Tea Party, remember we all share important things—among these is our love for our children and respect for their teachers and school administrators. No matter what your party affiliation I ask you to think and think clearly about what is happening our nation and our families and to join with others to stop the killings.

I know first-hand what it is like to lose a family member in a school shooting, I still hear the hours of cries and screams of my then seven-year-old granddaughter when she was told that her mother had been gunned down at the Appalachian School of Law in Grundy, Virginia; I have talked with and felt the pain of the Virginia Tech families; I have listened to the lies of school and elected officials while they cover up incompetence and inaction. I have had enough! The young people of Parkland are right, now is the time to act, now is the time to take steps to stop the killings.

Students at Parkland, we hear your cry and we will not remain silent. You inspire us, you are giving us courage; we are responding to your call and we are demanding change. And if our elected officials will not pass common sense gun safety laws and increase spending on mental health, we will vote them out. We have an election this November, how many more have to die? We are tired of waiting for action. If no meaningful steps are taken to stop the slaughter, then it is time to vote them out! Vote them out! Vote them out! Let me repeat, vote them out!

Thank you for listening to me. Now, let’s get to work and elected people who will help stop the slaughter.




Friday, March 23, 2018

MARCH FOR OUR LIVES


MARCH FOR OUR
LIVES

IN KILMARNOCK, VIRGINIA
March 24, 2018
10:00 a.m.

CHESAPEAKE COMMONS
463 N. Main Street

All people of all ages of all walks of life are welcome. March from Chesapeake Commons, down the sidewalks of Main Street to Grace Episcopal Church.

Bring your changes, signs, songs, and demands that common sense gun control legislation be passed.

WALK IN MEMORY OF
All students who have been killed in mass shootings.
All families who have lost children to gun violence.

A rally will be held at the end of the march. David Cariens, author of a book on the Virginia Tech tragedy, will lead us in a call to action.


Wednesday, March 21, 2018

AN UPHILL BATTLE--NOW IT'S A MARYLAND SCHOOL

   
And the carnage continues. This time it is Great Mills school in Maryland. Two students were injured and the killer was shot and killed by the quick action of the school resource officer.

In the absence of politicians and school leaders with backbones, the bodies pile up. It is next to impossible to get legislators to adopt even the most elementary measures to keep guns out of the hands of those who are a threat to themselves or others, terrorists, convicted felons, and spouse abusers.

In the wake of the Parkland school shooting, President Trump bloviated he would support raising the age to buy guns to 21. However, one dinner with National Rifle Association officials and that idea was dropped.


To quote Douglas Kellner in his book, Guys and Guns Amock: Domestic Terrorism and School Shootings from the Oklahoma City Bombing to the Virginia Tech Massace: “Given the power of the gun lobby and the cowardice of politicians, obviously only a minimal amount of gun control is foreseeable. Certainly, the attempts at reform after Columbine that were advanced during the Clinton-Gore years, and then repulsed during the Bush-Cheney years, are reasonable and in the national interest. Hence, for starters, reasonable gun control would involve: 1) returning to earlier attempts to require child-safety locks on handguns; 2) increasing the minimum age for gun purchases; 3) requiring stricter background checks on weapons purchased; 4) producing better data sharing among police, legal, and mental health institutions and universities; and 5) closing the gun show loophole through which guns can be purchased without background checks.”  (To be continued)