One also has to ask why citizens need military style weapons and body armor. You don’t need that kind of thing for hunting deer.

And the pundits and “serious people” will examine their navels musing on how such happens and what motivated the shooter.

At the core these shooters do these things simply because they can.

The free and unregulated access to instruments designed for the single purpose of killing enables them, so they can.

Just like enabling all those little “add ons” for your browser, so simple and no immediate result from checking the box turns into multiple nefarious disabling processes that eventually choke the system.

Dday. I am working on a story right now about a foiled mass shooting in Missouri. You might remember it as the “Twilight” Shooting.

In the process I’m finding out what worked and didn’t work to stop this shooting. I found out that the shooter should not have gotten legal access to the weapons because of a previous violent mental health issue. However the law in Missouri says that the incident doesn’t put the guy in the database to prevent him from purchasing guns. Why not? Because the NRA works behind the scenes to stop anything that would stop people from buying guns.

What I’m going to do is ask the lawmakers in Missouri “What kind of support would it take to fix your laws? Do you need people tweeting at you? Do you need public safety enthusiasts sending you money to deal with the way the NRA withholds support for anyone who wants to fix laws?”

The politicians aren’t just afraid of the NRA lobbyist they are afraid of the people who support the ideas that the NRA pushes. They are NOT afraid of the ideas of public safety enthusiasts.

And no one needs to kill deer.

In China they prefer knives:

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-pacific/2012/12/2012121481220620325.html

“What kind of support would it take to fix your laws? Do you need people tweeting at you? Do you need public safety enthusiasts sending you money to deal with the way the NRA withholds support for anyone who wants to fix laws?”

Likely they need someone holding a gun to their head to get their attention away from the NRA money in their wallets.

I see what you did there.

Actually considering the number of people who are food insecure in this country I don’t know that I’d say that is an accurate portrayal.

Then again, I live in the Appalachians where hunting is considered an important part of the culture.

http://www.joplinglobe.com/local/x1752051131/Hunters-help-food-pantries-through-statewide-programs/print

CT is full of gun manufacturers, including Colt, Mossberg, Sturm Ruger, Marlin. Gun mfrs subsidize the like of Wayne LaPierre and Tucker Carlson and… And gun mfrs threaten to pull up stakes and head for the Wild West if any, ANY, sensible gun control regs are proposed. And stand mute when the crazy Koch bros push laws in states via ALEC and parade their tanks thru Colorado villages. No hands are clean.

In a nation where war seems to be sacred and citizens are pilloried for speaking out against the military, it is hardly surprising that gun violence is tolerated by so many.

Here in Illinois, many of us are outraged by a judge’s decision this week (Richard Posner, one of the great a**holes of the judiciary) overruling the citizens, the governor, the mayor of Chicago, and every Chicago alderman who are all opposed to concealed carry of weapons. We were the last sane state in the nation to understand the danger of handguns and automatic weapons. Now Posner says that since the Supreme Court has said that gun ownership rights supersede the rights of everyone else, the “right to bear arms” means the right to carry a gun anywhere. We in Illinois disagree.

Today’s tragedy is the inevitable outcome of legislators who have been bought off by the NRA, movie producers who seem to think that there can never be enough violence on the screen, and toy and game manufacturers who pander to our most violent instincts.

Meanwhile, the D.C. politicians are silent, the churches are silent, and our fellow citizens are being slaughtered in the thousands by automatic weapons. As you say, David, which is the death that is going to mean enough to this nation? We have a complete vacuum in this country when it comes to moral values, led by a President whose only concern is himself.

I hate both sides of the debate as well.

You’d think a country that can monitor fertilizer or sudafed could come up with a system to keep guns out of the hands of people that don’t belong carrying them.

No instead we’re going to have to loud mouthed groups of people who will insist that the guns themselves are the problem rather than the people who got a hold of them and the other group that will insist that even if we outlawed guns that criminals would obtain them and still commit crimes(so essentially you end up penalizing law abiding citizens.) They’ll scream and rant and talk over each other and past each other just like they always do.

The fact is, I remember back to the Charles Whitman shooting from the U of Texas tower. I watched it on TV, live. I had a girlfriend who was injured badly at Poe Elementary in Houston in’59 when a guy walked onto the playground with a bomb and killed a teacher the VP and three kids.There will always be a % of crazy people in the world. The more people, the more crazies. It is very sad. But I don;t know what to do.

That’s part of the reason why I loathe the idea that somehow or another banning guns is the solution.

I grew up in a household with a mentally ill person, before he shot a police officer he spent his time taking baseball bats to cars and his fists to my mother. Yes, banning guns would mean someone wouldn’t mow down a roomful of strangers easily but it wouldn’t prevent a mentally unwell person from hurting others. If what we want is to prevent mentally ill people from hurting each other we’d actually have to address our policy of not addressing mental problems and the ridiculous notion that everyone was made to be a rugged individualist and that mental defects can be cured by sheer will.

Outlaw assault rifles and have extended prison sentences for those who own such nasty things even if they haven’t used them. Guns are for killing. whether it’s for hunting deer or for the military. This is way too crazy now.

Why would you give someone a prison sentence for something they didn’t do?

This the 21st century. Old thinking — gun policy — doesn’t apply.
from Parent Further:

You have to wonder what makes some people think that school shootings are funny and entertaining. That’s the theme on a new “mod” based on the popular computer game Half Life 2.

Half Life 2 is a very popular computer game that was released in 2004 based on the success of its predecessor Half Life. The game has sold more than 6.5 million copies with some critics naming it the “game of the decade” because of the quality of its animation, graphics, audio, and sophisticated use of artificial intelligence. Parents need to know, however, that it was rated M for mature meaning that the industry itself says that it’s not appropriate for kids to play. . . .

That brings us to a twisted mod about school shootings. Mods are accessed on the Internet, and Mod DB is perhaps the single biggest source with two million visitors a month and ten thousands registered mods. A recently featured mod is built on Half Life 2 entitled School Shooter North American Tour 2012. Here’s a verbatim description, “He decides to become the best school shooter ever. You decide to arm yourself with the exact same weapons as a previous school shooter….The possibilities are endless, you are free to do whatever you want. As long as it involves shooting people.”
http://www.parentfurther.com/blog/dangerous-mods

And don’t forget the role models. Clinton: “We Came, We Saw, He Died.”

NRA ‏@NRA
Black Friday Gun Sales Set Record http://www.nssfblog.com/black-friday-gun-sales-set-record/ …
Retweeted by Rachel
Expand Reply Retweeted Favorite More

David Swanson has a take on this, with a broader perspective:

http://my.firedoglake.com/davidswanson/2012/12/14/a-way-to-stop-the-violence/

What if Obama had said “This is the last time we will allow such a tragedy to take place”?

What if Obama had said “Our little ones are more important to me than any organization of gun owners”??

What if Obama had said ” We can and will put the peaceful citizenry before the gun lobbies in listening to the grievances of those who have lost loved ones in this manner, and we will follow the edicts of other civilized countries in preventing this kind of mayhem in the future”???

“What if Obama had said “THIS IS THE TIME”???????????????????????????

It wouldn’t assuage the agony those parents are going through.

But it might help them go through it.

I’m talking about people who own military type weapons. No one needs those nor should they have them. It should be a crime to have one – you really can’t hunt with them – they are ONLY for killing people. This shooter today had 3 weapons – Glock, Sig Sauer and a .223 rifle. Why?

People with guns kill.

Until we get a fundamental grasp of that fact and stop listening to the NRA, all we can do is bury our dead, mourn their loss, and prepare for the next massacre.

I live in Appalachia also. It is part of a primitive regressive culture that needs to go. No one has to kill for food, yet anyway. In deer season there is deer meat all over the place that is never eaten. They kill out of blood lust. Besides, you can buy a lot of food for the price of ammunition and killing instruments. Whopping slaves is part of the Piedmont and coastal plains also. And there are enough that still consider that also as a cultural heritage thing that justifies their racism.

Exactly. If they are able someone will do it.

The Stand Your Ground is one of the most dangerous moves ever made in this country. When it started I read that you could shoot someone on the street because they looked at you and it made you uncomfortable ! Have we gone totally insane? If not, we’re half way there.

December 2, 2012.

“Eight people are dead and at least 28 others — including six teens — have been wounded in violence throughout the city since Friday night.
Seven of the dead were shot.

Six teenagers were among those wounded in weekend violence. On Friday, a 16-year-old girl suffered a graze wound to the chest in the 1200 block of South Wood Street about 7 p.m., police said, and a 14-year-old boy was shot in the leg during a drive-by in the 4300 block of South Calumet Avenue about 8 p.m. Both teens were listed in good condition.

On Saturday, a boy and a girl, both 14 years old, were shot in the 7700 block of South Carpenter Street about 6:33 p.m. on Saturday, police said. The boy was shot in the left leg and buttocks, police said, and the girl was shot in the right leg. Both were taken to Comer Children’s Hospital.

On Sunday about 1:15 p.m., a 15-year-old boy suffered a gunshot wound to the abdomen in the 8300 block of South Kingston Avenue. He was taken in “stable” condition to Comer Children’s Hospital, police said.
Also on Sunday, a 17-year-old boy was shot in the lower back about 5:16 p.m. in the 7100 block of South Emerald Avenue, police said.

Source: http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/Killed-Hurt-in-Weekend-Violence-December-181670441.html#ixzz2F4CGvLnI

This will continue for all sorts of reasons… violence celebrated in the media… by Hollywood.. in video games… the worship of and hands off approach to all things military… the completely irrational acceptance f hunting… and of course the idiotic interpretation of the 2nd Amendment.

We have a population which believes in vengeance and an eye for an eye… we brutally punish rather than rehabilitate. We toss aside millions as if they are dust in the wind.

THIS IS AMERICA… this is the land we have created. It began with the slaughter of the indigenous people and the buffalo and virtually everything else. Killing is a sport… and violent sports are acceptable as normal we offer scholarships for such things.

There’s no easy solution here. We are a monster.. And we go around the world killing and spreading weapons and carrying the big stick… We’re weaponizing everything from food to space.

But we’ve wrecked the environment so we won’t even have a world to inhabit that can support the population even if it wasn’t so violent.

We were lied to about the American “dream”… we killed Martin because he was a man of peace.

On holiday last summer, I met a man and women in a small town in the state of Washington. both retired.

They told me that a friend of their son, had a disagreement in a grocery store cash register line. When the friend was leaving in his car, the person that he had the argument with shot his car full of holes with a semi automatic pistol, I recall that being told that it was a “glock”.

@Sandero: “we killed Martin because he was a man of peace.”

I think this is true.

You will never never never defeat the 2d amendment. Give it up.

There are lots of things no one “needs.” For example, no one needs a dozen cars and yet we have people who chose to collect them. As long as they aren’t breaking any laws I see no reason to penalize gun owners.

My husband has more than 3 guns. Why? He likes them. He hasn’t used them to kill anyone. He goes to the range. He hunts. He likes having the gun in our home for our protection. While I don’t completely get it. I also don’t get collecting stamps, pennies or dolls either. My only concern has been to ensure those guns are secured so that someone who doesn’t belong having access to them doesn’t get access.

This is a country where judges call war protestors and animal rights advocates terrorists. Where corporations have person-hood and bribing politicians is free speech.

Uh I can provide you with at least a dozen more links that talk of the gratitude the food pantries have for the meat provided by hunters.

Please provide me with one that substantiates your position that hunters are just satisfying blood lust.

It would help a lot if people stopped denying that their relatives are mentally ill. We need a much-improved mental health system readily available to families. This shooter today clearly was not well. I confess that I hate guns. Three members of my family and a childhood friend all committed suicide with guns. But my primary objection is ordinary citizens having assault weapons.

Calm down David. It’s a tragedy. So are medical errors, except now we’re all being forced to buy into a system that may kill us.

<5% of NRA funds come from the firearms industry
<1% of guns used in crime come from gun shows.
Zero Dark Thirty is set to make hundreds of millions of dollars in theaters.

Is the real problem a culture of guns, or a culture of violence and aggression?

I think you are all missing the boat here. Missing the point. It’s not about the weapons used. Take one away and these same people will find another. maybe even more bloody and deadly.

Not the question is, what is it about our culture, our society, our economy, our politics. What is it about this country that drives these people to such ends ? That enables them to such ends ?

Those are the questions. Though I believe you all know the answer, but refuse to admit it. To yourselves or anyone else.

Almost surreal to read as the list of bugbears grows steadily longer:

Lax gun laws
Hollywood movies
Video Games
Crappy Mental Health System
Hunger

The people who do this sh*t are deranged whack jobs. The idea we can predict, prevent, control, etc. their behavior is a joke.

I always find it informative to check out the money. Here, for starters.

The beltway hack “reporters” could do worse than to loudly and publicly question these clowns about why they’re accepting NRA money, if for no other reason than to incite tapdancing.

We treat mental health issues like it is a dirty little secret. Everyone turns their head in the other direction until it is too late and someone gets hurt.

If I had my way screenings for mental well being would be as common place as cholesterol checks. Then again, I’m of the mindset that most people could benefit from sitting down and talking to someone for a little while.

Look, some folks don’t do these things, others do.

What’s the difference?

Access to guns? Not a chance, guns are everywhere.

And will be, unless they are collected up and outlawed, and that’s a form of fascism I don’t want to see, anymore than the proliferate ACCESS to guns.

But crazy kills, why is there more crazy? Or, SEEMINGLY more crazy?

We can’t have these discussions without some details about frequency of occurrence and the various factors involved in each event.

Some guns are stolen, for the deed done. Some are in the household, and taken by young people who shouldn’t have taken them, or should have been better secured by the owners.

Some are readily available on the black market, some are readily available at gun shows with little legal interfaces.

But is this this crazy a medial issue? A social issue?

How about it’s a media deregulation issue? How many of these crazy fucks were inundated by Beck, Fox and more, day after day, because Reagan and Clinton de regulated media ownership, eliminated Equal Time Provision, and in general eliminated the NEED, LEGALLY, for media to present all sides in an equal manner?

As I said, I have no answers, lots of questions tho.

But one thing is for sure, at least to me, and this goes out to Mr. Dayen as well, we can’t just blame the NRA for this.

This sitch, of SEEMINGLY increasingly accounts of crazed killings, can’t be lumped down on NRA. The causes of these crazed killings permeate every facet of our lives.

From parental influence (or lack of), to media conditioning, to a battered down populous out of work with gens behind it already seething and angry about their non futures . . .

This is a nationalistic, political and social issue of the grand sorts. It encompasses each and every facet of the lives of we the people that have been impugned and eroded by the class war aimed by the corporate elitists against the masses.

This issue is MUCH more complicated than just blasting the NRA.

IMHO.

Spocko, good on yas, and very interesting.

But my only question is this, how do a minority of gun loving red necked whackaloons dominate this issue when the majority of the population is fully against the lax gun ownership/purchase policies in place?

We are NOT a nation divided, this is the fucking Civil War mindset v the liberals all over again, and the corporate fascists who profit from the NRA’s efforts are fully behind the minority whackaloons, and they own the media, who control the mindsets of viewers, which fully propogates the crazy over and over and over again.

How do you solve THAT? Cuz I’m a bit frustrated, not to mention, deeply saddened this shit continues in what should be, the greatest place in the world, but it’s not. And still, it’s held up as a model for SO much of the world (are we still fooling anyone?).

LeSigh.

Yeah, I fully support the whole hunting food for being alive, completely. Those who do, are not usually the one’s doing these horrid and crazed actions, either.

Hunt to eat? No problem. And I don’t care if you use an AR-16 to feed yer family . . . not at all.

The idea that we shouldn’t at least TRY would also be laughable if it weren’t so tragic.

We might not be able to prevent all deaths but if you can save some lives by addressing some of these issues then it seems to me that it’d be a worthwhile effort.

Thanks for the location, location and location info, VERY revealing.

Yep, I fully concur with you. They are enabled, end of story. And our system is corrupted top to bottom. Bought and sold to the corporatists.

And we can’t survive long, like this, history proves it.

The NRA gets a heaping helping of blame because they refuse to look at ANY efforts to legislate responsible gun ownership.

They even opposed trigger locks for crimineys sake.

It’s absolutely irresponsible to suggest that something that has the potential to cause loss of life should just be treated as if it were benign.

You wish.

“Every society is based on the twin concepts of duty and loyalty. If those concepts fall into disrepute, it is time to move elsewhere. Social collapse is not far away.”
–Robert A. Heinlein

Duty and loyalty are mocked by capitalism, the only goal of which is the accumulation of more capital. Capitalism, which has shaped our culture and bought our government. And most of us are shocked, shocked! to find acts of senseless violence happening all over the place with increasing frequency.

Capitalism is clinically insane. Is it any wonder that it produces more and more clinically insane people who do things like what happened in Newbury, Virginia Tech, Chardon, and Columbine?

No. It is not. It is quite logical. It’s not the availability of guns that’s the problem. In the Old West, lots of people had guns, but there were relatively few murders compared to what we have now. Hell, far fewer people on both sides died at the Little Big Horn than how many die every year due to gun violence.

It is the system that sells the guns that is the problem, not the guns. Think about it.

When the president shows that much emotion for dead children in Afghanistan or regret for rescuers slaughtered with secondary drone strikes will this end.

War is not the answer, killing is not the answer, violence is not the answer until we reverse the course the military has driven us down for the last forty years, starting with the violence of blowing a President’s brains out in broad daylight , this type of killing will increase. We do it every day over there to our brothers and sisters don’t we think they ache for their dead kids too.

this is the pro-life agenda we should be advocating for…pro-life for children in our schools, our movie theatres…

look at the US stats on gun deaths compared to the rest of the world…where is the outrage?

not in the Koch household. Monsters, they.

“… the question is, what is it about our culture, our society, our economy, our politics. What is it about this country that drives these people to such ends ? That enables them to such ends ?”

Appropriate question, cmaukonen, given that this was so horrible to contemplate that many of us, including those in leadership, don’t seem able to grasp what a classroom full of kindergarten kids looks like before and after something like this, and what it means for loving parents all over the country, not to mention those who lost their kids this morning. Here’s part of the answer in a comment at commondreams.org:

ceti −
“Sadly, and I say this in all somberness, that the chickens have come home to roost once again. The spiritual doom that King warned about has manifested once again in the berserk rage of one of its citizens driven to murderous madness.

The US fueled much of the mayhem south of the border with the supply of guns to drug cartels. It has just authorized the resupply of Israel’s bombs after their brief bit of pre-election slaughter. And in the past few months, the weapons pipeline has been worsening the carnage in Syria, regardless of how those very same weapons are landing in the hands of our ostensible phantom enemy, Al-Qaeda.

Obama has also become the best salesman for the US military-industrial complex, cornering most of the arms market in 2011: http://www.nytimes.com/interac…

All this violence will seep back into the pores of the nation, but it seems even the White House, which has done absolutely nothing on gun control over the last four years, has accepted that these massacres are the price to pay for maintaining a system founded on violence.”

The term ‘spiritual doom’ is apt. And it is not enough to say, well, we need to ‘take care of’ our mentally ill. The manner in which this country has done this, by shackling the distressed to powerful drugs whose effects are only dimly being realized is not an answer. Young people (and anyone feeling depressed for that matter) are being put on these medications ‘for life’ – I don’t at all know if that was the case in this instance – and for that matter, who in this country could not be diagnosed in this horrible time with ptsd?

Spiritual doom is putting it kindly. As another poster put it, the fish rots from the head down.

You had my attention for a while.

I concur, conceal carry is insane, so sorry IL has Posner, he’s an asshat.

But your thoughts about movie producers, gaming violence, and such, harken to tirades about morality in music and the efforts to squelch freedom of speech issues.

I grew up in SF Bay Area, after growing up in SE Asia. I was multi cultural before it was even labeled that.

And I grew up, in one of the most dynamic and incredible periods of artistic creativity since the Renaissance, which was SPEARHEADED from The Bay Area.

WE led the way against Vietnam, poverty, social injustices, greyed 50′s sheepling, and more.

Other than the incredible efforts of the north and south in the 50′s and 60′s to pressure the development and implementation of civil rights legislation, I can’t THINK of a more influential place, time or group of people than the SF Bay Area in the 60′s.

I’d fully like you to consider, today’s tragedy is not the result of anything you posit.

It’s the result of corporate fascism, bought and paid for politicians who don’t represent us even though we VOTE for them, and Obama (I don’t value his presidency, but I’m HUGELY progressive) is NOT the reason for the tragedies that are befalling us. Seemingly, more and more often, and to greater degrees.

That these are moral failures is a simple broad brush stroke, of fucking COURSE these are moral failures.

But all the things you refer to? Are NOT the source of the moral failing.

In this, you misrepresent and distort, the reality at hand.

Of course because blood lust is part of the culture all you hear or see in our local media supports guns and praises those who drag the meat in including the food pantries.

The Republicans see it as just fine, this living like primitive cave men. That’s why they won’t fund nutrition programs thus forcing their view of man’s nature and potential.

Ronald Reagan, as Gov of CA, deregulated services for the mentally ill, and in doing so, created the new homeless population.

As president, he pretty much continued this, in one form or another.

Until the homeless population became a national epidemic, and now it’s just accepted, we let homeless people loose upon the streets.

More recently, due to the mortgage crisis, and the lies and deceipt involved, our homeless population continues to increase alarmingly.

Factor in Veterans who have served in our military since 1980, unemployment, and continued release of incarcerated mentally ill, and you have a stew of social malady that’s BOUND to end up in horrid and terrible ways, like mass killings.

I dare anyone to solve these issues, in any one fell swoop, other than to eliminate the source of it all.

Corporate fascism, and class war.

This completely overlooks the nations problem with incarceration and the costs of that policy.

I find it difficult to believe you speak for all of Appalachia.

Or poverty, homelessness, and such.

Completely concur.

It’s not even the real issue, Don, and you know it.

*GRINS*

I dunna BMull, where does the deadly bacteria come from that kills people that are hospitalized, or do out patient surgs?

Cuz, they all kill, kill kill and are supported by the interests who profit from their existence.

Class war hoss, not any thing else, no matter how ya wanna paint it.

i bet we will find out the shooter was under mental health care already….

My belief is that many of these tragedies arent really gun issues but issues of people under the influence of “presription” drugs the mental health/pharma complex has been pushing on us for the past 30 years.

In fact just before I had found out about the shootings I was reading about how the next psychiatry bible has all but classified all human emotion as disorders.

They have to make up disorders so insurance companies will pay for the meds.

No one in the media will blame the anti depressants, it will all be about assualt weapons.

For those older people, before the 90s when every other person was being put on Paxil or Prozac, how many school shootings were there? How often did you hear about woman hacking up their babies because satan told them to?

The people who do this sh*t are deranged whack jobs. The idea we can predict, prevent, control, etc. their behavior is a joke.

Agreed with the first statement.

Disagreed with the second one.

But identifying the CAUSE for the (seemingly) increase of these behaviors amongst the population committing them, is essential.

Hmm, not bad. I’m of a mindset where I could be persuaded in all this.

On the other hand, if we were TREATING the mentally ill, instead of letting them out on the streets THANKS Reagan, it would be a start.

Sure, a handful of blame, but they are the agent, not the originator.

Please, keep focused on SOURCES, not agents. Cuz the agents can be changed out in a fell swoop.

Changing out the sources, that’s class war.

Simple, end of story, thanks for wading in.

Systematic, failure, and abetted, condoned and aided fully by the owners of the system.

What a horrific tragedy. All those innocent lives.

I agree with most liberals about passing legislation for assault rifles and high capacity clips, but I think we also need to ask ourselves why most of these terrible events seem to involve young men? And why do these guys usually dress up when committing their atrocities (fatigues, masks, long black overcoats…)?

It is under the rubric of “duty and loyalty” (mocked by capitalism) that the US maintains trained killers at this moment in a little country,on the other side of the globe, killing children and adults. This behavior started way back when the first Europeans came to this land and virtually wiped out the native population, and then extended with time to many other countries.

Obama who publicly mourns “beautiful little kids” has done his share.

In your Old West many people had guns and they used them to kill Native Americans, as well as each other.

So this has little to do with capitalism. The competitive aspect (vs. cooperation) contributes but that goes beyond capitalism to sports and other endeavors. “Kill ‘em.”

To all those “Originalist” interpreters of the Constitution – you can own all the single-shot muskets you want.

For those older people, before the 90s when every other person was being put on Paxil or Prozac, how many school shootings were there? How often did you hear about woman hacking up their babies because satan told them to?

A VERY good point, and something that freinds & I have pondered for many years now. I also witness how utterly weird & strange – and frankly sometimes seemingly deranged – a relative of mine seems, and she has been on & off prescrip drugs like Prozac & whatever else for *decades.* DECADES. WTF is UP with that?? this relative has also turned into a massive hoarder.

Good questions. Kids are being drugged almost at the drop of a hat for trivial shit, but no acting out of any kind appears to be permissable these days. Just fill ‘em with drugs to get ‘em to STFU & become passive & maleable… until….

Hmmm but what if the NRA actually worked to help implement sane gun control laws? Like WTF do we need assault weapons for? What if the republican lawmakers in the states and congress did the same? What if the just got the fuck put of the way?

Visiting relatives so have had watched about 45 min worth of TV “nooz.”

NOT. ONE. WORD. spoken about gun control.

NOT. ONE.

Bastards! Cowards! Enablers! Liars! Shits!

Had to get away from what is, imo, a predatory media nightmare almost as shockingly horrid as the killings themselves. Ghouls. Showing “interviews” of youngsters where these shitheels are yelling out at them: “HOW Many GUN SHOTS did you hear little girl?????!!!”

Gross. I could almost hear the pervert panting as they *gleefully* shouted out these utterly inappropriate “questions.” Sickening & disgusting.

It’s the system that sells the guns that’s the problem? Fucking brilliant.

ratings……….

Thanks for pointing to this. It’s sick that it even exists.

I’d appreciate it in the future if you would put quotes around all the material that is being quoted. Most of what is in your comment is a direct quote from the article. If I hadn’t clicked on the link (and I often don’t click on links), I would not have known that most of your post was quoted.

Again, thanks.

Wow. Running low on Prozac? :-)

Is the real problem a culture of guns, or a culture of violence and aggression?

To me these reinforce each other. It’s not an “either/or”, but a “both/and”.

-stewartm

It would make no difference if he said it. He doesn’t do what he says he’ll do.

You’re welcome. I did say “from.” I do use the blockquote but on my browser it looks faint, a light blue, and difficult to read, so when I really want something to stand out out and be read I eschew the blockquote. I should use the bold w/bq.

The point is that we have some societal things going on that go beyond gun control, which won’t happen anyhow. This is a violent country, a warring country, where many public meetings and events customarily salute our warriors. Kids wear cammies and they want the violent games. It’s all part of a societal problem, from sports to war, junior ROTC, etc.

I say nuke Iran and it will solve the whole thing. (sick humor)

“Gun violence in America has reached epidemic proportions — over 30,000 people died by gun in 2011, according to preliminary data”

http://www.theatlanticcities.com/neighborhoods/2012/12/geography-us-gun-violence/4171/

You will never never never defeat the 2d amendment. Give it up

The 2nd amendment was never interpreted to give an individual a right to own a gun until the Roberts court invented that new right.

“Original intent” would call for the 2nd amendment continued to be interpreted to refer to a collective right, a right which originated in the Founder’s distrust and fear of a permanent large standing military. Nearly all the references duringthe debate of the times regarding the 2nd Amendment spoke of it as referring to the arming of a military force, and not as addressing an individual right to firearms.

-stewartm

Oh, please. The Native Americans had essentially a Stone Age, hunter-gatherer culture, and were faced with an invasion of a far more numerous and technologically advanced migration from people who had ocean-going sailing ships and guns. What the hell did you think would happen? And spare me the moralist prose.

My ancestors conquered the Native Americans, through numbers, technology, alcohol, organization, and disease. Does that make it right? No, but it kinda did make it inevitable. Even in Canada, the result was the same, though it was not accomplished in quite such a brutal fashion.

As far as your contention that the generational spate of school and other shootings has little to do with capitalism, crap. How much money do YOU have invested in the stock or bond markets? I have none. Any system that defines success and failure on how much wealth that you have is just insane.

Don’t you get that?

Even if you aren’t going to the doctor for the magic pill to make you feel better, the crap is in our water supply. It’s incredibly troubling.

Its sad but what it will take is a deranged killer not focusing on school kids but maybe targeting more specific groups say the top brass of the NRA itself or maybe the heads of the Republican caucus before theses same idiots quit spouting about the guns don’t kill people crap. Have thought for a long time that a lot of the elite in this country seem to feel immune from any repercusions to some of the things they do that so dramtically effect the majority of Americans including fighting tooth and nail even minor gun control initiatives. At some point that feeling of immunity is going to be shattered and only then might real change take place. Do not believe in violence as an answer in any way shape or form but am simply stating that that result is almost inevitiable in an ever increasingly violent America. Have always thought the quickest way to have radical gun control and concealed carry laws enacted in these United States is to have every left group imaginable arm themselves to the teeth and make a habit of attending every tea party rally or as is allowed in some places like Wisconsin actually attending assembly meetings armed.

Unfortunately its always the innocent who are getting hurt now.

The competitive aspect (vs. cooperation) contributes but that goes beyond capitalism to sports and other endeavors. “Kill ‘em.”

You don’t think capitalism (or at least its self-serving propaganda) doesn’t celebrate competition and “winning”?

Me, I think the NRA has a decided interest in seeing the homicide rate go up. More murders, more fearful people. More fearful people, more gun sales. More gun sales, more murders. Throw in a budget cut here or there to cut back on the number of police available, and it’s a winning formula.

-stewartm

Ignorance of mental health problems does appear to be pretty common in this country. I was equally ignorant most of my life, until someone very close to me developed problems, and was fortunately treated with some success.

A lot, maybe even all, of the mass shootings in the past few years have been committed by persons who are mentally ill.

A few weeks ago the victims and families from the Tucson shooting got to address the shooter in court at his sentencing. Giffords’ husband gave a scathing rebuke to the kid.

You might think that an astronaut would have more scientific understanding. But he’s in a career field where the mentally ill are screened out and not found in the workplace in proportion to the general population. So maybe he hasn’t encountered mental illness at a personal level, and therefore doesn’t understand it.

It would be an extremely challenging task to try to educate the general public on the facts of mental illness, rather than the popular images. Just consider how many talking heads on TV use the term “snapped”. That’s so far off the mark.

And assuming you’ve reached a state of better public understanding of the symptoms — say equivalent to the N warning signs of cancer, e.g., “a wound that won’t heal” — then you need some mechanism for every sufferer to get some competent medical help. That’s probably a bigger challenge than the education part.

But the very first step is just what cwaltz and Twain and others suggest — facing the issue and starting the conversation.

“Gun violence in America has reached epidemic proportions — over 30,000 people died by gun in 2011, according to preliminary data”

To be clear the “epidemic of violence” includes suicides. Using your link:

Oct 2012
National Vital Statistics Reports
preliminary 2011
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr61/nvsr61_06.pdf

Table 2 p. 42
Assault (homicide) by discharge of firearms — 11,101
Intentional self-harm (suicide) by discharge of firearms — 19,766

Instead of tossing pills out down toilets (and into the eventual water supply), some police stations in New England now have burn boxes/incinerators where citizens can dispose of their expired/excess medications of all sorts.

Spread the word to every town/city/county. No more flushing pills down the drain.

My “isn’t it Ironic” fantasy has always been that every concealed carry and “stand your ground” advocate in the US all happen to meet in groups of 2 at every streetcorner in America at high noon one day soon and each sees the others weapon and begin blazing away at each other until we have the sublime treat of “no man left standing” in each occurence. Kind of a classic Social Darwinism in action approach.

What if Obama said, “People should not be allowed to carry guns in the national parks where families take vacations and children can be gunned down in front of their parents.”

Time for a replay of C.J. Craig’s press conference from the TV series The West Wing, after US Pres. Bartlett was shot at a rally.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivVnVhYxS0Y

Come on.
I said:

The competitive aspect (vs. cooperation) contributes but that goes beyond capitalism to sports and other endeavors. “Kill ‘em.”

You said:

You don’t think capitalism (or at least its self-serving propaganda) doesn’t celebrate competition and “winning”?

Again: Yes it does, but it goes beyond it.

To see where I’m coming from go to
COMD
Committee Opposed to Militarism and the Draft

articles like:
The Militarization of High School Students and JROTC in Southern California

COMD believes
we must resist the spread of militaristic values and the power of the military in our society.

What is militarism?

Militarism is a value system that stresses the superiority of some people over others. Under militarism, the people deemed inferior are dehumanized as enemies who must be overpowered by any means necessary. Those who deem themselves superior are permitted to take whatever they want from others — land, freedom, natural resources, cultures, lives — by force.

Militarism derides cooperation, equality and nonviolence, and instead enforces strict hierarchical relationships. Hierarchical systems create a winner at the top and render all others losers, so in a desperate attempt not to be a loser, each individual or group struggles to keep others down. As long as it is possible to see someone else as inferior, even those victimized by the hierarchy believe it is beneficial and continue to endorse it.

I don’t know why this guy killed. But we do have a predominant culture of killing in this country, and it’s based on COMD’s broad definition of militarism, in its competitive sense.

Very horrific news today. All those innocent people killed for no reason.

I agree we need legislation to ban assault rifles and high capacity clips, and I really like this article, because it’s so true. We always get arguments from both sides, and then nothing happens, and we move on until the next shooting.

I don’t personally own any guns, and I have lots of friends and family, the great majority don’t own any guns either, I’d say about 3% to 5% of the people I know and associate with own guns.

I don’t think this is an easy problem to fix, because we need to go about it in many different ways.
1) We should greatly restrict high capacity clips.
2) Let’s start taking mental illness much more seriously in this country, and expand the availability of treatment for mentally ill people, don’t just give them drugs and forget about them, going on and off these meds cause people to act out in many strange and sometimes violent ways.
3) These realistic Violent video games need to be made less realistic. They are like simulated mass murder games. The player of these games should always be the good guy defending innocent people.
4) Return God to our schools, children need to be taught that God exists and that human life is valued above all other forms of life.

So thirty people a day die from firearm assaults.

I’ve been scrolling through a lot of comments on this tragedy – several places it was mentioned that Britain passed restrictive (yes!) gun laws after the tragedy in Scotland. Mention was even made of the Wild West situation in New Mexico when outlaws and bank robbers had pretty much ruled the roost – laws were passed.

It can be done. Here’s a good example from Australia:

Steve MontgomerySydney, AustraliaNYT Pick
Deep and profound condolences to the families, the community, the beautiful state of Connecticut and to your whole country, and indeed the world. It is too hard to comprehend the agony and sadness, particularly given the ages of many of the victims and the time of year.
If I may I will proffer a comment from another land across the seas. In Australia in 1998, we too had a terrible event remembered as the Port Arthur Massacre when dozens of innocent children and adults were murdered by another deranged lunatic . Our Prime Minister of the day (John Howard), supported by the major opposition parties introduced strict new gun laws that removed any rights for most people to own or be sold many types of guns. For those that were still legally able to sell or own guns there were strict, comprehensive and enforceable and enforced laws introduced. There was a government funded gun buy back scheme introduced and hundreds of thousands of guns were removed form circulation and destroyed.
The gun lobby was shouted down in every forum and whilst still influential, the culture of this country has been irrevocably changed, hopefully for ever.
We will always have madmen, however removing easy options for them to exercise their madness has proven invaluable for our country.”

The argument that carrying a gun protects others is not rational. The more weapons on a scene, the more chance for bystanders to be injured or for the perpetrator to be confused with Don Quixote coming to the rescue.

Selfish gun owners: take a good look at yourselves in the mirror. The time to change your ways is now. It won’t kill you NOT to have a gun. It will kill others if you keep insisting on your ‘right’.

I love the idea of that gun buyback scheme. Think how many windfarms could be produced with all that metal! Or church bells! It can be done. We need a government for the people, not just of the people.

Mr. Obama, melt down those guns!

Guns, butts, booze and cars?

How many dead Americans in a year?

Never mind…. “Ding” Pump gas and go shopping, Pavlov? Don’t forget your dog.

Return God to our schools

No, any belief God has not been an influence in curbing violence and religion doesn’t belong in schools. They’re bad enough already.

I guess you haven’t seen the “only out of my cold dead hands” bumper stickers.

Your comment goes with something I touched on in mine. While we have been going downhill in this country for the past several and more decades towards that Wild West to which we both have referred, there has also been a time of comparative sanity sandwiched in there – when towns and states passed laws restricting gun ownership, when women got the vote, when the New Deal came about, when the UN was first created, when civil rights became a real issue, human rights, ending a bad war – this nightmare we have now is directly related to an imbalance of power, sure enough; to a madness among warcrazed and undereducated youth, sure enough. The direction we’re heading can be rightly compared to the Old Wild West – it is nothing new; we have been here before.

And we got out of it by passing laws to restrict gun ownership!

It’s not rocket science, people! When everyone owned guns, we weren’t safer, we had mayhem! And we’re getting back to those ‘good ol’ days’ when everyone again will have a gun. Was that good?! Is this good?! For the gun manufacturers, it is. For those who can benefit from chaos, it is.

The children are dying. We are murdering our young.

Enough already.

Of course I have. But you know, if the Aussies can do it, why can’t we? Macho is their middle name. (Just attend an Aussie cricket match.)

Selfish gun owners: take a good look at yourselves in the mirror. The time to change your ways is now. It won’t kill you NOT to have a gun. It will kill others if you keep insisting on your ‘right’.

Quite a few of those selfish gun owners actually fought, killed and suffered from killing those that would have no qualms about “wasting you” to advance a political or economic agenda. Men and woman who saw the horrors and brutality of war and would do anything to avoid it. But dam well understand, a man unable to defend himself from aggression, is a dead man. The world is not nice Juliania. You know that. Unless your Paris Hilton?

No child should have to defend “himself” from a gunman at school. A sick deranged person intent on harming people will find a way to do it. Gun owners are not selfish. In fact ask many gun owner if would have given their life to neutralize this POS? Chances are yes, they would. There where lots of guys with guns prepared to do just that today. Unfortunately not one got the chance because the sad reality is the “individual” is the variable in the equation of life, with no certainty or guarantees in life except that people die everyday from irresponsible actions of another human being. Like children killed in a drone attack in some far away land based upon intelligence that was incorrect? Guess we will never know, will we? Sucks when it is so close to home!

Guns, Butts, Booze and Cars. Thousands of people killed every year. Mammon sucks…

:(

It is difficult (nearly impossible) to get a man/woman to understand something when his/her portfolio requires him/her to not understand.

Oh, please. The Native Americans had essentially a Stone Age, hunter-gatherer culture

Perhaps some did, but others had very advanced civilizations. If you have can, go to the Cherokee National Museum in Oklahoma and learn about the Trail of Tears, the forced relocation of Native Americans from the southeastern United States, where they had established towns and agriculture, to Oklahoma. And those were the “lucky” ones. Other were simply shot on sight.

You need to educate yourself, barbarian.

if the Aussies can do it, why can’t we?

Because we’re not Aussies?

Poverty is chronic and pervasive in the long time families in Appalachia. It creates the environment where people desperate for simple subsistence will hold on to a pretty primitive world view and lifestyle.

Good Lord! I didn’t know such ignorance of the culture and civilizations of the Native Americans still existed.

It’s the FDL default position that every problem from acne to auto accidents is caused by corporations and you are loyal to it.

The barbarian’s position is exactly what we’re talking about, some people thinking they’re superior to others, and then “proving” it with a firearm.

Maybe so. It’s my position that it’s about a culture that puts personal gain and personal property above all else. Where the more you have, the more you believe you can get away with and generally do. Where those with the most feel entitled to whatever they can get. Where I’ve got mine and to hell with the rest trumps everything.

And were this attitude is encouraged by parents, schools, religion, the media and especially the government.

Okay, but (1) you seem to think that people that think differently than you (like me) in any way are automatically in the category you describe, which is wrong and (2) it’s only a big deal if you make it one, so personally I’d rather take the St. Francis / Thoreau approach and live my life my way and avoid them, because it’s not worth the aggravation over something I can’t change. Thoreau: I came into this world to live in it, not to change it.

Never said I wanted to change it. Just pointing out what should be – but quite often isn’t – completely obvious.

You act as if suicide isn’t a tragedy. When people choose to take their lives you lose all the potential that life could have ha.(not to mention the impact on those that knew the person.) This rule doesn’t just apply to fetuses. It applies to every living and breathing human being.

Tragedy was not an issue, (gun) violence was. I think violence implies one person acting against another, and not against oneself, even though suicide is (I guess) a crime.

I don’t think suicide enters into the current thread at all, regarding the tragedy at Newtown Elementary School, I think you just injected it to charge me with something even though it’s irrelevant. So waltz with that.

It isn’t irrelevant unless you consider what actually pushes one to commit acts of violence whether against oneself or against another “irrelevant.”

In both cases you are dealing with the mental well being of a person and I’m not sure if you noticed but a lot of the people who choose to commit suicide with a gun often take people with them before they go(exactly as this young man who died from a SELF INFLICTED wound.)

Child abuse wasn’t reported on back in the 1950s and earlier, either, but should we assume that there wasn’t any?

There have been horrendous multiple killings going well back into American history that did make the news — but given that up until World War One the majority of Americans lived in rural areas, and what we now call “media coverage” was local and small-scale, it’s likely that a lot of bad things happened — on isolated farms or in the poor sections of small towns — that never came to public attention.

Whether there’s any relation between psychiatric medications and violence — I have no opinion on the topic, being almost totally ignorant. But I think it’s unwise to look at what made news in the pre-meds days versus what gets covered now for proof one way or the other.

I’m with you, cwaltz. But MENTAL HEALTH would cost money, lots of it, and it’s unspeakable to spend more money on human need in the debate.

And with you, cmaukonen. You say: ” it’s about a culture that puts personal gain and personal property above all else. Where the more you have, the more you believe you can get away with and generally do. Where those with the most feel entitled to whatever they can get. Where I’ve got mine and to hell with the rest trumps everything.”

Yeah, the values are so bleeping crazy and provide no support for humanness. It’s amazing that in fact there is still as much humanity as there (fortunately) is, when it’s bleeping indoctrinated out of us.

As all cultures do, various values in our’s ebb and flow and all that was past is neither all good nor bad. But I do dare to make the observation that this country was settled mostly by folks who were wanting to create something permanent and man the creator was highly valued. — No I am not ignoring the fact that they had little and often no regard for the rights of those already occupying the land. That is a story for another time. —

The narcissist criminal did not appear so prominently as hero, especially in the West until the chaos of Reconstruction.

It seems to me that more and more our culture is defining man’s virtue on the basis of his (especially the males) capacity to dominate, destroy and kill.

We seem to have forgotten man the creator.

It seems to me that more and more our culture is defining man’s virtue on the basis of his (especially the males) capacity to dominate, destroy and kill.

It has always been that way. Natural selection! In fact that natural aristocracy of men, Jefferson spoke of? “Those neocons fascists bastards,” fit that mold quite well.

Part and parcel of that Second Amendment is the ability to defend oneself against that sort of predatory animal, tyranny in government or those sick bastardz who have no regard for life, only money, power, and cutting deals with Mammon.

Like those neocon fascist bastardz. Suck big time when the seeds we sow blow up in our faces and yet people will deny the reality that this murderer, did what Americans are trained to do.

Kill, in the name of America. Yes, innocents as innocent as the children killed yesterday, by a whack-job, made in America. America is a drunk in denial.

Militarism is a value system that stresses the superiority of some people over others.

I’m sure that Ohio Barbarian and I would say the same for capitalism. The justification by capitalists why Bill Gates or the Koch brothers or Jamie Dimon have so much loot is that they “deserve” it because they are smarter/more driven/etc etc etc, right?

Capitalism and militarism actually niche nicely with each other. Henry Clay and others who supported the “American system” in the 19th century saw this and explained the difference between their form of economic system and that of laissez-faire “free enterprise”. From a Henry Carey quote:

Two systems are before the world;… One looks to increasing the necessity of commerce; the other to increasing the power to maintain it. One looks to underworking the Hindoo, and sinking the rest of the world to his level; the other to raising the standard of man throughout the world to our level. One looks to pauperism, ignorance, depopulation, and barbarism; the other to increasing wealth, comfort, intelligence, combination of action, and civilization. One looks towards universal war; the other towards universal peace. One is the English system; the other we may be proud to call the American system, for it is the only one ever devised the tendency of which was that of elevating while equalizing the condition of man throughout the world.

Notice the part on how the “English system” (laissez-faire capitalism) also entailed “universal war”?

And note that even after the collapse of the bad ole Soviet Union, with the US being the sole superpower on the plaent, we’ve still been in a state of “universal war”?

Think that a coincidence?

-stewartm

Guns, Butts, Booze and Cars. Thousands of people killed every year. Mammon sucks…

Paradoxically what you said might offer an ‘out’. The big advance against smoking occurred when Big Tobacco was threatened to be held legally responsible for the deaths they caused (the threat that the families of the victims could sue them in court).

Now, if we could only apply the same threat to Big Alcohol and the NRA.

-stewartm

Oil?

Hell no. The US military protects oil, while oil fucks America to the tune of over a billion dollars a day? It is like supporting your local crack dealer.

Fill tank with gas… Go shopping….
HO Ho Ho, not

Notice the part on how the “English system” (laissez-faire capitalism) also entailed “universal war”?

“It is a racket,” From a King, to slave owners to corporate fascism. War sucks…….

We have a culture that lives the myth of redemptive violence. We worship the military. We watch shows like “24″ and go to movies like “Zero Dark Thirty.” Our morning cartoon shows routinely depict superheroes saving the world with violence. But then we recoil at horrors like the Newton massacre, and ask “why”, even as we kill children in Pakistan with our drones. We have seriously lost our way. If we can’t see that when 5-year-olds get gunned down, we will never see it.