On Saturday morning, thousands and possibly millions of Americans are going to take to the streets in the March for our Lives, the protest organized by the teenagers who survived the trauma at Stoneman Douglas High School last month.
I will be in Santa Cruz, marching for our lives, my children's lives, and the lives of all who are tired of the NRA putting every citizen of this country in danger to serve gun manufacturers' interests.
Fox News is quite upset by the prospect of a march, Tucker Carlson in particular, who has spent more air time slapping the organizers around than most other Fox hosts.
On Wednesday's show, Carlson brought a former Army sniper on to gunsplain things to victims of gun violence. Great job there, Tuckie.
"So, I think a lot of the people who are coming to the marches this weekend are just upset about school shootings," Tucker said, laying the foundation for Cleckner. "And maybe haven't thought about the agenda that undergirds -- the people organizing it have a pretty clear legislative agenda."
You're damn tootin' right we have an agenda, Tucker. We have a clear agenda -- saving the lives of our children and the citizens of this great country, getting rid of death machines that rip their flesh to shreds in the name of the second amendment, and outshouting the likes of YOU.
Cleckner's responses were anodyne and typical. "Criminals don't obey laws," he gunsplained. "The definition of a criminal is somebody who doesn't obey a law."
He continued, "Banning an inanimate object will not solve these problems. So, for example, the Maryland shooting yesterday didn't involve an AR-15. Virginia Tech, used pistols. The Ft. Hood massacre, he used pistols. 9/11, they used box cutters. The tool is not the problem."
No sir. The tool is absolutely the problem. First, had yesterday's shooter in Maryland had an AR-15, another dozen kids would have been dead along with the one critically injured girl he had a thing for and the unfortunate boy who was in the way.
Thank GOD he didn't have an AR-15. But he could have had one in a different state, easily enough. And that he had a gun at all is surely the problem. You bet it is. If there were fewer guns there would be fewer shootings. Period. End of discussion.
Of the now-expired assault weapons ban, he said, "During the assault weapons ban that started in 1994 and sunsetted in 2004, it did nothing to stop violent crime."
We are not talking about violent crime. We are talking about mass shootings, which take the term violent crime and turn it on its head. We are not talking about muggings or holdups. We are talking about ELEMENTARY SCHOOL CHILDREN SLAUGHTERED BY A WEAPON OF MASS DEATH.
Blah, blah, blah. "Today's level of violent crime are 50% lower than they were at the peak in 1997 right in the middle of the same ban that banned those so-called dangerous high capacity magazines," he went on. Maybe the NRA could just have put some talking points in a power point and run it during Tucker's show.
"I mean, you want to talk about tools, look at the Austin bombings that we just solved today -- bombs are already illegal," he said. "It didn't stop the bombings from happening."
No, it didn't. But I would note that if you added up all of the people killed in bombings over the past 15 years and you compared it to the list of people who are maimed and killed just by AR-15s in the past 15 years, the numbers will not compare. They will not.
All of this, before I get to the part where we discuss the craven evil of Tucker Carlson bringing a sniper on his show to smack victims of shootings around.
Fox News is a cancer. It is a cancer that absolutely needs to die before it kills the host. Tucker Carlson is but one of several carriers.
(h/t Media Matters)