Trump held a “listening session” with survivors of school shootings, but judging by the reporting on Twitter, it was a sour joke – carefully packed with Trump fans, and no naughty rebels allowed.
To help him simulate human reactions, Trump's minders gave him a cheat sheet that prompted him to say things like "I hear you" during the WH listening session on the #Parkland shootings. [@AP Photo by Carolyn Kaster] pic.twitter.com/cEyVNDlvjU
— Steve Silberman (@stevesilberman) February 21, 2018
https://twitter.com/poniewozik/status/966438137936384002
I want to know why Emma Gonzalez and the Parkland students in the national spotlight aren’t at the President’s listening session. The focus seem to be focused on everything but easy access to guns.
— Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) February 21, 2018
Frame it however you like, this White House "listening session" is an organized institutional cover up for gun lobby–to blunt criticism, pay lip service and do as little as possible to protect the children and people of America. It is murder in a gilded setting.
— David Rothkopf (@djrothkopf) February 21, 2018
This is really something – Trump's most enthusiastic proposal, in his "listening session" on school shootings, is: A) encouraging teachers and coaches to carry guns; B) sending a company of armed veterans into schools.
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) February 21, 2018
Please someone write a story as to how the students and parents were screened for this sham of a listening session. Listening to these kids praise Trump in the context of all this is beyond appalling. They're human shields for an industry that is literally killing our children.
— David Rothkopf (@djrothkopf) February 21, 2018
Oh god. Oh god. This listening session just got terrifying. Trump is now fully advocating concealed carry for teachers and staff. That's what this was about.
— Maureen Johnson (@maureenjohnson) February 21, 2018
Comments
12 responses to “Arm all the teachers”
Love that shot of the talking points. At least it’s better staff work than the George H.W. Bush aide who left in the note “Message: I care” in a speech, and 41 read it out loud by mistake.
I trust that everyone noted that Trump has “45” monogrammed on his shirt cuffs?
Sure that’s not his EQ?
Yes, that’s the answer. Arm everyone. Arm the teachers, arm the administrators, hell, arm the kids themselves. Guns everywhere, what could possibly go wrong? And why stop there? Give the principal a grenade launcher, flamethrowers for the custodial staff, have parents drive the kids to school in a tank. Place landmines around the school perimeter. That’ll learn ’em.
Seriously, I’m an educator, albeit at the postgraduate level but the point still stands. I don’t want a gun. I don’t want my students to have guns. My job is to teach and their role is to learn, not wonder if the next person to open the classroom door has an AR-15. Why is this so much to ask?
Brilliant. This will guarantee the teachers get killed first. Any killer worth a grain of salt will take them down then the classmates they might suspect have the greatest chance of overturning their kill ratio. Insane, but I am not surprised by the trurantula that sits in the White House.
I’m afraid our custodians would love that way too much. ;-)
Claire, I am also a teacher, and I would never want to have a gun when I went to class. I know that there are students who carry on campus, in spite of rules against it; I don’t know who they are, and I’m not sure I want to know, since I would definitely not be able to interact with them quite as well if I knew they were armed.
Seriously, this is the most screwed up suggestion of them all. Answer the guns with more guns, pretty soon blood is running in the streets…all the streets. It’s a bloodbath. My experience has been that there are people out there who get guns and then feel the need to use them. My brother shot himself, and nearly shot other people, because some clueless HR person decided to hire him to be a security guard and didn’t bother to do any sort of screening to see if he was stable enough to handle carrying a weapon.
Remind me again, just why is the NRA running a country of 300 million people, most of whom want some sort of sensible gun legislation? (Purely rhetorical – I know the answer. Money.)
I have a question. Under the Second Amendment, do non-citizens have the “right to bear arms?” This is important to me, because I overlooked it on my last two visits to the US. But next time I go there, I would like to open-carry a bazooka, plus ammo of course.
I would feel one helluva lot safer that way.
Omar, that depends. Are you white? If not, the answer is obviously no. If so, of course, feel free.
By the way, that equation goes for citizens, too. One of the police shootings, a lot of people I know who are Second Amendment fundamentalists were saying “But he had a gun in the car!” A legal gun, one he notified the officer he had, and which he did not attempt to use. But he was not white, so the rules did not apply.
No flamethrowers for custodians; Miller hates janitors.
iknklast
Thanks for that. It really sorts it out for me and puts my troubled mind to rest in peace.
No. I’d better rephrase that.
Somehow.
“Listening?” It must have been excruciating for Trump to sit and say nothing for an extended period of time while not sleeping or watching FOX. I can’t imagine him being capable of taking in any information (ever), but particularly not in this unsettling, unnatural state of “not talking.” Had those carefully screened people been briefed in advance to include frequent mentions of Trump’s name so he would be less inclined to wander off in inattention? Did they have little pictures of him to hold up and wave whenever they thought his concentration was flagging? IMaybe he’d been rigged up with one of those dog training collars where, upon barking, the dog receives an ultrasonic noise or mild electrical shock.
He certainly looked as though he found it excruciating. Also as though none of it got through to him in the slightest.