In the weeks since the Sandy Hook School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, the issue of gun control has taken center-stage in the national conversation. A new social web app gives us a unique chance to participate by listing “mugshots” of every member of Congress who has accepted gun lobby money, and inviting us to tweet them.
We’re not going to take a side in the gun control debate, but we will say that many ideas on how to solve the issue of gun violence in America have been thrown around liberally since 20 children and six adults were gunned down in Connecticut weeks ago. Some of these ideas have made for great fear-mongering headlines (NY’s Cuomo considering confiscation, for instance), and even the Illinois state legislature attempted to vote recently on a near-total gun ban, with the mandated surrender of all firearms.
But is there a conflict of interest up on Capitol Hill? Give US Gun Control thinks so. The site is a social web app that allows you to see every single member of Congress who has accepted gun lobby money. Of course, a majority are Republicans (a huge surprise, said no one ever) but there are some surprising names from the Democratic side on the site as well, topped off by none other than Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
The site also includes a few soundbites on the state of the gun control issue in the country, and hosts a donation link to the Brady Campaign, the country’s largest gun control advocacy group. The app includes social plug-ins to Facebook and Twitter to help spread awareness, as well.
Additionally, as stated above, you can tweet these elected officials to demand gun control legislation, call them out for hypocrisy, or heck, tell them “job well done” if you’re fond of the 2nd.
let every american have as many muskets as they want, but no automatic weapons.
The musket was the 'automatic weapon' of the day when the Constitution was ratified. And… automatic weapons have been restriced heavily since 1934. Idiot.
None-other? SoundbYtes?
The gun laws are fine as they are. We need better medical and social services! Think of the children…think of them indeed before you abrogate our rights, think of all the help that could be done if the efforts at removing simple tools were instead levied against a broken and healthcare system.
I forgot to remove the last "and".
I agree that gun control won't solve everything. Mass shootings like the one at Sandy Hook Elementary are a problem which need to be addressed at many levels. First off, is there a way to prevent, identify, and treat the mental illnesses that cause these events? Secondly, maybe we can look at our violent culture.
Where does The Constitution say "musket"?
Awesome App, Just used it to thank all the Democrats that support Gun Rights! Thanks!