Exclusive: The United States has been on a three-decade binge of unreality, imbibing delusions that began with Ronald Reagan and have continued through the Tea Party. The challenge now is for rational Americans to show they have the toughness and tenacity to fight for the real world — and to save it, writes Robert Parry.
Exclusive: Elements of the American Right are suggesting that Barack Obama, the twice-elected President of the United States, is a tyrant whose gun-control plans should be resisted by force, a gross and dangerous distortion of why the Framers wrote the Second Amendment, says Robert Parry.
As America prepares for the Second Inaugural of its first African-American president – and as demands grow for some commonsense gun control after a horrific school massacre – the Right is arming itself amid hysterical rhetoric about the need to “shoot tyrants,” ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar notes.
Americans are grieving over the 20 schoolchildren and six teachers mowed down in Newtown, Connecticut, by a deranged gunman with a semi-automatic assault rifle. But national grief may not be enough to overcome the cold calculations of profit and politics, says Danny Schechter.
The American Right and the gun lobby have hijacked the original intent of the Second Amendment, which was designed for a system of citizen militias to provide for domestic “security” without the need for a standing army. But the amendment is now a dangerous relic, writes Joe Lauria.
After each mass slaughter – usually inflicted by some high-powered assault rifle in the hands of a mentally unstable individual – Americans search for some explanation, some way to make sense of the madness. That was especially true of the latest massacre of children in Connecticut, writes Michael Winship.
Exclusive: When looking at the faces of the six-year-olds butchered in their Connecticut classroom, you should also see the faces of the politicians who pandered to the NRA and its obsessive opposition to commonsense gun control, the likes of Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, writes Robert Parry.
After each gun-related massacre, the U.S. news media waves its collective finger at politicians for permitting today’s insane tolerance of gun violence, but the media lacks the courage to call out specific individuals who bear most responsibility. One of those people is the NRA’s Wayne LaPierre, says Peter Dreier.
Exclusive: As Americans reel in shock over the slaughter of 20 schoolchildren in Newtown, Connecticut, defenders of “gun rights” insist, in effect, that such deaths are part of the price of “liberty” enshrined by the Framers in the Second Amendment. But this was not what James Madison had in mind, argues Robert Parry.
From the Archive: As the United States wrestles with the latest gun massacre – this time aimed at Connecticut kindergarteners – the real question is the character of American adults, many of whom punish gun-control advocates at the polls. Is America a nation of wildebeest, as Robert Parry asked after an earlier massacre.
Thanks to You We Reached Our Spring Goal -- Donations of any size are always welcome. Thanks again.
