Worse mass shooting in contemporary American history

If there is one thing we can be sure of, when the worse mass shooting in contemporary American history occurs, it will be news.

In reviewing how this horrible event is being covered by the media, we see some pretty typical and predictable elements in their stories. For example, there are tributes to the "naive and innocent victims."

And there are stories about the "heroes" that helped save the day.

CNN has a minute by minute account. And a look into the gunman's perch.

Fox has a story featuring the victims and this: Stories of heroism emerge following deadly Vegas shooting. And of course, they use this to attack a Democrat (duh): Hillary Clinton shamelessly politicizes Las Vegas massacre.

And of course, both have lots of video where you can watch the shooting happen. How sick is that?

I wonder how long it will take to face the reality of what is undeniably behind this--the presence of far too many guns in our society. Consider this, from the Washington Post:

Investigators find arsenal fit for a commando team in retiree’s hotel room

 

Don't believe it has to do with the guns? Read this and tell me why!?!?!?! Gun violence in America, explained in 17 maps and charts

 

Yes, it has begun, the media questioning of why Congress does nothing. This from the New York Times: 477 Days. 521 Mass Shootings. Zero Action From Congress.

 

We just have to accept that, we simply don't care. I personally knew this was true when 20 six and seven year olds had their heads and faces blown off in an elementary school in 2012. Even that didn't cause us to do anything. And so this just keeps happening, over and over and over and over and ...

 

 

Who Gets Shot in the United States?

This is from a fascinating article in the New York Times. Here ...


This is from a journalist who, while writing for the Times, covered many, many, many shootings and killings. She then complied a report--called the Gun Report--where she summarizes what she learned in her time covering such incidents.


Very important stuff. READ IT!


This is portion of the article:

Before starting work on Gun Report, I had my own ideas about gun violence: Most of it probably resulted from gang activity, I assumed, along with the marital domestic shootings we so often read about.

More than 350 posts and 40,000 deaths later, here is what I learned.

Gang shootings are prevalent, especially in former hubs of industry now in economic decline in Ohio; the Flint/Tri-Cities region of Michigan; in Indianapolis and Fort Wayne, Indiana; Newport News, Va.; and Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Carjackings and home invasions often appeared in my Google news searches. I was surprised to learn that suburbs were a magnet for gun violence, perhaps mirroring the housing implosion, which decimated the suburbs and propelled people to cities, where there are always jobs.

Not that nation’s largest cities are exempt: Miami, Chicago, St. Louis, Detroit, Newark, New Orleans, Philadelphia, and Dallas are notable examples. (Less so New York, possibly because of the NYPD’s stop-and-frisk policy, which was ruled unconstitutional.) Drive-by shootings still plague northern and southern California; Los Angeles, Fresno and the entire east side of the state are rife with gang activity. Tennessee, Alabama, and Missouri also frequently popped up in this regard.

What was also notable was where the shootings aren’t: Maine, Hawaii, Vermont, Wyoming, Montana, and New Hampshire were rarely mentioned in the report. Why? Weapons don’t easily flow into Hawaii, surrounded by the Pacific, and Montana and Wyoming are sparsely populated, mostly by experienced, rural gun owners. But homeowners in these states are also armed against home invaders, and as we saw in Montana in May, tragedy can result.

But while half of the shootings I featured were the result of a crime, the other half, I was most surprised to learn, resulted from arguments — often fueled by alcohol — among friends, neighbors, family members and romantic partners. More and more, people are solving their differences not with their fists but with guns. Husbands and wives are shooting each other, as are sisters and brothers. In many homes across America, loaded guns are easily accessible, and children find them, accidentally shooting themselves or each other. One hundred children died in unintentional shootings in the year after Newtown, which breaks down to two every week.

Crime in the news today

As usual, even with a new year upon us and all the hope that accompanies it, crime remains in the news today. And a lot of it deals with guns:

Georgia mom home alone with kids shoots intruder (yay for guns!)

Police investigate triple shooting at Philly biker club (boo on guns!)

Man on run after allegedly setting girlfriend on fire
- Infant dies after mother posts murder-suicide note (boo on guns!)

Iowa officer battles against sexual movies in prison 

• Grisly details likely in theater rampage (boo on guns!)
• Sandy puts crime evidence in doubt  
• Rand Paul's teen son arrested
• Victim single; rape conviction tossed
• Four dead after Aurora standoff (boo on guns!)

 And then there is this, sent to me by my mom: http://www.tampabay.com/news/publicsafety/crime/article1268955.ecehttp://www.tampabay.com/news/publicsafety/crime/article1268955.ece  At least some people still have some sense. I wonder how this particular offender is out in the first place.

What exactly can be done about a "crazy" person with a gun?

In the past month, "crazy" people with guns have gone on shooting sprees, killing multiple people in each incident.

First was the movie theater shooting in Colorado that killed 12 people.

Then there was the massacre at the Sikh religious facility in Wisconsin that left seven dead.

In fact, in the past 30 years there have been at least 58 cases of mass murder with guns in the US. To be included in this list the event must meet these criteria:

• The killings were carried out by a lone shooter. (Except in the case of the Columbine massacre and the Westside Middle School killings, both of which involved two shooters.)
• The shootings happened during a single incident and in a public place. (Public, except in the case of a party at an apartment complex in Crandon, Wisconsin.) Crimes primarily related to armed robbery or gang activity are not included.
• The shooter took the lives of at least four people. An FBI crime classification report identifies an individual as a mass murderer—as opposed to a spree killer or a serial killer—if he kills four or more people in a single incident (not including himself), and typically in a single location.
• If the shooter died or was hurt from injuries sustained during the incident, he is included in the total victim count. (But we have excluded cases in which there were three fatalities and the shooter also died, per the previous criterion.)
• We included six so-called "spree killings"—prominent cases that fit closely with our above criteria for mass murder, but in which the killings occurred in multiple locations over a short period of time.

In the Colorado shooting, the psychiatrist who treated the shooter James Holmes actually made contact with a University of Colorado police officer to express concerns about her patient's behavior several weeks before Holmes' alleged rampage, sources told ABC News.

The sources did not know what the officer approached by Dr. Lynne Fenton did with the information she passed along. They said, however, that the officer was recently interviewed, with an attorney present, by the Aurora Police Department as a part of the ongoing investigation of the shooting.

 Fenton would have had to have serious concerns to break confidentiality with her patient to reach out to the police officer or others, the sources said. Under Colorado law, a psychiatrist can legally breach a pledge of confidentiality with a patient if he or she becomes aware of a serious and imminent threat that their patient might cause harm to others. Psychiatrists can also breach confidentiality if a court has ordered them to do so. 

This raises an important question. If we have evidence that a person with a serious mental illness or brain disorder is talking about or even planning such a massacre, what can actually be done about it?

The answer is, it depends on the state. In some states, the police can take action and a person can be held against his or her will pending a mental health evaluation. In others, the person cannot be detained unless he or she is an immediate threat to himself or herself (or others) at that very moment.

This is a tough one. We'll always look back on cases like this one (and the Sikh shooting where the shooter was known to many groups and the US government as a threat and dangerous, hate-filled person ... and the Columbine killings where the shooters were known to be in serious trouble and the plot was known to many beforehand ... and ...) and we will speculate about what could have been done.

The news media will address the issue for weeks after every mass killing. And yet, nothing will ever be done. So get used to this happening again and again, year after year.

Coming soon to your college and university

Guns!

From the article:

"Texas is preparing to give college students and professors the right to carry guns on campus, adding momentum to a national campaign to open this part of society to firearms.

"More than half the members of the Texas House have signed on as co-authors of a measure directing universities to allow concealed handguns. The Senate passed a similar bill in 2009 and is expected to do so again. Republican Gov. Rick Perry, who sometimes packs a pistol when he jogs, has said he's in favor of the idea."

And the guy in the picture firing the pistol in public, surrounded by tall buildings, is the Governor of the state (the same guys who favors secession from the US).

One hopes those are blanks.

Or that he is aiming at someone who currently does not have a gun. Like a college student or professor.

Just imagine an argument on campus or in class. Now add some guns. I think you see the problem.

We have a Second Amendment right to carry and bare arms. Yet, the government is allowed to pass reasonable gun controls to keep us safe. The only question is what is reasonable.

In our history, you've not been able to carry guns on campus. Texans think that is unreasonable.

Imagine what will happen if this bill becomes law and Oklahoma beats Texas in football, at the campus of Texas. How long until a student pulls a gun for the sake of this rivalry?

NPR examines history of the NRA

And explains why the US cannot institute reasonable gun control laws.

Seems like the 2nd Amendment is the only safe one in the Bill of Rights today.

http://www.npr.org/2011/01/27/133247508/the-history-and-growing-influence-of-the-nra?sc=fb&cc=fp

"Guns don't kill people, people with guns kill people."

It's true.

And especially in the US.

Great stats and context in this article from PolitiFact:

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2011/jan/13/frank-lautenberg/frank-lautenberg-says-us-has-9500-gun-murders-year/

CNN has its own JUSTICE page

Notice the kinds of stories they cover there.

Here are their top stories for today:

Gunman hits Bellagio, gets $1.5M in chips

• Man opens fire at school board meeting
• Global child porn ring broken up, Feds say
• Virginia abduction suspect waives extradition
• NY state senator charged with embezzling from nonprofit
• Feds: Man threatened D.C. transit system
• 4 bodies found near New York beach
• Bail granted to WikiLeaks' Assange
• Police: Missing teen spent month in shelters with uncle
• Former TV chef sentenced in murder plot

http://www.cnn.com/JUSTICE/?hpt=Sbin

So of their top 10 stories, 6 deal with violence (and 2 with guns), 1 with porn, 1 with a missing girl, 1 with Wikileaks founder, and 1 with embezzlement by a state senator. Notice there are NO stories about corporate crime.