More Dead

Maybe its the heat but we have had a spate of mass shootings in the last couple of weeks, Gilroy, El Paso and now Dayton.

There is no justification for them and they also seem to stem from various mental defects.

We have the suspect from El Paso but the other two died in their events.

We are not going to be able to identify people likely to commit such a crime, we don't have the resources or the capability.  It is also almost certain that for every loner who picks up a gun there are many, many more who don't.

The only real common denominator is the guns they use and their ability to kill large numbers of people in a short time.

People have a constitutional right to bear arms, but not any arms.  We certainly wouldn't allow a citizen to have a nuclear device.  What about a gun that fired a nuclear bullet?

We can place sensible restrictions on deadly weapons without attacking that right.  It was never intended for this.

More Senseless gun Violence

So this last attack was in Virginia beach.

Twelve dead for no reason except one man's anger and easy availability of guns.

Watching the survivors describe the incident, you can tell it was life changing for them, coming so close to death and knowing the victims.

Imagine it changes their whole opinion on the issue.

They saw incidents on the news but they didn't think it could happen to them.

Maybe its a mistake for the news to not show the truly horrendous violence to avoid offending viewers.  Better to be offended than dead.

If these shooting were being done by a terrorist group we would have an all out campaign to stop them.

Maybe we need to realize the terror is real even if the people doing it aren't joined in some plot.

They simply all own guns.

Hate

Terrible news from New Zealand as misguided people decided they had the right to kill innocents in pursuit of some goal.  The idea that any group of people can be treated as "targets" is dehumanizing to all of us.  My heart goes out to the victims of this senseless violence.

There are people around the world preaching hate against those different from us.  The problem with that is we are all people who share the same basic feelings, desires and fears.  To create barriers benefits those preaching hate and who parlay that into holding power.

None of this is new.  History has shown us time after time how hate mongers have succeeded in oppressing populations, and holding on to power until the bitter end.

They generally act like it is some "us" against some "them" but really in the end the only thing they care about is themselves.  Whatever success they may achieve initially is often short lived leading to catastrophe for their followers.

Unfortunately we seem to fall for the hate promoters over and over again.

Its simply a lesson we need to learn.

Senseless

Every time there's a shooting we have people saying its time to do something real instead of simply lamenting the horror and mourning the dead.

Each time nothing happens.

The gun lobby has decided that even conceding an inch is a slippery slope to gun control.

I do agree with them to some degree that the problem isn't the guns, its the people who use them to kill, but they couldn't do it without the guns.

Identifying and restricting their access t guns is opposed because it concedes something on that slippery slope.

There were a lot of groups this weekend in support of the innocent lives lost in Pittsburgh.  I don't think the speeches and the symbolism will solve anything, it isn't reaching the right people.

Its an odd thing the way hate groups act.

They engage in these terrorist activities, although we often don't refer to them that way, without a clear objective or message, except I guess hate.

Islamic terrorists generally want Israel and Western support for Israel to be eliminated.

Not an acceptable goal but one I understand.

There doesn't seem to be a reason for these attacks except just hate.

Guess that's all they need.

Inciting Bad Behavior

The problem with angry rhetoric is that when it works it leads to angry actions.

When you use it as a campaign scare tactic you have to accept that your words are somewhat responsible when people do things like send bombs to the people you have identified as the enemy.

Even if you are clueless enough to think otherwise, it doesn't really matter.

Calls for unity ring hollow when the only unity you envision is everyone agreeing and swearing loyalty to you.

Everyone in office takes an oath to defend the Constitution, not an individual.

No one is above the law.

Now certain people have authorities as defined in the Constitution, but only those authorities.

Disagreement on policies is not a crime, at least not in this country and disagreeing on things like the best way to deal with immigration does not make anyone an enemy of the people.

Attempting to corrupt our institutions does make someone an enemy of the people who are the authority for all of us via the laws of the land.

Going around lying about factual events is only perjury under oath, but it is always morally and ethically wrong.

When it incites behavior, even if not specifically called for it borders on abetting crimes.

History teaches us that violent behavior eventually leads to violent responses and then societies descend into anarchy or oligarchy.

Stop lying would be a first step towards a unified country.

Its also pretty easy.

Unknown Disturbed People

The shooter in Vegas was essentially fairly normal in most respects.

Meanwhile he apparently decided to commit an atrocity was the worst mass shooting in our history.

Story after story I see attempts to understand this apparent contradiction, unsuccessfully in my opinion.

I have no idea why he did it but clearly he was disturbed about something.

He had a girlfriend, money, a place to live and access to his preferred recreation, gambling.

In many ways he was just a guy.

Some people remember that he would be grumpy at times.

Some Starbucks employees remember him yelling at his girlfriend.

He looked a little scruffier recently by some accounts.

None of which would lead to any particular motive.

Its also pretty obvious that it wasn't a spur of the moment thing.

Some seem impressed by the planning involved, although it consisted of a few pretty straightforward things, Getting the right room would be the hardest.

Apparently he attempted to explode some Aviation Fuel Tanks and failed at that.

The search for a motive is going to go on and its not obvious one will be found.

Its probably scarier to think that an normal guy with above average intelligence, not down on his luck would just do something like this.

Its actually pretty terrifying.

Guns with a Chance of Anger

America is a big country with plenty of guns and not that many restrictions on who can buy them.

Ratchet up the political talk to a fever pitch and you get angry people who may honestly believe that American values are in danger.

We had an incident where a shooter tried to kill members of congress while they were practicing for a bipartisan game.

Now violence is not a good response to an election loss, especially random acts like this.

The issue then becomes do we have too much anger or too many guns/

I know that an isolated incident isn't likely to change much in how we handle guns in this country and I'm not even sure what we should do.  The shooter yesterday would most likely have passed every background test.

It is clearly time for the rhetoric to become more controlled, however in the current age of media extremism, I don't see that being likely.

We may have to see more of the same.