More mass murders; some answers, but not enough
If I seem like a broken record 鈥� then so be it.
Somebody has got to figure out a way to get these military-style rifles off the streets of America.
It鈥檚 only been a little over a month (right after the mass murders in Uvalde, Texas) since I wrote about the glut of these weapons that have continued to wreak havoc across the United States.
When I wrote in early June about guns and gun violence, I made the bold claim that despite the country鈥檚 horror about the mass murders in Buffalo, New York, and in Uvalde, Texas 鈥� 鈥淣OTHING EVER CHANGES. Nothing!鈥�
Well, I was wrong.
There鈥檚 a brand new, bipartisan law that could be somewhat helpful in the future.
There will be a stronger background check system; more federal money will be spent on mental health resources to weed out those people who shouldn鈥檛 own guns; and, among other things, there will be closer scrutiny of people who try to make straw purchases for people who鈥檝e been barred from owning guns.
That new legislation didn鈥檛 send the NRA into a tizzy. Most gun owners seemed to go along with it.
But it鈥檚 certainly not enough.
There should be more.
Just ask the people of Highland Park, Illinois, who had their Fourth of July shattered by a young madman carrying a military-style weapon, with the will to kill as many people as he possibly could.
He fired at least 70 bullets, and he killed seven people 鈥� while hitting a total of 45 people.
As with many of the madmen who鈥檝e acted out their aggressions before him, Robert Crimo III got his gun legally.
He鈥檇 exhibited some questionable behavior in the past. But he managed to avoid the kinds of scrutiny that would have prevented him from owning, say, a military-style weapon.
And that鈥檚 all that matters, isn鈥檛 it?
His right to bear arms was, for some people, as sacred as anybody else鈥檚.
It doesn鈥檛 matter that he carried a weapon to his mass murders that could be used on a battlefield.
The U.S. Constitution says he had every right to own it.
When he dressed as a woman to avoid being discovered, while he climbed a fire escape to the roof of his personal execution roost 鈥� he carried a legal weapon 鈥� that had been guaranteed by our Founding Fathers.
That鈥檚 the long and the short of it, huh? The truth of it? That鈥檚 the preposterous logic that the NRA and adherents to the silly notion that gun owners are part of some (invisible) 鈥渨ell-regulated militia,鈥� even when they act alone as bloodthirsty madmen.
Crimo III won鈥檛 be the last mass murderer of 2022.
He鈥檚 merely the 15th.
There will be another one, most likely, while all of the thoughts and prayers, and funerals in Highland Park, Illinois, are still fresh.
And there will be hundreds more mass shootings this year, too.
We see all of the politicians on TV, draped in their practiced solemnity as if they鈥檙e about to say something we haven鈥檛 already heard dozens of times.
There is nothing particularly new being said.
I suggest we hammer home the fact that mass murders are merely forms of indiscriminate, post-natal abortions.
Republicans might bite on that one.
You know how they are, don鈥檛 you?
They鈥檇 rig the entire U.S. Supreme Court 鈥� and for decades 鈥� to put an anti-mass murder jurist on the court. They have such indefatigable energy for such crusades.
Their quest to overturn Roe vs. Wade lasted nearly 50 years.
They could probably do away with mass murder in 40.
I have faith in those Republicans.
Since terror by headline hungry madmen has become something of a daily ritual in this country, and the main terror-maker has been a military-style weapon, it鈥檚 time to rethink their usefulness, too.
An assault weapon ban could probably help alleviate the growing problem of killing for killing鈥檚 sake.
There are those who claim that might not work.
But we won鈥檛 know until we try it, won鈥檛 we?
Edward A. Owens is a multi-Emmy Award winner, former reporter, and anchor for Entertainment Tonight, and 40-year TV news and newspaper veteran. E-mail him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net.