Pelosi Goes Off On Reporter Over Gun Control Question

This isn’t Nancy Pelosi’s first go-around as Speaker of the House. She’s done this before and knows what the job entails. At least, one would think so. Especially in an era where President Donald Trump’s outward hostility to the press is framed as an all-out assault on the free press, she should know how the media works.

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Yet apparently she forgot all of that when asked whether or not she should have called the House back in session early to deal with gun violence. She kind of lost her mind.

On Tuesday, San Francisco Chronicle reporter Tal Kopan approached Pelosi on Capitol Hill and asked “Do you have any regrets about not bringing the House back in August to keep the flame lit on gun violence?”

“No, absolutely not,” Pelosi said. “We did our jobs. The Senate was supposed to come back. Why don’t you all get that straight? The Senate did not come back to pass the bill.”

“I’m getting very angry about the silliness of these questions,” an animated Pelosi continued, adding “Lives are at stake. Senator McConnell is standing in the way. We passed our bill in February. Members had events all over the country to ask him to bring up the bill.”

“Don’t ask me what we haven’t done. We have done it,” Pelosi said, and unapologetically added “If you are annoyed with my impatience, it’s because people are dying because Senator McConnell hasn’t acted. Why don’t you go ask him if he has any regrets for all the people who died because he hasn’t acted?”

Well.

I guess he should be glad she didn’t label him a domestic terrorist.

To be fair, the question was kind of a BS question. No, Pelosi didn’t need to bring the House back in session to deal with this issue.

Of course, it wasn’t a BS question for the reason Pelosi argued it was.

The truth of the matter is that the mass shooting issue isn’t a gun control issue, it’s a personal control issue. These people are unable to control themselves and are filled with rage, a rage that boils up and is eventually released in horrific ways. Take away all the guns and they’ll use cars. Take away the cars and they’ll make bombs out of easily-available materials. Take away those materials and they’ll stab a bunch of people. That rage won’t be satisfied.

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No one has died because Sen. McConnell has refused to pass whatever the House sees fit to send him. They die because monsters exist and we’ve done a piss-poor job recognizing it when they’re planning something horrific. That’s it. That’s the whole thing.

So yeah, the question was crap and there’s no reason for the reporter to have even asked it. It’s not crap because Pelosi has done all this good, but because everyone in Congress and the media seems to be intent on asking the wrong things. They’re so busy vilifying guns that they can’t be bothered to look and see if there’s another way, a better way.

That’s the question Kopan should have been asking. That’s the question a lot of people should be asking, both in Congress and in the media.

The fact that they’re not is enough to make me lose my mind.

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