{"id":814,"date":"2012-12-19T00:34:59","date_gmt":"2012-12-18T22:34:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/?p=814"},"modified":"2015-04-25T18:17:03","modified_gmt":"2015-04-25T16:17:03","slug":"this-is-not-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/this-is-not-news\/","title":{"rendered":"This is not news"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Few things are certain in this world, but there&#8217;s one prediction I can make: When <a title=\"Do you know anyone who believes the world will end this week? (Today's Question)\" href=\"http:\/\/www.spotlight-online.de\/language\/todays-question\/do-you-know-anyone-who-believes-the-world-will-end-this-week\" target=\"_blank\">the Mayan apocalypse<\/a> comes and goes this weekend, life will continue as it always has.<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately for the United States, this means that mall shoppers, moviegoers and schoolchildren will be <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c21748\">gunned down<\/span> on a regular basis. It sounds <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c21b2f\">cruel<\/span> and cynical of me to say this, but we are now at the point where this sort of thing is no longer news. I&#8217;ve written about three such <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c21f19\">incidents<\/span> in 2012 alone. There have been many more; the two that happened last week are just the latest ones.<\/p>\n<p>On TV, Barack Obama cried and <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c222fe\">choked up<\/span> for a long moment as he expressed his sadness when hearing what happened. It doesn&#8217;t mean he&#8217;ll do anything about it. He didn&#8217;t do anything when Gabrielle Giffords was shot. He didn&#8217;t do anything when a <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c226e8\">bunch<\/span> of kids were shot and <a title=\"Go to school, get shot (Mike Pilewski)\" href=\"\/blog\/go-to-school-get-shot\" target=\"_blank\">killed in their school in Ohio<\/a> in February. He didn&#8217;t do anything when <a title=\"Trayvon Martin didn't have to die (Mike Pilewski)\" href=\"\/blog\/trayvon-martin-didnt-have-to-die\" target=\"_blank\">Trayvon Martin<\/a> was killed in March. He didn&#8217;t do anything when <a title=\"What would Batman do? (Mike Pilewski)\" href=\"\/blog\/what-would-batman-do\" target=\"_blank\">the Batman killer<\/a> <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c22acf\">struck<\/span> this summer.<\/p>\n<p>This would be his opportunity, though. In a second <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c22eb5\">term<\/span>, with no hand-picked <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c232a0\">successor<\/span>, he can stand up and say what he wants without fear of losing popularity. The president has the power to <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c23687\">introduce legislation<\/span> in Congress. He also has the power to <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c23a6e\">issue<\/span> <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c23e57\">executive orders<\/span> in the interest of national security.<\/p>\n<p>For days, <i>The New York Times<\/i>, which is widely read in Connecticut \u2014 Newtown, where the latest school shooting happened, is basically a <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2423f\">Gotham<\/span> suburb \u2014 has been full of articles and commentary on gun control. It&#8217;s interesting to see what <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c24626\">excuses<\/span> are made for not <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c24a0e\">restricting<\/span> access to <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c24df7\">assault weapons<\/span>:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Compared to 30,000 <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c251de\">traffic<\/span> deaths a year, school shootings kill hardly anybody. This is all newspaper sensationalism. (Perhaps, but individual gun murders and accidents kill 10,000 Americans a year, as <i>Spotlight<\/i> columnist Peter Flynn <a title=\"A more civilized society (Around Oz, Spotlight 11\/2012)\" href=\"http:\/\/www.spotlight-online.de\/files\/spotlight\/Magazine_content\/Documents\/spotlight_1112_36_around_oz.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">pointed out<\/a> in November.)<\/li>\n<li>It would be wrong to &#8220;politicize&#8221; the <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c255c7\">issue<\/span> of guns while people are <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c259ae\">mourning<\/span>.<\/li>\n<li>If guns are <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c25d95\">outlawed<\/span>, only <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2617f\">outlaws<\/span> will have guns.<\/li>\n<li>Gun restrictions did not stop the massacres in Norway and Winnenden, Germany.<\/li>\n<li>If the teachers had guns, they could shoot back.<\/li>\n<li>The problem is not guns, but mental illness.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Access to assault weapons actually <i>was<\/i> restricted following an <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c26567\">assassination attempt<\/span> on <a title=\"Reagan assassination attempt (Wikipedia)\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Reagan_assassination_attempt\" target=\"_blank\">a Republican president<\/a> \u2014 so it can be done. However, the ban was allowed to <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2694e\">expire<\/span> in 2004. Since then, a dozen unsuccessful attempts have been made to <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c26d37\">reinstate<\/span> it. Senator Dianne Feinstein, a <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2711e\">prominent<\/span> California Democrat, has promised to try again as soon as the new Congress meets in January.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Immediately address the issue of gun control through the introduction of legislation in Congress (Petitions.whitehouse.gov)\" href=\"https:\/\/petitions.whitehouse.gov\/petition\/immediately-address-issue-gun-control-through-introduction-legislation-congress\/2tgcXzQC\" target=\"_blank\">A petition<\/a> on the White House website asking the Obama <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c27506\">administration<\/span> to &#8220;immediately <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c278ee\">address<\/span> the issue of gun control through the introduction of legislation in Congress&#8221; has received 190,000 signatures in five days.<\/p>\n<p>So something might happen. But unless it does, I won&#8217;t be writing about gun violence in this column next year. It is simply not news.<\/p>\n<p>The commenters on <a title=\"A tragedy of silence (commentary in NY Times)\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/12\/15\/opinion\/blow-a-tragedy-of-silence.html\" target=\"_blank\">the <i>New York Times<\/i> website<\/a> are of one mind:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><b>Reed in California:<\/b> I&#8217;d like to see the president on TV again, choked up and with tears in his eyes again, and hear him say that though it breaks his heart, he does not have the courage or the political capital to <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c27cd6\">stand up to<\/span> the gun lobby.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p><b>Jim in Pennsylvania:<\/b> With this horrible tragedy will follow reports in the coming weeks of <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c280be\">ammo<\/span> and <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c284a7\">firearms<\/span> <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2888e\">shortages<\/span> across the country as gun owners &#8220;<span id=\"tooltip55230a0c28c75\">stock up<\/span>&#8221; in fear of more gun control. The cycle never ends, and the madness will continue.<br \/>\n[Editor&#8217;s note: <a title=\"It only takes minutes to buy assault rifle day after Newtown massacre (NY Daily News)\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nydailynews.com\/new-york\/takes-minutes-buy-assault-rifle-day-newtown-massacre-article-1.1223241\" target=\"_blank\">It&#8217;s already happened.<\/a>]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p><b>Meredith in New York:<\/b> Was Obama shaken up enough yet to strongly use his office to push for change in gun laws? Was there enough Kleenex to dry his tears while he goes back to business as usual?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p><b>JP in Michigan:<\/b> [Will] we now see a documentary named <i>Bowling for Connecticut<\/i>?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p><b>Mavis Tavis in Kentucky:<\/b> We need to take a long, hard look at our culture and ask the question, &#8220;Why do so many young men approach their own personal problems with such antisocial, <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2905e\">homicidal<\/span> solutions?&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p><b>Brian Dewitt in California:<\/b> It might be said that planes flying into buildings don&#8217;t kill people; people kill people. Yet, after the 9\/11 attacks, laws were <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c29445\">enacted<\/span> to prevent terrorists <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2982d\">obtaining<\/span> planes, including increased airport security, <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c29c17\">screening of passengers<\/span>, [and] <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c29fff\">invasive<\/span> pre-boarding searches. These measures <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2a3e5\">impose<\/span> significant <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2a7d5\">inconvenience<\/span> on <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2abb6\">law-abiding<\/span> travelers, but they have prevented another domestic terrorist incident involving an aircraft. This was seen as an acceptable <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2af9e\">trade-off<\/span> and so should restricting gun purchases and ownership, especially automatic weapons, to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally disturbed and thereby reduce gun deaths.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p><b>Gennady Shkliarevsky in New York:<\/b> <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2b387\">Let&#8217;s face it<\/span>: we as a nation show our total powerlessness to do anything about these tragedies. We have no solution. We will <span id=\"tooltip55230a0c2b76e\">bog down<\/span> in endless debates with tired arguments, but little, if anything, will be done. It is amazing that the nation that considers itself the nation of doers is so powerless against this and many other problems that we as a nation face.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Few things are certain in this world, but there&#8217;s one prediction I can make: When the Mayan apocalypse comes and goes this weekend, life will continue as it always has. Unfortunately for the United States, this means that mall shoppers, moviegoers and schoolchildren will be gunned down on a regular basis. It sounds cruel and cynical of me to say <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/this-is-not-news\/\">&#8230; >><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[27,187,244,45,48],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/814"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=814"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/814\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1518,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/814\/revisions\/1518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}