Piers Morgan bid adieu to his television viewers on Friday, replete with a shot at the NRA and a plea for Americans to become more stringent about gun control. Morgan’s show was canceled due to low ratings. Critics say the British native is “out of touch” with American culture.
“We gave everything we had and loved every minute of it. Well, almost every minute of it,” Morgan said before signing off for the last time.
Morgan’s show was supposed to fill the open hole Larry King left with his retirement. Things didn’t quite pan out the way CNN had planned.
During the last few minutes of Piers Morgan’s final commentary, the talk switched to gun control. He had in fact pre-empted his last show with a tweet that indicated he had something more to say before his official goodbye.
I'll be saying something at the end of my CNN show tonight that is important to me. Tune into the final 20 minutes of @PiersMorganLive .
— Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) March 29, 2014
Saying first that he respects Americans, the CNN host quoted something his brother, a colonel in the Royal British Army, once told him.
“You always want an American next to you in a trench when the going gets tough.”
“But that’s where I think guns belong, on a military battlefield,” Morgan said. “Not in the hands of civilians.”
Piers Morgan went on to say that gun violence in America is “a disease.”
“The gun lobby in America, led by the NRA, has bullied this nation’s politicians into cowardly [sic] silence even when 20 children are blown away in their classrooms,” he said.
Long criticized for his anti-gun stance, Morgan once lost his cool during an interview with a woman whose brother died from gun violence. He crumpled up his papers and promptly ended the interview.
During his sign off, however, Piers Morgan insisted that his beliefs were shared solely for the good of Americans.
“I’m so pro-American I want more of you to stay alive,” he said.
While many are opposed to Piers Morgan’s beliefs about gun control, it is interesting to learn what someone from another country feels about safety and violence. Were you a fan of his CNN show or did you think he was better suited to being a judge on America’s Got Talent?
Image via Wikimedia Commons
