{"id":5235,"date":"2011-01-11T12:49:52","date_gmt":"2011-01-11T16:49:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/?p=5235"},"modified":"2011-01-11T12:49:52","modified_gmt":"2011-01-11T16:49:52","slug":"last-man-standing-songs-that-may-help-someone-stop-and-think-about-our-gun-control-laws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/last-man-standing-songs-that-may-help-someone-stop-and-think-about-our-gun-control-laws\/","title":{"rendered":"Last Man Standing: Songs That May Help Someone Stop and Think About Our Gun Control Laws"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The recent shooting rampage in Arizona has me tuned in more than most current events stories tend to do. The fact that the 9-year-old granddaughter (same age as my youngest boy) of one of the most iconic figures in Philadelphia Phillies history, 1980 World Series manager Dallas Green,\u00a0was shot and killed by this sick, young man especially brought the story home for me, but I’d already found\u00a0too much troubling regarding our lax handgun laws and\u00a0stores like Walmart<\/strong>, which are cool selling ammunition for semi-automatic handguns but won’t sell Eminem<\/strong> CDs with the dirty bits left in, not to mention those who choose to use handguns for reasons other than official police and military business.<\/p>\n

My goal with this potentially\u00a0inflammatory Last Man Standing<\/em>\u00a0is not<\/strong> to get on my soapbox and pound my fist over my<\/em> particular opinions on gun laws and usage but to share songs and lyrics\u2014from any angle of this debate<\/em>\u2014that might at least help someone think<\/em> about these issues. Likewise, this is not<\/strong> the space to get on your soapbox and pound your<\/em> fist. I am confident we can let the songs do the talking and let the tunes carry whatever messages they may for any of us as we eventually mount our particular soapboxes in venues that encourage such activities. There’s room for the full spectrum of views on these issues, but I also encourage you to stick to songs that resonate on some meaningful level. Resist, if at all possible, being a wiseass and simply posting songs and song lyrics that justify gun laws based on the need to rid the world of Don Henley, you know what I mean?<\/p>\n

I’ll start with Neil Young’s impressionistic “Powderfinger.” I’m never sure exactly what’s going on in this song, but this verse in particular gives me a sense of what it might feel like to shoot a gun for the first time.<\/p>\n

Daddy’s rifle in my hand
\nfelt reassurin’
\nHe told me,
\nRed means run, son,
\nnumbers add up to nothin’
\nBut when the first shot
\nhit the docks I saw it comin’
\nRaised my rifle to my eye
\nNever stopped to wonder why.
\nThen I saw black,
\nAnd my face splashed in the sky.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The recent shooting rampage in Arizona has me tuned in more than most current events stories tend to do. The fact that the 9-year-old granddaughter (same age as my youngest boy) of one of the most iconic figures in Philadelphia Phillies history, 1980 World Series manager Dallas Green,\u00a0was shot and killed by this sick, young […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[342],"tags":[55],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5235"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5235"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5235\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}