PA: 32 lie-in planned for Sen. Spector's house

[K-Romulus]

This is obviously unconfirmed coming from a Phila. Daily News editorial, but here it is:

http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/20070824_MY_NAME_IS_JOE__IM_A_GUN_ADDICT_.html

Posted on Fri, Aug. 24, 2007

MY NAME IS JOE. I'M A GUN ADDICT.
FOUR-DAY GUN SALE SHUTDOWN PUTS SOME IN TIZZY

LOOK AT THEM.

Shaking. Sweating. Pacing.

Unable to concentrate. Unable to focus on anything other than . . . their next gun buy.

Pennsylvania's gun addicts are already going through withdrawal, as the planned four-day halt on gun sales to allow the state to update its computerized background checks grows closer.

The Pennsylvania Instant Check System is used by gun store owners to do state and federally required criminal background checks on potential customers. It will be closed for upgrading from 6 p.m. Sept. 2 to noon Sept. 6. That means that no guns can be sold.

Gun store owners are hot. The shutdown coincides with the beginning of the early dove and goose hunting season, a popular time - at least in some parts of the state -for gun sales.

One Harrisburg lawmaker, Senate President Pro Tempore Joseph Scarnati, is also in a snit. He's claming that this is an attempt by Philadelphia liberals to limit the rights of gun owners.

The outcry has us a little worried about just how stable some of these gun addicts are. We've seen actual junkies more behaved than this when they hear they can't get their hands on their stuff.

But four lousy days with no guns? And with plenty of warning so those who want to buy new hunting rifles can plan ahead?

Gov. Rendell is already beginning to back-pedal, ordering a committee to review alternate dates for shutting down the system. We hope he stands firm.

Maybe he can suggest that those four days should be spent productively. Instead of sitting around moping, why not take a field trip? Ride through some of the state's larger cities and their suburban towns, where gun violence has grown. Let's call it a reality check. Some of these guns used to kill are on the street, thanks to straw purchasers who patronize the state's gun stores, and then sell the guns illegally.

Tomorrow, during a national day of protest against illegal guns, there will be a "lie-in" in front of Sen. Arlen Specter's house in East Falls. Thirty-two people, representing the number killed in the Virginia Tech shooting, will be dressed in black and lie down for three minutes, the time it took Seung-Hui Cho to do his sick work.

A few days later, the four-day halt on gun sales in Pennsylvania begins.

We feel safer already. *

So, with the incoherent date description, the lie-in could happen either tomorrow or on the 28th during the national protest.

In context, I think the paper meant to say the 28th, since that is the actual day of "national" protests.

 

[General Geoff]

What are they protesting? Murder?

That's been happening since the dawn of time. What changed..?


Also, what should we be doing to counteract? Show up at Arlen's house open-carrying, to make sure the black-clad ninja death squad doesn't do anything stupid?

 

[Cliff47]

I am offended by the newspaper article. I do NOT get the shakes just before my next purchase.

All I can say is that they could have timed the update of their software to late on Sunday evening, to have it ready for Monday morning. Sloppy planning on somebody's part there. And no way should it take four days to upgrade what they already have installed. Where I work, we just upgraded a rather large (2500+ programs and other related modules) in half of a day. Of course there were a few problems, but those are getting fewer and further between.

 

[scout26]

Imagine the hue and cry if they shutdown the ability to buy and register cars for four days.......

 

[RoadkingLarry]

Shut down cigarette sales for 4 days, liquor maybe, hamburger sales...no Big Macs today buddy.
Pick any other legal item and halt sales for 4 days and see how it goes. Hey maybe they should halt newspaper sale for a holiday weekend...

 

[Roccobro]

So, what happened?

Justin

 

[Old Fuff]

Gun store owners are hot. The shutdown coincides with the beginning of the early dove and goose hunting season, a popular time - at least in some parts of the state -for gun sales.

But four lousy days with no guns? And with plenty of warning so those who want to buy new hunting rifles can plan ahead?

So what rifle does one use for dove and goose hunting?

Tomorrow, during a national day of protest against illegal guns, there will be a "lie-in" in front of Sen. Arlen Specter's house in East Falls. Thirty-two people, representing the number killed in the Virginia Tech shooting, will be dressed in black and lie down for three minutes, the time it took Seung-Hui Cho to do his sick work.

Ah... How exactly does this help solve the problem of school/workplace shootings? Are we to understand that if another Seung-Hui Cho came up to a school building and found 32 dingbats dressed in black laid out in front of the door he'd give up, throw his guns and ammunition away, and become a peaceful person?

As my mother used to say, some people don't have enough brains to keep their ears apart... :banghead:

 

[Sistema1927]

Let a state government shut down all the newspapers for four days and I imagine that the author of this tripe would be "in a snit", and would scream loud and moan long, the miserable "junkie".

"A right delayed is a right denied".

 

[K-Romulus]

update: final report

I forgot about this "Event" and had to search to find out what happened. Here is the best write-up I found:

http://philly.metro.us/metro/local/...rch_speaks_out_against_gun_violence/9826.html

Million Mom March speaks out against gun violence

by brian x. mccrone / metro philadelphia

AUG 29, 2007

EAST FALLS. Thirty-two people lay on the grassy knoll along School House Lane last evening for three minutes, silently protesting the proliferation of illegal guns in cities like Philadelphia.

The rally was held along a leafy, quiet stretch of road far from the city’s violent streets for a reason: Organizers wanted one particular East Falls resident to see them. U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pennsylvania, has a home on Timber Lane just yards from yesterday’s rally.

Million Mom March member Barbara Montgomery, who organized the “lie-in,” said they were acting as part of a National Day of Protest Against Illegal Guns.

“There’s 32 of us to represent the number of murders by handguns in this country every day,” Montgomery said. “If you counted suicide and accidents, we’d have 83 people out here.”

Events in 17 cities across the country took place after the Rev. Jesse Jackson and his nonprofit Rainbow Coalition organized the rallies around the 35th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s March on Washington.

Every age group seemed represented on the grass yesterday, from the elderly to 11-year-old Jerron Corley, a city middle-schooler whose father Clayton brought him.

Corley’s father has kept Jerron well informed of the deadly toll.

“Five children get killed every day [in the United States],” the young boy said. “We’re here to stop all the people from getting killed.”

Philadelphia police have confiscated more than 10,000 illegal guns in the last two years. The number grew from just over 5,000 taken by police in 2005 to 5,300 taken last year.

Democratic mayoral nominee Michael Nutter has said repeatedly over the last year that the city is in a “state of emergency,” greatly due to the huge increase in gun violence in the past year.

“We are the most heavily armed country in the world,” Montgomery said. “There are 90 guns for every 100 residents. That shows where the priorities are.”

Photo:

Protesters lay on the ground in East Falls yesterday to show their support for anti-violence. The event was staged near Sen. Arlen Specter’s house.

 

[scout26]

And the only attention they got was from a kid on a BMX who's thinking "I bet I could jump over all of them on my bike."

 

[Henry Bowman]

And the only attention they got was from a kid on a BMX who's thinking "I bet I could jump over all of them on my bike."

ROTFLMAO! Exactly what I thought!

 

[mnw42]

One a month.

More than a few of the politicians in Philly want to institute a one-a-month law.

I for one will feel hard pressed to follow such a law. I can barely buy one gun every few months. I'll have to sell my car to keep up with the pace.

Seriously, Sen. Specter is a lame duck.