“More than 80 percent of Americans want Congress to do something—anything—to prevent mass shootings,” Colbert said.

On Wednesday evening, a rifle-toting gunman murdered 18 people and wounded at least 13 more in Lewiston, Maine, when he opened fire at two separate locations—a bowling alley, followed by a bar. A manhunt is still underway for 40-year-old suspect Robert Card, a trained firearms instructor with the U.S. Army Reserve who, just this summer, spent two weeks in a mental hospital after reporting that he was hearing voices and threatening to shoot up a military base.

While the other late-night talk show hosts stuck to poking fun at new Speaker of the House Mike Johnson on Thursday night, Stephen Colbert took his rebuke of the Louisiana congressman to a whole other level.

“Now, we know the arguments,” Colbert said of the do-nothing response politicians generally have to tragedies such as this. “Some people are going to say this is a mental health issue. Others are going to say it’s a gun issue. But there’s no reason it can’t be both.”

  • Jeremy [Iowa]English
    1·
    11 months ago

    In the civilized world, you have to justify your need for a gun with the presence of the aforementioned varmints

    Rather, in the civilized world, you have to justify infringing upon a person’s rights.

    No legitimate, well-reasoned justification means no infringement.

    No one needs a machine gun to hunt deer, and no one needs a handgun. Handguns are lousy fof self defense (“buy a shotgun”, to quote the President). All they’re good for is killing humans and making gun shareholders richer.

    Need was never about it, though I’m interested in your reference point for machine guns being used to hunt deer. You seem to be living in fantasy.

    I’m similarly interested in your sources indicating handguns aren’t effective for self-defense; proving a negative will be interesting but your position is mere baseless nonsense otherwise - that would align with your hyperbole.

    All of the justifiable bases for having a gun are solved with a double barrel shotgun. Even if you’re being mauled by a bear, if two rounds of buckshot don’t stop it, you weren’t gonna make it anyway.

    Again, need was never a factor, though I’m interested in your source on the efficacy of double-barrel shotguns in self defense especially concealed carry and close quarters.

    I’m similarly interested in your source regarding defense against a bear being a foregone conclusion.

    License shotguns like cars and get rid of everything else. “Only criminals will have guns!” That’s what your shotgun is for. And if the criminals are getting locked up for having mobile armories, even better. We can replace the current prison population of black drug users with actual gangsters.

    Alternatively, we could actually address the underlying issues to mass violence - mass and otherwise - and by default address the shootings. We’d coincidentally be improving lives. This is a thing much more likely to pass than the amendment necessary to implement such asinine and arbitrary restrictions.

    I can’t help but wonder if you realize how deeply unserious you seem.