At least 58 people are dead and more than 500 are injured after a mass shooting last night at a country music festival on the Las Vegas Strip. The shooter opened fire from a window of the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino.
Anyone who doesn’t find this acceptable is going to ask for some kind of political action. People may differ greatly about what kind of political action would be effective in preventing similar tragedies in the future, but nearly everyone’s first inclination is to seek some of kind of solution. The political sphere is the most natural and obvious place to start.
Some people want to find a way to delegitimize this natural human impulse.
Gun control is a legitimate issue, but for the Dems already raising it after Las Vegas massacre, could we just have a day before plunging in
— HowardKurtz (@HowardKurtz) October 2, 2017
Others, like the governor of Kentucky, want to direct that impulse away from gun regulation.
To all those political opportunists who are seizing on the tragedy in Las Vegas to call for more gun regs…You can't regulate evil…
— Governor Matt Bevin (@GovMattBevin) October 2, 2017
Still others recognize that maybe today isn’t the best time to begin running pro-gun commercials on behalf of a political candidate, for example, Virginia gubernatorial candidate Ed Gillespie:
VA-Gov: NRA-PVF TV ad spending that was scheduled to start tomorrow has been postponed. New start date is 10/10.
— Medium Buying (@mediumbuyingllc) October 2, 2017
It’s going to be hard for the NRA to argue that the concert-goers would have been safe if they’d all been armed—their typical response after gun massacres in movies theaters or night clubs.
Despite that, reading through the responses to this massacre on social media, I felt like I was trapped on Groundhog Day. The same people are making the same arguments and counterarguments they always make. I have no reason to believe any of it will be more or less effective than it has been in the past.
I don’t really know what I can say that would be original or effective. I wish I did, but I don’t.
All I can really say is that it’s obnoxious to tell people not to immediately think in political terms about something like this. Anyone who doesn’t think in political terms about what just happened in Nevada is a monster.
Listening to liberal MSNBC this morning, I was struck by several things: a) the overwhelming (and appropriate but kind of inoculating) praise for first responders; b) the solution most talked about was metal detectors in hotels or trained desk clerks, trained to profile threats; c) the lack of gun-control talk (ie., how could he get so many guns and so much ammunition.
Last night we finished watching the VietNam War documentary. Don’t know if this shooter had a military background, but I was struck, as always, by the obscene disregard for human life that was inculcated in many American men of this shooter’s age.
Obviously something went terribly wrong in this guy’s head. We can’t make everyone safe all the time. But we really must do something about the easy accessibility of non-sporting weapons.
Do you imagine that this could be Trump’s moment to move the needle in that direction? After all, Nixon went to China!
..the solution most talked about was metal detectors in hotels or trained desk clerks, trained to profile threats
When will the majority, who are not gun owners, get sick and tired of the enormous cost to them to shore up the 2nd Amendment rights of the minority?
Each round of major violence, mostly but not exclusively perpetrated with guns, adds more guards/cops, metal detectors, etc. to public spaces. As if all the potential soft targets in any community or society can ever be fully protected.
Until the courts decide to interpret 2nd Amendment differently, there is little to be done.
However, sensible regulation is possible if the political power of NRA is challenged effectively. Not by East/West Coast liberals, academics, talking heads, and their Congressional representatives.
Realistic appeal would have to be made to the citizens in the non-coastal regions and their Electors. How to do so?
You can’t ban the mechanism as it is almost 100 yrs old and used for both military and civilian weapons. Ban form? Being tried in Calif. Ban extended or large capacity magazines? Done in Mass.
However, the interest in firearms has shifted from hunting precision rifles and shotguns to military style. Why? look to the worship or fetishization of the Armed forces and Swat type units. They are praised to the heavens and emulated with gear and firearms. That has taken over the market. Where a well made hunting rifle takes skill to craft. Military weapons often just take a machine shop to crank one out and assemble from parts.
Some think 3d printing will remove the ability to regulate the industry. Home CiC machines are now making major components from partially finished blocks of aluminum.
To change public opinion it has to be come like smoking and drinking/driving. That will take time and concerted effort outside the legislative avenue.
Ridge
Yes:
These gun owners have been more thoroughly socialized to the prevailing US culture than we anti-gun types. Holding their warm guns, they live the glory and violence of the USG military vicariously. Filling whatever emotional voids that exist in their psyches. The Pentagon would struggle to exist without them. Hollywood plays a critical role in this as well.
The high cost to society and victims was integral to the changes on smoking and drink driving. The changes were made over the same period of time as gun control efforts have existed. Progress on the first two and at best no progress the last one.
One of the firearm sites I look at is this-
thefirearmblog.com
It doesn’t participate in NRA political nonsense.
But as it is appealing to its readership, its pages are filled with military style rifles and the various accessories. Even bolt action models discussed are Swat sniper type. Yes, they are also used in accuracy competitions, but that isn’t what they are recognized as.
Same with publications seen in grocery and drug stores. Years past, they would be filled with different style and configuration hunting arms. No one would want a AR-15. Now, that’s all in there. Why? Fear generated for sales with NRA as a willing marketing arm.
As details come out, we will probably find that the Las Vegas shooter had illegally modified rifles. Why?
and what was his motivation in acquiring them and then using them on a crowd?
And yes. I’ll say it. Comments by the last Democratic Presidential candidate didn’t help much in the states she needed to win. Were they the deciding factor? No, but they were one of several reasons for people not to vote for her.
You can use this tragedy to ride the horse of strict gun control, but it won’t win you elections in States you need to win. Plain Fact.
But it will be one more step in beginning realistic firearm control, if the supporters of that can restrain their reflexive impulses and begin a dialog with fervent firearm advocates.
Ridge
Perhaps gun lovers will change as their children become more likely to be killed and maimed at concerts and ballgames? Although school shootings haven’t made much difference, so perhaps not.
I’ve read more than one account of gun fanatics who, confronted with keeping their guns, and keeping them readily accessible and ready to fire, or seeing their grandchildren, chose the guns.
Training desk clerks and hotel staff to profile threats? Seriously? Is that something purportedly intelligent people are recommmending as a solution? You have got to be f@#$ing kidding me!! Now I’ve heard everything.
I always shake my head when I hear people ask, “How can someone have so many guns? And how can someone hoard so much ammo”? I know a few fellow liberals who have that same bewilderment all the time. You know, I am surrounded by gun “enthusiasts”. I like to target shoot. I belong to a sportsman’s club that has a range. I know tons of people who love their guns. And I can tell you, accumulating guns and ammo is not exactly rocket science, and there is hardly anyone around here who would blink an eye about their neighbor coming out of the local Rural King store every month, or so, with a new gun. And buying ammo by the case is not something that makes people look side-eyed at you. Does hoarding guns and ammo like that make even the remotest sense for most of these people? Of course not. These people are not exactly collectors. They are gun hoarders. And what they are doing is generally not viewed by most of their fellow community members as a ridiculous thing. And it is completely legal. Guns around here are ubiquitous. Most years our county is near the top in the state for new issuances of concealed carry permits. For a lot of these people, they view guns as part of the fabric of their culture. Why that is, I honestly cannot say. But there is nothing that will raise passions in their ranks like talk of anything remotely limiting their ability to buy and trade as much of any firearm related items as they can imagine. This borders on an obsession for a lot of them. So it doesn’t surprise me when a massacre happens, and people start hypothesizing on the TV about possible scenarios that include simple, common sense questions about curbing the worst of the gun excesses, they have a total freakout. These folks honestly think that doing ANYTHING will be the first baby step on the slippery slope to total confiscation. These are not rational actors. And they will not go quietly into the night, that’s for damn sure. That talk you heard on MSNBC about training hotel clerks, and the puzzlement on the pundit’s faces about someone having a lot of ammo and a stash of guns sounds to these people like the ignorant and clueless bleatings of the coastal elites.
As for the possibility that Trump would use this event to do anything, I would say that possibility is exactly ZERO. Not-Going-To-Happen….
Twenty Kindergartners were mowed down in their classroom, and all we got were “thoughts and prayers”. I hope to have at least another thirty years on this blue orb, and I will wager that I will not live to see the day we do anything in this country about guns.
Of course. If gun dealers can do it — and it’s accepted as one of those measures that keeps guns out of the hands of crazies — why can’t everybody do it? The fact that nobody can do it with anything approaching the requisite skill level is irrelevant. But — here’s the woo-woo — it might give a crazy pause if he/she thinks that others can do it.
Didn’t stop Holmes and Laughner who were obviously and floridly disturbed from buying guns, but the fantasy that training others could have prevented it lives on.
I have to agree that training hotel staff to somehow profile for guns and threats is, at very best, impractical, and, in reality, well, uh, let’s just say: Not a solution.
The obvious solutions are stronger gun controls and more regulations of the industry. Period.
Anything else is specious window dressing.
I have to laugh (or I’ll cry), but just recently got back from a trip to Central Asia (countries whose names end in ‘stan, except Afghanistan and Pakistan). The number of my fellow citizens who looked horrified before I went and asked in hushed tones if I thought I’ be “safe” is risable. SAFE – Hell yeah. They have sensible gun controls in those countries – and yes, many of the people there have guns because they hunt.
And yet I’m supposed to feel “safer” here where any old citizen can show up ANYWHERE with a frickin amory of automatic weapons and let loose on the crowd??? Yeah, I frickin don’t feel safe here at all.
Get real, America… as if that’ll ever happen.
Would that include tougher background checks that has already been raised in response to this carnage? Wouldn’t have made one iota difference in this or the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacres.
Exactly, there’s nothing more to say really. Until there’s a change in Congress & the White House nothing will be done except thoughts and prayers
Silence is a political act as well.
The silence on guns gives respect to the shooter, not to the victims.
People Want Political Solutions, commonly referred to as ponies that politicians have no intention of delivering, and often saying that they won’t.
Charles P. Pierce – If Newtown Wasn’t Enough, Why Would Las Vegas Be Enough?
The tweets/comments by almost all politicians to major domestic mass killings/shooting have been a ritual. Bots could compose these responses as well as whoever it is that writes this stuff for politicians. Pre-printed, fill-in-the-blanks, outrage/condolence statements would save everybody time. Pols could memorize their lines and the public wouldn’t have to bother reading or listening to any of them.
And as day follows night, this is what follows mass shootings in the USA:
In anticipation of what else is guaranteed to follow. Another ritualized response to mass shooting.
Even Bernie’s got a tweet on gun safety.
Face it: there will never ever ever be a “good time” to bring up gun control because the White Supremacist Republicans simply don’t want it. They’re handsomely rewarded by the NRA and the gunz and ammo industry to flip out their usual b.s. glib answers as to why NEVER is a “good time” to discuss gun control.
Sociopaths run the country. Haven’t we all figured that out by now?
They could give a stuff that 58 uselss rubes were mowed down. The stock market ROSE after the carnage.
Get it???
Money talks. Period. The rest is collateral damage.
LV just beat Chicago gun deaths and shooting for 9/17 and LV will get the same response that Chicago is getting. So when the donald goes to the place where he talks about how sad he is about the deaths in LV why no prior sadness for the dead and wounded in Chicago. Again another broken promise. This broken promise should be an ad as gun safety is a Democratic political issue. Stop the gun silencer law NOW.
Submitted for your consideration: “The Seven Stages of Gun Violence” – http://www.stonekettle.com/2012/07/the-seven-stages-of-gun-violence.html — an essay Jim Wright updates regularly as more mass shootings accumulate. At the bottom of the essay he offers further thoughts, links to the 11 entries in his “Bang Bang Crazy” series of essays (there’s also a 12th entry – http://www.stonekettle.com/2016/04/bang-bang-crazy-part-12-god-guns-and.html ) and to his “Bang Bang Sane” effort to describe a way forward, as well as details about his background.
Long, loooong essays, but well worth reading.
Thanks for pointing me to those articles. His suggestion of legislating the concepts the NRA has already endorsed strikes me as a great way to begin the process. If the NRA thinks those principles are so basic, then they should be willing to have them codified. Great idea. Having a well-funded alternative organization for gun owners would facilitate this.
Full disclosure: I am a gun owner, but absolutely NOT an NRA member. Too many looney-tunes in that organization for my taste.
Finally!!!
The official word, straight from the CIA mouthpiece/Washingtoon Post.
The shooter was a serious gambler.
So of course is Trump, in his own way. Betcha the shooter lost it all. Trump can identify, plus with all of his casino loot he is part of the gambling problem.
Rooting for Trump’s eventual collapse?
Be careful what you wish for.
Compared to Trump’s possible weaponry, Paddock was firing a peashooter.
AG
Arthur,
I don’t know how others feel, so I’ll just say this for myself:
(1) I’ve give up trying to read your comments. They’re non compos mentis, and I really don’t have time for it.
(2) When I start to see you dominating a post’s comments, I tune out. I read Booman’s original post, and then skip everything else.
(3) If there were a “block” function, you’d have been blocked long, long ago.
Now, I’m not the most valuable commenter here. Far, far from it. But lordy man, you’re poisoning this well.
At least his mannered format is distinctive enough that it’s easy to spot it and glide right past to people who have something worth saying.
I’ve tried. He doesn’t care. He ignores us all, not bothering to distinguish between us (by his own admission) except when attacked, which he then clumsily transforms into a badge of honor because we’re all so conventional in our thinking whereas he’s some kind of iconoclastic maverick who’s beyond us all.
I know I sound like a groupie of MikeInOhio, but as a fellow Mid-westerner, his observations on this forum really ring true. It’s hard for city-dwellers and members of the coastal intelligentsia to appreciate how deep the feeling for guns is in rural America. Mike is right, there are many gun-hoarders. There are also many sportsmen who just like to shoot. Most of these folks are law-abiding citizens. You may disagree with their politics, but it’s hard for me to see them as monsters, since they raised me.
I got into a sharp, but respectful discussion with a gentleman on another forum who argued that the only way forward was the Australian model – banning and confiscation. I urged him to reconsider. Simply put, any real attempt to confiscate guns in the US would trigger the Second American Civil War.
It’s a political non-starter, anyway, but for the gun-nuts, it’s real, and they are preparing. The preppers and the militia and the Oath Keepers are looking for an excuse to saddle-up and shoot people – preferably people from the big city who don’t look like them. They aren’t all racists, but there’s plenty of cross-pollination with the Klan, the neo-Nazis, and the other wackos. As I’ve stated previously, I fear that if Trump is removed from office, that might be the spark that sets these groups loose. (I’m willing to take that chance to be rid of Trump.)
In any case, if banning all guns is politically impossible (and something I oppose) the only hope is some new constellation of forces that will pass common-sense legislation to limit the availability of military-grade weapons.
Guns made for shooting sports and hunting are inherently inefficient as killing machines. They are made for accuracy, balance, and sportsmanship, not rate-of fire or “wound ballistics.” Real sportsmen know there is no “slippery slope.” The technology of an AR-15 is nothing like the shotgun that three generations of my family have used to hunt pheasant and quail. But the NRA has been so taken over by loonies that any attempts at reason are suppressed with extreme prejudice.
The only hope, as I see it, is a new organization to challenge the NRA craziness. This has been tried in the past, but what is needed is a benefactor with VERY deep pockets. Like a Soros, or a Mike Bloomberg, but not either of these men. Both of them would be tarred as “outside interlopers,” because for rural America, they are both foreigners. One is from Hungary, and one is from the exotic land of NYC. It would have to be a Warren Buffet-type character.
Previous gun organizations that challenged the NRA fanaticism ran into a buzz saw of NRA propaganda and, I suspect, lawyers. I often wonder if some NRA behavior might even qualify as racketeering. But the pro-gun-anti-NRA forces have never had the money, or enough lawyers, to offer a powerful alternative.
With a well-funded Shooting Sports organization, allied with other civic-minded organizations, perhaps there would be a critical mass to control assault weapons, magazine capacities, and other technologies that increase lethality.
If you’re passionately anti-gun, these may sound like half measures, but they would save lives. Even achieving that will require a political triple-bank-shot. And that triple-bank-shot will require the visible, active participation of the (admittedly, shrinking) community of sensible gun owners. Sorry to be long-winded.
If Buffett devoted his deep pockets to this worthy cause, he would instantly join Soros and Bloomberg in rightwingnut mythology and alongside them as targets of the Two Minutes* Hate. Being from Omaha would not insulate him.
*or more accurately, 24 Hours Hate (I’m confident it continues through many of their dreams, where some probably get the thrill of acting out those hate-driven fantasies.) Orwell way undershot the lunacy.
I fear you are correct. But without wealthy sponsors, any attempt to set up an alternative to the NRA will be roadkill. Perhaps it’s a lost cause, already. As several astute commentators have observed, here and elsewhere: if a classroom full of dead first graders doesn’t even move the needle, we may be irredeemable as a nation. But I’m not giving up on common sense, despite all evidence to the contrary.
If I lose hope, I might as well fill the bathtub with gin, climb in, and drown myself. I think about it every time I watch cable news. Then I go out on the street, where I still meet folks who live in reality and appreciate truth. That keeps me going.
For every crazy gun owner I know, there are many, many more sensible and responsible ones. We often will not agree on some areas of politics, but I have known a lot of them all my life. One of my main fears is that the way the discussion has played out over the years, the sensible people are being slowly driven into the waiting and welcoming arms of the small minority of crazy groups that are out there. This, combined with a massively successful propaganda effort from the NRA and the gun lobbyists, is convincing them that a siege mentality is the only appropriate response. So they slowly begin to feel a kinship and common identity with the likes of the Oathkeepers and the militias. I see this among some people I have known for a long, long time. And I find it a frightening thing.
Exactly. The challenge is to keep reasonable gun owners from radicalizing, and to, hopefully, peel away some folks who are drifting into the orbit of the loonies. You said it better than I did.
I’m a gun owner (three, all .22 target guns, used solely at the range for fun) and I’d love to have a sane gun organization I could join. Unfortunately, even here in (mostly) blue Massachusetts the NRA is it. At least the local F&G club I belong to doesn’t require NRA membership to join, as the adjoining town’s does. Cautious conversation at club meetings indicates there are other sane gun owners out there, but lots more who buy totally into the NRA mindset.
The sportman’s club I belong has a lot of really sane gun owners. I used to do some competitive shooting, and that helps me bridge the gap with a lot of people who might normally view me as a lunatic liberal. There have been some momentary stunned looks when they find out I am a Democrat who is active in grassroots politics. But that passes quickly. I was an NRA member many, many years ago. But I walked away from that and make no excuses at the club as to why I am not a supporter of the NRA.
Well said. As a non-gun owner who would fully support the Australian solution, I got a rash of pushback in the early naughts for recommending that Democrats take the gun issue off the table. It’s been a political loser for Democrats since 1970. Over the decades had Democrats limited to their critique to the new “machine gun” type weapons coming to market, they would have caught a lot more flies and that possibly could had led to enough public support to limit/restrict them before they proliferated. And maybe politicians and the public would have been smarter about regulatory proposals.
Yes to all of this. I’m one of those gun owners that knows we need to do something, and hopes we can find something effective enough that we can avoid a ban. A blanket one, anyway (important thing to remember about guns in America: mass killings get the news, but most people die one or two at a time, and by handguns, not scary-looking AR-15’s. Stopping mass killing is surely good, but it won’t make a dent in the total).
Because one thing I am sure about, is that every one of these events chips away at the broad but brittle wall the NRA has constructed. What has protected the “no laws ever” crowd is the fact that while a majority of Americans (hell, a majority of gun owners) favor gun control, it’s not the most important thing to them, while the dead-enders are…well, dead-enders. It’s their top priority.
But I think that eventually, the broad tide will overwhelm the committed tide, the whole thing will come down at once, and everything will get swept away. I know a lot of people will not see that as any sort of tragedy, but I will.
I’d be happy to treat guns like cars: Register them, require insurance, require a license to own and use earned by competency testing — that would be a good place to start. Heck, in supposedly strict Massachusetts, I was able to get my Class A license just by taking a five-hour class without any live fire training, then pass a background check and be approved by the local police chief (and they’re not very strict about it in my semirural town, unlike the large cities) and hey, presto! I could walk into any gun shop in the state and buy whatever was legal to own — and me in my early 60s who’d fired a gun maybe twice in my life, with no experience beyond that class in the care and feeding of firearms.
Not being a fool, I hired the class instructor to give me a couple of private lessons in shooting and gun handling as soon as I’d bought my first pistol. You don’t want to know some of the stupidity I’ve seen at the range, despite all the safety rules.
I don’t care about those people and their feelings. They must be made to relinquish their guns — no Americans should be allowed to have firearms. We have to join the civilized world.
Complex articulate arguments about hunting, collecting, or just White Americans’ frenzied race-based home-invasion paranoia or “safeguards against tyranny” nonsense should be set aside and disregarded as either patent nonsense or misplaced, inappropriate sentiment akin to Southerners’ affection for confederate monuments. Go for one last walk in the woods fondling your rifle and killing helpless animals and then give it up.
People will be mad for a while but they’ll get over it, just like people got over racially-integrated bathrooms. Overcoming barbaric elements in society always works this way. Get rid of the guns.
http://www.jordanorlando.com/ns/index.php/get-rid-of-the-guns/
Mr. Orlando, I’m a little unclear on what you mean by “those people.”
If you mean law-abiding gun owners, you’re talking about roughly 35-45% of the US population, depending on whose statistics one finds most convincing.
If you mean people who own dozens of guns and who are active in the pro-gun groups, that’s a much smaller number.
But let’s be clear: your argument, and your attitude, is a sure way for the Democratic Party to remain the minority party for years to come in most of the Midwest and the South. It also makes them much less competitive in the Mountain West.
Booman has written about ways the Democratic Party can remain true to its ideals while it reaches out to rural voters. While I may not agree with every point, he’s on the right track. I am sure that a “zero tolerance” policy on firearms ownership is a deal breaker for many voters.
In 2017, there are places in the US where a gun is still a useful, even necessary, implement.
My family owns property in the Mountain West. There are bears, mountain lions, and the nearest law enforcement officer is a long drive from our little rancho. I love all of the creatures that inhabit the area, but if any four- or two-legged predator comes around our place, calling 911 won’t be much help.
The kind of implements we use to protect ourselves on that property are not assault rifles, nor military weapons. We have rifles, and handguns – because carrying a rifle while cutting brush or hiking at dusk, or dawn, is a bother, and that’s the time of day one might run into a sick, rabid, or wounded animal that might be aggressive. Occasionally, a perfectly healthy mountain lion will have a go at a human.
There are also the occasional squatters who plant hidden cannabis fields on nearby public lands, or pop-up meth labs. These are not common, but if you stumble across these types of characters, they are usually not friendly.
In short, not all of us live in the East Village, where the greatest risk to life and limb is burning your tongue on your herbal tea. Sorry cheap shot, but I couldn’t resist. I live on the East Coast 9 months out of the year, but my soul resides on the Great Plains, and in the basin and range country out West. Folks out there think that the Northeast Corridor is a foreign land. Sometimes I feel the same way.
The rest of your post is excellent as well. I wanted to highlight this portion because it is the bottom line. I live in a part of the US where an absolutist anti-gun argument will be a deal-breaker. It’s an argument that will guarantee a GOP supermajority in my state legislature for at least the next generation, if not longer.
Is this discussion still live? What I’m saying is that it takes generations to change the public’s minds and get rid of an outmoded idea (like, say, slavery) — but that it must be done. Getting rid of guns is one such necessary shift, for the good of civilization.
It’s a barbaric practice, just like slavery, and, just like slavery, there are proponents or sympathetic parties such as yourselves who are appalled and believe it to be impossible or to involve unreasonable political sacrifice. These are obstacles that can and must be overcome, that’s all there is to it.
I seriously doubt telling hunters, farmers, and ranchers that their possession of what they consider necessary tools of the trade are equivalent to genocidal human trafficking (slavery) is going to go over well out in my part of the US. Try it if you need to get that out of your system. The “all the guns must go” talk will not fly. Now, I do think you have a case that there is no need for anyone to be stocking arsenals of military grade assault firearms, and those doing so are at risk to commit the sorts of acts of terrorism like what occurred in Las Vegas. Really, there’s no need for one of those weapons in a home. Even that can be a hard sell after decades of NRA propaganda, but it’s one I’m willing to help make. One thing I got to do for a research project a long time ago was to actually ask a set of hunters to describe different types of firearms. They had nothing good to say about the assault type firearms. Hunting rifles and shotguns on the other hand were a different matter – they seemed to not attach any sort of violent meaning to that specific class of firearm. That was long ago, but I’d bet that would be possibly true today. My guess is we’ll end up having to agree to disagree on the whole matter, aside from yeah – the stockpiling of weapons and especially firearms designed solely to murder people, yeah, that needs to end. If I can get some Dems in my district who are receptive to that, I’ll pester them til the cows come home. Right now, I have GOP reps bought and paid for by NRA.
All the stories will be sad/tragic, but one’s like this pull a bit harder on heartstrings:
“All I can really say is that it’s obnoxious to tell people not to immediately think in political terms about something like this. Anyone who doesn’t think in political terms about what just happened in Nevada is a monster.”
Well then. I wanted to vomit when I heard the news this morning. That’s the preface.
I have a work place friend S—- who uses me as an ear to vent when he is distressed about events in the world. Since Trump was elected, I have asked him repeatedly to rein in that impulse, as I’m already distressed about the situation, but he has a hell of a hard time doing that. This morning, I had barely opened my office door when S—- showed up and started to launch into some speculation about the politics of the Las Vegas mass murderer. I lifted my finger and said, “Don’t go there. Just wait a decent interval.” So yeah, I did exactly what Booman wrote is “obnoxious”. And I don’t regret it one bit.
Others can do whatever they want, say whatever they want, write whatever they want. For me, I have to take some time to acknowledge the horror and the suffering before I can begin to think about the politics.
Over the next few days, this inherently carries more weight than anything and Democratic politician can say:
Conservatives can’t empathise. Here’s all the proof you need. No matter how dramatic or obvious this is, it didn’t exist until it happened to him, personally.
The best way that I can think of to try and reduce gun violence such as this is to allow victims of gun violence to sue the NRA/gun manufacturers.
Basically turn to them and say, “Fine, if you don’t want the Federal Government regulating who can have guns, then we hold you financially and publicly accountable for mass shootings, etc…you can 1) make sure that people are properly trained in how to use firearms safely, etc…, 2) work with gun manufacturers to put safeguards in place on firearms, 3) create a Constitutionally protected system of to determine who can/cannot have a gun, and 4) cut down on the black market/straw party sale of firearms and/or the gun show loophole.
Let’s see if Wayne LaPierre and Dana Loesch use the same violent rhetoric if every time there’s a mass shooting the victims can sue their organization for hundreds of millions of dollars.
I admit that it’s not a perfect solution, and it puts Gun Control in the hands of the NRA but also provides a justice system that can serve as a check against them; but at least it would be a start toward gun control and hopefully helping to keep people safe.
If we couldn’t get some sensible gun control after 5 year olds were shot down like ducks in a shooting gallery, it will never happened. The killing of 5 year olds was meaningless to the gun nuts. Why would they care about concert goers.