A lengthy history of random shootings and recent school shootings has raised public fury and ensured that the gun debate is not about to go away very soon in the U.S. Gun groups are predicting that attempts through Congress to ban sale of assault weapons will fail. The debate and petitions continue.
Wal-Mart is set to see gun violence survivors, together with other groups, deliver a 250,000-name petition and a letter asking it to cease sale of munitions and assault weapons in their stores. The delivery is to be made at one of its stores at Danbury, Connecticut on January 15th.
The Danbury Wal-Mart store is near Newtown, Connecticut where twenty children and 6 adults died after a shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December. The group organizing the action is SumOfUs.org, which is an international corporate watchdog organization. They will be joined by Courage Campaign, Change.org, MomsRising and SignOn.org.
The letter notes that the company (Wal-Mart) has reaped huge profits from selling military-style weapons including the Bushmaster Patrolman’s Carbine M4A3 Rifle, which is the kind of semiautomatic ‘firearm that was used in the killing of the 20 schoolchildren and 6 adults at the elementary school last month. The letter also observes that such weapons were designed to slay people in large numbers quickly and these assault weapons can be purchased at the retail giant’s stores all over the country.
The letter also asks the retailer to honor a pledge it had made in the year 2004 to stop carrying the assault weapons after a federal ban on the weapons expired.
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