By Bankole Thompson
One would think in the wake of the massacre in Connecticut that claimed the lives of 20 innocent children and eight adults that Michigan’s Republican leadership that is ready to allow guns in schools, daycare centers, churches and stadiums would pause and take a step back.

I thought events create a moment for people to take a deep search into their actions or how their actions affect the rest of the people they are governing. In essence SB59 the gun bill that stopped short of becoming law only because of the Connecticut shooting should be vetoed by Governor Rick Snyder. Snyder said he has some concerns but has not signaled when and if he would sign this notorious bill into law.

But the Republican Senate Majority leader Randy Richardville is already urging the governor to sign the bill. Richardville said the gun bill has nothing to do with what happened in Connecticut.

He said the actions of the gunman in Connecticut should not be a factor in Michigan deciding whether to expose its children to guns in schools and daycare centers.

“They are two totally devoid situations of each other. Whether this law was enacted or not enacted in Connecticut, it wouldn’t have changed the outcome on bit,” Richardville told the Detroit News.

So that justifies having guns around children including automatic rifles that were used in the Connecticut massacre?

How out of touch can Richardville and the other politically intoxicated leaders in Lansing be?

This shows us the kind of leadership Michigan has and what the state and its kids are in for in the coming year. That there will be government sanctioned law to expose children to guns and the imagery of guns in schools where kids are supposed to be protected is unthinkable and betrays every effort to sheild and protect children from violence.

Gov. Snyder in good conscience cannot pen his signature to this kind of right wing social engineering that only satisfies an ideological fantasy and does nothing to protect the lives of children or avert what happened at Sandy Hook Elementary.

The Second Amendment right to bear fire arms is important and must be safeguarded. But we cannot engage in a hypocritical and selective interpretation of the Constitution because the First Amendment right to life is equally as important as the Second Amendment. That means the lives of those children and adults killed in Connecticut deserved to live.

We cannot just be concerned about the right to life of the unborn by anti-abortion activists at the expense of the right to life of the living. And this gun bill heading to Gov. Snyder’s desk for his signature does nothing in protecting our environment.

Where are the adults in Lansing?

Who are the parents in the Michigan legislature who will approve of guns been displayed in places where their kids are learning?

Bankole Thompson author of “Obama and Christian Loyalty,” is a distinguished journalist and presidential author. Since 2008 he has been a member of the weekly “Obama Watch” Sunday evening program on New York’s WLIB-1190AM. You can tune in every Sunday to hear his take on the Obama administration from 9-10:30pm and simulcast in New Jersey and Connecticut. You can listen to him every Thursday morning on WDET-101.9FM (Detroit NPR Affiliate) where he is a political analyst. Thompson is the editor of the Michigan Chronicle and author of the forthcoming book “Rising from the Ashes: Engaging Detroit’s Future with Courage.” No part of this blog must be republished without the appropriate designation or expressed permisison of the author http://www.bankolethompson.com