Michael,
You must be kidding...
To expand on your suggestion, why not give all the "responsibly trained NRA members" special uniforms to wear, maybe brown shirts or black shirts, and given them special authority to watch over everyone's security. Of course, they would be able to brandish guns and "prevent" any disruptions to order...

Since only .00004% out of 300,000,000 plus LEGAL guns are involved in any kind of violence, indeed, I would trust "responsibly trained NRA members" with school security. The current feckless alternative is the current insane policy of schools as "gun free zones" in which violent maniacs are assured a free fire zone to take out the innocent without fear of any opposition. Police responders take at least five minutes (with another 5 to 10 minutes to assess the situation upon arrival) to respond to a massacre situation and the suicidal maniac completes his slaughter in the first 2 or 3 minutes. Why do you insist on leaving our children in a shooting gallery without protection?

There's always a totalitarian yearning for another Kristallnacht.

If America wanted the Obama agenda, why did America return a House of Representatives full of Republicans... I think America likes the checks and balances.
Not sure if ONE party should control 2/3 of the government.

Semi-clever stuff there Mr. Brennick (emphasis in the "semi").

Do you read history MB? If not, forget it. If so, can you point to a political party from this country's history that was COMPLETELY unwilling to compromise with the other side? A party that would rather hamstring government into inaction than concede on anything? IMO, the only examples of this come from the 1850s (The South and the northern abolitionists) and we know where that ended up.

The Founding Fathers set up a divided government that forces political opponents to work with each other. Over time, that produced a 2 party system. In such a system, if one of those parties is COMPLETELY unwilling to negotiate/compromise, then our country becomes ungovernable.

My passion directed against today's GOP (my party, by the way, for 23 years) seems over the top to you. Perhaps it is a bit too much, especially if it just puts Republicans off. But the reason for that passion is that the GOP, via its virtually unprecedented unwillingness to compromise, is ruining the country's ability to govern itself. And I'm sorry, but that's a big deal. A VERY big deal.

The Democratic party fits your bill. The Democrat architects of segregation and Jim Crow refused to compromise on their apartheid system from Reconstruction until it was dismantled in the 1960s, with a larger percentage of Republicans (llike Everett Dirksen) supporting the demise of segregation and Jim Crow.

Let's also have a look at the 1930s. The early New Deal legislation was rammed through and compromise be damned until the US Supreme Court struck down the NRA (not to be confused with the virtuous gun owners group of today). Let's also remember that the great Democratic party non-compromiser FDR attempted to pack the Court in order to eliminate all opposition to his rule.

Let's fast forward to the 1960s and the Democratic party under LBJ. The Great Society legislation contained minimal input from the opposition and was not the result of compromise.

Your ignorance of American history is astounding. Perhaps you've absorbed all your "history" from the likes of Howard Zinn and Oliver Stone's recent fictional "Untold History of the United States" series on Showtime. Pathetic.

Not to beat a dead horse....I don't want to forget another Democratic "non-compromiser":Woodrow Wilson. At the end of WWI in 1918, Wilson refused all attempts at compromise in regards to the Treaty of Versailles , especially pertaining to the League of Nations. The adamant refusal of the majority to accept the League led to Henry Cabot Lodge's heroic opposition and the defeat of Wilson's attempt at ramming through his internationalist monstrosity. Wilson's ideological pigheadedness lead to his stroke and threw the nation into disarray. Another Democrat averse to compromise.

Nice job giving us part of the historical picture there Michael Brennick. Yes you are correct: As strange as it may seem today, in the late 19th century and early 20th century it was REPUBLICANS who tried to protect blacks and it was the DEMOCRATS that were persecuting them. This did give rise to Jim Crowe. But then you made a teensy weensy error: You left out the period from 1948 to the present! See that’s where the tables began to be turned vis-à-vis the parties and Civil Rights. Truman began things by desegregating the military and by adding the very 1st Civil Rights plank to the party convention platform. LBJ virtually gave up the South to the GOP when he signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Nixon completed the switch with his cynical “southern strategy” in which he leveraged southern discontent at Democratic progressivism on Civil Rights. Since then, of course, the Democratic Party has been the champion of Civil Rights.

Ironically, more Republicans voted for the CRA of 1964 than Democrats (higher percentage). But that’s because the South was still solid Democratic after the Civil War and Reconstruction. I’m sure you’ll agree that not one of those southern Democrats voted for the Act. The Democratic Party, via LBJ, bit the bullet anyway and lost millions of voters in the process.

So, as to the positions of the parties on Civil Rights you’re in fine shape as long as you ignore the last 60+ years.

No problem there, DK, since you gave us no part of the historical picture, it's a pleasure to try and educate you.

I'm not arguing Civil Rights. I'm refuting your inane point regarding compromise.

I've given you a plethora of historical knowledge, off the top of my head, you can now mine Wikipedia and attempt to rehabilitate yourself. If you return with some very clever cut and paste material. I may up your grade to a D+.

Wow Mr. Brennick, you are a CHAMPION of providing just part of history: The part that serves your purposes.

Hey, I'm not going to defend Woodrow Wilson's egotism. He had it in spades and had an incredibly bad ear for Capital Hill politics. He was a know-it-all and that had a great deal to do with his failure to get the League of Nations ratified.

But the "heroic opposition" of Henry Cabot Lodge was nothing of the sort. Rather, Lodge killed the League largely out of personal animus for Wilson. He was so angry at the Wilson egotism and superiority that he killed the League largely out of personal spite. It was FAR from "heroic".

And anyway MB: Why is it useful to review Democratic politics of the '20s and '40s today? That's ancient history! Talk about being on a "mission from G*d" to excoriate Democrats! If you keep it up, I'll have to starting feeding you a diet of Harding, Hoover and Nixon!

"Why is it useful to review Democratic politics of the '20s and '40s today?"

Your sophistry is boundless. You challenged me (as a supposed non-history reader) regarding examples of non-compromise. I cited chapter and verse. You then danced onto the Civil Rights issue, in order to distract. Now you would like to distract with Harding, Hoover and Nixon...I'm not a Republican. Hoover was a statist who inspired much of the early early New Deal....Nixon was a traditional big government man, he created much of the administrative apparatus beloved by liberals...EPA, affirmative action..etc.....Harding was a coaster, who had an excellent Treasury Secretary...

Please attempt to at least argue your silly compromise point. As a side-note, your point about Henry Cabot Lodge's animus to Wilson as the root of his opposition to the League of Nations is juvenile. That is like arguing that Churchill hated Hitler's haircut and moustache so he wanted war....please.......you have to find better cut and paste stuff then this. You're still in F territory.

I gave you no part historical picture MB? I don’t know, I described Truman and the military, Truman’s convention plank, the CVA of 1964 and Nixon’s “Southern Strategy”. Ahem… those are part of history MB. Have you heard of them?

You’re not arguing Civil Rights? Too bad. You were wrong so I pointed that out. You don’t get to claim “I didn’t mean it” later.

Hey, why don’t you show us if you know your stuff. Please point out an error in my Civil Rights post. Can you? Do you know enough to even try? See, you’ll have to show me something before you earn the right to grade me.

Seriously, can you point out an error of mine? You’ll punt on that won’t you?

Here is my point regarding non-compromise and CIvil Rights:
"The Democrat architects of segregation and Jim Crow refused to compromise on their apartheid system from Reconstruction until it was dismantled in the 1960s..."

Here is your valid agreement with my point:

"it was REPUBLICANS who tried to protect blacks and it was the DEMOCRATS that were persecuting them. This did give rise to Jim Crowe(sic)."

Very good, thanks for pointing this out, you are up to a D-. I spoke of the architects of Jim Crow and their non compromise posture.

Then you mention Truman's deseg order.....yes, so, it did not overturn the solid Democratic legislative block to preserve Jim Crow. Unlike you I have no deep-seated need to malign all Democrats or Republicans. Truman was a decent chap who attempted to do the right thing. His party prevented him from moving forward.FDR also attempted some CR moves but was rebuffed and pulled back....in order to preserve his domestic and later his WWII policy.

Now, please refute each of my examples regarding compromise.

FDR and the early New Deal

Wilson and Treaty of Versailles (the Lodge point is cartoon stuff)

LBJ and Great Society.

The Nixon "Southern strategy" ...what does this have to do with your initial point regarding compromise. Yes, Nixon opportunistically attempted to capitalize on the Democrat's loss of the South. If you read Kevin Phillip's book on this subject, you will see that it was mostly based on the South's law and order fears and their military and patriotic traditions which Nixon hoped to exploit (and did). Nixon was a liberal Republican and supported the Civil Rights agenda, he moved to implement Federal affirmative action and created the EEOC etc. he opposed forced busing not in opposition to CR but because it was an insane liberal policy, that even he could not stomach..

All very interesting but it hasn't anything to do with your initial ridiculous compromise assertion, which remains unsupported.

I’m sorry MB: You brought up Civil Rights not me so I followed you lead and discussed it.

After taking us to Civil Rights, and after I responded on that, you criticized me. So I challenged you to point out an error of mine. You punted on that as I expected. OK, I’ll give you one last chance to explain a point to prove you know something.

Pray tell: How did Hoover “inspire the New Deal”?

If you can’t explain that then I’m through with you. It’s not enough to make impressive sounding observations MB. You’ve gotta be able to back them up with actual knowledge when challenged too. Can you re: Hoover? Fat chance, huh?

Now, if you want to be rid of me for good, just respond avoid the question. I’ll drop out knowing that you're an empty shirt.

Have a look at George Nash's multivolume biography of Hoover. In the 1932 campaign FDR castigated Hoover as a big spender who would bankrupt the country. Hoover was a believer in strong centralized governmental planning. Once FDR took office he completely reversed himself and began an approach involving a massive increase in spending and government planning. He brought in the whole New Deal planning model. Hoover was a brilliant engineer and was celebrated by central planning types for his amazing work in hunger relief in Europe post WWI and famine relief in the Soviet Union in 1920 before his Presidency. Hoover was not a laissez faire capitalist type.

I guess, MB, you make a valid point about Democrats not compromising on Civil Rights. I have to tell you, though, that I’m not very impressed with that point.

The “Party of Lincoln” lost the South completely for several generations after the Civil War. There were exceedingly few Republicans elected south of the Mason Dixon line before the mid-20th century. So, that gave the congressional Democratic Party a HUGE southern block. A huge bigoted block that drove Jim Crowe. Sure that made the Democratic Party unwilling to compromise on Civil Right, but not because of any innate inability to compromise but because of glaring southern prejudice.

And then here’s my point: Even though those southerners gave the Democratic Party asevere disadvantage on race relations, it was STILL the party that took all of the historic steps that culminated in the Civil Rights movement. And there's denying that the Democratic Party was the party behind the Civil Rights movement. That’s the part that you conveniently left out of your criticism of the Democratic Party vis-à-vis Civil Rights.

However, I hear you: That last part does go far beyond hour original point

Finally, can you defend your Cabot Lodge point or not? My impression came from reading 3 or 4 books on Wilson. You should read some of the ridiculous reasons that Lodge gave for opposition. Saying my point is “cartoon stuff” without any justification is, well, toddler stuff.

Lodge was considered the premier interventionist or imperialist throughout the 1880s and 1890s. He was the top intellectual and political voice calling for naval supremacy, strong American presence in the world etc. However, post 1920, he was characterized as the leader of the unwashed isolationists peering out from under their beds in fear of the outside world. What happened? The defeat of Wilsonism and his major contribution to it happened.

His opposition to the League was based on the ceding of American sovereignty to an international body, especially the clause that called for automatic intervention to defend members against external aggression. With the defeat of Wilsonian internationalism the powerful faction of Wilsonian academics, historians and foreign policy idealists painted Lodge as an isolationist yahoo who put Wilson in his grave and defeated any chance for an internationalist nirvana.

There's a study of Lodge by a Professor Widenor that masterfully surveys this false metamorphosis of Lodge from interventionist/imperialist to yahoo isolationist published in the 1980s called HC Lodge and the Search for an American Foreign Policy or something like that...

No compromise on Heath Care Patrick? Ever heard of the "Public Option"? Where did that go? Away in a compromise, that's where. Obama compromised a bunch during those negotiations. Obamacare was passed, containing those compromises.

Then the GOP revisionists went to work: Gone was the Public Option compromise. Never happened. Gone were the compromises over abortion funding with conservative Democrat Bart Stupak. Never happened. Gone were a myriad of other compromises.

Beyond the typical GOP hyperbole that you’ve obviously fallen for Patrick, it comes down to this with today’s GOP: The GOP’s idea of “compromise” is its opponent acceding to ALL of its wishes. If it can’t get EVERYTHING that it wants, today’s GOP stomps its feet like a 3 year old. “FOUL” it cries. "Obama wouldn’t cave into everything we demanded. He wouldn’t compromise".

What rubbish. Obama compromised over and over on Health Care. The one thing he wouldn’t do, however, was give the GOP EVERYTHING it wanted. And that’s completely unacceptable to today’s GOP which has lost the art of negotiating with its opponent to govern.

Patrick, compromise is a word unknown to BHO and the Leftists who dominate Washington. You are completely correct that the so called ObamaCare monstrosity had virtually no input except from the Left side of the aisle. BHO decided that he would placate his Left base by allowing the House and Senate Democrats to design ObamaCare. This has been pointed out by liberals like Bob Woodward.

BHO has decided that ideology trumps governance. This has been the aim of the Left since the 1970s.

The gunman, like the burglar will take the path of least resistance. If a house has an alarm, the burglar likely will go elsewhere. It's no coincidence that shooters target gun free areas or areas like shopping malls where people are less likely to be armed. Find responsible, willing individuals in schools, train them and arm them.

All of the data shows that the more guns in a society, the more gun violence that society has. The more guns you put into our schools, the more gun violence you'll have at those schools. Perhaps a bunch of people walking the halls with guns in schools WILL reduce the number of occasional rampages like Newtown. But then we'll be left with the routine, day to day gun violence in our schools that a vastly larger number of guns in those schools will spawn.

More guns means more gun violence. That's been proven over and over by the studies. We do not need to demonstrate that in our schools.

"More guns means more gun violence".

There are in excess of 300 million legal guns in the US. The number of legal guns used in violent crime is de minimis. On the other hand the highest violent gun crime rates occur in blue states with the most rigorous gun control regimes. On the other hand, right to carry states have the lowest rates of gun violence.

Your assertions amount to hot air and should be regulated by the EPA. There is no substance to your ideology.

I'm sure your foreign born terrorist would be smart enough to choose a target located in a state without a "right to carry" law. He would also choose a target within that state that was located in a "gun free zone" e.g school, mall etc. Therefore, he would be granted, by our high minded Leftists, with a target rich zone without fear of being eliminated in the first several minutes of his attack. Since "right to carry" states have much lower violent crime rates than the incredibly violent blue states with their permissive judges and fantasy, stringent "gun control laws", your caricature of an "armed camp" is absurd.

Hmmmm... I see that Patrick is a charter member of the "Barack Obama created all of the problems of the world" club. Yeah, yeah we know Patrick: None of the problems you mentioned existed until January 20, 2009: Obama inauguration day.

I wonder Patrick, can you find a quote from Obama's 1st 2 years in which he blamed the country's problems on Bush? If you can, can you find enough of those to prove your point that "obama blamed it all on Bush"? Seriously, the Right says this all the time but I don't remember it that way. Now, Obama DID say this a decent amount during the campaign, but those 1st 2 years? Take a look to see if you're describing something real or just one of those conventional wisdoms.

All I know, Patrick, is that when one President hands and economy in free fall to his successor it takes AGES to fix things. Take FDR following Hoover. Now we have Obama following Bush (600,000 lost jobs, I believe, from December to February of '08 and '09). Bush left the country on fire. I think we can forgive Obama for assigning some blame where it's deserved.

But check out those 1st 2 years. I think you'll be surprised at how hard it is to find Obama blaming Bush.

Patrick, if Obama blaming Bush during his 1st to years was so common, let’s see a couple of references. Or are you too lazy to prove your point?

“And FDR never fixed anything”. That’s right, economically. The problem is that you’re proving my point Patrick. Deep economic holes like what Hoover and Bush left take YEARS to recover from regardless of who’s president what is the economic policy. See, it’s best to AVOID destroying the economy. Too bad Mr. Bush didn’t do that, huh?

Come on, try to keep up Patrick. I mentioned FDR because he was the victim of a predecessor that bequeathed an economy on its knees. You know, what Bush did to Obama.

And again, try to keep up: DEEP economic disasters take years to recover from. And that's why Bush deserves blame.

Try to raise you game would you Patrick?

Patrick,

Please cut and paste the words in which I said FDR was an economic success. Alas, you won't find those words. I never said them.

Are you always that good at putting words in peoples' mouths?