We Are At War

Morning, slept in for the first time in weeks and awoke to a barrage of negative comments here and on twitter about my various posts. Discounting the comments made by the usual Shrivel Souled Trolls, there is a legitimate debate raging about the proximate cause of the mass murders that afflict our nation. Yes we are at war with the savages of ISIS and with anyone else who wants to do us harm. Clearly, the long arm of Sunni Muslim extremism reached deep into the soul of San Bernardino and tore our guts out. We must destroy ISIS. As I have written here countless times it represents an existential threat to civilization. But ISIS didn’t attack the children in Connecticut's Sandy Hook or the Umpqua Community College in Oregon or Rep. Gabby Giffords' campaign headquarters in Tucson or the folks in the movie theater in Aurora or the black folks in the Charleston church or the Iraq vet, cop and mom at Planned Parenthood in Boulder. Yet innocent people were slaughtered and maimed in those places as in San Bernardino by guns legally purchased. Why are people so reluctant to admit the undeniable? Assume 99% of gun owners are sober, competent, responsible patriotic people. It is a generous assumption, like saying 99% of auto drivers fit that bill. Say modestly that there are 350 millions guns in this country. That means 3.5 million guns are in the hands of the 1% who are not sober, competent, responsible or patriotic. Whatever the motivation, whether religious extremism, anti-abortion fervor, racism, headaches, heart break or hemorrhoids, some tiny fraction of that 1% are going to act out violently to make some sick point. And they will have the hardware to do it because in America the gun lobby has made it easier to get a gun license than a driver's license and sometimes that's a license to commit mass murder. Welcome to the future.