Steve Leser debates Eric Bolling on Fox News' Your World Regarding Economy and Deficit

Making Sense with Steve Leser - Week in Review 1/20-1/27/13

http://goo.gl/wB9yX

Making Sense with Steve Leser - Week in Review 1/20-1/27/13

1.Science and the Republican Red state innovation Desert
2.Hillary turns the table on Republicans regarding Benghazi
3.Following up on my segment last week about Republicans Stealing the Electoral College in future elections

And of course, our Trademark weekly hall of fame and shame for those politicians and prominent individuals who made great sense, or shameful nonsense, respectively.

President Obama's Full Second Inaugural Address

Hillary thrashing Senate Republicans in the Benghazi hearing after them talking about how badly they wanted to get her in hearings so they can attack her reminds me of that old adage, "BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR... YOU MIGHT GET IT!!!"

Once again we have a Gun enthusiast talking about how owning a portable device that shoots small pieces of metal through the air at lethal speeds is a "God Given Right". Funny, I've read the old testament, the new testament and the Koran. None of them mention such a device.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2013/01/23/nras-wayne-lapierre-says-obama-trying-to-take-away-basic-rights/

 

NRA’s Wayne LaPierre: Obama ‘made a mockery’ of Constitution
President Obama is trying to take away Americans’ fundamental freedoms guaranteed under the Constitution, National Rifle Association Chief Executive Wayne LaPierre said Tuesday night.

“They are God-given freedoms. They belong to us in the United States of America as our birthright. No government gave them to us and no government can ever take them away,” LaPierre said in his first response to the president’s inaugural address Monday.

I interrupt the inauguration day festivities to remind us all that this isn't just MLK day, it's not just inauguration day, it's Mitch McConnell Fail Day!

From NY Times - What's in President Obama's Gun Proposals

As discussed on my 1-20-13 show:

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/01/16/us/obama-gun-control-proposal.html

Proposed Congressional Actions

• Requiring criminal background checks for all gun sales, including those by private sellers that currently are exempt.
• Reinstating and strengthening the ban on assault weapons that was in place from 1994 to 2004.
• Limiting ammunition magazines to 10 rounds.
• Banning the possession of armor-piercing bullets by anyone other than members of the military and law enforcement.
• Increasing criminal penalties for "straw purchasers," people who pass the required background check to buy a gun on behalf of someone else.
• Acting on a $4 billion administration proposal to help keep 15,000 police officers on the street.
• Confirming President Obama's nominee for director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
• Eliminating a restriction that requires the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to allow the importation of weapons that are more than 50 years old.
• Financing programs to train more police officers, first responders and school officials on how to respond to active armed attacks.
• Provide additional $20 million to help expand the a system that tracks violent deaths across the nation from 18 states to 50 states.
• Providing $30 million in grants to states to help schools develop emergency response plans.
• Providing financing to expand mental health programs for young people.

Executive actions

• Issuing a presidential memorandum to require federal agencies to make relevant data available to the federal background check system.
• Addressing unnecessary legal barriers, particularly relating to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, that may prevent states from making information available to the background check system.
• Improving incentives for states to share information with the background check system.
• Directing the attorney general to review categories of individuals prohibited from having a gun to make sure dangerous people are not slipping through the cracks.
• Proposing a rule making to give law enforcement authorities the ability to run a full background check on an individual before returning a seized gun.
• Publishing a letter from the A.T.F. to federally licensed gun dealers providing guidance on how to run background checks for private sellers.
• Starting a national safe and responsible gun ownership campaign.
• Reviewing safety standards for gun locks and gun safes (Consumer Product Safety Commission).
• Issuing a presidential memorandum to require federal law enforcement to trace guns recovered in criminal investigations.
• Releasing a report analyzing information on lost and stolen guns and making it widely available to law enforcement authorities.
• Nominating an A.T.F. director.
• Providing law enforcement authorities, first responders and school officials with proper training for armed attacks situations.
• Maximizing enforcement efforts to prevent gun violence and prosecute gun crime.
• Issuing a presidential memorandum directing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to research gun violence.
• Directing the attorney general to issue a report on the availability and most effective use of new gun safety technologies and challenging the private sector to develop innovative technologies.
• Clarify that the Affordable Care Act does not prohibit doctors asking their patients about guns in their homes.
• Releasing a letter to health care providers clarifying that no federal law prohibits them from reporting threats of violence to law enforcement authorities.
• Providing incentives for schools to hire school resource officers.
• Developing model emergency response plans for schools, houses of worship and institutions of higher education.
• Releasing a letter to state health officials clarifying the scope of mental health services that Medicaid plans must cover.
• Finalizing regulations clarifying essential health benefits and parity requirements within insurance exchanges.
• Committing to finalizing mental health parity regulations.
• Starting a national dialogue on mental health led by Kathleen Sebelius, the secretary of health and human services, and Arne Duncan, the secretary of education.

Sunday 1/20/13 Making Sense with Steve Leser - Republican Bid to Rig Electoral College, The President acts to curb Gun Violence and the Debt Ceiling

If you missed hearing it live Click to hear my radio show this week

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/lesersense/2013/01/21/making-sense-with-steve-leser--week-in-review

1. The Republican Bid to Steal Future Presidential Elections is Here in Pennsylvania
2. The President acts to Protect Americans from Gun Violence
3. House Republicans Cower from Challenging President on Debt Ceiling

Don't forget you can subscribe to podcasts of my show by going to http://www.blogtalkradio.com/lesersense and clicking on the itunes link under my photo

Official Agenda of the January 2013 Republican Party Retreat on Minorities and Women outreach.

The Ghost of Republican Shenanigans past...

Governor Christie On NRA Ad: It's Reprehensible

I totally agree with Chris Christie here

Tonight's (Sunday 1/13/13) Making Sense with Steve Leser - Right Wing Media Trolls Democratic Underground, Gun Control & LGBT equality

Making Sense with Steve Leser - Week in Review 01/13 by Making Sense with Steve Leser | Blog Talk Radio

1.The big Journalistic Fail. Rush Limbaugh, the Washington Times, Legal Insurrection, National Review and Howie Carr troll Democratic Underground

2.Unhinged gun rights advocate threatens Murder and Insurrection and Other Gun News

3.Big Drop in those who say Being Gay Is a Sin and other LGBT Issues

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/lesersense/2013/01/14/making-sense-with-steve-leser--week-in-review

Various additional gun statistics quoted on my show

http://bradycampaign.org/facts/gunviolence#FBI

DID YOU KNOW? In one year on average, more than 100,000 people in America are shot or killed with a gun. Click here to see a fact sheet summarizing gun deaths and injuries over an average year.

• Over a million people have been killed with guns in the United States since 1968, when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated (Childrens’ Defense Fund, p. 20).
  
• U.S. homicide rates are 6.9 times higher than rates in 22 other populous high-income countries combined, despite similar non-lethal crime and violence rates. The firearm homicide rate in the U.S. is 19.5 times higher (Richardson, p.1).
  
• Among 23 populous, high-income countries, 80% of all firearm deaths occurred in the United States (Richardson, p. 1).

• Gun violence impacts society in countless ways: medical costs, costs of the criminal justice system, security precautions such as metal detectors, and reductions in quality of life because of fear of gun violence. These impacts are estimated to cost U.S. citizens $100 billion annually (Cook, 2000).

DID YOU KNOW? Where there are more guns, there are more gun deaths.

• An estimated 41% of gun-related homicides and 94% of gun-related suicides would not occur under the same circumstances had no guns been present (Wiebe, p. 780).

• Higher household gun ownership correlates with higher rates of homicides, suicides, and unintentional shootings (Harvard Injury Control Center).

• Keeping a firearm in the home increases the risk of suicide by a factor of 3 to 5 and increases the risk of suicide with a firearm by a factor of 17 (Kellermann, 1992, p. 467; Wiebe, p. 771).

• Keeping a firearm in the home increases the risk of homicide by a factor of 3 (Kellermann, 1993, p. 1084).

DID YOU KNOW? On the whole, guns are more likely to raise the risk of injury than to confer protection.

• A gun in the home is 22 times more likely to be used in a completed or attempted suicide (11x), criminal assault or homicide (7x), or unintentional shooting death or injury (4x) than to be used in a self-defense shooting. (Kellermann, 1998, p. 263).

• Guns are used to intimidate and threaten 4 to 6 times more often than they are used to thwart crime (Hemenway, p. 269).

• Every year there are only about 200 legally justified self-defense homicides by private citizens (FBI, Expanded Homicide Data, Table 15) compared with over 30,000 gun deaths (NCIPC).

• A 2009 study found that people in possession of a gun are 4.5 times more likely to be shot in an assault (Branas).

DID YOU KNOW? Assaults and suicide attempts with firearms are much more likely to be fatal than those perpetrated with less lethal weapons or means. Removing guns saves lives.

• There are five times as many deaths from gun assaults as from knife assaults, where the rates of assault with knives and with guns are similar (Zimring, p. 199).

• More than 90 percent of suicide attempts with a gun are fatal (Miller, 2004, p. 626). In comparison, only 3 percent of attempts with drugs or cutting are fatal (Miller, 2004, p. 626).

National Institutes of Health: Homicide, suicide, and unintentional firearm fatality: comparing the United States with other high-income countries, 2003.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20571454
Homicide, suicide, and unintentional firearm fatality: comparing the United States with other high-income countries, 2003.
Richardson EG, Hemenway D.

Source
Department of Health Services, UCLA School of Public Health, Los Angeles, California 90095-1772, USA. erin.richardson@gmail.com

Abstract
BACKGROUND:
Violent death is a major public health problem in the United States and throughout the world.

METHODS:
A cross-sectional analysis of the World Health Organization Mortality Database analyzes homicides and suicides (both disaggregated as firearm related and non-firearm related) and unintentional and undetermined firearm deaths from 23 populous high-income Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development countries that provided data to the World Health Organization for 2003.

RESULTS:
The US homicide rates were 6.9 times higher than rates in the other high-income countries, driven by firearm homicide rates that were 19.5 times higher. For 15-year olds to 24-year olds, firearm homicide rates in the United States were 42.7 times higher than in the other countries. For US males, firearm homicide rates were 22.0 times higher, and for US females, firearm homicide rates were 11.4 times higher. The US firearm suicide rates were 5.8 times higher than in the other countries, though overall suicide rates were 30% lower. The US unintentional firearm deaths were 5.2 times higher than in the other countries. Among these 23 countries, 80% of all firearm deaths occurred in the United States, 86% of women killed by firearms were US women, and 87% of all children aged 0 to 14 killed by firearms were US children.

CONCLUSIONS:
The United States has far higher rates of firearm deaths-firearm homicides, firearm suicides, and unintentional firearm deaths compared with other high-income countries. The US overall suicide rate is not out of line with these countries, but the United States is an outlier in terms of our overall homicide rate.

VPC - Violence Policy Center Statistics that show more Guns in a state = More Gun Deaths per 100,000 people

http://www.vpc.org/press/1006gundeath.htm

The analysis reveals that the five states with the highest per capita gun death rates were Louisiana, Mississippi, Alaska, Alabama, and Nevada. Each of these states had a per capita gun death rate far exceeding the national per capita gun death rate of 10.34 per 100,000 for 2007. Each of the top-ranking states has lax gun laws and higher gun ownership rates. By contrast, states with strong gun laws and low rates of gun ownership had far lower rates of firearm-related death. Ranking last in the nation for gun death was Hawaii, followed by Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York. (See rankings below for top and bottom five states. See http://www.vpc.org/fadeathchart10.htm for a ranking of all 50 states.) VPC Legislative Director Kristen Rand states, “The equation is simple. More guns lead to more gun death, but limiting exposure to firearms saves lives.”

States with the Five Highest Gun Death Rates				States with the Five Lowest Gun Death Rates
Rank	State	Household Gun Ownership	Gun Death Rate per 100,000	Rank	State	Household Gun Ownership	Gun Death Rate per 100,000
1	Louisiana	45.6 percent	19.87	50	Hawaii	9.7 percent	2.82
2	Mississippi	54.3 percent	18.32	49	Rhode Island	13.3 percent	3.51
3	Alaska	60.6 percent	17.62	48	Massachusetts	12.8 percent	3.63
4	Alabama	57.2 percent	17.55	47	Connecticut	16.2 percent	4.27
5	Nevada	31.5 percent	16.21	46	New York	18.1 percent	5.07

Dont miss Making Sense with Steve Leser Sunday 7pm EST

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/lesersense/2013/01/07/making-sense-with-steve-leser--week-in-review

Topics Will include

1. The Fiscal Cliff Deal, what’s in it and who won, Democrats, Republicans, Congress, the President and what about upcoming Debt Ceiling Issues?

2. Spreading the word on gun violence and debunking pro-gun falsehoods

3. The Shameful Steubeville gang rape coverup and Anonymous involvement. Are Anonymous the modern evolution of what it means to be a superhero.
And of course, our weekly hall of fame and shame for those politicians and prominent individuals who made great sense, or shameful nonsense, respectively.

Slate: How Many People Have Been Killed by Guns Since Newtown?

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/crime/2012/12/
gun_death_tally_every_american_gun_death_since_newtown_sandy_hook_shooting.html

Note: The answer is 409 between 12/14/12 and 12/31/12

Slate partners with @GunDeaths for an interactive, crowdsourced tally of the toll firearms have taken since Dec. 14.

By Chris Kirk and Dan Kois

Posted Friday, Jan. 4, 2013, at 7:00 AM ET

The answer to the simple question in that headline is surprisingly hard to come by. So Slate and the Twitter feed @GunDeaths are collecting data for our crowdsourced interactive. This data is necessarily incomplete. But the more people who are paying attention, the better the data will be. You can help us draw a more complete picture of gun violence in America. If you know about a gun death in your community that isn’t represented here, please tweet @GunDeaths with a citation. (If you’re not on Twitter, you can email slatedata@gmail.com.) And if you’d like to use this data yourself for your own projects, it’s open. You can download it here.

This Video won Rachel Maddow best video of the year for 2012

Boehner to Reid: "Go f*ck yourself" - House GOP are like two year olds in the middle of a tantrum

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/01/02/1175604/-Boehner-to-Reid-Go-f-ck-yourself

The House GOP are like a two year old in the middle of a tantrum.

Except its worse. There are several dozen two year olds with an even worse disposition backing up the original two year old, and they are in charge. It's impossible to deal with these guys.

We're lucky we got the deal we got on the Fiscal Cliff.