It has now been (over) one week since Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) mixed it up during a Senate Judiciary Committee debate over Second Amendment rights and proposed gun control legislation and over 100 days since the tragedy in Newtown, Conn. Congress appears no closer to voting on an assault weapons ban, stiffer background checks, or any further firearms legislation since Senators Cruz and Feinstein’s heated exchange, yet there has been a great deal of attention paid to their verbal food fight.
Consider Senator Feinstein’s emphasis in her now widely known immediate response to Senator Cruz where she used her personal experiences as in when she was the first one to find San Francisco Mayor George Moscone after he was shot. Rather than keeping the discussion focused on the matter at hand and her desired result, Senator Feinstein chose to validate herself, her credentials and her deep personal experience dealing with Moscone’s death.
In my opinion, there are certainly better ways to address a serious issue with significant implications than reducing it to a contest between empowered individuals with opposing views.