Monday, November 6, 2017

"Thoughts, Prayers, God — Why Didn't Anyone Think of That Before?": More Commentary on America's Gun (and NRA-GOP) Problem

Huffington Post, "Mass Shooting Suspect Devin Patrick Kelley Had ‘Connection’ To Texas Church"






Thoughts, prayers, God—why didn't anyone think of that before? If we'd only tried thoughts, prayers, and God after the last mass shooting then this one surely could've been prevented.

David Edwards at Raw Story




Ryan Williams-Jent, "‘Thoughts and Prayers’ Pour Out to Sutherland Springs, Site of America’s Latest Mass Shooting"







The paralysis you feel right now – the impotent helplessness that washes over you as news of another mass slaughter scrolls across the television screen – isn’t real. It's a fiction created and methodically cultivated by the gun lobby, designed to assure that no laws are passed to make America safer, because those laws would cut into their profits. My heart sunk to the pit of my stomach, once again, when I heard of today's shooting in Texas. My heart dropped further when I thought about the growing macabre club of families in Las Vegas and Orlando and Charleston and Newtown, who have to relive their own day of horror every time another mass killing occurs. 
None of this is inevitable. I know this because no other country endures this pace of mass carnage like America. It is uniquely and tragically American. As long as our nation chooses to flood the county with dangerous weapons and consciously let those weapons fall into the hands of dangerous people, these killings will not abate. 
As my colleagues go to sleep tonight, they need to think about whether the political support of the gun industry is worth the blood that flows endlessly onto the floors of American churches, elementary schools, movie theaters, and city streets. Ask yourself – how can you claim that you respect human life while choosing fealty to weapons-makers over support for measures favored by the vast majority of your constituents. 
My heart breaks for Sutherland Springs. Just like it still does for Las Vegas. And Orlando. And Charleston. And Aurora. And Blacksburg. And Newtown. Just like it does every night for Chicago. And New Orleans. And Baltimore. And Bridgeport. The terrifying fact is that no one is safe so long as Congress chooses to do absolutely nothing in the face of this epidemic. The time is now for Congress to shed its cowardly cover and do something.




Huffington Post Lead Headline, Monday Morning, 6 November 2017


The man in the White House says that the U.S. doesn't have a guns problem, but a mental health problem. Steve Benen responds:

As regular readers know, Trump has endorsed repealing the Affordable Care Act's essential health benefits, which includes mental-health treatments. The Republican president has also supported deep cuts to Medicaid, which provides mental health treatments to many low-income Americans. 
Trump also signed into law a GOP bill that expanded gun access to the mentally impaired.


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