Posts Made By: Mel Maki

Originally Posted by James Lacey

Mel,

This unfounded claim is just another right-wing talking point whose only purpose is to discredit the Mueller report. There is overwhelming evidence that the Internet Research Agency (IRA) was involved in illegal interference in the 2016 presidential election. A DC grand jury indicted 13 different individuals, all Russian citizens, who work for the IRA in February of 2018. Do you think a DC grand jury indicted them because there is no evidence? Come on, man, what next? Is your team going to start claiming that Hillary colluded with Russia to defeat herself? Wait too late. Fox News and Sean Hannity have already floated that sound-bite.

Originally Posted by James Lacey

It's not a theory at this point. The evidence that this is the case is quite overwhelming. I don't believe the IRA influence campaign started with the sole purpose of helping Trump. However, once it became clear that Trump viewed Putin favorably and that many of his policy proposals dovetailed with Russian propaganda, then the IRA went all-in on helping Trump. It's all detailed in gory detail, in Volume I of the Mueller report. Read it; you may just be surprised.

Originally Posted by James Lacey

If we can't agree on basic facts like the Russian government carried out a broad and sustained influence campaign before, during, and after the 2016 election, then there is probably not much to discuss. However, just this last Thursday a report from the Senate Intelligence committee reaffirmed what the Mueller report already says and concluded that significant vulnerabilities remain. I will remind you that the Senate is Republican-controlled and the Senate Intelligence committee consists of seven Republicans and 6 Democrats. The chairman is Richard Burr a Republican and the vice Chairman is Mark Warner a Democrat. It is a bi-partisan committee and a bi-partisan report by any measure.

Originally Posted by David Cotterell

In Dayton, good guys with guns killed the perp after only 30 seconds!  Yay! chalk one up for Rich!

During those 30 seconds he shot 9 people dead and another 26 were wounded... a rate of fire faster than 1 per second..

What if the best rifle he could by was a rifle like my uncle's old hunting rifle where you pulled back a bolt, stuck a single bullet in, shoved the bolt forward then pulled the trigger......4 or 5 seconds between shots at least......maybe someone could have tackled him after the first or second shot, brained him with a chair or whatever...less carnage.... (my uncle was a good hunter with that - he got his deer every year....)  

I do not wish to get into labelling guns as assault weapons or military style or whatever some folks call them - the debate devolves into a 'tastes great, less filling' labelling argument instead of hitting the main point.  It's high rates of fire and huge clips/magazines holding 20-30 or more rounds that are one of the main  problems no matter what you call the guns...Rifles that can get off a round a second need banning 100%.  Clips holding more than 3 bullets need 100% banning. Or no clips at all for rifles...  Make licensing for firearms at least as difficult and time consuming as licensing for an amateur radio license....make meaningful background checks and long waiting periods part of the process... (the Dayton perp  had a history in high school of making lists of people he wanted to kill and girls he wanted to assault...this should be part of his permanent record - should have been no guns for this guy, there was a police record of these offences....here - https://news.yahoo.com/classmate-says-dayton-shooter-targeted-180053657.html;_ylt=AwrCxnWod0hdY0YA.AIXFwx.;_ylu=X3oDMTByMjB0aG5zBGNvbG8DYmYxBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzYw--   )

But he got a high-rate-of-fire rifle, big clips and ammo because IF he had a background check at all, it was not nearly thorough enough...

Dave