BANG! BANG! BANG!

 

It happened again this week - twice! - Can you believe it??? Actually come to think about it, two mass shootings in a single week should come as no surprise to anyone who's bothered to pay attention.  This is the new "normal" - if you want to call it that. In both cases the number thirteen was involved: thirteen dead at the Washington DC Navy Yard; thirteen people shot in a Chicago park. But in the Case of Chicago "thirteen" turned out to be a very lucky number. This time there were no fatalities and only one person injured critically - a three-year-old boy who was shot in the face. It appears he's going to be fine in the long run, God bless him.

Guess Who

Wayne LaPierre, the National Rifle Association's most visible spokesman, will be going on Meet The Press for a sit-down with David Gregory tomorrow. He's always loads of fun to watch. On his last appearance on that program, the hideous twit was literally foaming at the mouth. I'm not kidding! It must be a difficult thing to make one's living defending the indefensible. How this guy sleeps at night is anyone's guess. My theory is that he's simply a sociopath. Or maybe he's suffering from acute brain damage. Whatever the case, it should be an interesting hour.

In the wake of the Newtown tragedy of December 14, Wayne said something to the effect that the only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. In the case of the Washington DC Naval yard massacre you had a bad guy with a gun entering a military facility that we must presume was packed to the rafters with lots of good guys with guns. And sure enough, one of them was able to take the bad guy out. HOORAY! The only problem was the fact that he was able to murder twelve innocent people before he was put down. OUCH! So much for the delightful idiocy of Wayne LaPierre.

I'm not going to mention the Washington Navy Yard shooter by name. I'm through giving these freaks another ounce of publicity. It's obvious that he was a troubled, mentally disturbed man. According to everyone who knew him he had recently been saying that he was hearing voices that weren't there. We can debate from now till whenever what the Founding Fathers were thinking when they inserted "well-regulated militia" into the second amendment of the Constitution. Can we at least all agree that this guy wasn't what they had in mind?

You can expect at least one more mass killings before the year is out. And as more and more people are increasingly able to gain access do these dangerous, rapid-fire, people-killing machines, the carnage will only multiply. Until we wake the hell up, this is the way it's gonna be from now on, kids. Get used to it. Deal with it. Why get all bent-out-of-shape over the inevitable? I'm not. I long ago adjusted to living in a nation in ruins. You ought to, too. Don't worry. Be happy.

Giron and Morse

Don't count on the distinguished men and women inside of the House of Reprehensibles to do the right thing. If the slaughter of twenty little boys and girls won't do the trick, a bunch of dead, middle-aged contractors won't get the job done either. As I said, we need to come to terms with this nasty new reality in America. Our elected "lawmakers" are too frightened of the political power of the NRA. Two Colorado state legislators who had the courage to take on that organization were recently defeated in recall elections. Neither of them regret doing what is right for their country. Their names are Angela Giron and John Morse. Neither of them is a Republican. That didn't surprise you, did it. I didn't think it would.

NOTE TO CAROLINE KENNEDY: 

I've got two perfectly good candidates for next year's Profiles In Courage Awards that are given out every year by the Kennedy Library. That's just a friendly suggestion on my part. Do you read my blog, Caroline? Please tell me you do.

And are you ready for the punch line? Here goes: What happened in Newtown, Connecticut last year is going to happen again. As I write these words, some sick, twisted little psychopath is smoldering in the basement of his mother's home planning another schoolhouse slaughter so brutal and appalling, it will make Newtown look inconsequential by comparison. Ain't that a scream?
`

Get used to Grief

And when the next massacre of thirty, forty, fifty - or more innocent children happens it will play perfectly into the hands of the half-witted extremists who are trying to do away with public education in this doomed nation. I can just hear it now:

"See? It's just too dangerous fer y'all to send your kids to them nasty ol' public schools! Now you good folks jes leave their edjukayshun to the private sector!"

Oh, yeah. That'll be the next idiotic right wing talking point. Just you wait, Henry Higgins. 

Recently on Democracy Now, an ex-NRA member named Tom Diaz posed the question, "What kind of society are we going to be?" His heart was in the right place but he's asking the wrong question. What he should be asking is, "What kind of society have we become?" You don't need a masters degree in sociology to come up with the answer to that. It's all-too-clear that we've morphed into a society with a homicidal, cowboy mentality. "Gun Culture": it's a term you're hearing quite often these days, and there's a damned good reason for that, pardner. We just can't get enough of those iron phallic symbols. That's the reason this is so-much-more of a "man problem". I'm glad I was born a male but I'm not proud to be one. Men can be real assholes. Have you ever noticed that?

We got guns
They got guns
All God's chil'en got guns.... 

The Marx Brothers
from their 1932 film, Duck Souop  

In 2004 when George W. Bush stupidly let Bill Clinton's ban on assault weapons expire, the surge in these sort of atrocities was predicted. If you consider a "mass killing" to be five or more people we've had a jolly total of at least one-a-month since Newtown. Expect that grim number to rise each and every year from now on. As I said, this is the undeniable reality of living in the USA in the twenty-first century. This is the way it's going to be from now on. Get used to the broken bodies of dead children; come to terms with the carnage. When you bundle your little ones off to school give them a hug - and say a gentle prayer. And while you're at it, get used to living in a nation in ruins.

WAS THIS A GREAT COUNTRY OR WHAT!

Tom Degan
Goshen, NY 

SUGGESTED LISTENING:

Mercy, Mercy Me
by Marvin Gaye

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9BA6fFGMjI

A beautiful recording by one of the more stellar victims of gun violence in America in the twentieth century. 

UPDATE, 9/22/13, 11:32AM:

There were eleven more shootings in Chicago the other night. Four of them were fatalities. Please tell me you're not surprised.