CNN Uses Aurora Shooting to Force Anti-Gun Agenda on Viewers

NewsBusters.org ^ | July 24, 2012 | Matt Hadro

[Kaslin]

CNN used Friday's tragic shooting to force the gun control debate back into headlines this past weekend, and multiple network anchors made a blatant liberal push for further gun regulation.

The advocacy began just hours after the atrocity, despite both President Obama and Mitt Romney abstaining from politicking on the day of the massacre. "America has got to do something about its gun laws. Now is the time," CNN's Piers Morgan tweeted hours after the shooting. [Video below the break. Audio here.]

CNN Uses Aurora Shooting to Force Anti-Gun Agenda on Viewers

Morgan followed that up with more tweets and a Friday night show that was loaded with pro-gun control guests. Below are some of the most egregious examples of CNN's bias in favor of gun control from Friday, July 20, through Monday, July 23:

"You tell me a good reason why we should not strengthen the law now to stop another young man like him going into a store tomorrow, buying four more weapons, 6,000 rounds of ammunition on the internet, and killing and shooting another 70 people in America." – Piers Morgan, Piers Morgan Tonight, July 20

"[W]hat has to happen for Washington to reinstate the Assault Weapons Ban which expired back in 2004?" – Brooke Baldwin to Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter (D), 3 p.m. CNN Newsroom, July 20

"So why hasn't your party, the Democratic party done more to legislate guns?" – Brooke Baldwin to Nutter, 3 p.m. CNN Newsroom, July 20

"This is dating back to 1999, Littleton, Colorado, otherwise known as Columbine. 13 killed in a mass shooting. 2007, Virginia Tech, 32 killed. 2009, Fort Hood, Texas, 13 killed; 2012, Aurora, Colorado, 12 killed. Different circumstances, different people, but people look at this and say, can't we do anything to stop this?" – Candy Crowley, State of the Union, July 22

"Every time one of these things happens – Gabrielle Giffords last year, this shooting here -- there's an outrage, and then very quickly it dissipates. The American people quite quickly go back to their normal lives and they don't demand action in a way that I would expect them to. Why do so many Americans not feel angry enough to demand further gun control?" – Piers Morgan to New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (I), Piers Morgan Tonight, July 23

"If the political leaders in this country continue to say nothing about this, gun sales increase at the rate they've been increasing, and we see more and more of these incidents, people will say, Mayor Bloomberg, it's time you ran for the highest office. It's time you took charge of this." – Piers Morgan to pro-gun control Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Piers Morgan Tonight, July 23

"I want to ban all assault rifles." – Piers Morgan, Piers Morgan Tonight, July 23

"But it's ultimately about conscience. It's about learning from our experiences, our country, these searing experiences and recognizing that we've done this before. Bill Clinton took on the NRA in 1994. We passed an assault weapons ban. It lapsed 10 years later. So there is an example of profiles in courage. This should not be an undiscovered country. It is about courage. It is about taking on some powerful interests. But sometimes that's necessary to have a rational debate that actually deals with the problem." – CNN contributor John Avlon, Erin Burnett OutFront, July 23

Ironically, both a CNN host and a CNN contributor expressed their distaste for the media hitting on the gun issue Friday morning. Howard Kurtz called out CNN and Piers Morgan by name for turning the atrocity into "ideological fodder."

"I feel so strongly about this – how about waiting a decent interval, maybe a day, until, you know, the families have had a time to absorb the shock, the victims have been identified. Why this rush to do it immediately?" Kurtz asked on his Sunday show Reliable Sources.

"But in terms of just overall sensitivity, where the nation's mood was, no I don't think it was the right time to bring up that conversation," CNN contributor L.Z. Granderson said of debating guns the very morning of the shooting, which is what Morgan did.

[VideoDoctor]

If you've checked CNN's viewership ratings lately you'll see that they're probably affecting about a hundred and thirteen viewers total.

CNN... Cable News for those not wanting to watch the news.

[Standing Wolf]

In exactly one word familiar to all: click.

[SaraJohnson]

The response of the normal people in Colorado is to buy guns. What is going on CNN?

They are not going away from guns, they asked themselves the question normal Americans asked after the shooting: Why did no audience members shoot back at the wacko? The answer, they were not armed! They were sitting ducks.

The disarmed heros threw their bodies over their loved ones and died. They would have shot back and knocked off Holmes if they were armed and ready like they SHOULD have been.

[jonrick46]

The citizens of Colorado are now solving the problem of the crazy savage: Gun sales are up 40%

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-07-24/colorado-gun-sales-surge-after-the-aurora-massacre

[tacticalogic]

I think this is an orchestrated attempt to try and force Senate ratifiction of the UN arms control treaty. It’s all too consistent. Somebody is handing out the script and pulling the strings.

[Wally_Kalbacken]

What viewers?

[tumblindice]

Come and get them ass****.

[txrefugee]

What’s a “CNN”?

[Buddy Sorrell]

Something that should be wiped and flushed.

[D-fendr]

“You tell me a good reason why we should not strengthen the law ..”

Facts, Piers.

Gun violence has gone down since the end of the “assault” rifle ban.

More than twice as many people are murdered each year with bare hands than with all rifles combined.

[Marcella]

Piers Morgan needs to go home to the little island of England AND STAY THERE. He makes me sick when he acts like this is his country.

[Iron Munro]

"America has got to do something about its gun laws."

YES!

My suggestions:

1 - No gun-free zones

2 - Unrestricted open carry across the board in all 57 + 1 states.

[D-fendr]

If CNN practiced more responsible coverage they could do more to decrease mass murders than any legislation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PezlFNTGWv4&feature=player_embedded

Psychiatrist: “Whenever we see intense saturation coverage of a mass murder, we expect to see one or two more within a week.”

[RandallFlagg]

FUCNN

[Jack Hydrazine]

Let’s add US territories and possessions, too!

Let’s see 57 + 2 + 1 for a total of 60 States of the Union.
(”I’ve visited 57 States with one left to go. Alaska and Hawaii I was not allow to go though I really wanted to, my staff could not justify.” -B.O.)

Territories: 3
Commonwealths: 2
Possessions: 8
Compacts of Free Association: 3
http://rationalrevolution.net/articles/territories.htm

Total:76

[Jack Hydrazine]

CO needs Constitutional carry although I’d rather it be national. Bring back full-auto ownership.

[Jack Hydrazine]

Do you have a website with those statistics handy? Thanks!

[moovova]

CNN couldn’t be any worse than the Head Bloviator, Bill O’Really tonight demanding that owners of “heavy weaponry” be put on a list with the FBI.

What’s heavy weaponry, you ask? Bazookas, mortars...AKs, semi-autos...according to BOR.

What a jerk.

[D-fendr]

>>Do you have a website with those statistics handy?

There was a long article comparing stats from US and Canada that referenced these stats - which I can’t find quickly now. However, here’s a couple of recent references, quotes, then source:

“Though it is one of the most popular rifles sold to civilians, the AR-15 is rarely used in crimes, presumably because it’s not readily concealed. The most recent FBI figures show just 358 of the 8,775 murders by firearm in 2010 involved rifles of any type. By comparison, 745 people were beaten to death with only hands that year, but no one has called for outlawing fists.”

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jul/23/dispelling-gun-myths/?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS

---

JENNIFER RUBIN, WASHINGTON POST: “Listen, we can make all of the declarative statements we want. There is no shortage of empirical data in criminology. In fact, it’s one of the most researched areas of social science. When we had the gun law, the assault ban weapon, there wasn’t a decrease, when we let it expire, there wasn’t an increase.

“We have had a gradual decline over the last 40 years in gun violence and all kinds of violence, in part, because of better policing, in part, because incarceration. So I think some of these statements that there are — we’re having more of these incidents, they simply are not true.”

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2012/07/22/george-will-and-jennifer-rubin-demolish-times-joe-klein-gun-control-l#ixzz21bGnJWYG