Again everything has to stop because something has happened so terrible it does not fit into our rational political discourse, a mass shooting at a club in Orlando, Florida, with a death toll so far (writing just after noon) upwards of 50. I'm following updates at The Guardian. The site was a gay club near downtown called Pulse. The shooter, who has been killed by police liberating the hostages he'd taken, was a 29-year-old American of Afghan roots from Fort Pierce, with the (yes, Muslim) name of Omar Mateen. Senator Nelson thought he had been told by the FBI that there was a suspected connection with ISIS, which he later corrected to "radicalism" of some unspecified kind and not necessarily any organization. Imam Muhammad Musri, president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, said:
Cross-posted at The Rectification of Names.
I call on everybody in the community who has any info to please call the FBI share what you know. I call on my fellow faith leaders, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, whatever faith you follow, please pray for the victims and their families.
It’s supposed to be a beautiful morning but it is already an incredibly heartbreaking morning. It’s like lightning. This person is not likely to be connected to a network. I also want to caution the media from rushing to judgment and sensationalizing the story, we do not want the story to be shifted from the focus where it is.
It’s a horrible tragedy. We are mourning. We are sad. We are heartbroken. It’s not really time for any sensational news and rushing to judgment. As a nation we need to look at this issue of mass shootings, we just had one too many today.That's the best I can do for now except to add that there is no value in hatred for any community of human beings, whether it is gay people or Muslims or anybody else, and that assault weapons of the type used by the shooter, with their diabolical efficiency, need to be banned.
Cross-posted at The Rectification of Names.
Amen.
ReplyDeleteDitto, Tom.
ReplyDeleteI had very serious reconstructive ankle surgery 9 months ago.
I've been off opiods for 3 months.
Here's probably the biggest problem in this country:
It's harder to buy antihistamine and prescribed pain killers, than it is to but a gun.
WTF.
It does not fit into your rational political discourse? Why not? Mass shootings are frequent and inevitable in America, just like suicide bombings in Iraq. The only way to tackle them effectively is to repeal the 2nd amendment and introduce common sense gun control measures, but nobody significant in US politics is willing to say so. So just accept them as unavoidable aspects of modern life, like car accidents, and stop making such a fuss every few weeks as if they're something alien to America. They're as American as hot dogs and apple pie.
ReplyDeleteNobody is going to give up their arsenals without a fight. What we need is to introduce the concept of militia back into gun ownership. Let each township or county setup an main arsenal and Militia board to get and train members, who have the right to own guns. In the beginning they are kept at the Militia HQ arsenal, and later members can take them home. All ammo is run through the HQ. If someone is acting crazy, drinking too much or beating his wife, the Militia command revokes his carry status and stores the guns at HQ "for saftey".
ReplyDeleteSure good old boy will run it, but include ER docs, high school principals and a game warden..