A Ground Hog Day New Year

Happy New Year. One feels apologetic after addressing someone with that greeting, now needing to qualify it, saying this New Year has to be better than the last.  In the spirit of self analysis, or criticism, I once again look at my writings over the past years.  I’ve always said that writing this blog is not an act of self promotion, there is no advertising, no dialogue invitation (other than my email address if one wants to write me).  It is an exercise in accountability and remembrance.  I’ve joked with friends that it provides an alternative memory bank, particularly when it comes to books, cultural events, and travel destinations, the details of which are too easily forgotten as time inextricably moves on.  

We all have our opinions and our passions.  For nearly 15 years I’ve guardedly worn my heart and mind on my sleeve, and while looking back there are things I regret saying, but for the most part I’m satisfied.  Sometimes, I’ve even been prophetic, and now I’m alarmed by some of the things I write and think, those going to a dark, dark place.  Perhaps that direction is to be expected as I age, and feel its physical and psychological impact. 

However, most of all I fear that the “American Experiment” is beginning to look like the creation of Victor Frankenstein as we slip from democracy, to anacrocy, to oligarchy, destination autocracy.  We have abandoned the concept of “the common good” and are in a civil war, the polarization of just about every major issue.  This has been mostly played out in a grand political charade but incidents such as Charlottesville, and the attack on Congress last January 6 foreshadows where this might go as a hot war.  The proliferation of guns almost ensures some kind of armed conflict, most likely that very kind of guerrilla warfare.

We can’t even see eye to eye about COVID, extremists exploiting the issue as one of individual freedom.  I have written about this and our ex-President; the thought of his being the leader of our country could have been the punch line of a joke not very long ago.  His popular support ironically is not what he’s done for his followers but instead his giving voice to his follower’s hatred of the virtues of where we thought we were moving, into a more tolerant, ethnically diverse, educated society. 

It is bad enough if we only had to be concerned about the Trumpublicans mastery of propaganda and Gaslighting.  The liberal press writes much about the evils of Gerrymandering and I agree.  But, worse than Gerrymandering is the recent attempts to appoint local election officials, or representatives to the out dated, unnecessary, democracy-threatening Electoral College who are “sympathetic” to Trumpublican causes.

This sets up the real possibility that fair elections can be overturned as being illegitimate.  Then we will be a banana republic.  If election fraud does not work there are always guns.  Is it no wonder I am in a dark place?

At least a cultural light was on in this blog for a long time, but with COVID, many of the theatre and the musical performances which we used to attend in the past, and I enthusiastically wrote about, have been discontinued or migrated to Zoom (not the same).

My reading life has been disrupted by the chaos of our times and although I still try to escape in reading, I find myself less motivated to write about what I read.   Similarly, the piano: still working on improving my skills, but writing about it right now is a different matter.  (Stephen Sondheim’s death in 2021 was a shock and I will write about Sondheim eventually; what he has meant to me musically and personally).

Travel has been shut down, or dangerous, as the civil war plays out, the unvaccinated, the unmasked, claiming their “freedom” transcends everyone else’s. Thus trips I might have written about are no longer to be experienced.

As a society we’ve politicized everything and consequently progress with managing COVID has been disrupted. Years ago we were able to eliminate most smoking in public places which is clearly a danger to the non-smoker, but that took decades for “freedom-loving” smokers to accept, and the Covid issue is even more volatile and equally consequential. 

They accept the licensing of motor vehicles, but not of guns, again equally dangerous if in the wrong hands, or being military grade. I have written more than 30 entries over the years on the need for sensible control of automatic weapons, and covering incidents such as the recent Kyle Rittenhouse murders as examples of the consequences of no congressional action.  Even since the horror of murders of children at Sandy Hook in Newtown, CT, now almost ten years ago, we’ve done nothing other than recite the hollow words, “thoughts and prayers.”

It’s open shooting season on the soil of our once sacred nation, each and every one of them intolerable, destroying spirit.  I’ve written to our so called elected representatives who answer with form letters or emails extolling “freedom and the sacredness of the 2^nd amendment” as if it was handed down from heaven.

I am getting to my point.  Every year I seem to write less.  The definition of “banging one’s head against the wall” is “to attempt continuously and fruitlessly to accomplish some task or achieve some goal that is or seems ultimately hopeless.”  Yes that is where I am at with “freedom lovers” be they of guns, ignoring science, pursuing conspiracy theories, or undermining the very essence of our laws.

Ah, laws.  Another bête noire.  Here we are at the 1^st anniversary of one of the ugliest days in American history, and our Justice System moves in glacial slow motion.  Of course we must be thorough, but at the expense of never bringing the masterminds who are responsible to Justice? 

When I wrote my 100^th entry in this blog I posted a playful entry “How is my driving?”  Now that I;m posting my 726^th entry, I no longer ask that question.  A better one would be, “why am I driving?” I am struck by my first entry from last year ironically beginning “Could we have a worse start to a year that follows the worst year in memory?”  Talk about déjà vous.  I include that entry below as the same themes reverberate:

Saturday, January 9, 2021

The Revoltingly Horrid Year Continues….

 

Could we have a worse start to a year that follows the worst year in memory?

 

A quote President unquote, whose name I cannot even speak, continues behaving like an unhinged mobster boss.  His attempts to coerce the Georgia Secretary of State to throw their lawful election is just one more manifestation of his never-ending quest not to be labeled a loser, which he is and has always been.  His behavior then was criminal, impeachable.

 

But wait, that has been forgotten now as this deranged man stood safely behind a bullet proof shield and urged his slavish rabble to storm Congress just as it was ratifying the Electoral College Vote to name Joseph Biden the next President.  He yelled, Stop the Steal!  He promised he’ll be there with them every step along the way.  He didn’t clarify that he meant that metaphorically, as neither he nor his followers know the meaning of the word.  Instead he retired to the security of his White House Media Room with family members and sycophants to enjoy the siege of his insurrectionists in what we would consider a coup attempt if we were watching a 3rd world government.  It was like a Super Bowl party to them as they watched his minions do his dirty work.

 

Criminal, inciting sedition.  This by a sitting President.  Unthinkable.  Punishable, impeachable,

 

So his job of demolishing the last vestiges of democracy and decency is complete.  He is a deluded anarchist and by pandering to that base he has created a populist persona with a dedicated following, ready to die for him.  It could have been a greater loss of life during the siege had those pipe bombs and Molotov cocktails been detonated.  Perhaps the deep rumble of explosions and their accompanying terrifying bright lights was what he was waiting for.

 

We’ve all seen this coming and with every despicable act we (and many elected representatives) have given him more and more latitude.  After all it has been reasoned, he doesn’t understand the consequences.  He doesn’t understand how government really works….

 

How easily the behavior of one tragically flawed person can obfuscate so many serious issues which are tossed by the wayside, the pandemic and distribution of the vaccines, the climate, racial issues, gun control, voter suppression, and a national debt from which the nation might not recover.  Meanwhile Bitcoins and the stock market rage on while the nation burns, and we wake up each morning, fearing the next disaster du jour.

 

Good riddance to our Mobster President who, unfortunately, will still be part of the cancer that erodes our society from within, no matter the degree of his exile.  Mar a Lago may be his Elba.

 

 

 

 

The Rittenhouse Decision and Its Implications

The Kyle Rittenhouse trial had me reeling and consequently I dashed off a Letter to the Editor of my local Palm Beach Post newspaper, one that had to be limited to 200 words.  I sent it to Bruce Rettman, my longest tenured friend from our college years.  I’ve written about our friendship in this space before.  The first such time I included another terrific essay he wrote.

When I sent my piece to him, he responded with something he wrote, not necessarily for publication, but he just wanted to “let it out,” his own reaction to the Rittenhouse decision.  While space made me focus on one aspect, our society’s increasing permissiveness for carrying military style weapons, his is broader, making him ask why he should even stay in this country, the title of his piece, appropriately, I Would Leave.

I thought it was excellent and he agreed to allow me to publish it here.  And as my letter to the Post was restricted in length, I take this opportunity to add back what I had to cut out to make the paper’s length restrictions: 

The absence of sensible gun control laws led directly to the jury’s decision.  They could reach no other verdict in a society which not only allows for the possession of military style weapons but increasingly promotes “Stand Your Ground” laws, either explicit or implied.  Our society and its leaders have actively advanced the 2^nd amendment to an absurd degree.  In this respect our judicial system has been rendered as ineffective as another branch of government, Congress.  Gerrymandering and the effort of Republican states to appoint electors to the Electoral College who might be amenable to not certifying future election results also have frightening implications for The Republic’s future. 

As students sixty years ago Bruce and I recited John Masefield’s On Growing Old, never imagining it would happen to us.  Now we come together in that unimaginable future, and find ourselves in a nation we no longer recognize, one slouching towards autocracy.

I Would Leave 

by Bruce Rettman

If I were younger, I would leave the United States of America and make my life in another country.  The trial in Kenosha gives us yet another example of our broken, barbaric society giving legitimacy and permission to a person, in this case an adolescent, to carry a military assault weapon on the street and to use it to commit murder.  Our judicial system has constructed laws that put such action in the category of reasonable behavior so that a jury must return a verdict of not guilty.  A murderer is free to kill again.

I would leave.  What kind of society elects Donald Trump as its president and on his behalf attacks the capitol threatening the lives of legislators and bringing death and destruction to the building that stands as a symbol of our democracy?  What kind of country elects representatives who become leaders of one of its major political parties and defend such action?  We are a society in violent decline plagued by the prejudices that have haunted our history.  We have shown ourselves unequal to resolving our national crimes.

I would leave, but where would I go?  I would go to a society that does not allow its citizens to bear arms and does not have an armed police force.  I would go to a society that offers universal health care.  I would go to a society that advocates the end of the use of fossil fuel and not only takes climate change seriously but does what it can to save the planet from the ravages of our wanton destruction.  I doubt we will act to save ourselves, and I have little faith the USA will do what decent people should do.  We would rather fund what has brought us to prominence.  The USA will continue to fund a military that fights to protect wealth.

What decent person does not advocate for free education? Who would support a system that creates elite colleges and preparatory schools attended for the most part by people of substantial means?  I would look for a society that housed and fed the poor and the elderly and did not complain that such action constitutes entitlements that burden the rest of us.  I would look for a society that offered child care so that the very young and their parents could live healthy lives.  I would look for a society that guaranteed food and shelter for all of its citizens. 

The USA is over.  I know without a reasonable doubt that the United States is not, as most all of its elected leaders feel required to repeat, the greatest country in the world. Rather, it is a country of savage cruelty, at home and abroad, that is responsible for the suffering of people around the globe.  We are a military state and have been at war incessantly, war without end.  I would look for a society at peace with itself and the world. 

I would leave the USA.

My November 25 letter in the Palm Beach Post:

 

 

“Not with a bang but a whimper”

 

I quote the famous last stanza of T.S. Eliot’s “The Hollow Men,” as it has such relevancy today.

This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

Not with a bang but a whimper

This vile pandemic has claimed lives, the means of making a living, disrupting every aspect of our entire society.  The tragedies that ensue have been a tsunami of pain and heartbreak.  More than a half million lives lost in the US alone, and the impact on small business, and all the people they employ incalculable. Restaurants, the arts and all the other service industries have been particularly hard hit, rendering actors, technicians, waiters, kitchen staff, hairdressers, unemployed.  One such victim is our beloved Double Roads Tavern in Jupiter where we were regulars for years to enjoy their Sunday night jazz sessions.  I’ve written about the restaurant in these pages and my Twitter feed on Sundays frequently highlighted a brief clip of performances.  They give a sense of the restaurant’s community experience and the high quality jazz they sponsored on Sunday nights.  Vince Flora and his wife Kelly opened the restaurant in 2014.  Vince frequently played on the DR stage with his rhythm and blues band, Big Vince and the Phat Cats .

The Palm Beach Post tells the story at this link. 

I would be remiss in not covering the closing in this blog as it has been an important part of our lives, and so many others.  My wife, Ann, said it best in a heartfelt letter to Kelly:

Dear Kelly,

It was such a pleasure getting to know you a little and seeing that gorgeous smile during the several years we were regulars at your Sunday Night Jazz Fests.  You always saved our favorite table, right in front of Rick and the band.  I loved seeing Cherie too, who always gave us a hug.  We never knew who we were going to see, from little Ava Faith to an eye-popping, sophisticated Ava only a few years later belting out the standards like a pro.  We met Yvette Norwood Tiger there and still follow her very successful career, booking her Palm Beach International Jazz Festival from its beginning.

We met Mike and Linda at your Club, a very fortuitous friendship as they insisted we consider joining them on the weeklong Jazz Cruise in early 2020.  We did and it was the highlight of a most dismal year.  Thanks to them, we saw Emmet Cohen again on board the ship, a young brilliant and charismatic jazz pianist we had seen once in a NY Jazz club and totally flipped over.  He has held Monday night jam sessions in his NY apartment on YouTube which we never miss.  That lifted our spirits during this Pandemic.  And it’s all thanks to you guys and Double Roads!

Once COVID hit, Bob and I went into quarantine on March 12th and never left the house for most of the year.  That hurt us too, as it meant the end of our standing Sunday night Jazz dates.

Now I can only imagine what you and Vince are going through, closing what was a labor-of-love restaurant/dive/bar/music hangout.  Whatever you two decide to do, wherever you go, I’m sure your hundreds and hundreds of faithful customers will follow. I wish you good luck and good health.  You contributed so much to our well being that we will never forget you.

Fondly,

Ann & Bob

P.S. we LOVED your hamburgers!

I think of that tragedy as being emblematic of the larger issue, the hundreds of thousands of lives lost, and the infinite number of similar wide ranging effects of the pandemic with an overwhelming sense of sadness and anger: as a nation we failed.  Period.  While it would have been impossible to avoid the impact completely, it could have been ameliorated by not denying it and listening to science, and following their recommendations scrupulously.  How many lives were needlessly lost as a consequence?  Even one is too many if the result of negligence. We must hold our leaders accountable.

The saddest part is we are still fighting a cultural war using the pandemic as the battle ground, the anti-vaxxers taking up Trumpism.  How can we reach herd immunity when “leaders,” such as our Governor DeSantis, comes out against some form of “vaccination passport?”  One anti-vaxxer wrote a letter to the editor of the Palm Beach Post, asking that vaccinated people “respect” her “right” not to be vaccinated and not to segregate her from public venues. It was a reasonable letter, but the logic deeply flawed.  I tried to write an equally reasonable letter to the editor, but it turned into an essay so they published it as a “guest columnist.”  Here is the link but as they sometimes do not allow non subscribers to view, I include a photograph of the column.

Will we be forced to live with this virus for the foreseeable future due to “perceived” personal liberties?  In a rational society, that would seem unthinkable, but we’ve lived with outdated gun laws for decades due to the same problem.  There are now so many of these mass killings that I’ve given up writing about more sensible gun control laws, particularly to eliminate military style weaponry (which was not the intent of the Second Amendment).  Is this America’s future, an uncontrolled pandemic, wearing masks, having high hospitalization rates, those injured by gun assaults lying next to those with COVID?  Mass burials?  Are we already spiritually dead as Eliot implies in his poem?

Perhaps this is how a once great society, a representative democracy formerly the envy of the world, finally implodes.  “Not with a bang but a whimper.”

The Inevitable Year of Reckoning, a Year That Never Was

A contradictory heading.  How can both be true?  How can a year be and not be, or should not have been but is?

The answer lies in one’s perspective, and as I am now entering the outfield of old age, the game has been called.  It’s a matter of simple math.  Removing a year from your life when you’re approaching 80 represents a huge fraction of one’s remaining life.  So, waiting for COVID-19 to abate or to be solved is tantamount to a kind of purgatory, a state of being between life and death.

Purgatory implies some kind of judgement.  I’d say we are among the fortunate who can afford to stay in our house, surrounded by our books and streaming choices of theatre and  music, and for me my precious piano,  Judgement day is looking up, if you believe in religious fabrication.  I don’t; and have always argued that we make our own heaven or hell right here and now.

At first we hung onto every word of Dr. Fauci, for guidance and for any hopeful signs of a vaccination.  Any good news would release us, the most vulnerable, from being confined to our home.  Instead, what we feared, a therapeutic and better yet, a vaccination, will be a long time coming.

Ok, “normal” life will continue without us.  As “reopening” occurred, we watched boats pass by our house, their Trump flags flying, celebrating reverence for their King releasing them from bondage, going right back to their previous ways of ignoring social distancing, just making it more dangerous for the rest of us, but, hey, it’s their “freedom” not ours.

Until the thunderbolt of America’s original sin struck in Minneapolis of all places.  Racism, lack of opportunity, income inequality, white privilege, police violence, and the message that black lives really don’t matter, came crashing down on the country’s collective conscience with the murder of just one black person, George Floyd, by an imperious white policeman, Derek Chauvin, filmed for all the world to see.  The country burst into the same Chicago flames as in 1968 after Martin Luther King’s assassination.  Then too we had another elephant in the room, the Vietnam War which had fomented its own trauma.  There were also the Watts Riots of 1965, involving the police and a black man and they foreshadowed the 1992 LA riots which were sparked by the arrest and beating of Rodney King, all of which was filmed.  Cell phones were not around then, but a TV cameraman captured the gruesome details.

But the killing of the seemingly gentle giant George Floyd was different.  It came soon after filmed killings either by police or white vigilantes of other blacks and, over the past years hundreds, more like them.  It came after Dylann Roof’s mass murder in a Charleston black Baptist Church.  It came immediately after the filmed confrontation of a black man who was bird watching in Central Park and a white woman who felt entitled to call the police when he asked her to put her dog on a leash in an area where birds were protected.  But she chose to turn the call into a racial one, saying "I'm taking a picture and calling the cops, I'm going to tell them there's an African American man threatening my life."  It was an open invitation for the police to take action which would not have been justified.  The mere fact that he was black gave the woman a sense of entitlement, the power, to make such a call.  Had she had a gun and was in Florida she might have shot him and been vindicated under its racially charged “Stand Your Ground” law.  It reveals the basis of a problem which has existed forever in this country, remaining unaddressed.

We all know the systemic basis for it all and this country’s failure to do anything while propping up the stock market to benefit the few is a sin.

Its failure to address gun control is just another, but related, sin. 

Its failure to invest in education as part of the long term solution overarches the entire topic. 

Hopelessness breeds a certain kind of despair which can burst into flames when a match is thrown into the kindling.  But this is no mere match, as the video of the white policeman shows him kneeling on the neck of this poor man, suffocating the life out of him, the half shit grin knowing he was being filmed, the casual hand in the pocket.  It had the characteristics of the hunter proudly dominating his dead prey.  Like the ones of the Trump brothers grinning over their dead leopard, elk, elephant, or endangered sheep, the same shit eating grin of domination by gun or authority.

Many knew that with the election of a sociopathic reality TV star a Trumpocalypse might result.  Being so close to the election now, I was starting to think we might escape with merely part of our world being dismantled but COVID-19 gave him another way to pursue his egotistical ends, forcing himself into our homes each day with frequent preposterous claims about the virus, not giving the experts the floor, and refusing to wear a mask although that is the guidelines our health experts advocated.  Nothing applies to him and it makes him look weak.  One must wonder how he felt when he had to be taken to the bunker in the White House because of protests.

Well, he decided, I’ll look strong by clearing a way to St. John's Church across the park from the White House to pose for photos holding up a bible, as if he has spent his Sundays in church.  If this photo op meant pepper spraying protestors or using rubber bullets against them, so be it.  He wants us to know he’s a tough guy.  It invites commentary, the absurdity and the arrogance of it all and it would be funny if it were not so tragic, that that is the action our “President” thinks meaningful in light of this wake up moment in our history.

It is more than ironic that George Floyd’s brother, Terrence Floyd, was the one who took the conciliatory Presidential fork in the road, exhorting the crowds to not turn to violence and looting, urging protests in a peaceful way to honor his brother.  He also asked that the crowds turn to the voting booth to make their voices heard.  "Educate yourselves. Don't wait for somebody else to tell you who's who, educate yourself and know who you're voting for. That's how we're going to help. It's a lot of us! ... Let's switch it up and do this peacefully.''

Trump, meanwhile took the low road, urging the Governors of those States to “dominate” with force, warning that if they didn’t do it, he’d call up the military.  He said "I’m your president of law and order.''

It would have been an ideal opportunity for a normal President of the United States to show empathy, compassion, urging Congress to bring a bill to his desk to ensure a massive investment in education and in the short term economic relief for the most poverty stricken and unemployed.  But we know that this President was not born with an empathic bone in his body, only bone spurs.

He is like CV19 itself.  It knows nothing about empathy and only “thinks” of its own existence by replicating through infecting others.  It is not an “equal opportunity” infector, more seriously impacting those without access to good diets and medical care as well us elderly.  It ruins lives.  It kills.  And once a large number of unprotected citizens are infected, it leads to disastrous societal and economic consequences. Trump’s strong-arm behavior only exacerbates an already incendiary situation.  I fear it will worsen.

Yet, this is our moment to stand in solidarity with all people of color, to work towards an election of bringing people to Congress who will work together to find solutions to the systemic problem of racism and income disparity and full employment for all.  If we can afford to go to Mars, we can afford to do this. And it is time to remove the virulent President.  Indeed, make this a year of reckoning, one that might have been a year that never was, but now can count for something constructive.

“Truthful hyperbole”

It’s an interesting juxtaposition of words, almost the dictionary definition of oxymoron.  Here’s another two words strung together which approach an oxymoron: “President” and “Trump.”   So it is fitting that oxymoronic terms should hang out together.  This term is expressed by Brad Parscale who according to the Palm Beach Post (great local reporting in this case) is “the ‘genius who won Trump’s campaign,’ and how he’ll get him reelected.

I guess we’ll hear more about this digital / marketing “genius” as the 2020 election gets underway. Stoking the Trump base and bringing in other digital followers will be his responsibility to get Trump reelected. 

This digital gunslinger is more than that, a modern day Elmer Gantry who tackles his calling with a evangelistic fervor, whipping up his crowds, “It’s not just me and my computer and a bunch of algorithms that are going to save us. It’s all of you that are going to save us.” By saving us, he means from immigrants, “socialists,” and gun control advocates.  The details of these issues are not discussed, but are to be dropped as puns, one-liners, the repetition of talking points, etc., “truthful hyperbole.”

At his disposal will be a war chest to turn sites like Facebook into an endless stream of propaganda and fake news, oh, sorry, meant to say, “truthful hyperbole.”  His plan is to turn out an army of faithful automatons, 1.7 million “volunteers,” “super Trump fans.”  A soon to-be-released app “’gamifies’ the experience of waiting in line to get in” to Nuremberg style Trump rallies.  How “exciting” is that?

It is the stuff of the great dystopian novels and we will be living it with people such as Brad Parscale the Wizard behind the curtain, pulling the switches.  

Meanwhile, in the real world, there is the Virginia Beach massacre:  twelve people shot dead by a deranged, supposedly aggrieved person.  Not an immigrant.  Not a Muslim.  Not a person of color.  Most of these shootings are not by such people -- as we all know.  Most are committed by angry white men.  Yet, we still hear about the murderers pouring over our borders.  Among the “solutions” espoused by this administration is to separate families, “build the wall” of course, and not achieving that just put into place tariff taxes by executive order.   Punish the innocent and let the NRA’s propaganda propagate.

The list of mass shootings in America since the infamous Texas clock tower in 1966 is staggering. 

It’s in our blood.  Guns.  The blood is on your hands, NRA.  We allow this?  How preposterous in a so called civilized society?  The 2^nd amendment now goes hand in hand with “truthful hyperbole.”  The right to bear arms never, never would have applied to automatic weapons or handguns with enlarged clips for rapid firing, had the writers of that amendment could have conceived of such weaponry. 

I’m going to simply “reprint” one of the pieces I published a couple years before, the one I think that comes closest to the beginning of a solution.  And indeed, it’s only a beginning.  But no more “truthful hyperbole” please about “bad guys” crossing over the border.  Congress, face up to what is needed!

I’ve now written dozens of times about gun control and in particular the need to outlaw military type weapons, institute stringent background checks, age limits, etc., all the usual ideas and have seen the usual push backs to the same.

I’ve also (not uniquely) suggested that firearms be regulated in the same way automobiles are, requiring registration and tracking when one is sold.

I go back to this argument as it is more of a total solution than any others.

There are of course persuasive arguments against the bureaucracy of establishing a Federal or State system of a “Bureau of Firearms Control.”  Expensive.  Loss of freedom, Big brother watching, etc. etc.  But we tolerate those for automobiles, which also includes testing, insurance, inspection, etc.  We do so for the greater good of society.  We establish laws governing their use and prosecute when those laws are broken, even by generally “law abiding citizens.”  Gun ownership advocates make virtual talking robot arguments that gun laws only hurt the “good” people while “evil” ones ignore them and thus, we should have fewer gun laws.  Talk about circular logic.

We take off our shoes at airports because someone tried to blow up a plane with a shoe. My constitutional rights allow me to wear shoes!

Annual gun deaths are now approaching those caused by motor vehicle incidents (the latter declining and the former steadily increasing).

Getting to the difficult part, implementation.

First, indeed institute stringent background checks, age limit laws, and ban the use of military style weapons.

Secondly, as Congress now sees fit to increase our national debt, go further and institute a Federal program for buying back weapons voluntarily surrendered, with higher premiums for military style weapons.  Pay fair price.  Return them no questions asked for a specified grace period.

Those choosing to keep their weapons, and those buying new ones, must register them with renewals required.  If the registered weapon is given or sold to another, forms have to be completed, the item identified, with the new owner’s name and address.  Then the new owner has 30 days to register them.  Registration fees will support the process.

Gradually a data base will be developed and ones who have a collection of weapons, an arsenal, would be identified and flagged as dealers, subject to another level of scrutiny and regulatory control.

This is complicated stuff and the devil is in the details.

Indeed, some (especially the “bad guys”) will ignore all of this, but they will be subject to prosecution if found with unregistered weapons, or if someone is found with an unregistered weapon purchased or given by them.  It will take time, maybe decades, to work through this group.  It has to start sometime.

And while more regulatory control and knowledge of our lives is abhorrent to me, something has to be started NOW and a more comprehensive solution needs to be sought by our lawmakers.  No more Sandy Hooks, Parklands, Santa Fes.  Now.  Please.

We don’t even hear much anymore about thoughts and prayers regarding the latest incident.  It’s as if we’ve all become inured to them.  That strategy never did work.  We have heard enhanced rhetoric about turning our schools into heavily armed prisons.  Is that really preferable to a “Bureau of Firearms Control?”