#herblock

Editorial cartoonist Herblock (Herb Block) at work

[Herb Block Foundation]

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Americans want gun control.  :: May 1, 2023

ROBERT B. HUBBELL

MAY 1, 2023

         Americans mourn for the victims of the weekend gun violence in Texas and the Texans forced to live in a society that glorifies guns above public safety. The details of two shootings over the weekend are horrifying. In the first, neighbors asked a man shooting an assault rifle in his front yard at 11:00 PM to stop because he was waking sleeping infants in the neighbors’ home. The man with the assault rifle then executed five of the neighbors in their home—including an eight-year-old boy. The gunman remains at large. Governor Abbott said nothing for 24 hours (other than releasing a photo of his golden retriever). When he finally commented, he tried to diminish the horror of the executions by describing the victims as “illegal immigrants.” See Business Insider, Gov. Abbott Calls Texas Mass Shooting Victims 'Illegal Immigrants'.

         In a second killing, a man on a date was scammed out of $40 by someone pretending to be a parking valet. When the man learned he had been scammed, he shot and killed the scammer, then returned to the restaurant to finish his dinner with his date. He has been arrested.

         When everyone is armed, the temptation to solve every disagreement by resorting to arms is overwhelming. The killings are sickening, and the lawless situation is dispiriting. But . . . there is reason to hope. All Americans are tired of the senseless killings that are the inevitable result of an armed populace. Fox News conducted a poll that confirms that a majority of Americans—including Republicans—now favor enhanced regulations of firearms. See Mom’s Demand Action, New Fox News Polling Confirms Popularity of Gun Safety Laws Among Democrats, Republicans, and Gun Owners.

         Moms Demand Action summarizes the key points of the Fox polls as follows:

87% of Americans support requiring criminal background checks on all gun buyers, including 83% support from gun-owning households.

81% of Americans support improving enforcement of existing gun laws.

81% of Americans support raising the legal age to buy a gun to 21, including 76% of gun-owning households.

80% of Americans support allowing police to take guns from those considered a danger to themselves or others, also known as Red Flag laws, including 76% of gun-owning households.

61% of Americans support banning assault rifles and semi-automatic weapons, including 50% support from gun-owning households.

         But Republican legislatures are not able to restrain themselves. They are captives of the NRA and the minority of Americans who value guns above all else. The Fox poll suggests that Republicans are vulnerable on a core issue going into 2024. They have picked the wrong side on guns and reproductive liberty. And the economy.

         The fact that Republicans seem hell-bent on creating the worst platform possible for 2024 does nothing to reduce the sting and sorrow of the latest mass shootings. But there is a path forward for Democrats as Americans come to understand the dark future that Republicans are plotting.

Various agencies including the FBI, CIA, NSA, and the Department of Defense have a long history of intercepting telegrams, phone calls, mail and other private communications. A Supreme Court ruling in 1928 held that phone tapping did not violate the Fourth Amendment banning illegal search and seizure, as long as the authorities did not encroach on the individual’s physical property, but in 1967, that ruling was overturned and required the government to obtain a warrant for wiretapping activities.

Cartoonists like Herblock and Walt Kelly, helped bring these secret surveillance activities of the government to the attention of the public, as seen in these comics from the archive printed in our Secrets issue, curated by Jenny Robb of the Ohio State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum.

(via CSotD: Straw polling The Daily Cartoonist)

The judges' scores depend on the judges. Click here -- https://t.co/IKL4PjWztJ -- for a dose of subjective reality from @kaltoons @Patbagley @AnnTelnaes @BennettCartoons @davidhorsey @Branchtoon @Nick_Anderson_ & @leejudge8 pic.twitter.com/1jHjViMFKZ

— Mike Peterson (@ComicStripOTD) July 29, 2020

Listen, are you going to be loyal to me or to that (expletive deleted) Constitution?

"Little man, so spic and span, where were you during the Democratic debates?" w/@JACKOHMAN @varvel @AnnTelnaes @wuerker @RubenBolling #RJMatson --plus the road apple doesn't fall far from the horse's ass, w/ @stevebrodner -- https://t.co/DUYBumcvk3 pic.twitter.com/IgzhCh9yRb