A Flaw in the System

On this date in 1963 a guy with a rifle killed John F. Kennedy, the President of the United States. He bought his weapon of choice through a mail order firm. Back then there were no background checks, or red flag laws like there are now.

Not that either of those things matter. Just ask the people who hang out at Club Q in Colorado Springs.  

Even before this past weekend the Sheriff's Department in El Paso, County, Colorado knew Anderson Lee Aldrich was a wild and crazy guy. Last year, after a brief stand off, in Colorado Springs young Mr. Aldrich was arrested and charged with two counts of felony menacing and three counts of felony kidnapping. His mother, one of the persons he menaced, had called for help. According to her, her son had threatened to kill her and other family members with a home made bomb and, or a number of guns.

Later, because he was, after all, family the charges against the then 21 year old Aldrich were dropped, leaving him foot loose and fancy free on the streets of Colorado Springs. Thanks to Colorado privacy laws--no trial, no foul--it also allowed him free to walk into a gun store, buy an assault style long gun and as much ammunition as he wanted without tripping any sort of alarm bells.

Obviously, there is a flaw in the system.

And Anderson Lee Aldrich took full advantage of it. Close to midnight last Saturday he walked into a popular Colorado Springs LGBTQ bar and opened fire with his new, legally purchased, toy. Before he was beaten half to death by a couple of gutsy patrons--one an army combat vet and the other a drag queen--he had killed five and wounded 17. Authorities are still unsure of the motive, but say, "It has all the trappings of a hate crime."

You think?

The national media has jumped all over the nightmare, many claiming it is the result of so Christian Nationalist and extremist hate speech. Well, sure, but, in the end, we all know the decisive factor is, as always, the easy availability of paramilitary style weapons to each and every deadly loon out there.

Defining a mass shooting as one with four, or more victims, excluding the shooter, NPR reports so far in 2022 there have been 601 them in the United States. For those like myself who are mathematically challenged, that averages out to a little more than three per week.  

On average 0.058 people per one million die during mass shootings in the United States every year. The average number of deaths per million in Europe--each and every country--from mass shootings is zero. You know as in 0.000.

As Bill Murray once said in a movie, "There is something wrong with us. There is something very, very wrong with us." Yes, there is and it all begins at the local gun store and in congress, and with all those screaming yahoos who think if someone takes their guns they won't be able to have sex that night.

Indeed, at times it is easy to think many of us have come to believe Ameria is one giant, "John Wick," movie. That we can kill others because of some perceived wrong, or hateful impulse without consequence. 

Well, why not? All those guns are as easy to buy as blueberries no matter how bat shit crazy you are. And, hey, they wouldn't sell them if they didn't want you to use them, right?

Right.

11-22-22