And Counting

 There is an old George Carlin bit in which he plays a radio announcer reporting on the Memorial Day weekend traffic fatalities, described as lagging behind the previous year's total. To this, George adds, "You're not trying!"

This was the nostalgia nugget that opened for me after a very ugly weekend of Americans killing Americans. With guns.

Four people were killed and eight more were injured when a gunman opened fire on a waterfront bar in North Carolina. This was, according to the Gun Violence Archive, the three hundred twenty-fourth mass shooting in the United States this year. 

We didn't have to wait long for three twenty-five. Sunday morning in Michigan, a different shooter fired into a group of people entering their house of worship, and then he set the place on fire. Because this is what Americans do. Thoughts and prayers? I'm pretty sure the folks who fled their temple have that covered. 

Motives? At this point how can it really matter? Why would someone want to kill a stranger? Why would it matter if they were Mormon or late night patrons of a bar with live music? Some have begun to make the case that since both of the gunmen were both Marines, veterans of service in the war in Iraq. 

There will be plenty of speculation as these stories are tossed into the melting pot of murder which exists almost exclusively on the continental United States. Familiarity with firearms? That would be advantageous if you happened to be interested in a killing spree, but not required. It can't hurt that as a nation we tend to fetishize our guns and protect them better than our right to free speech. Is this current flurry of killings all a horribly misunderstood attempt to provide for a well regulated militia? From where I'm sitting, there isn't much regulation going on. 

There was a time when the phrase "innocent bystanders" meant something. It seems now there is no such thing. A target is a target, and innocence is something to be discussed on the way to heaven. I will reiterate here my fervent belief that no one deserves to be shot. Life and death is not something we get to decide for others. It certainly raises the issue of whether those who commit these acts then turn their guns on themselves are sparing us the details of a lengthy discussion of how they came to their end. Did we fail these two former Marines? Almost certainly. But not nearly as much as we failed their victims. 

I don't know how the right to bear arms became more important than the right to worship or the right to assemble, but I would very much like to put a cap on this before we hit three hundred thirty.  

Or so.