Tag Archives: mass shootings

Looking Up

Posted on by under cartoons, education, Environmental Issues, guns, Law and justice, Political commentary, Social commentary

I always enjoy Clay Jones’ cartoons, but I enjoy his commentary even more. He is an astute observer of the politics of the day and his words are typically as wise as any OpEd writer … though often spicier! His latest is spot-on … Republicans are desperately trying to distract us, to direct our attention anywhere but where it belongs.

claytoonz

I called a goon a “goon” yesterday and it upset him.

I enjoy reading the comments my cartoons get at GoComics but I don’t always interact with the readers there. But sometimes I’ll see a comment that I feel needs addressing. Yesterday, one of the right-wingers suggested a topic that fit his narrative, like that’s what I’m here for. I don’t see these guys telling the Boks, Varvels, and Lesters to draw on gun control, equal rights, Black Lives Matter, or women’s rights. Maybe someone should suggest a cartoon about climate change to Ben Garrison.

But this reader suggested a draw a cartoon that would feed his narrative, something he obviously saw while watching Tucker. I replied that it’s funny he found that to be an important issue while totally ignoring the mass shooting on Monday night that occurred at Michigan State University which resulted in three deaths from the…

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Thoughts On Human Adaptability … And Hearing!

Posted on by under guns, Personal, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Social commentary

For Christmas, my daughter bought me a set of hearing aids.  Now, I was born with defective ears, and when I was very young, I think around 8 years old, I tried hearing aids … this was back in the late 1950s when hearing aids meant a box strapped to the chest with wires leading from the box to big, bulky pieces in both ears.  Well, long story short, they didn’t work out for me and the audiologist said that my particular hearing problem could not be resolved with hearing aids.  As I aged, the problem grew worse and today I am about 95% deaf.  But, with the improvements in the hearing aid technology in recent years, my daughter thought it was worth a shot.  Her order was delayed, so it was a late Christmas present, arriving just before New Year’s, and a complete surprise to me, for while we had talked about it, I had no idea she had actually ordered them.

With eager anticipation combined with a bit of trepidation, I tried them on … and … WOW!!!  I never knew our front door squeaked!  I didn’t know that a toilet flushing made noise!  Had no idea that my keyboard was so LOUD!  I can hear the kitties cry!  I can hear Natasha clearing her throat and Chris snuffling!  One day I was in the kitchen rinsing off some dishes when I heard voices behind me, even caught some of the words, so I swung around, for I thought I was alone in the house!  It was the neighbor kids walking through my backyard on their way home from school!  I heard them through closed windows and a wall!!!

Needless to say, I am a happy camper!  Yes, there are a few negatives, like sometimes there’s just too much noise between the television (if Chris is home), three people typing on keyboards, the cats scratching in the litterbox, the furnace running, the washing machine spinning, etc. And my own voice sounds overly loud and somewhat mechanical. But the positives far outweigh the negatives. Last night, I noticed something different.  For the first several days, I marveled constantly about the things I could hear that I had never heard before, but last night when I took the hearing aids out for the night, it was the silence I noticed.  I did not hear the water running, did not hear the furnace nor the cats.  I think this means that I have gotten so used to wearing the hearing aids, to hearing sounds, that silence is no longer my norm, but rather the aberration.

Which brings me to my point, in case you were wondering if I had one.  We become conditioned.  In this case, I spent nearly 72 years being unable to hear, depending on lip reading, closed captioning, and otherwise just nodding my head and smiling, but it took me just over a week to become conditioned to hearing everyday sounds, and then silence became the anomaly.  Here in the U.S., we have become conditioned or inured to gun violence, to bigotry and racism, to corrupt politicians, to wealthy corporations enjoying the fruits of our labour, to the poor and homeless living hand-to-mouth.  If asked to think about those things, we do and we are horrified, but on a day-to-day basis, we simply don’t think about them because they have become the ‘norm’ just as surely as my hearing running water is now the norm.  Every day there is a new horror and we learn to skim the news and simply turn a blind eye, get on with our own lives.

Humans are adaptable creatures … throughout history humans have evolved, have adjusted to meet the circumstances of the changing world.  In most ways that is a good thing, a necessary thing for our survival as a species.  But when it enables us to simply accept the unacceptable, perhaps it is not such a good thing.  When our senses become dulled to the horrors of children being killed in schools, of police killing Black people at a higher rate than white people, of politicians favouring the wealthy over the rest of us, of homeless people living on the streets, then our adaptation to the new norms puts us on a path set to destroy the very things that make us ‘human’ by definition.

There are many things that we must adapt to in order to survive in this world, but when gun violence becomes the acceptable norm, when each set of elected politicians is just a little more corrupt than the last, when people are shunned and abused because of the colour of their skin, their religion or sexual orientation, those are things that we should never accept as the “new normal”.  If we allow them to, then future generations, our grandchildren and and their children, will pay for our apathy. If we want the world to be a better place, then we have to change it and we cannot change it if we are willing to simply accept what is wrong.

DAMMIT!!! 🤬

Posted on by under guns, History, Law and justice, Personal, Political commentary, Rants, Social commentary

Wednesday, 1:30 a.m.

1:30 this morning, I had just finished my music post and was getting ready to put it on the schedule for the usual time, 11:00 a.m.  Suddenly my phone went mad with a knock-knock here and a knock-knock there.  Being nearly deaf, my notification sound is a sharp knock, which I can hear much better than any tone.  Usually, it is silent at 1:30 in the morning, so I knew something was up.  Sure enough … three notifications from The Guardian, The Washington Post, and the New York Times informing me that a gunman had shot and killed multiple people in a Wal-Mart store in Virginia.

GODDAMMIT PEOPLE!!!!  Two days before Thanksgiving and people cannot even go buy a damned turkey or some sweet potatoes without getting killed???  We the People … our damned lives are less important to the members of Congress we pay to protect us than the profits of the damned gun industry?

As I pound the keyboard, hitting as many wrong keys as right ones, my loving cat Oliver, sensing my distress, hops onto my lap and using his paw, gently pulls my left hand away from the keyboard.  Whoever called them ‘dumb animals’ was dead wrong … they’re a hell of a lot smarter than we humans are.

Having spent a few minutes patting Oliver and chatting with him, my tears have dried and I am now somewhat calmer … at least I’m hitting the right keys now!  By the time I resume this post later today, hopefully there will be some details, but already … barely 3 hours after the massacre, Wal-Mart management is sending useless ‘thoughts and prayers’ just as most of our elected officials who cannot be bothered to take guns out of the hands of lunatics will be doing by this afternoon.  The latest from the BBC is that they think it may have been the store manager who opened fire, but … don’t worry, folks, for a Wal-Mart corporate executive said that the company is “shocked by this tragic event.”

On that note, I shall switch gears, pat Oliver a bit longer, have a piece of cheese, try for some sleep (it is now 2:45 a.m.), and return to this story later this morning.

Wednesday afternoon

Well, details remain sketchy but apparently it was the night manager who did the shooting.  He was in the break room with a number of employees planning for today’s deluge of last-minute Thanksgiving shoppers, and just as the meeting was about to break up, the manager pulled out a pistol and opened fire.  Six people were killed and either 4 or 5 were taken to nearby hospitals with injuries.  Given that there were some 20+ employees in that break room and the store was crowded with shoppers, it’s a small wonder that there weren’t more killed.  The gunman then turned the gun on himself and was dead when police arrived.  The name of the shooter (murderer) has not been released and the FBI is involved in the investigation.

Mass shootings … as commonplace as syrup on pancakes.  Someday perhaps we will have lawmakers who see it as their duty to craft restrictive gun laws with teeth, but as long as the gun industry is allowed to put lots of money into the pockets of these men and women, essentially buying their votes against ANY gun restrictions, these shootings will continue to escalate.  People claim the biggest reason for gun ownership is self-defense, but it is rare that a gun is used for self-defense.  The night manager at Wal-Mart certainly wasn’t ‘defending’ himself, nor was the murderer at Club Q last weekend, nor was the man who killed three University of Virginia football players ten days ago.  More often than not, guns are used to murder people for any or no reason, but not self-defense.

In some states today, it is as easy to buy a gun as it is to buy a pack of bananas.  When does it stop?  Does it stop when some crazed gunman kills a large number of members of Congress, or perhaps the President?  I know you’re all tired of hearing me rant about guns, and I’m tired of writing about guns, but until something is done, I WILL KEEP WRITING ABOUT IT!!!

And Yet Again …

Posted on by under education, guns, History, Law and justice, Racism & Bigotry, Social commentary

I have not yet written about the horrific massacre in Colorado that left 5 people dead and 25 injured, not because I had nothing to say, but rather because I have too much to say.  Meanwhile, Dan Rather and Elliott Kirschner have said it for me, and in a much better way than I could have, for mine would have been a rant.  I will, no doubt, have more of my own words on this subject sometime soon, once I can stop 🤬.

Guns and Hatred

Once more

Dan Rather and Elliott Kirschner

22 November 2022

Guns and hatred collide once more.

Peace is broken; lives are shattered.

Again we see the pictures and learn the names of those who have been slaughtered.

“Authorities are trying to determine a motive.” But the broader narrative is already known.

Those who feed the hate, stoke the vitriol, and profit off of our divisions hide behind meaningless expressions of thoughts and prayers. For them, there is no pause for reflection, no sense that we can do better.

Anger, waves of anger, sweep over a deep trench of hopelessness.

We have mourned before, and we surely will again.

A cycle repeats. The words we uttered for the last tragedy could be reprised for this one, and likely the one to come.

In what sane world do we accept a national impotence in the face of unending bloodshed? None.

Why do we demonize people for how they express their love for others? Or for what they look like? Or for how they pray?

Why is celebrating our common humanity not enough?

What do we tell our children? How do we teach them?

Hate is learned, and it is being taught.

If we are honest with our history, we know that hatred has been a constant in our national story. But so too have attempts to rise above it, to make progress toward a more just and equitable nation, to strive for that “more perfect union.”

We celebrate acts of heroism. We find support in our collective grief. But we should never accept this murderous hostility to our diversity. Our national strength is rooted in our differences. We are all at our best when we support each other.

Far too many continue to live in fear because of who they are. This fear is not an accident or unintentional. There are powerful people in this country who base their power on the ability to frighten.

Cultivated terror is a poison that infects our society. Once unleashed, it is impossible to control. It easily explodes in violence, as it did in Colorado Springs. There will be another set of charges to mark, another court case to cover, another verdict to await. But we can already pass a verdict on a society that allows this to continue.

Completely eliminating cultivated hate and violence is not possible, but we can drastically reduce it — if only enough Americans unite to make it happen.

In The Words Of Forrest Gump …

Posted on by under Bits 'n Pieces, Election 2020, Election 2022, Free Press Issues, guns, Law and justice, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Rants, Social commentary

“Stupid is as stupid does”

(My apologies to Keith in advance, but sometimes you just gotta get it out of your system)

Now, I know I’m not the sharpest knife in the drawer, so before I start criticizing others, I’ll tell you about my latest moment of dumb.  Our electricity went out yesterday afternoon.  I was sitting here writing when the lamp beside me went out, and I thought the bulb had just blown, but at the same time, my granddaughter screeched that her computer had shut down.  Then the neighbor came over to ask if our electricity was out, as was his.  So, I grabbed my laptop to send Duke Energy a text, but … duh … the internet was out!  So, I managed to send them a text via my phone, and they immediately responded, saying that they were aware of the outage, crews were on their way, and they estimated that service would be restored by 6:00 p.m., although they reserved the right to alter their estimate.  Since it was only 2:00 at that time, and since the temperature outside was in the 90s, I told Miss Goose that we better go get the fans out of the storage shed.  Oops … my second ‘duh’ moment, for the fans are powered by … electricity!  Fortunately, the power was back on within about a half-hour, so all was well.

So, now that I’ve fessed up to my own idiocy, I won’t feel so bad about critiquing others’ lack of brain power.  Let’s start with …

Stupid is as stupid does #1 – Ken Paxton

Let me start by saying that I have never known of an Attorney General who was as much a bastard as Texas’ Attorney General Ken Paxton.  Paxton was the one who sued the states of Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin over the 2020 election results because he claimed they “flooded their people with unlawful ballot applications and ballots while ignoring statutory requirements as to how they were received, evaluated and counted.”  Mind you, Paxton is the TEXAS AG and thus has no skin in the game in those other states, as was made clear to him by the United States Supreme Court.  Paxton, in fact, was then slapped with a misconduct lawsuit by his own state!

But do you think ol’ Kenny learned his lesson?  No, sadly he is just as obnoxious and nauseating as ever.  What’s the latest, you ask?  Well, he has commandeered the attorneys general of some 20 other states and they are collectively filing a lawsuit against … the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)!  Why, you ask?  The simple answer is because they are all idiots, but the more exhaustive explanation is that they are suing because the USDA does not discriminate against LGBTQ people!  Yes, you heard right!

It all started when Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack issued a press release in May stating that …

“USDA is committed to administering all its programs with equity and fairness, and serving those in need with the highest dignity. A key step in advancing these principles is rooting out discrimination in any form — including discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.”

So, I suppose that AG Paxton and his cronies would like to see LGBTQ people starve to death if they find themselves unable to afford food for whatever reason?  Perhaps his philosophy is akin to …

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.  This, my friends, is the direction the new GOP is heading … you must be white, straight, Christian, and preferably male in order that the likes of Paxton will consider you human.  Now, I’m not worried that they’ll win their lawsuit, even with the lopsided Supreme Court of the day, but the fact that someone in such a position of trust and power … make that 20+ someones in positions of trust … can be so blatantly and unapologetically bigoted is … mind-blowing!

Stupid is as stupid does #2 – Charlotte Bergmann

Charlotte Bergman is running for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives from Tennessee’s 9th district.  Either she is related to Alex Jones or took lessons from him somewhere along the line, for she claims that nearly all mass shootings, including the one where 19 children were shot and killed in Uvalde, Texas, in May, are “false flag” operations, are ‘planned events’ designed to ‘take away people’s guns’.

On the day after the July 4th mass shooting in Highland Park, Illinois, in which seven people were killed, Bergmann said …

“You cannot tell me that this was not planned. The shooting is not just random. There is an agenda behind the shooting. There is an agenda. And that agenda is to make sure that our guns are taken away.”

It must be tough living in the Twilight Zone!  Ms. Bergmann, just for a bit of background, has run five times before — in every election since 2010, with the exception of 2016 — and has not yet won an election.  She is a documented QAnon supporter and even claimed that the 2018 mail pipe bomb attempts were false flags.  And yet, she is still running for the U.S. House of Representatives … THIS, my friends, is the face of the new GOP, which, by the way, no longer stands for “Grand Old Party”, for there is nothing ‘grand’ about them anymore.

Stupid is as stupid does #3 – Donald Trump

Trump put out a statement through his “Save America” PAC saying he’s “notified CNN” of his “intent to file a lawsuit over their repeated defamatory statements against me.” He also said he does, in fact, plan to go after other media outlets …

“I will also be commencing actions against other media outlets who have defamed me and defrauded the public regarding the overwhelming evidence of fraud throughout the 2020 Election. I will never stop fighting for the truth and for the future of our Country!”

And all I can do is laugh!  🤣  First, he would have to prove that whatever “defamatory statements” the outlet made were false!  It isn’t illegal to call a spade a spade … unless it’s a diamond, and Donald Trump sure as hell ain’t no diamond!

In a 282-page letter that Trump’s lawyers sent to CNN executives on July 21st, they claim that Trump’s …

“… comments are not lies because he subjectively believes that the results of the 2020 presidential election turned on fraudulent voting activity in several key states.”

Bullshit.

A Dose of Needed Optimism

Posted on by under Bits 'n Pieces, education, Election 2022, guns, History, Law and justice, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Re-blogs, Social commentary

Jeff and Greg … they started On the Fence Voters several years ago. Life has a way of changing the best laid plans, so we haven’t heard much from Greg in the last couple of years (I owe you an email, Greg … I haven’t forgotten … I’m just perpetually behind!), but Jeff has worked hard to get the message across. Today, we get to not only hear Greg’s voice once again, but see some great, inspirational photos! And, he’s nudging us all to get out there and do our part, telling us that our voices DO make a difference! Thank you both, Jeff & Greg! Loved the photos and loved the chat between you two!

On The Fence Voters

On the heels of my last post, which was on the dark and pessimistic side, I’d like to head in the opposite direction. And, by the way, I’d like to thank everyone who commented on that post. All of them were thoughtful and encouraging. Frankly, I need that!

Four years ago, my long-time good friend Greg called and asked me if I was interested in starting a blog. We were both angry and sick over the Parkland, Florida mass shooting and wanted to do something about it. Instead of complaining about how things were going in this country, it was time to put our anger into words and try to make a difference.

Since that day, it hasn’t quite worked out how Greg had intended. He could not contribute to the blog as he had planned. Life was dealing him lemon after lemon, and it wasn’t working out.

However…

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The Week’s Best Cartoons

Posted on by under Bits 'n Pieces, cartoons, Election 2020, guns, Humour, Law and justice, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Re-blogs, Social commentary

I’m only a day or two late re-blogging TokyoSand’s excellent collection of political cartoons from last week!  Predictably, the topics were women’s rights, human rights, mass shootings, and Boris Johnson’s resignation.  Be sure to follow the link at the end to see the rest of the ‘toons over at TokyoSand’s Political Charge!  Thank you, TS!

See all the ‘toons at Political Charge!!!

A Toothless, Useless, Waste of Time

Posted on by under education, guns, Law and justice, Political commentary, Social commentary

There are so damn many issues to claim our attention and concern today that it seems something important is always falling by the wayside.  There are some things, though, that we simply cannot afford to lose sight of – climate change, the threats to democracy, the ‘dumbing-down’ of education, the pandemic that is still a pandemic, and our massive gun problem.  Speaking of the gun crisis … I have looked at the ‘bi-partisan’ agreement in Congress and said, “pbthhhh … it has no teeth.”  In my book, it is even less than the very minimum I would expect or demand, were I in a position to make demands.  It is the Republican’s attempt to placate us, to shut us up, to brag that they took our concerns seriously, when they don’t at all.  Did you know that according to the latest NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll, 59% favor curbing gun violence, while 35% do not. That includes 92% of Democrats in favor, along with 54% of independents. However, “70% of Republicans say it’s more important to protect gun rights.” 

Yesterday, Paul Waldman published an OpEd in The Washington Post that echoes my own sentiments on the topic …

More guns in schools, and everywhere else? Have we gone mad?

By Paul Waldman

Columnist

June 14, 2022

There’s nothing like a massacre of elementary school children to get the attention of lawmakers, who will be eager to show they’re at least willing to pretend to do something about the gun carnage we Americans endure. But while Democratic states often respond to mass shootings by passing new gun restrictions, Republican states tend to pass laws loosening regulations, driven by the psychotic idea that protecting us from gun violence requires getting more guns in more places.

While there are some glimmers of hope — senators might soon agree on a few worthwhile things on guns — we might emerge from this moment realizing that the flurry of lawmaking after the latest mass shootings took us to an even darker place.

If you want a hint of the dystopian future that might await us, look no further than a bill Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) signed into law Monday.

The new law’s guiding principle seems to be that we should turn every school into an armed camp as quickly as possible. The law lowers the amount of training required for a teacher to go armed in Ohio from around 700 hours down to 24 hours. According to its text, teacher training must include “at least four hours of training in scenario-based or simulated training exercises.” Four whole hours!

Think for a moment about your schoolteachers, or your children’s teachers. Maybe a few were past their prime and not as enthusiastic as they used to be. Some were young and idealistic, devoted to the well being of children. Some were brilliant; all had a difficult and stressful job.

But I’ll bet none of them were Jason Bourne, were they?

This is the world Republicans want us to live in, where every spasm of deadly violence is met with what is essentially a military response. If we face a threat from guns, we should get more guns and put them in more people’s hands. If there’s a school shooting, it means schools are “soft targets” that we must harden. Then we’ll do the same to stores and parks and synagogues and churches and mosques — and everywhere else we gather.

It’s a tribute to the GOP’s political and communication skills that it can take any idea, no matter how deranged — we have mass shootings because schools have too many doors! — and push it right to the heart of the discussion. Yes, we could theoretically turn your neighborhood elementary school into something like a supermax prison, but what would that do to the children inside?

We already have a clue from the proliferation of active-shooter lockdown drills in recent years. Meant to tell students that “this will keep you safe,” instead it told them that “this is the nightmare you live in now.” Over and over, they were told to live in fear, that a violent death was their possible future. In some cases, officials have organized simulated attacks where murders were acted out; as one teacher said, “I felt more traumatized than trained.”

We simply don’t know what kind of effects members of this lockdown generation will carry with them. But we’re apparently going to keep subjecting more and more kids to it — better that than force anyone to suffer any minor inconvenience when purchasing their arsenal of deadly weapons.

That’s certainly how the Republicans who control the state legislature in Ohio feel. On the same day DeWine signed that bill, another one he signed took effect. This one enacts “permitless carry,” meaning almost anyone is allowed to carry a gun almost anywhere in the state — no license or training required.

If almost anyone in Ohio could be carrying a gun, shouldn’t the teachers have guns? And if the teachers have guns, shouldn’t the students have guns? Perhaps we should discuss whether a 5-year-old’s constitutional right to bear arms is being infringed if they can’t pack a Glock in their lunchbox.

What we have here is a profound disagreement about what it means for a place to feel, and to be, “safe.” You can weld shut the doors and windows, fill the school with armed personnel and make the kids think every day about their deaths, and you will have achieved a kind of “safety.” But it’s a poisonous kind, one that will terrorize every child who enters there.

Unfortunately, we’re going to see a lot of that in the near future, because “hardening” schools is one of the only ideas Republicans will agree to in response to mass shootings. Money for “school safety” will be in the bipartisan gun bill (if it passes), and states will offer the same, so Republicans can say they responded to the endless wave of mass shootings.

Heaven forbid we should say someone has to be 21 years old to buy a military-style rifle designed to kill as many human beings as possible in the shortest amount of time. But if your school wants a grant to install more metal detectors? Step right up.

And Mrs. O’Neill, the kindly librarian at the elementary school? Put a gun in her hand. That’ll make everyone safe, won’t it?

WHOA … The Hypocrisy!!!

Posted on by under guns, Law and justice, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Rants, Social commentary

What, exactly, is the ‘Right to Life’?  Whose life?  To what extent are we willing to go to preserve life?  And what, exactly is life?  I’m frankly sick of hearing people say they are “pro-life” when all they really mean is they are against abortion.  Something in the news yesterday, though, connected some dots and made me stop … and after a bit of cursing and punching the coffee pot for not heating quickly enough, I sat down and said, “WHOA … the hypocrisy!!!!”  What was that something?  The second mass shooting of the weekend yesterday afternoon in a grocery store in a predominantly Black neighborhood in Buffalo, New York, where at last count, 13 people were shot, 10 murdered.  Folks, let me make something perfectly clear here:  the nearly-uncontrolled right to own guns is completely inconsistent with the right to life.  Completely.  If a person buys a gun, he or she does so with the intention of using that gun to kill.  Guns literally have no other purpose than to maim and murder.

Next time someone tells you they are ‘pro-life’, ask them if they own a gun.  If they say ‘yes’, then you can inform them that they are a potential taker of life, so no, they are not pro-life at all, they are just using the term to justify their stance on taking away women’s rights.

The shooter in Buffalo was an 18-year-old white male who apparently hates Black people for some reason, for the government is treating this as a hate crime based on his ‘manifesto’.  Gee, I wonder where he got that prejudice from?  Look first at the parents, but then look at society today.  Wonder why an 18-year-old kid even has access to a gun?  Last Wednesday, a judge in ruled that California’s ban on the sale of semiautomatic weapons to people under 21 is unconstitutional.  What’s next … will it be ruled unconstitutional to ban giving guns to children age 14?  Age 10?  Age 5?  The gun culture in this nation is truly insane.  In no other nation is a civilian allowed to own an assault weapon, let alone an arsenal!

If you’ve followed this blog for any length of time, you know my stance on guns … they do not belong in the hands of civilians.  Full stop.  Need further proof?

In Milwaukee, Wisconsin on Friday night, there was yet another mass shooting that left 17 people injured, but no fatalities thus far, miraculously.  This one took place late Friday night shortly after fans left a nearby NBA playoff game.  Two other shootings in the same general vicinity took place earlier that evening, leaving an additional four people injured.

My message to every single member of the United States Congress is this …

Do not offer ‘condolences’ to the families of the victims in Milwaukee or Buffalo.  Do not offer meaningless ‘thoughts and prayers’.  DO SOMETHING!  Initiate and pass serious and meaningful gun legislation to get the guns out of the hands of people!  No 18-year-old child has the need for a gun.  Nobody who has EVER been accused of abusing another person in any way should be allowed to own a gun.  And NOBODY anywhere, ever, for any reason has a need for an assault weapon!  Shut down the gun shows where even the most basic rules are openly disregarded.  Override with federal legislation the individual state laws that allow for carrying concealed weapons, for possession of a gun without a license, and make the federal law ‘One Strike, You’re Out’!

But alas, mine is a pipe dream, for those very people who claim to be ‘pro-life’ would scream, yell, and threaten any who even suggested such laws.  No matter that gun violence is the leading cause of death in the U.S.  You have a roughly 1-in-315 lifetime chance of death from gun violence.

For those who would claim that the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution gives them the right to own as many guns of any sort as they wish, let me clarify the exact wording of that Amendment:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

NOWHERE does it say that people should be allowed to keep a gun in the glove compartment of their car or walk into a grocery store with one concealed in pocket or purse.  NOWHERE does it say that guns should be freely available to teens.  NOWHERE does it say that a person should be allowed to own an assault weapon that didn’t even exist when the Constitution was written in 1787!  Those who believe that abortion is an infringement on the right to life, better wake up and look at the gun culture, the lack of gun laws in this country, for already this year 15,862 people have lost their life to a person with a gun.  That is more than the total gun deaths all year in 2016!!! But yet, do you hear anybody speaking for the ‘right to life’ of those victims?

Friday it was Milwaukee, Saturday it was Buffalo … will your neighborhood be Sunday’s statistics?

Already In 2022 … Guns And Death

Posted on by under guns, History, Law and justice, Political commentary, Rants, Social commentary

As I write this post, it is just after 10:00 p.m. on January 1st 2022 in the U.S. and already 99 people have lost their lives to gun violence in the first 22 hours of the new year.  One of my New Year’s hopes I wrote about in a previous post was that reasonable gun laws would be enacted by Congress before the end of the year.  Had I taken a moment to write to members of Congress after seeing today’s statistics, my letter would have started with …

Hey, you STUPID Jackass, take your head out of your arse and do something right just for once!!!

But, as our friend Keith reminds me from time to time, that isn’t the right approach. It is certainly the one I felt at that moment in time, though.  There is something wrong with a nation, a society, whose citizens demand to be allowed to kill people, and that is exactly what the gun nuts in this country are doing.  Guns are intended to kill.  Period.  The only reason any fool wants to own a gun is to kill, whether they wish to kill fellow humans or animals.  And they will fight for the right to own an arsenal so that they can kill lots of people, before they will fight for the right for their children to get a good education or be able to live healthy lives.  Their guns mean more than their children, spouses, co-workers, neighbors, or dogs.

When I mention ‘reasonable gun legislation’, it is because I know that the sort of gun laws I would really like to see will never pass muster in this nation.  So, by ‘reasonable’, I am willing to compromise and settle for serious background checks on ALL gun purchases, disallowing anybody with a history of violence from owning a gun, and a cessation of conceal carry laws.  You want to carry a gun into Wal-Mart?  Fine, but make sure it can be seen by us all so we can exit and do our shopping elsewhere.  You’ll have most of the store to yourself … just you and your gun.

Last year, there were 42 school shootings in this country.  FORTY-TWO!!!  Thousands of children’s lives were in danger as they attempted to get an education!  Only in the good ol’ US of A.

In 2021, 44,768 people died as a result of gun violence.  Granted, Covid took more lives in the same time frame, and that is also the fault of the people in this nation who refuse to take precautions, but it is a story for another day.  Also, in 2021 there were 693 mass shootings, 310 children killed, 746 injured, 1,223 teens killed and 3,368 injured!  And yet, people just roll their eyes, shrug their shoulders, and go back to watching their televisions or grilling steaks on the backyard barbeque!

Every single year the number of mass shootings, the number of children and teens killed by guns, increases over the prior year.  EVERY YEAR!  No other nation on earth has such an abysmal record!

Last month in Oxford, Michigan, a father purchased a gun for his 15-year-old son.  The next day, the son, Ethan Crumbley, took the gun to school where, with malice aforethought, he shot and killed four of his classmates and injured seven others.  He is being charged as an adult and will likely spend most of the rest of his life behind bars … as should his parents.  The parents are cowards who ran and hid, leaving their son to shoulder the blame by himself.  What parent in his/her right mind puts a killing machine in the hands of a teen???  A gun nut, that’s who.

No other country turns a blind eye, permits almost anybody to own a gun, as the U.S.  In essence, this nation tells people that it’s okay to kill … just don’t get caught!  In 1994, Congress actually got off their collective arses and passed the Federal Assault Weapons Ban that prohibited civilian use of certain semi-automatic firearms that were defined as assault weapons as well as certain ammunition magazines that were defined as large capacity.  Unfortunately, by the time it expired ten years later in 2004, enough members of Congress were bought and paid-for by the NRA that the law was allowed to expire on September 13, 2004.  Every time that reinstatement has even been mentioned, the gun nuts go berserk and the members of Congress tuck their tails between their legs and slink off to safer turf.

I don’t know about you folks, but I’m sick and damn tired of walking through the grocery store not knowing whether that man perusing the bell peppers is carrying a gun and might just go off on a tangent if somebody accidentally bumps him with their cart.  I’m sick and damn tired of worrying about the children I see walking past my house in the morning on their way to the school bus, not knowing if they will be safe and return home all in one piece in the afternoon.  I’m sick and damn tired of reading about multiple shootings in my city every night, two of which were within a few feet of my front door last year!

DO SOMETHING, Congress!  The gun nuts in this country are destroying our peace of mind, not to mention our safety!  You have a responsibility … a grave responsibility … to every one of the people in this country.  Instead, you are owned, lock stock and barrel, by the wealthy arms industry and cowed by the gun nuts in the nation.  What about the rest of us?  Think about it.