Comments for Pulitzer Prize Winner Cynthia Tucker | Journalist. Professor. Progressive. http://cynthiatucker.com Political commentary from Pulitzer Prize winner Cynthia Tucker. Mon, 16 Apr 2012 11:37:46 +0000 hourly 1 Comment on All-American madness: A love affair with firearms by Tim Cummings http://cynthiatucker.com/2012/04/all-american-madness-a-love-affair-with-firearms.html#comment-217 Tim Cummings Mon, 16 Apr 2012 11:37:46 +0000 http://cynthiatucker.com/?p=550#comment-217 I have one question for you Cynthia: "Would you?" The question follows my post. I am a gun owner and advocate of the Second Amendment, assured of the Founder's intent to provide the right, knowing the positives and negatives, to allow an armed citizenry. Thank you for penning "All-American madness: A love affair with firearms". It articulates the extreme 'gun owners are troubled people hell bent on using their firearms with evil intent' mindset. Does that happen? Indeed, it has, but at nearly immeasurably low rates. I won't toss in the "when firearms are made criminal only criminals will have firearms" or 'people don't kill people, guns kill people' arguments (although I do see them both as hard truths), but I do ask you to consider the inevitable outcome of gun control undertaken to the extent this piece postulates: Increased and unchecked criminal acts, assaults, home invasions, school shootings, and so on, with no chance of a legally carrying, law abiding citizen around to respond and cause the violence to cease. Professor Tucker, you are gifted, possess a fine education, a truly gifted author and enjoy a national platform for sharing your thoughts. That is what is great with our country and while permitted, I want to say use of "madness is stoked and sheltered, nurtured and fed by another kind of crazy - a widespread denial about the price of our love affair with firearms, a disbelief that borders on delusion.", gun ownership being "irrational", the gun lobby "more radical and more unhinged - pushing past the limits of sanity." and whose lobbying of "reckless radicalism" is whole heartedly embraced by the Republican Party. Finally, you lump me and all gun owners in the "lunatic fringe" segment of our nation and with a broad brush paint our feelings about our right to own firearms as "the very definition of crazy". If you found yourself the victim of a random criminal act, violent in nature, terrifying in magnitude, the outcome of which is unattainable in your mind and a person coming upon it was a trained and legally carrying firearm owner, would you find their intervention beneficial? Would you? All the best. I have one question for you Cynthia: “Would you?” The question follows my post.

I am a gun owner and advocate of the Second Amendment, assured of the Founder’s intent to provide the right, knowing the positives and negatives, to allow an armed citizenry. Thank you for penning “All-American madness: A love affair with firearms”. It articulates the extreme ‘gun owners are troubled people hell bent on using their firearms with evil intent’ mindset. Does that happen? Indeed, it has, but at nearly immeasurably low rates.

I won’t toss in the “when firearms are made criminal only criminals will have firearms” or ‘people don’t kill people, guns kill people’ arguments (although I do see them both as hard truths), but I do ask you to consider the inevitable outcome of gun control undertaken to the extent this piece postulates: Increased and unchecked criminal acts, assaults, home invasions, school shootings, and so on, with no chance of a legally carrying, law abiding citizen around to respond and cause the violence to cease.

Professor Tucker, you are gifted, possess a fine education, a truly gifted author and enjoy a national platform for sharing your thoughts. That is what is great with our country and while permitted, I want to say use of “madness is stoked and sheltered, nurtured and fed by another kind of crazy – a widespread denial about the price of our love affair with firearms, a disbelief that borders on delusion.”, gun ownership being “irrational”, the gun lobby “more radical and more unhinged – pushing past the limits of sanity.” and whose lobbying of “reckless radicalism” is whole heartedly embraced by the Republican Party. Finally, you lump me and all gun owners in the “lunatic fringe” segment of our nation and with a broad brush paint our feelings about our right to own firearms as “the very definition of crazy”.

If you found yourself the victim of a random criminal act, violent in nature, terrifying in magnitude, the outcome of which is unattainable in your mind and a person coming upon it was a trained and legally carrying firearm owner, would you find their intervention beneficial? Would you?

All the best.

]]> Comment on About Ann Romney and motherhood by Krista Brewer http://cynthiatucker.com/2012/04/about-ann-romney-and-motherhood.html#comment-214 Krista Brewer Fri, 13 Apr 2012 22:44:39 +0000 http://cynthiatucker.com/?p=552#comment-214 Thanks so much for this. I couldn't agree more. As a women who stayed at home to raise three children, I got pretty tired of trite comments like, "Well, you actually do work, just not outside the home." Well, in America work can mean a lot of things, but Hillary Rosen was commenting on Mitt Romney's quip that he consults his wife Ann about what women care about. ‘Well, you know, my wife tells me that what women really care about are economic issues. And when I listen to my wife, that’s what I’m hearing.’ But for a woman married to a multi-millionaire, and who has never had a job, to be advising Mitt about what most women care about is pretty absurd. We can now add Mitt's statement to his long list of tone-deaf, out-of-touch statements that really should make us all wonder what planet this guy lives on. Or right, he lives on the rich people's planet. Things are different there. Thanks so much for this. I couldn’t agree more. As a women who stayed at home to raise three children, I got pretty tired of trite comments like, “Well, you actually do work, just not outside the home.” Well, in America work can mean a lot of things, but Hillary Rosen was commenting on Mitt Romney’s quip that he consults his wife Ann about what women care about. ‘Well, you know, my wife tells me that what women really care about are economic issues. And when I listen to my wife, that’s what I’m hearing.’ But for a woman married to a multi-millionaire, and who has never had a job, to be advising Mitt about what most women care about is pretty absurd. We can now add Mitt’s statement to his long list of tone-deaf, out-of-touch statements that really should make us all wonder what planet this guy lives on. Or right, he lives on the rich people’s planet. Things are different there.

]]> Comment on About Ann Romney and motherhood by Libby Middleson http://cynthiatucker.com/2012/04/about-ann-romney-and-motherhood.html#comment-213 Libby Middleson Fri, 13 Apr 2012 22:15:36 +0000 http://cynthiatucker.com/?p=552#comment-213 Well said. I find the offense with the ones claiming to be offended. When your top decision is a car elevator in your beach home, then I suspect "nanny" is not a foreign word. I am up early every morning to get my child ready for school. I would love to have a guranteed salary of at least 250K that allowed me to stay home with my child or to at least be there when my child got out of school. I do not. I have student loans and I now make less than what I did 15 years ago. However, I am blessed and happy for the time I have with my son and the other children in my life. I chose to make less to have more time with them. Ann Romeny is not every woman. Although she would sing it, Whitney Houston was not every woman. The sad fact of life is a majority of the women in America do not have the luxury that either Ann or Whitney had when it came to being a parent. I am not jealous. I am looking at life for what it is. A nanny, cook, and maid makes running a household easier than being all three plus doctor, therapist, educator, engineer, plumber, and whatever else your child requires an hour before school starts. Ann and Mitt are not one of us. They need to embrace their wealth and then tell to America how they will help all Americans. Attempting to turn a slip of the lip into an attack on motherhood is ridiculous at best. Well said. I find the offense with the ones claiming to be offended. When your top decision is a car elevator in your beach home, then I suspect “nanny” is not a foreign word. I am up early every morning to get my child ready for school. I would love to have a guranteed salary of at least 250K that allowed me to stay home with my child or to at least be there when my child got out of school. I do not. I have student loans and I now make less than what I did 15 years ago. However, I am blessed and happy for the time I have with my son and the other children in my life. I chose to make less to have more time with them. Ann Romeny is not every woman. Although she would sing it, Whitney Houston was not every woman. The sad fact of life is a majority of the women in America do not have the luxury that either Ann or Whitney had when it came to being a parent. I am not jealous. I am looking at life for what it is. A nanny, cook, and maid makes running a household easier than being all three plus doctor, therapist, educator, engineer, plumber, and whatever else your child requires an hour before school starts. Ann and Mitt are not one of us. They need to embrace their wealth and then tell to America how they will help all Americans. Attempting to turn a slip of the lip into an attack on motherhood is ridiculous at best.

]]> Comment on All-American madness: A love affair with firearms by Anthony Green http://cynthiatucker.com/2012/04/all-american-madness-a-love-affair-with-firearms.html#comment-212 Anthony Green Fri, 13 Apr 2012 15:51:08 +0000 http://cynthiatucker.com/?p=550#comment-212 Thought you might be interested in this report released yesterday by the Center for American Progress on the cost of gun violence, not just in lives, but in public money. http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2012/04/pdf/vt_gun_control.pdf Thought you might be interested in this report released yesterday by the Center for American Progress on the cost of gun violence, not just in lives, but in public money. http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2012/04/pdf/vt_gun_control.pdf

]]> Comment on Trayvon Martin and the prejudices of the law enforcement establishment by rachel smith http://cynthiatucker.com/2012/03/trayvon-martin-and-the-prejudices-of-the-law-enforcement-establishment.html#comment-211 rachel smith Thu, 12 Apr 2012 19:13:00 +0000 http://cynthiatucker.com/?p=537#comment-211 You know i was thinking the same thing in my head when the story first came out. Zimmerman is half hispanic and half white yet the media and the Martin family refer to him only as being (White)... Which makes it a white vs black conflict. Great points on the situations you pointed as well obama and tiger. This whole situation is just a mess the way everything gets so twisted and turned around. Like for instance why wasn't Zimmerman arrested from day one I mean he did kill Trayvon. Why did NBC leave out the fact that it was the 911 dispatcher that asked the race of the suspect, Instead they made it seem like Zimmerman was being racist from the get go. And who cares whether Trayvon had a troubled childhood that still doesnt give Zimmerman the right to shoot and kill him. It's a shame how can anyone ever think this world will extinct (racism) when we have situations like this and media sturring it up even more. You know i was thinking the same thing in my head when the story first came out. Zimmerman is half hispanic and half white yet the media and the Martin family refer to him only as being (White)… Which makes it a white vs black conflict. Great points on the situations you pointed as well obama and tiger. This whole situation is just a mess the way everything gets so twisted and turned around. Like for instance why wasn’t Zimmerman arrested from day one I mean he did kill Trayvon. Why did NBC leave out the fact that it was the 911 dispatcher that asked the race of the suspect, Instead they made it seem like Zimmerman was being racist from the get go. And who cares whether Trayvon had a troubled childhood that still doesnt give Zimmerman the right to shoot and kill him. It’s a shame how can anyone ever think this world will extinct (racism) when we have situations like this and media sturring it up even more.

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