Dear Friends:

Today was a tragic day. I didn't know anyone involved in the shooting in Connecticut nor have I (thankfully) ever had to experience what they did, but my heart goes out to them none the less on this senseless and sadly preventable day.

I have been reading your facebook posts all day and amidst the anger of this incident is outrage, that yet again we have another string of victims who could have been saved through fairly reasonable means and pleas to allow this to be the incident that wakes us up. That finally show our political opposites that a small degree of regulation, sensibly written and applied, is not going to send us spiraling into Hell. I find myself asking the same questions. Unfortunately I also find myself coming to inevitable answers.

No.

No this will not be the thing that shines fresh light on the subject.

No this will not be the water shed moment that the right abandons it's hard headed obstinacy.

No this will not be the tragedy that finally gets us all to the table looking for a real solution to gun violence.

We will be accused of politicizing the tragedy, as if such events aren't always politicized as with the drive to war following 9/11 or the NRA convention in the Denver suburbs after Columbine.

The right will toss tired and debunked straw man arguments that have nothing to do with the current tragedy (I am a gun owner and avid participant in shooting sports and have many times been told
I want to ban guns)

The right will make outrageous claims that if the kids had been carrying guns this could have been avoided. In fact already I have read someone advocating that if the teachers had been allowed to carry guns this wouldn't have happened. Which assumes that the teachers WOULD have carried guns and that a shoot out would not have occurred and even after that still ends up with some people dead.

This is because the right are not entering this debate as honest actors. They may think they are, but what they really are coming in as is fundamentalists. They have no interest in common sense. They have no interest in reexamining their own beliefs, even just to double check their validity. They have a near religious belief that if everyone can have guns then everyone will and crime will stop. This belief is not held up by numbers. The highest rates of gun crimes are in states that have loose gun laws. They have a blind adherence to the second half of the second amendment. The first half refers to a militia and makes it clear that the right to bear arms is meant for national defense against the government and not personal protection. They will not even agree the while the mentally ill should be allowed to have guns it would be better for us all if the criminally insane Didn't have them. We are not going to win on gun control at this time.

There is hope. The right has already started sandbagging against any and all attempts at even the meekest legislation. But there is another avenue to help prevent tragedies such as this. In all of the mass shootings of the past several years the perpetrator has been mentally ill. When considered it's kind of a crazy thing to do after all. So while they build bunkers on the supply side. They will leave their demand side flank uncovered. Naomi Klein wrote about the Shock Doctrine which uses tragedy to pull us into fear and war. It can be used for good.  

The discussion of gun control is a discussion of means.  It is ultimately tangential to the problem.  What we need, is s discussion of cause.  Those who are so busy prepping against the imagined assault on their guns have no answer for how to avoid the cause of these tragedies.  They claim more guns may reduce body counts but their demagoguing cannot not even conceive of prevention.  So it falls to us. 

Now is the time to call for comprehensive mental care for the mentally ill.

Now is the time get your representatives to demand that we treat those who are mentally ill as people and not just cast them to the wolves.

Now is the time to try and treat the problem at it's source. They make a good point, that banning guns will not solve the problem. So let's focus on solving the problem before it starts.

It might seem tasteless to bring this up now. But if we don't act fast we will be leaving the next school, theater, shopping mall waiting for the next tragedy.