DARK KNIGHT RISING - The FUTILITY OF GUN CONTROL - The FUTILITY OF PROHIBITON

The Aurora Colorado shooter, James Holmes never watched the movie The DARK KNIGHT RISING... if he had... he wouldn't have murdered so many people in a pseudo-Joker, pseudo Batman inspired melee.

President Obama has signed into law 18 decrees designed to limit the rights of American citizens and gun ownership. We are to commend him in light of the massacre at an elementary school in Sandy hook CT.  He is pressing Congress for additional gun control legislation as is Senator Dianne Feinstein. 

People want to protect our children... and frankly, I can't blame them. My mission is to "Stop the Hurt"... however further gun control won't accomplish that end. Unless of course the White House plans on an all out war confiscating all firearms owned by American Citizens. Short of that, there is no way, as Vice President Biden admitted, to prevent future mass shootings based solely on new federal gun regulations.

What do James Holmes, Jared Loughner and other mass killers have in common?

If James Holmes had watched the Dark Knight Rising... I doubt very much he would have massacred dozens of people in a movie theater. I recently watched the movie and it's message is anything but a massacre. And these Mass Killers seem oblivious to the reality behind a movie, especially movies they don't even watch, or books they don't read. What they have in common is a separation from humanity. They live in a world of their own design. There's a lot of that around; Neo-Nazis and their zen for hatred of non Aryan people; The Assad government in Syria and the murders of countless thousands they call terrorists, when we call them rebels; Antisemitism or denial of the Holocaust; Churches who condone or look the other way when it's members or leaders violate children - as if the destruction of a child's childhood is something God would approve of or tolerate.

If there is a case for innocent by plea of insanity, James Holmes is it. Nothing about what he did would have been done by a sane person. The same with Jared Loughtner and the shooting of AZ Senator Gabby Giffords, and others, and Adam Lanza and the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary school. These people are not playing with a full deck of cards. There's a difference between plotting to kill someone based on jealousy, or robbing a bank for money... these are human-like deviance. You get drunk, get into a car and drive, have an accident and kill someone - that is stupidity and shows a profound lack of judgement or self-control. These people do commit crimes and should be locked up in prisons. To commit mass murder based on a fictional idealism, like the Assad government in Syria; or indirectly a country contributes to mass murders in Mexico, for example, because the US Gov't maintains a strict and intrusive prohibition of certain plants that Americans want, and rather than resolve the issue through science and common-sense, they indirectly promote the growth of murderous gangs; this is insanity...

After Sandy Hook, millions of America citizens demanded a solution. And they should!

President Obama elected VP Joe Biden to find that solution. The solution he arrived at is gun control. A very broad subject that reaches deep into America's society. It fondles and gropes the 2nd amendment to the US Constitution.   An American citizens right to bear arms... upheld recently by the US Supreme Court.

What we don't need is wallpaper and window dressings... the President intends to ban what are called "military assault weapons"... a misnomer as no one in America without going through extreme regulatory action gets to own a military assault weapon.  They are automatic weapons, with precision far exceeding any American owned facsimile. There are many people just hanging on in America, out of work with children going to bed hungry. However since Sandy Hook and other high profile shootings, the country is buying guns and ammunition in record numbers. How are people affording these purchases? Credit cards? But the facts behind this surge in buying guns is a threat to our 2nd Amendment rights. Why? Because our government has shown it likes enacting prohibitions and Zero tolerance regulations. It get's into being a government, like government is an entity onto itself. Within days after the Sandy Hook massacre the federal government was grappling for a solution, but rather than use science and common-sense to find a solution it quickly decides guns are the problem, just as it did after the 9/11 terrorist's attacks when it decided a Patriot Act was necessary - and expanded intrusion into the lives of ordinary Americans was warranted. Soon we will have military and police drones flying overhead to watch our every move, and drones the size of dragon-flies hovering outside or inside our windows. George Orwell was correct - though off by a few decades.

New regulations would make it illegal to give your gun to a family member or friend without a universal background check. Prior to that happening requires federal registration of all currently owned guns. An FID must be required to identify all gun owners and their weapons. Further, anyone diagnosed with a mental health issue, or anyone who uses cannabis even when legal under state law cannot own a firearm. Enforcement of this prohibition would mean that 70% or more of Americans would be stripped of their right to own a firearm. It would put the 20% black-market criminal element in charge of the streets, against the 10% who are authorized to protect us. 

Many are striving to burn a paper dragon... and a lot of smoke and mirrors is what they'll get in return.

Guns can kill, and everyday someone dies from gun violence. Everyday thousands die from use of tobacco or in motor vehicle accidents. The most common way to die is to trip, fall and break your neck. It is to be a victim of depression and to kill yourself, or to let yourself die, often through alcoholism.

James Holmes never saw "The Dark Knight Rising", if he had he'd know that the movie was about hope, saving people and heroes... not villains.

The federal government wastes it's time and resources battling wars against which it has no business doing so, and often very little public support.  Hundreds of thousands of sworn law enforcement officers routinely hunt down drug users, poker players and prostitutes. They put spies in our schools called "narcs' and johns on the streets to capture deviant people. They encourage commercials that make the person playing a computer game or online poker a dangerous deviant... a loner. Paper dragons.

Since the early 1980's there has been an push to "Just Say No". For Zero Tolerance policies. Extreme control like it's some sort of made for TV reality show. School children are arrested for paper guns, and one child's interest in bombs is rewarded while another goes to prison. Has anyone considered the possibility that our society is extremely regulated and much is prohibited? Since the tragic events of 9/11 the FAA feels it has the right to conduct intrusive body searches, and schools have a right to detain and search students, and those with misdemeanor convictions need not apply for a job. In Gotham City that means you work for the mob.

Not without reservations, given the opinion of a fellow blogger, but I do believe for now anyways, the place for law enforcement is at our public schools... on a street corner. The guy making the bomb? Let's find out if they are simply a future Einstein or a danger to society? It's time to stop Zero Tolerance and bigotry and try being human.

The answer isn't a new prohibition, like gun control, or increased public scrutiny and drones outside our windows; alienating those with mental health issues - as the most dangerous freaks know how to escape detection. The solution is letting go... becoming neighborly, getting involved, sitting on your front porch again... coming out of the closet... gays, pot users, and poker players. It's about seeking treatment if you are suffering from an addiction, or you like children for sex, or you feel the urge to kill. It's opening up resources for people who need them and letting the rest of us do the best we can with what we have.

Time to end Puritanical America and live in a Free America. It's time America live based on science and knowledge, common-sense and our Constitution.

Gun control will not stop the next Sandy Hook massacre... A Free America will.

PREVENTING GUN VIOLENCE - STOPPING THE HURT

This is an unplanned post. But recently I received an e-mail from VP Biden beginning to outline the White House Plan to reduce gun violence, shooting tragedies such as those at Sandy Hook CT, or Aurora CO., as well as other schools, malls and public places.

This is a snippet of the letter I received from the VP:

"We're going to give law enforcement more tools and resources to prevent and prosecute gun crimes, and we're going to end the freeze on gun violence research that prevents the Center from Disease Control from looking at the causes of gun violence." The rest can be found here:

WHITE HOUSE POLICY ON GUNS

I don't usually write about guns or the 2nd Amendment. And sorry this post is so long - but it is. I know how to use a gun, and respect them for the tool they are. To me, a gun is a gun no matter what it looks like, or how many bullets are loaded. Being that the theme of my blog is to stop the hurt, like many other Americans I question what happened at the Sandy Hook Elementary school with 20 children slaughtered as well as 6 adults by one 20 years old person. We ask ourselves, what motivates a person to do such a thing?

The mass murderer is dead, as is common in mass killings he took his own life. But enough is known about the killer to suggest he was reacting to what he perceived to be a threat to his own freedom, that being there is talk that he suffered from a form of autism and his mother was attempting to get a court order to procure involuntary treatment, in a hospital, for his behavior issues. How much he knew about this alleged plan by his mother isn't known. Apparently enough, as his actions to shoot her multiple times while she slept, and to go Sandy Hook Elementary school where he knew his mother contributed after stealing several of her weapons makes it fairly clear he was angry. He took his anger to an extreme. Denotes to me a lack of communication between himself and his mother, a lack of alternative actions, and an image of a person backed into his own self-imaged nightmare style corner.

So why didn't he seek mental health intervention if things were so bad? I did at age twenty, though I wasn't a violent type - I didn't think thoughts of shooting people and children at a school. I wanted freedom to live my life and my mother was doing everything possible to invoke changes to how i actually did that. Plus, by then I worked at a college and therapy was free, a benefit of the job. I continued in therapy for the next 25 years, while my mother never sought therapy but rather, continued her quest to reset me on the one road that she believed was life, by using shame and guilt strategies to sway me and intervene as if I was in some sort of cult.

Troubling, to say the least. My opinion, it was not I who should have sought out therapy, but her. However that's a mute point, and it's good and smart on my part that I did not feel adverse to getting therapy. As I said, violent behavior on my part was never an issue - for me it was to free myself from my mother's tactic to force shame and guilt on me because I liked women, liked sex, and I worked as a custodian at the city college, which was in her words a disgrace to the family. My mother was fixated with the idea that her son cleaned toilets. That her son had a very good job, received good benefits and good pay never occurred to her.

Lest I stray from my goal here, it's not about me, but rather, a solution in general to the apparent surge in mass killings. Did I know about guns? Of course I did - my father owned guns, and took me shooting around age 10. I used to go hunting with my friends for ducks. I can recall having shot around 3 ducks and watching as my grandmother labored plucking their feathers so we could eat them. To me it looked like way too much work. Eventually I gave up hunting as I really felt no desire to kill wildlife when I could simply go to a grocery store for meat. That and the fact that when I first got stoned on pot I remember feelings of being peaceful took over, as in Peace and Love.

So I read with sadness that one of President Obama's solutions to random mass murders was to require a mental health provider to notify law enforcement if a client speaks of anger or suggested violence towards others. The source no doubt, is the Aurora Colorado shooter James Holmes, and his reported confessions while in therapy.

James Holmes survived, yet nothing significant has yet to come out about his motives or ways in which his violence could have been prevented. Instead, a future James Holmes need not seek therapy, as the therapist will now be required by law to report him to authorities. In this one singular example that may seem like a good thing. However in general, many people experience feelings of anger and hostility towards others - most often never resulting in a mass killing. Or even a single death. Most notable is in cases where there are deaths due to these hostile feelings, the perp rarely sought therapy in the first place. Like my mother, they weren't the one's with the problem, the victims were.

Under President Obama's new initiative to prevent future Sandy Hooks, or Aurora cinema mass killings is the requirement of a therapist to notify law enforcement of expressed anger and for the then notified authorities to seize any guns the client may own, and their family might own.

Ludicrous as most of the time the person plotting violence will not seek out therapy as that denotes accepting there may be something wrong with them-self. What the new strategies to curb gun violence do is to further alienate a troubled person from seeking mental health treatment. As my mother said often - only sick people seek help. Or their victims since the troubled person was convinced it was not themselves with the issues, but rather the victims.

Other measures the President plans to enact to stem mass killings:

A renewed ban on assault rifles and high capacity clips. When the last one expired in 2004 I think it was, there was no surge in overall gun violence, especially associated with civilian assault style weapons or high capacity clips. Overall gun violence went down according to FBI statistics. Granted, the high profile cases aforementioned do involve these devices, but they are essentially anomalies, not very common. What both restrictions accomplish in effect ie to target and regulate the liberties of  law abiding citizens who own such devices. It will do nothing to stem the random, heinous acts of mass murder we've recently become to be aware of.

Recent statistics I read supporting gun control were that there are deaths due to firearms at the rate of 32 people per day. Statistics are interesting, like the fact several thousand die every day from tobacco use,  or falling down stairs. Suicide, wow, more deaths by suicide have occurred of late due to taking of one's own life in the military than actual battlefield causalities. Sobering statistics. So what's being done to correct or alleviate this issue? The military has enacted new drug and alcohol tests. That's about it. Like my mother, the military leaders and the structure of the military has nothing to do with soldiers taking their own life. It must be drugs. The victim is at fault!

I found the following video to be of interest. There are questions as to what makes a civilian weapon into an assault weapon? There are kits one can purchase to modernize a standard rifle, like the Ruger 10-22. Such a rifle is a very common and reliable gun that shoots 22 caliper bullets most commonly at squirrels. A 22 caliper bullet is not a great defensive tool against a predator. It is the kind of bullet that is very small and one would have to be very lucky to stop a home invasion with such a weapon, let alone use it in a mass killing spree. The following video puts into perspective the inane new regulations the WH plans to implement to curb mass violence with guns:

WHAT MAKES A GUN AN ASSAULT WEAPON?

I own a Ruger 10-22, and ironically I converted it to the Nomad Style. I like building things. The gun was a gift. Does it shoot any differently than it did before I made the conversion? No. It's still a squirrel gun. According to the video, adding one "military style" modification to a gun is making it a military weapon. With logic like that I plan on adding an armor plate to my car and a tank turret on top as a sun-roof. That creates a military style tank. If drunk drivers that kill people did the same we might get a ban on military style assault cars. The problem is driving under the influence, not the car. Duh!

In particular, again I must emphasize that any stigma to mental health resources is a very serious problem and yet, VP Biden states in the quote above that the CDC has been restricted and not able to conduct research into acts of violence involving guns. Who's brainchild of an idea was that? A "freeze" on research into gun violence and why? Were they too busy trying to locate someone who died of cannabis use? Or, maybe the NRA convinced someone in Washington to enact the freeze or an anti-gun group wanted the inevitable violence to occur so they could then rally support for anti-gun laws? ... but again why? Why a freeze, like a freeze into medical uses of cannabis?

Stupidity and special interests. There is no question that progress and a new world order that involves personal liberty and freedom is being stifled. Rational regulations are not a part of the public safety initiatives being invoked by our state and federal law-makers. Smoke and mirrors is. For example, I put colonial style shutters on my windows at home to repel home invasion attacks, rifle slots in my wall to shoot the invaders, and night-vision video cameras outside my home to see any intruders. Makes my home a military style fort. That along with my "military style" Ruger 10-22 makes this a fortress. Not. Who could be so stupid as to believe that? And yet, this is the strategy the federal government is taking to stem mass shootings.

The NRA had it right when it proposed armed guards at all public schools. Airports have armed guards, and extensive screening processes, court houses have the same. Politicians are provided armed security. Why not public schools? And why put a burden on mental heath assistance? So you hate your husband or wife? They bully you - and all you can think is your only way out is to kill them? Does this mean you're actually going to do it? You could seek out the help of a psychologist... or at least, in the past you could have. Now that therapist is required by law to be a mole.

There is violence in America, but we're not alone. We're simply different. And of course we're different. We always have been. This country was founded by Christian Puritans and Pagans. Very near to where I live is the site of the Maypole of Merrymount. They were people escaping Puritan England for a place where they could freely pursue their religious beliefs. Much persecution followed... many people were killed to bring this nation to where we are today. I'm told not one Quaker survives today - they were hunted to extinction. Quakers were a prominent religious group present in Colonial America.

Violence in America... of course there's violence! We are not civilized - we don't yet know what being civilized entails. Does it mean no guns. Does it mean no one breaking societal laws? Does it mean we should all become vegetarians? Or does it imply rationality - as when we hear the word wolf, we don't jump up with our shotguns to kill it to extinction, or we don't slaughter elephants, rhinos's and sharks to extinction because of their horns or fins?

But to suppress research of any kind, as the CDC was told to freeze all research into causes of gun violence...  when it comes to protecting the public well-being, that's plain wrong.Perhaps whoever ordered that freeze should be in front of a judge right now, facing accessory to murder charges?

It is unfortunate, unlikely that we could have prevented the past tragedies with gun violence had new regulations been in place.  What could have prevented some of the tragedy would have been common-sense safeguards. Classroom that actually locked-down. Security resources at the schools like police officers. Administrators and teachers able to protect themselves and others with their own firearm. Advanced security systems. And yes, advanced mental health reforms.

While we've been pursuing,  the pot-head, well we've completely abandoned  common-sense, have not learned from the past, and are now enacting useless regulations that only benefit the ignorant and promote a comfy feeling that "something is being done". If someone wants to conduct mass murder, or even a single murder, the regulations now being introduced will have little effect.

The problem is with society, and I don't mean that by saying we are now an immoral society. It has nothing to do with religion, nothing to do with our family structure,gay couples wishing to marry and raise a child. But rather, it has everything to do with being a society that lives rationally and realistically.

Quite frankly - what President Obama and VP Biden have decided is an embarrassment and like fighting HIV with a toothbrush. Pure stupidity and shows a lack of understanding or even caring. It is smoke and mirrors... mirrors and smoke...

It's no different than book-banning... Henry Miller and the Tropic of Cancer;  Norman Mailer; Anais Nin; Jack Kerouac; George Orwell; John Fowles; Hemingway; etc...

BANNED BOOKS

One doesn't prevent the Charlie Manson murders; The In Cold Blood murders; the Aurora CO killings or the Green River killings by enactment of such laws and regulations currently being offered up by our President. Offering an immediate response to the Sandy Hook murders such as what the WH is doing is a sham. It's an embarrassing example of a lack of leadership and logic. A reaction to drum up sympathetic support. It accomplishes nothing.

At least they're not going after my favorite computer games like Half-Life; Max Payne; Battle-Field 1942; Bethesda's Morrowind; Oblivian; etc including movies and TV. 

The reality is... we need to make mental health therapy as popular as video games. And the President did just the opposite!

Stop the Hurt!!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2013 - SO THE WORLD DIDN'T END?

Yeah, okay.. another fizzled plan.

So, yeah, here unexpectedly... given I thought it was The END:

Happy New Year from BobKat!

I just woke up... actually.

So gone is 2012. President Obama got his 2nd term, wow. So did we, hmmm? Well, given the alternative, ex-governor of Massachusetts, where I lived for 6 years in and around Boston, Mitt Romney, to me it was a slam-dunk; wouldn't you agree:>? Well, so maybe not... but for me I could not figure out what skills or benefits he might reap on us pheasant Americans. He passed a Health Care Law, yeah, and turned around and put down his own law!? Disowned it essentially.  So what's up with that?

Well it's history, and speaking of history, 2012 brought about a rather surprising and encouraging new set of laws. No, prostitution isn't legal in New York, a nod to Elliot Spitzer. But cannabis is legal in Washington State and Colorado. Recreational Cannabis!!!

Ahem; by recreational I don't mean to imply Reefer Madness has set in and those states lost all control over governance or sanity. Before I continue with a post I consider to be light hearted,  considering past violent acts that have shaken the nation, and the fact that a little fun right now might actually be good medicine, I should take a moment to put myself in the shoes of many people who have never tried cannabis, or know it's street-name is marijuana. Educators have been telling the public for years, since 1982, to "Just Say NO!" A highly ingenious phrase first coined by then, First Lady, Nancy Reagan.

SOURCE: WIKIPEDIA LINK

Facts First: Abusing "DRUGS" can be very bad for your health and well-being! But the"Just Say No" approach was honestly pointed and directed at the wrong drug. The believe was, and is still believed by many that marijuana, a Mexican term for cannabis, is the stepping stone to hard drugs like heroin and crack cocaine. There is absolutely no evidence for this claim.

Granted the laws in many states and the federal government place access to any of these substances all together... as they're all illegal. One buys them, whether as an adult or a kid, from similar sources, all black-market. If tobacco were illegal that's where people would be buying it, and as it is seriously addictive, to which I can attest, it is legal and taxed.

Cannabis is nowhere near as addictive as tobacco, and hardly as dangerous, in practical terms as most other "drugs". It does have disadvantages for some people, like a potential link to schizophrenia in some individuals and some people just seem to want to smoke a lot of it, but the thing is, unlike alcohol, one doesn't keep getting higher and higher. They just want to smoke a lot. The tars in cannabis are not the tars found in tobacco. No comparisons can be drawn. It's been said one "joint" (cannabis cigarette) is equal to 20 tobacco cigarettes; this is the kind of scientific information that discredits true scientific people. They are two totally different plants. Carbon monoxide is present in both, if smoked, as is any substance that's burned. Cannabis can be consumed where tobacco cannot - as the latter is actually toxic.

And there's actually a counter component in cannabis to those suffering schizophrenia; it is (WIKIPEDIA LINK): cannabidiol. The higher the ratio of it to THC the less the user will likely incur problems and they may actually benefit. The science and medical profession are still at odds on this, and I'm no expert. That's just what I've learned in the past 40 years of research into cannabis, there is a balance a user would like to achieve. With alcohol that is difficult, with tobacco impossible, in most cases.

Cannabis is as unique as having a beer, only safer. You might read a recent book by Steve Fox, Paul Armentano, Mason Tvert, entitled: "Marijuana is Safer, So Why Are We Driving People to Drink?" It really is insane, in my opinion, the misinformation and propaganda surrounding cannabis use. The most preposterous is there is zero medical value, and is so addictive as to warrant it classification as a Federal Schedule One drug. The worst of the worst. And yet way to many people know that's not true, yet the official stance is that it is. Stubborn. Yet two states have said enough and over 15 have said there's enough medical evidence ascribed to cannabis that it's legal as a medicine.

For those of you shaking your heads and thinking it's the beginning of the end, consider that no one has ever died as a result of cannabis use, and most violent crimes are comitted by drunks and straight people.

Cannabis users simply enjoy unwinding at the end of the day with a small amount of weed (cannabis). Recreation to them is more likely eating junk food

and watching TV, or having a serious, philosophical discussion about Mars.They're not plotting the destruction of the world, or other terrible things.

Maybe fried eggs: 

Hello 2013... 

If you want to have some fun, learn more, peruse some cannabis stories, enjoy the following link:

 HAIL MARY-JANE.com

Happy New Year to YOU!

Meow...

ABOUT THE MASSACRE AT SANDY HOOK, CT: MY OPINION

I am torn up over the senseless slaughter at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. 20 kindergarten students and 7 or more adults were shot and killed by a single assailant who it now appears suffered from an emotional/psychiatric disorder. Something snapped.

The work I do, the victims could well have been clients of mine - so imagine finding out someone, or several persons you work with often were gunned down. I've also worked, 10 years at an elementary school between 1988 - 1998. I know the kind of children that were murdered viciously. I would have been the first to throw myself at the gunman had I been working such a job now. The new school principal died doing just that; Ms. Dawn Hochsprung, who started in 2010. A Link from Today.com heard the shooting and tried unsuccessfully to jump the 20 year old assailant.

She had just implemented a whole new system for school security. The assailant, a former student by-passed that security by breaking a window, if my sources are correct. Which means he either discovered upon arrival or already knew there was a buzz-in policy.

He went to the office first, which I find odd. If he broke in, why go to the main office? But that is how I've read it happened. By coincidence morning announcements were going on, so rifle fire and screams could be heard over the loud-speakers. Somehow a lock-down order ensued, so the first classroom the shooter arrived at the door was locked, but the second classroom wasn't. Why?

It's history now. But history in the making also. As a result of the killings many people are angry, upset and demanding answers. I am too. But among the answers I'm hearing are taking all guns away from Americans - something akin to a military action. Also, anyone, with any history of a mental health disorder will not be able to possess a gun.

Think about it... Personally, you have a mother that bullies you to the point you seek psychiatric help, as she certainly won't. So you can'r possess a gun yet she can. Or, you're sexually abused and you seek treatment... again, not allowed to possess a gun.

How about we take a different look at this. I think we all know someone who would benefit from psychological help. If I can quote my mother - "Only SICK people seek help". Now my mother is in her 70's... so I don't expect she'll change her mind. But the fact is I know or have known many people like her where seeking mental health assistance is akin to admitting one is mentally ill. Not only admitting to it, but the talk is documenting such persons as such.

What we need is the exact opposite. We need to accept mental health assistance on par with regular physicals and MD visits. I've heard the number 20% tossed around as the number of Americans afflicted with a mental health disorder, and that includes me and the formerly mentioned sexual abuse victim. I hardly think that is an accurate percentage. Myself, I'd put the percentage more around 80%... as few people are actually considered to be NORMAL. Neurosis is common in America.

I've heard the argument America is unlike any other country in the world... we enjoy the 2nd Amendment, as as such the violence in America is unlike any other country. Hardly true... gun violence in the world is obvious. And it's true. But to target American's is wrong. The majority of gun owners do not go out and shoot people. A tragedy like that at Sandy Hook may imply otherwise, but it's an isolated event... one gun control is not the answer to.

There needs to be answers, like why wasn't the second classroom locked. Like why is going for therapy only "for sick people"? Why don't we use the money, resources, and law enforcement wasted on cannabis laws and secure public schools and malls instead? We target cannabis users as the pariahs of violence, yet under our noses the real violence is often a result of seemingly perfectly straight adults. We look for the Charles Manson's in violence and it's often simply not present.

President Obama/the White House e-mailed me the statement made by the President in regards to the shootings, and other shootings that seem to be becoming epidemic in the US society. I appreciate his words, grief and concern, but take offense when he say's: "We've endured too many of these tragedies in the past few years. And each time I learn the news I react not as a President, but as anybody else would -- as a parent."

I agree, too many. But the answer is not in "gun-control", as we already have gun-control. Some might say not enough, but any gun is still a gun, even if it's a black powder revolver as used in the old west. We have many methods we use to kill... many animals are being wiped to extinction because recipients believe in magical properties for elephant/rhino tusks, shark fins, tiger balls. This is the world we live in. It's violent and deadly.

And all the while that we tolerate the belief that seeking counseling in life is akin to being mentally sick, we perpetuate the problem. We live in a Hollywood, yet sterilized society - a Puritan society where violence as art is common in movies and on television, yet when a death occurs from a drunk driver we don't see the consequences. We're given a purified version of events. So on the one hand we're presented with fictional blood and gore, yet in life, we're provided a clean, violence free report of a real event. That goes for many things considered unlawful and harmful... sex, drugs, rock n' roll. Okay, maybe not unlawful all, but I hope you get my point.

I suggest we don't live reality in this country and it may be time that we do.