A Brief Commentary by Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper
Some of you on the Ontario side of the Niagara River might be saying to yourselves; ‘There he goes again. Why is he posting yet another commentary on the gun culture in the United States?’
Ted Cruz, a Canadian-born Senator for Texas and Republican running for his country’s presidential nomination, has tweeted a call for prayer for the California mass shooting victims but is totally opposed to background checks or any other rules for better controlling who can purchase a gun in America.
Well first, Niagara At Large, I am proud to say, has subscribers on the American side of the Niagara River, in the Buffalo and other cities and towns in Erie and Niagara Counties, New York that we include in a binational community of communities we call the Greater Niagara Region.
Second, I know I am not the only one on the Canadian side of the river who has close friends and relatives living in the United States, at least some of whom are far more disturbed by the mass circulation of guns and death toll from gun-related assaults in their country than the rest of the world is.
And finally, for those who believe America’s gun culture is not a Canadian problem, investigations by police and other bodies have repeatedly shown that more than have the guns used in violent crimes in Canada were smuggled across the border from the gun-drenched United States.
So in the wake of one of the most recent shoot-ups in the U.S. – at, of all places, a health centre dedicated to helping people with developmental disabilities, and where 14 people were slaughtered and many more wounded in what is being called one of the worst massing shooting episodes in the country so far – I want to join some others in celebrating the courage of the editors of the New York Daily News.
The Daily News editors produced the following front page for its December 3rd, 2015 edition in response to all the Republican Party stooges for the National Rifle Association out there who call for “a prayer” for the victims but do nothing to control the flow of guns, right up to and including military style assault weapons, to individuals with records of mental illness and crime, or whose names are on government drafted “terrorist watch lists.”
The front-page headline on this December 3rd edition New York Daily News is as bang on (to use a bad pun) as the words burned underneath – “As latest batch of innocent Americans are left lying in pools of blood, cowards who could truly end gun scourge continue to hide behind meaningless platitudes.”
To this, I will finish with the word most often said at the end of a prayer – Amen!
For more information on the flow of guns from the United States to Canada click on the following link – http://www.latitudenews.com/story/american-guns-fuel-violence-in-canada/ .
Visit Niagara At Large at www.niagaraatlarge.com for more news and commentary for and from the greater bi-national Niagara region.
(NOW IT IS YOUR TURN. Niagara At Large encourages you to share your views on this post. A reminder that we only post comments by individuals who share their first and last name with them.)
Niagara At Large 