Heavy Machinery
"But for now, there appears to be scant political will to continue the waivers on Capitol Hill. The Biden administration didn’t include the extensions in its latest $1.5tn spending bill, reportedly at the insistence of the Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell."Weak. So tired of Democrats folding at every turn and calling it political reality.
"As we previously reported, in 2015, assaults with a firearm were 6.8 times more common in states that had the most guns, compared to the least. More than a dozen studies have revealed that if you had a gun at home, you were twice as likely to be killed as someone who didn’t. Research from the Harvard School of Public Health tells us that states with higher gun ownership levels have higher rates of homicide. Data even tells us that where gun shops or gun dealers open for business, killings go up. These are but a few of the studies that show the exact opposite of what progun politicians are saying. The science must not be ignored."I really believe most people realize this but our government is in debt to a powerful few who won't.
"During the 1960s, for example, it seemed impossible to change tobacco use. The tobacco industry had one of the strongest lobbies in history, smoking was part of our every day lives, and people were addicted. But it needed to change. We were getting more and more evidence that tobacco causes lung cancer, and we started unpacking the dangers of second-hand smoking. So we treated it like a public health issue. And we did this not by banning tobacco, but through a consistent and coordinated effort of approaching the public health problem from multiple angles."Such a great point. We should address gun violence as a public health problem.
"The carnage has renewed a decades-old debate about how to end the horror of U.S. school shootings, with many Texas political leaders once again calling for heightened school security measures. But others, pointing to devastation even on campuses that have invested heavily in security, said that such a singular focus could not stop a committed killer with access to weapons — and that such efforts might actually provide a false sense of safety in the absence of gun control regulations and more robust investments in mental health."I’m tired of Republican talking points about "hardening" schools and militarizing police forces. We have already done those things and they do not work. Removing military assault weapons from civilians is something new we need to try.
"The rise of services that connect strangers through private messaging has strained the conventional “see something, say something” mantra repeated in the decades since the Columbine High School massacre and other attacks, according to social media researchers. And when strangers do suspect something is wrong, they may feel they have limited ways to respond beyond filing a user report into a corporate abyss."Centralized social media without strong moderation was a big mistake. The advertising industry needs to force reforms but I’m not optimistic.
"Robbins, who said she lives in California and only ever interacted with Ramos online, told CNN she reported him to Yubo several times and blocked his account, but continued seeing him in livestreams making lewd comments."We need both online and physical world consequences for threatening behavior online. Services allowing people to repeatedly make threats of physical harm is unethical but it is the status quo for online media.
"The findings of nearly 300 pages include shocking new details about specific abuse cases and shine a light on how denominational leaders for decades actively resisted calls for abuse prevention and reform."Decades of family values.
"The Senate leadership barely even pretended to try to force their hands by scheduling a vote. Instead, senators are reportedly going on their Memorial Day recess. It’s a broken, worthless institution."Definitely feeling this.