December 18, 2012

VIDEO: Corn Debates a Gun Lobbyist: Why is US Gun Violence Unique?


Mother Jones Washington bureau chief David Corn debated Richard Feldman of the Independent Firearm Owners Association on Britain’s Channel 4 evening news Monday regarding the need for gun control in the wake of the Newtown massacre.

Feldman said the United States is undergoing a “seminal moment” in the debate over gun policies, but he claimed the only issue at hand is “the problem of deranged individuals obtaining guns and causing mayhem.” Corn noted that the problem is much larger and pointed out that gun violence in the United States is unique among industrialized nations. “There is not one other country…that has this sort of problem and this sort of history with gun violence other than the US,” he said. “We do not have a monopoly on deranged individuals. What separates us from other countries is the population of… assault weapons… and the gun lobby doesn’t want to accept that. 

For more of David Corn’s stories, click here. He’s also on Twitter.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

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