SHINY HAPPY PEOPLE          

Distraught parents descended on a northeast Houston elementary school today after a pistol brought to campus by a kindergartner fell and discharged, slightly injuring three pupils.

The pistol fell out of a pants pocket of the 6-year-old boy, who was not identified, and fell on the floor of cafeteria of Ross Elementary School, 2819 Bay, about 10:22 a.m., Houston school district spokesman Jason Spencer said.

The boy who brought the gun was wounded in the foot, another 6-year-old boy was wounded in the leg and a 5-year-old girl was wounded in the foot, Spencer said. The students were either hit by a single bullet and/or fragments, officials said.

The children were taken to Texas Children's Hospital and their parents notified. Houston Independent School District police were investigating how the child obtained the weapon...

The three children were in stable condition and were in good spirits, playing video games this afternoon, said Dr. David deLemos, assistant trauma medical director at Texas Children's.

Jarneshia Broussard, 5, said she was sitting at the same cateteria table as the boy who brought the gun. She was eating a hot dog and beans when she heard a loud noise, she said.

She first thought a light had gone out but then realized this was more serious.

"I knew it was a gun because a gun goes 'pow,' " Jarneshia said. "I got really scared."

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7528178.html

I have stated scores of times before this that we (that is the left) have lost the battle over guns, over access to guns, over the types of guns made available to the public....

The NRA has won the battle over the hearts and minds and souls of Americans.

Now, gun control was never a black and white issue. I mean dems like to shoot critters just like repubs. And there are actually environmental benefits to hunting regulations in force throughout the 50 states—although I suppose there cannot be that much room available for such activities in states like RI or Del.

In Minnesota, hunting is severely regulated. You are entitled to a number of kills per season (and the hunting seasons are short) depending upon the findings of the government as to the number of deer and type of deer running around our forests. There is a logic to all of this, and the fees for a hunting license are very high.

I began to see the gun issue as insoluble because the anti-gun folks were really attempting to ignore technological advances. We on the left were in denial.

It is so easy nowadays for manufacturers to make the goddamn things, and they are so very cheap to make that people with individual licenses in places like Minnesota actually acquire the weapons and sell them legally from their garages and their basements. Distribution of guns is so universal that a guy can go to a gun show or just shop on line, acquire the weapons for some dollar amount and sell them from their homes for a profit. Check out these gun sites sometime, really interesting with the Feds in control of so many aspects involved in selling guns http://www.ehow.com/ffl/

In many states the buyer down the line fills in some short form, promises he never shot anybody or robbed anybody and he can get a gun; with his real motive being to do away with that rotten mother-in-law he always hated. And sometimes you do not even have to give this much information when you purchase a WMD!

Lawrence O'Donnell went nuts over the Gabby Giffords incident, and he had a point. The shooter was subdued when his clip ran out, and if the deranged killer had had fewer bullets in his oversized clip, fewer injuries would have occurred.

The right's reaction to all of this is...I am not sure how to describe their reaction except as insane.

The right wing sites would have you believe that if more folks had had guns at that Arizona gathering, the bad guy would have been shot dead before causing so much harm! Of course the Great State of Arizona would have saved a million bucks or more since they would not have to try and execute the sombitch.

I was not going to even get into this issue except for citing the kindergarten shooting on the news corner of Dagblog. But then I read this:

"Hotsinpiller was among several Deputy U.S. Marshals from the Northern District of West Virginia, who, along with members of the West Virginia State Police and The Mountain State Fugitive Task Force were serving an arrest warrant on Charles E. Smith at 319 Central Street in Elkins," Carter said.

"Smith, 50, was wanted on a charges related to possession with intent to distribute cocaine and felon in possession of a firearm," Carter said. "Immediately upon entry into Smith's residence, three Deputy U.S. Marshals were fired upon by a shotgun blast and struck. Deputies returned fire on Smith and he was shot dead on the scene."

This is just your run-of-the-mill Law & Order episode. Man sells drugs for money, police attempt to serve arrest warrant, accused shoots a police officer and police shoot felon.

Happens every goddamn day in this country. I keep hearing the figure of 30,000 dead from gun shots every year and there are many attempts to shoot police officers.

How many guns are there in this country? There is a gun for every man, woman and child in America

I do not have a gun. As a matter of fact I have never had a gun so that has to mean that someone out there has at least two guns!

The only reason I decided to delve into this subject at all has to do with this Smith shooting.

It seems that Smith's cohorts, the individuals who resided at the residence where the felon was shot, were being investigated for harboring a felon or some such charge.

After the shooting, Cassandra Smith allegedly told federal law enforcement officials that she did "not remember seeing any guns" in the residence where she lived with her father "other than the ones in [her] own room and, if anything, a gun that may have been on the pool table downstairs."

But federal officials say she knew about a "brown long gun in a corner at the bottom of the steps, a long gun in a corner in the hallway between the kitchen door and the door to [Charles Smith's] room; two (2) to three (3) pistols on the pool table in the room where [Charles Smith] slept; shotguns or long guns in the same room, possibly next to the door going into the hallway, next to [his] recliner; and (d) a black shotgun with a pistol handle."

This segment from a TPM story sounds like some farcical dialogue in a Tarantino flick.

I mean where on earth could a kindergartener find a weapon of mass destruction?

I am sure we will hear more about the Texas Kindergarten Massacre. I mean those keen reporters have already received statements from five-year-olds. I assume they will glean even more information by the time they get to the testimony of the third graders.

Shit happens!

You know in the eighth grade my buddy Steve got drunk, took his dad's car keys from the basket in the entry way of his suburban home and proceeded to crash it into a house down the street. He drove the vehicle right through the picture window and into the living room.

A baby survived unharmed, serendipitously protected by a couch and the baby carriage, if I recall correctly.

KIDS DO THE DARNDEST THINGS. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UgLpRvX7Qk

Guns are ubiquitous in this country and there is no way we can keep them out of the hands of children.

Remember says the NRA, guns don't shoot children, children shoot children!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXVvvRBBUn8

Previous draft @ http://onceuponaparadigm.wordpress.com/