Congresswoman Jackie Speier, D-San Mateo, will serve as a Vice Chair of a new congressional Gun Violence Prevention Task Force that will look at ways Congress can help reduce gun violence in the U.S.
The task force, led by Congressman Mike Thompson, D-Napa, will investigate new steps Congress can take now and in the future to reduce gun violence and prevent massacres like the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.
“We can turn the corner on gun violence with bold leadership and action. The victims of Newtown, Aurora, Oak Creek, Virginia Tech and Tucson deserve no less. It is time for Congress to enact common sense violence prevention laws that keep assault weapons and high capacity assault magazines out of our communities and require full background checks on all gun purchases,” Speier said in a statement.
“It’s important to note that every day brings the equivalent of a mass murder when 33 people are killed in this country at the hands of guns. Enough is enough. It’s time to put public safety and public health first,” she said.
Over the next month, the task force will hold a number of meetings and hearings with different experts designed to identify the best policies to reduce and prevent gun violence.
A comprehensive set of policy proposals will be released by the task force in early February.
Speier was Legislative Counsel to Congressman Leo Ryan in 1978 when she accompanied him to investigate the People’s Temple cult in Jonestown, Guyana.
Ryan was assassinated, and Speier was shot five times at close range.
She still carries two of the bullets in her body.
Since that time, Speier has been a consistent advocate of gun control, and carried assault weapons ban legislation in California 20 years ago.
the only reason I joined the patch in the first place is because some spaz commenter like Jo created a multi to pretend to be me after my name was mentioned in one of the news articles. anyway .. as far as calling BS on Jo. .. I got hit by a car in a crosswalk... that was ten years ago. to this day I still know the case number off the top of my head 061403-24 Tualatin Oregon Police. Jo supposedly was held up at gunpoint... Multiple times. Yet can't provide any proof ... still ... plenty of victims of gun violence speak out against weapons bans and with the courage to share their identity... I don't care much for it ... but posting a link to one of the more touching stories goes a whole lot farther than creating a bunch of multis that lie about getting shot at... unless you're just on the patch to rant and piss people off. I'm still kinda surprised that the second comment hasn't been deleted... which appears to me to be a direct threat of violence against a congressperson. How about you, Bren? What do you think about that second comment by Jo's first Multi "Andy".. is that a threat or not?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtyKofFih8Y
It really sucks that somebody impersonated you on this site. Sounds an awful lot like Vince Chutney's behavior. He is very well known to the moderators here and to a lot of us users for very blatantly and obviously creating multiple screen names and posting wildly untrue statements. I don't really have an opinion on whether Jo Tog and Vince Chutney are the same person, but I'm sure some of these other accounts with odd names belong to Vince.
I've been out of the country on business. No bet--that's easy money for you! lol How many more trolls accounts has he added?
Why didn't you protect yourself with your firearm? Isn't that the basis of your position? Sounds like a fanatic pro-life advocate that has a vasectomy.
Its too hard a topic and too sensitive to discuss. Reasonable dialogue has been squashed by the PC mentality of the media in complicity with politicians...elected and unelected.
When there's gun violence in non-white neighborhoods, you all are soooo very quick to talk about underlying cultural causes, but when a white man goes on a killing spree, suddenly he's a unique individual who happened to be troubled.
The same issue comes up with missing children. The ones that get national media attention are overwhelmingly attractive white kids. I don't remember ever seeing a missing black (or hispanic, or Asian) child get any attention in the national media.
So Bren, please open your mind and be open to real discussions.
7:57 pm on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 Andy_99 is correct. That is, indeed, what I am saying. There are so many people like Bren who appear unable to have an open dialogue about root cause issues of violence. They prefer to jump to their own narrow conclusions about the motives of those that may bring up sensitive topics. ----------------------------------------------------- Blah, blah, blah....
A number of sources have reported that Chicago's total for 2012 was 62 school-age children killed.
Anyhow, what nobody says in any article I've read about gun control either for or against it is, that these are all freak accidents, these shooting sprees will always happen, unfortunately. Try to ban guns, these"loonies" will find a way to acquire a gun and ammo, it's just a sad fact of living in such a large country with so much diversity, give cannot control everyone. Jackie Speir lost all credibility with me when she complained how food stamps didn't cover her coffee, which is a luxury not a necessity!
http://townhall.com/columnists/katiepavlich/2013/01/10/the-need-for-semiautomatic-assault-weapons-n1485999/page/2
7:38 am on Thursday, January 10, 2013 Jackie Speir lost all credibility with me when she complained how food stamps didn't cover her coffee, which is a luxury not a necessity! ---------------------------------------------------- Careful Resident, your sense of privilege and entitlement is showing.
7:38 am on Thursday, January 10, 2013 Anyhow, what nobody says in any article I've read about gun control either for or against it is, that these are all freak accidents, these shooting sprees will always happen, unfortunately. Try to ban guns, these"loonies" will find a way to acquire a gun and ammo... ---------------------------------------- First of all, I think you may be a little unclear on the definition of the word "accident." Secondly, that's quite an assumption you're making about the ability and willingness of "loonies" to go to extraordinary lengths to acquire guns. If you really believe a mentally ill, homicidal maniac having to go underground and find illegal sources for his assault weapons is exactly the same situation as a mentally ill, homicidal maniac being able to waltz into a gun store or gun show and purchase an assault weapon, you must have rocks in your brain. One scenario readily lends itself to massive loss of human life. The other scenario makes it much more difficult for the would-be murderer to get a hold of his murder weapon of choice.