It is blowback time.
Culture of militarism, violence, gun worshipping has nothing to do with but latest outburst of man, long on arms and short on selfconfidence. Or so we will hear from our opinion makers.
I think that herd of sheep has more collective brain power than herd of our ilk.

And I bet my life that nothing, absolutely nothing will change; killing will proceede with usual pace everywhere where there is presence of free people from land of braves.

The government basically says that it is right to kill, so people go out and kill. Then the government complains. And of course they would never blame guns. By their logic (as used with Iran) both the weapons and the people with the weapons are dangerous. When it comes to guns though they see no intrinsic danger in guns - just with "loners", people who are not part of their American dream.

The media does whatever it can to hep the elite. Speaking of which, they seem happy to rapidly label this the worst mass shooting in US history. With a stroke, Wounded Knee is removed from the history books. It's disgusting.

elsewhere i saw the idea of taxing ammunition so prohibitously that the more destructive bullets would not be bought.

on another topic, iraq has worse than this tragedy EVERY DAY. we must tell our congresspeople and senators to keep writing withdrawal of troops into the legislation till the troops get withdrawn.

Guns don't kill people unless they are thrown really hard.

Our president is doing a great job by showing the proper place in society for violence, torture, and injustice. And the place is in all aspects of our society, from the school campus, to our prisons, to our police and military, to our making a living. What percentage of our population is involved with making weapons, from bullets to aircraft? A lot of people. That is why we need weapons, its for building a strong economy.

The true tragedy will be the call for more gun control, just like they do after every massacre. Don't they get it? It is our god given right to have weapons and kill each other.

And yet there are people who think we can live in a peaceful manner. Go figure.

www.NotOneMore.US

The saddest part to me is that the liberal gun laws are based on nothing but deception and demagoguery. The Republicans claim it is related to the keeping of a militia under the Second Amendment, or that it is necessary to act as a curb on a repressive government, as if the weapons one can purchase legally in the US can stop a unit of Marines working under a fascist President. No chance.

The Republicans do not allow the purchase of weapons that would be necessary to fight a repressive government -- rocket launchers, anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles, grenade launchers, and of course WMD. Their arguments are hollow and are only intended to deceive another slice of gullible voters into voting against their own interests, with economic and personal costs. And at Virginia Tech yesterday, some of those costs were realized.

I better add that by "liberal gun laws" I meant laws that allow people to buy guns and ammunition liberally, not laws that are supported or passed by liberals.

This is the price we pay so that some people can own guns. The "sportsmen" fight every attempt to control any type of gun ownership. Some people must die so that others can have their guns.

"This is the price we pay so that some people can own guns". Maybe if a few more presidents, senators and congressmen got targeted there would be a change in the law. That was the story of the Brady law.

There may be some connections between increasing violence in the world on many levels and on many fronts.

US national leaders who promote invasions, violence, torture, the killing of half a million innocent Iraqi civilians (including children) and similar activities don't exactly contribute to an atmosphere of peaceful problem-solving.

Food for thought on this at:

"Events at home and overseas trouble our souls: New directions provide opportunities"

PopulistAmerica.com
October 13, 2006

http://www.populistamerica.com/events_at_home_and_overseas_trouble_our_souls

One comedy routine I liked proposed that bullets should cost $5000.00 each, so a barroom brawl threat might be "You better watch your ass or I'm gonna get a job and save up, buy me a bullet and come back here and shoot it!"

I know this is no time for jokes, but I agree something needs to be done about the rise violence in our culture.

It is indeed strange that we've been told so little about the perpetrator in this case. I wonder what's up with that?

Wasn't the right to bear arms written into the constitution a very long time ago to ensure that in times of war, and I mean when the US was trying to fight for independence from the British, that their soldiers could rightfully defend themselves? And specifically in a military context? I am not sure that this translates into a gun toting citizenry. However unfortunately the man making the statement is from a place where guns are as ingrained a part of the local culture as.. well as anything.
I lived in Texas, I now live in the UK where even a number of the police do not carry guns. Yes, it is absolutely time to move beyond thoughts and prayers but I wonder what we can do now being as that guns are just everywhere, how do we even begin to get rid of them? How do we stop people feeling so desperate that they feel the need to shoot others? How do we regain a little balance?
Yes, Iraq is far worse than this everyday but when it hits our own shores I think we see it differently, it makes us feel a little more mortal and a lot more scared.

As a lifelong pacifist I have become a student of the many ways our cultural death wish creeps into everything we do, from cigarettes to hand guns to capital punishment to the ghastly merchandise of Lockheed Martin et al to dressing up like Elmer Fudd every weekend and stalking off into nature to use wildlife for target practice. But as a realist I also see that we do not live in an ideal world, and that if the Shia of Baghdad gave up their Kalashnikovs they would soon be dead along with their families, just as we, had our ancestors been unarmed, would be a British colony today. We are the dubious beneficiaries of all kinds of Promethean gifts - fire, gunpowder, plutonium, anthrax, chlorine, ammonium nitrate and 45 calibre semiautomatic antipersonnel weapons - and we can't give them back since we are now obligated to protect ourselves from one another.

I am suspicious of our eagerness to tag easy scapegoats as the causes of our deeper ills. To blame Don Imus' microphone for the persistence of racism. To blame the idiots we have freely elected for straightaway driving the country into a tree. To blame religion for religious fanaticism. To blame guns for our obsession with violence. Drugs, gangs, rap music, Marilyn Manson tee shirts, a penchant for military adventurism and an epidemic of armed lunatics in our schools - are symptoms but not causes of our mysterious disease. You don't cure measles by painting out the spots.

They took the violent cartoon shows off Saturday morning television when? Twenty years ago? Successfully stamped them out. Are we a kinder, gentler society today? Evils driven underground are perhaps more worrisome than those we can see.

Gun control? Well, yes. We do need some gun control. But c'mon. It was not a gun that caused this psychopath to go on a rampage. That was merely the weapon of convience. Take his guns away and he simply moves on to another weapon of convenience: a truck, a 40 pound bag of nitrate fertilizer, or what have you.

The real issue here is not gun control but self control. We have always had guns with us; but we have not always had Columbine and VA Tech. Where are all these psychopaths coming from, is what we all should be wondering about. Yes, a culture of violence and misguided militarism is definitely part of the problem. But it runs deeper than that. A culture of sex, drugs, and rock n roll contributes to violence also. In every case the problem boils down to mental and spiritual health and self-control.

More gun control? Better gun control, OK. But keep in mind that the odds of your being killed in an auto accident by some cell-phone toting SUV driver far, far outweigh the odds of being cut down by another aberant gunslinger. Lets keep it all in perspective.

Then Almitra spoke, saying, "We would ask now of Death."

And he said:

You would know the secret of death.

But how shall you find it unless you seek it in the heart of life?

The owl whose night-bound eyes are blind unto the day cannot unveil the mystery of light.

If you would indeed behold the spirit of death, open your heart wide unto the body of life.

For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are one.

In the depth of your hopes and desires lies your silent knowledge of the beyond;

And like seeds dreaming beneath the snow your heart dreams of spring.

Trust the dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.

Your fear of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he stands before the king whose hand is to be laid upon him in honour.

Is the shepherd not joyful beneath his trembling, that he shall wear the mark of the king?

Yet is he not more mindful of his trembling?

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?

And what is to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing.

And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.

And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

http://www.columbia.edu/~gm84/gibran27.html

Thanks vinlander for reassuring me that there are people with brains out there.
The degree of helplessness nowadays is incomprehensible. With all that is served to 'the people' one is surely left to come to one conclusion only: TV sets must emit some sort of mind altering signals to render the 'American brain' dysfunctional. What else could explain the paralyzed state of the citizenry, mute and incapacitated, if not willingly, totally indifferent swallowing every lie that is dished to them. The Virginia Tech shooting lets Mr. bush order the flags flown half staff. With all my honest condolences and due respect to the families and friends that needlessly lost a loved one in the shooting, flags should be flying half staff since March 2003. For thousands of innocent Iraqi students, women, children and seniors who where killed out of the same reasons as in Virginia Tech. This self proclaimed president (that always reminds me of Idi Amin) is as much a loner as the troubled perpetrator in Virginia. George W. Amin's shooting spree is Iraq. Accountability? FOIA? Congressional oversight? Not with emperor George Amin. A while ago I posted a comment 'This ship is sinking'. Now America resembles the upright Titanic gushing down into the cold and dark abyss. Too bad the real Americans couldn't get their country back.

His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.

We are surrounded by weapons of convenience; none are more convenient than a gun, which was, after all, designed solely to murder human beings.

A culture of sex and drugs (and rock and roll? where did that come from?) contributes to violence only to the extent that those elements are considered taboo. As long as we have puritan attitudes decrying sex and drugs as evil, then we will never be able to face them honestly. If harsh gun control laws would produce that same "taboo" effect, then we should consider them very closely indeed; but going by the example of other nations, that result doesn't seem to be borne out.

andrewr: When it comes to guns though they see no intrinsic danger in guns - just with "loners", people who are not part of their American dream.

Yes, and the Bush administration is doing their best to create a society of "loners"... people without hope.

Look, the Virginia shooter had perfect gun control. Thirty-one hostiles down before noon is a record that just can't be matched by any US troop in Iraq that I've heard of.

Gun control in America means putting rounds on target and this English Major from South Korea demonstrated the incredible ability of US schools to transmit american values. The boy behaved in the best american spirit of John Brown, Tim McVeigh and the Columbine kids.

If those liberals teaching at Virginia Tech were true americans they would have had concealed carry permits and been able to deliver the proper, armed, response. The fact that the engineering department was full of a bunch of liberal, no-gun, weenies shows their inability to understand what america was about when this immigrant obviously got it.

The true tragedy was that the shooter isn't alive to train our brave boys in Iraq in the proper ways of dealing with the enemy.

:sarcasm off:

While the whole argument over the necessity/non necesity of handguns for self-defense rages on. The public health and medical community, through research, came to their conclusions long ago. A handgun or other non-sporting gun in a household is much more likely to cause harm in an accident or in malice than legitimate self defense. One study is here:
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/pdf/hemazrmill-ip-2000.pdf.

What I find so frustrating is even the minimal, common sense rules are impossible to pass. Why should any kind of high capacity handhgun magazine, or the purchase of multiple magazines, be allowed? Why this ridiculous worship of them? Why aren't guns subject to the same regulations that any other potentially dangerous consumer product is?

And sorry, but the "criminals will get them anyway" is utterly bogus. Murders happen in spite of laws against them too, so should we legalize murder?

THANK GOD NO COPS WERE HARMED IN THE MAKING OF THIS MASSACRE.

In Jefferson county, Colorado we learned much later that our police response was inadequate to the Columbine incident. The police force never engaged and because of that reluctance more kids lost their lives. That info is common knowledge, but NOTHING has been done to correct that fact.

Firefighters rush into burning buildings, but cops will NOT because you and I are nothing more than a traffic ticket, potential drug possessor or victim to be pitied to them.

We arm and armor them and they use that responsibility to serve and protect themselves, not us. Is the negligence theirs or ours?

Dealing with the truth is harder than looking for scapegoats: scapegoats like guns or violent games and movies. The truth is we are not safer after providing the police with Patriot Act abilities. In fact, we are LESS safe as they have abused those powers, abuses that have led to prolonged imprisonment, torture and murder. We won't deal with that. Instead, we'll turn our attention to the NRA as if we could EVER curb the 220+ million fire arms in America. We'll put bigger stickers on the games and movies, but what we won't do is talk about what really contributed to the problem - THE FAILURE OF THE POLICE TO CONTAIN AND ENGAGE THE "PERP."

The truth isn't soemthing Americans are good at dealing with. We know that our government lied us into Vietnam (Tonkin Gulf) and into Iraq (yellow cake uranium,) but for Americans it's easier to deal with 2 or 3 coffins a day than telling our war manufacturers that their profits are over, or that our police force cares more for their safety than ours.

To Protect and Serve. Second word, Chief.

Peace to you and yours.

We can only cry with those who have suffered so tragically because of yet another mad gunperson.

Episodes of gunviolence bring to mind that great American poet Gil-Scott Heron and one of his rants after a mass gunkilling in Florida years ago by a man dissatisfied with the repair of his lawnmower.

"Another mass killing!! And everybody's in a state of shock!! Shiit, I ain't shocked. What do you expect when there's twice as many guns as people."

We are truly a nation obsessed with guns, and we suffer the consequences. What is it with all all these damn guns. I am not anti-gun--I live in Central PA where guns are a way of life. Not for me so much but I am teaching my boy how to shoot.

But why are upwards of 250K 9 mm's manufactured in the US each year. What do people do with such guns. What else--kill each other. Maybe this preoccupation with guns is just a childlike fascination with action at a distance. "Look Ma, I can shoot and kill a critter way over there from way over here." Gimme a break. Handguns especially are made for one primary purpose--killing people. Don't give me that target practice sportsman bullshit either. Most handgun owners I know talk about the stopping power of their weapons, not their accuracy.

Meanwhile, my right to bare arms is in my shortsleeveshirts.

Just say NO to guns.

I have never owned and I do not use a gun for anything. I don't like and them and don't trust their presence to deter violence.

Okay fellows and girls, I have a magic wand and can instantly disappear all guns, bullets, pellets, bb's etc. If I do so, do you really think that this will put an end to murder and mayhem? If so you are living in a delusion.

It's strange that no one has focused on the shooter's mental state in these comments. I just read on MSNBC.com that he had been turning in some alarmingly violent "creative writing" in English class, and had been referred for counseling. (It's not clear that he ever went.) He was also described as such a extreme "loner" that he wouldn't even respond if a student said hello to him. Clearly this young man was profoundly disturbed -- as indeed were Harris and Klebold, and the man who gunned down the Amish school children. At times I'm more concerned about our society's failure to intervene vigorously when people with serious mental health issues are sending clear signals. As for our gun laws, enforcing them is just about as effective as enforcing our drug laws -- an exercise in futility.

It is time to prevent the sale of ALL handguns and small arms, period. This is the only way to stop this kind of violence. Let the NRA squawk all they want.

This country is besotted by the idea of violence and death. One only need look at the ads in the newspapers for current movies to see how many of them feature the "hero" with a gun in his/her hand. It is time to say, "Enough."

Like a Santa Claus distributing bits of wrapped candy to small children, death once again was handed out, casually, indiscriminately and, except for the cough of the guns, in a total mask of silence.

Brace yourself: once again, we are going to be subjected to a chorus of hand wringing well salted with hypocrisy from political and religious leaders.

While few poets compare with the breadth of vision of Kahlil Gibran, I don't think ANYONE has the right to determine WHEN another shall meet the great beyond! Violence begets violence, but peace has to begin somewhere. People remark that even children show aggressive tendencies; but there has been some research into the prenatal epoch. Most mothers are immersed in some form of violence, for our culture is soaked in it. Secondarily, if the soul exists in its own eternal continuum, taking on the human body with each successive incarnation, the MEMORY of violence is part of the heritage taken. I do not believe anyone is entirely a blank slate at birth, character and characteristics emerge early on. We do not see peace because it's been for most of human history that MIGHT made right, and only a few governments succeeded in bringing the faintest hope of sharing power, and establishing egalitarian ethics. How tragic that ours, the BEST ideal ever conceived, has made a love of arms its demi-god, and a worship of Mars disguised as hosannas to Jesus its central ethos, so much so that as someone else noted, a God-awful lot of people are employed in JOBS making weapons OR products that DO harm. This is a sane paradigm? We expect people to be harmonized and balanced as they try to negotiate the best in their own natures with the insanity going on around them, when in particular, the leader is a delusional murderer who thinks he has some kind of Christ-ordained impunity? Heaven help us.

Well, this is one where I disagree with a lot of people. I really don't think the answer is a bunch of new gun laws.

Maybe its because I grew up in a place where guns were pervasive. It wasn't a major city, instead it was rural east Tennessee. I'd swear every other house in my neighborhood had a gun cabinet full of pistols and rifles and shotguns. For almost any boy who was about 12 years old, it was almost standard to give them their first shotgun at about that age.

Thus, at almost any time, any other student whom I was around always had the option of getting upset, going home, breaking into the gun cabinet and coming back to school as well armed as Rambo. Any fight, any dispute, any case of depression, for anything, that would have been an option to any teenager around me during those years.

And you know what ... no one came into that high school blasting away.

So, when I read statements that somehow imply that guns are the fault, and that if we just limit or get rid of the guns then all of our problems will be magically solved .... well that just doesn't seem to match up with what I experienced when I grew up. We all had guns available. But this never happened.

At some point, it comes down to the human brain and the human heart. This can only happen when someone looks at another person and decides its ok to kill them. That's the key point. They can have any weapon in their hands, and if they decide they can't kill the person they are looking at, then this doesn't happen. I'll agree that guns can make this easier to do. But its more than possible to commit mass murder without a gun in your hand. I can think of examples from a night-club fire where the doors were deliberately jammed shut before the arson occurred, to George W Bush killing hundreds of thousands of people with a stroke of a pen.

To stop this, we have to address people. We have to talk to people. We have to teach people. We have to create a society where its unthinkable for someone to do this. The whole bit about gun laws is just a diversion. Its trying to take the easy way out. Its trying to make us think we've solved the problem by passing a law. But its just passing the buck to someone else to solve the problem, my making someone else enforce a law. And in the end it won't really do any good. It would just mean the next killer would walk into a building with a knapsack full of home-made pipe bombs that they'd toss into crowded areas.

Focus on the heart. That's where the answer lies.

Absolutely no guns for the public!!! Only police and the military can carry guns. If you want to go to hunt, you pick up your weapon at a controlled building and when you are done you take it back immediatly.
If there were no guns in public this gunman probably would have channelled his feelings of injustice into political activism or something.

I want to address the idea that we should be "more concerned about our society's failure to intervene vigorously when people with serious mental health issues are sending clear signals" (as AdeletheCzech says above). This argument was bandied about in Canada after last year's shooting at a university in Montreal. On CBC - a station whose race to become as American and thus irrelevant as possible - jumped on the bandwagon and interviewed someone they described as an 'Internet Expert' who explained that the reason the shooting had happened was because of the proliferation of forums on the internet where people like this can spin out hteir fantasies (the shootisit was a vampire fantasist). This 'Internet Expert' blamed all the people on the internet who hadn't stopped this person and said it is a failure to deal with these people.

So, what I don't understand is how do you know we do not deal with these people? If you think about all the psychological counselling going on in universities and high schools, all the support networks people have in their friends and families and the Internet, the fact is we are probably preventing massacres like this every day. We never say why couldn't we reach out to this loner drug addict who broke into a house to steal to buy drugs. For some reason a 23 year old who kills was always a missed project for some social worker or support network.

In reality, deviant acts happen in all societies. People feel estranged or anomoulus and do things because of this. The question is, when the saftey mechanisms fail as they do on one in a hundred million occasions, do you leave a stack of ready to use guns lying around? Do you let them go into a store and buy an assault rifle with ease? Gun laws are the answer. If they aren't available in a society where violence is deemed by its leaders the acceptable way to deal with someone you don't agree with then people will not use them to express their alienation. This style of shooting happened in Britian in Hungerford and Dunblane and laws have essentially stopped it from happening again. Unless someone is determined and wiling to break the law to get a gun (when they might well be caught) they use vandalism or less fruitful forms of violence. Canada now has strict gun laws to try to combat the threat, although they have not gone far enough yet. The state in Canada does not use legal murder (executions) unlike the USA which another reason these things are less common in canada.

"President Bush offered his prayers"

So if this praying thing is effective why didn't he pray yesterday morning - and every morning - for there to be no mass shootings?

Maybe instead of "praying" he should stop killing people and set an example.

Beyond hollow thoughts and nice prayers.

Thoughts of going on a murderous rampage aren't limited to deranged people. Too many students in College feel alienated as they deal with all the pressures of school ("fitting in and finding themselves"). Colleges offer "walk-ins", but there should be an agency on College campuses actively looking for students to reach out to who may be struggling with issues and could use a friend.

If I were Bush, responsible for all the deaths in Iraq, I'd feel mighty awkward addressing Virginia Tech.

This is not a tragedy. It is a disaster. The gun sellers will make a killing as usual - feeding off the crime they set up. Guns are for plinking and hunting at best. How did we come to accept assault weapons as legitimate, when they are clearly designed to kill wholesale.

We won't allow people to own machine guns, bazookas, rocket and grenade launchers and missiles. Why should people be trusted with handguns when these kill more people than the former do? That's because handguns can be concealed, whereas rifles and shotguns are difficult to conceal. They are hidden for the purpose of committing crimes or for killing those who commit crimes. Had Cho walked around with a difficult to conceal long weapon, even an assault rifle, people would have seen it and taken action.

In "Bowling for Columbine", Michael Moore walked into Canadian homes to prove that although they own more guns than Americans do, there is so little gun-related crime that they feel safe enough to not lock their doors. Why? Because the guns Canadians own are hunting rifles and shotguns, not handguns. No matter how handgun defenders rationalize it, handguns are made expressly for killing PEOPLE, not deer or ducks. Handgun owners mostly shoot at targets as practice for better killing people. That's why most handgun targets are figures of men, not deer, bear or other game.

The obvious and most effective way to stop gun crime is to ban handguns or at least make handgun owners subject to strict licensing procedures. The police say so. Strict jail penalties for handgun possession should be made effective today. But our government has been bought by the handgun industry, so this too is off the table. The first thing the POTUS said as he went off to pose for the cameras and victims of this massacre was that he did not believe in gun control. Killing and dying for oil and Zion is fine with him but war doesn't provide a safe photo opportunity.

The Hutus killed the Tutsies with machetes, but it is extremely doubtful that people here will engage in a genocide armed with kitchen knives. This is a specious argument, not worthy of serious consideration. Ban handguns NOW!

We don't need gun legislation we need peace legislation: support HR 808 for the creation of a Department of Peace.

The process of creating, establishing and carrying out this legislation would culture the human recognition, contact and connection that is needed far more than banning certain firearms.

F* anti-war, F* anti-gun: we need human recognition, human respect, human dignity. We need to re-establish what this Nation stands for, we need a Department of Peace!

Predictably, the authorities immediately declared the gunman a loner.
In a country which prides itself on individualism and the word "collective" is the dirtiest in the vocabulary, everyone is expected to spend every waking hour marching with other marching zombies. Reading a book, or just think is sooooooooooooooooooo dangerous.

It makes me sick to see Bush using this event as a photo op. Has he ever paid such respect for any soldier killed in Iraq? Has he attended one funeral?

I always liked one of Chris Rocks' routines about guns. First, he spoke about all the people looking for a reason behind the shootings a Columbine. Was it music? Was it a lack of friends and companionship? He then said, "What ever happened to the word 'crazy'?" He then went on to suggest that since it's bullets that kill people, then each bullet should cost $5,000. It was amusing, and it doesn't sound like a bad idea.

"Predictably, the authorities immediately declared the gunman a loner.
In a country which prides itself on individualism and the word "collective" is the dirtiest in the vocabulary, everyone is expected to spend every waking hour marching with other marching zombies. Reading a book, or just think is sooooooooooooooooooo dangerous."

I get called a loner a lot. I don't however play video games. Hopefully I won't get profiled.

Funny thing though, just when I start thinking that gun control perhaps is folly, something like this comes along and keeps me from jumping over the fence.

Sure most gun owners are responsible. I won't argue that. But for every 9 law-abiding citizens that gets a gun, one nutjob or dirtbag gets one too. And all it takes is one deranged person with bad intentions to wreak havoc.

I think one reason why I teeter back and forth with this issue though is that I worry about an illegal market for guns being augmented by a full-on gun ban. Plus, if demented individuals can't get their hands on guns, will they just get more creative in terms of committing mass murder? Will they start building bombs or poisoning water supplies?

I am sorry, but this is beyond ridiculous. Some professorial expert is talking now:"People like this gunman are rejected because they think only about themselves." Well, I am not a psychologist, but I am quite comfortable with history, including that of prejudices, racism, ostracism etc.
The Times has also an absurd piece (I just scanned). Among other things, the authors talk about the gunman taking some medicine. I am sure he was the only college kid in the country on medications. Poor, patients deprived,
doctors.

As I read the predictable anti-gun rhetoric sprinkled throughout this thread, I'd like to pose a question to the assemblage. How different would this tragic event have been if just one teacher, just one student, just one custodian, janitor or maintenance worker had been trained in, and in possession of a legally obtained firearm?

There are many voices screaming out for the absolute banning of all weapons, which is a predictable and frankly, knee-jerk reaction to such an event. I must agree completely with the voices who accurately state that the guns involved did not of their own volition kill anybody, they were wielded by a madman bent on wreaking havoc. If not guns, it could well have been explosives, chemicals, etc.

Does anyone reading this newsblog have any credible feeling that all weapons will someday vanish from the Earth? All weapons? Every single one? I live in a reality-based world that tells me this is a delusion and instead of delusional solutions, I'd rather see a solution that can actually come to pass. My solution involves a greater level of screening, requirements for rigorous training and certification, and permitted licensing of weapons, handguns in particular. As a weapons owner and user, I value the training and certifications that I have achieved, and they give me the confidence of my own ability to defend myself, my family, and my neighbors. I will agree that far too many guns fall into the hands of ignorant & violent people with dubious integrity ~ and feel that licensing is a reasonable path. Many don't agree with this, but it's my opinion.

So consider the outcome at Virginia Tech if just one person had been ready and able to step up to the plate. Sadly, no one was.

I think I'll skip this - too busy vomiting

This was my opinion

I am back with a question:
How much does NRA pay for posting sincere opinions? Does anybody know? I could use some money.

Sure, fall back on the time-honored methodology of insinuating negative things about the author of arguments you can't intellectually compete with. Geeze, if you can't come up with something a little more lucid, why don't you go back to reading the Village Voice or something? Learn some of the "big words" and then maybe you can graduate to actually participating in a cogent discussion about relevant topics.

hee, hee, hee

COMarc April 17th, 2007 5:57 pm

"To stop this, we have to address people. We have to talk to people. We have to teach people. We have to create a society where its unthinkable for someone to do this. The whole bit about gun laws is just a diversion. Its trying to take the easy way out. Its trying to make us think we've solved the problem by passing a law. But its just passing the buck to someone else to solve the problem, my making someone else enforce a law. And in the end it won't really do any good. It would just mean the next killer would walk into a building with a knapsack full of home-made pipe bombs that they'd toss into crowded areas.
Focus on the heart. That's where the answer lies."

You nailed it COMarc, but it takes kindness and compassion to address "people" issues; and I think the inappropriate handling of Katrina has shown us all that both of these elements are absent or lacking in many on Capitol Hill and in the White House.

George Bush only wants to sign appropriation bills that perpetuate war or increase profits to corporations at the expense of average citizens whose jobs are being offshored to accommodate the lavish lives and agendas of the super-wealthy....the same savages who "use" others to achieve their greed-driven, selfish agendas. Their only reverence is to money and power, not humanity.

Oh, now that was just precious. I'll add THAT to my collection of meaningful quotes.

"hee, hee, hee" ~ eurobelle

continuation
hee, hee, hee

It's not the guns (even though I dislike them myself) or knives or bombs ow what ever weapon is chosen.
It's our culture's attitude to violence. As long as violence is still given tacit approval by most
as a way to settle ones disputes, people will kill people in ever larger numbers. It is an attitude
problem and it's attitudes that need to be changed. And it all starts in the family. A person's
character is pretty much formed by the age of 10 so if a child is subject to violence, ridicule
and shame, then shown by example that violence is how one deals with ones problems - they will react
that way the rest of their lives regardless of being able to acquire a gun or not. They will find some other way to act out their rage violently.