Let’s talk honestly about the latest mass murder that has America outraged.
the Las Vegas shooting killed fifty eight (at last count) and wounded hundreds. I don’t want to focus on the shooters motives as we don’t know them yet. The timeline of the shooting, as it is changing and so far a lot of speculation.
So the focus is on the gun. The implement used to commit the crime is the low hanging fruit of mass media at this time.
The Vegas shooting is being touted as the worst mass shooting in American history. Maybe it is, but it is not the worst mass murder in American history.
Timothy McVeigh used a Ryder truck and a load of fertilizer to kill over a hundred and twenty five. The truck driver in Nice drove a truck through a crowd (much like the concert crowd) and killed eighty nine. And of course 9/11 used loaded aircraft to kill thousands. The Ricen attack in Japan, the Anthrax mail attack, the Unabomber never shot anybody.
Has any politician called for the prosecution of Ryder for someone using their truck as a weapon to kill? Banned trucks? Background checks to buy a plane ticket?
No.
the using of a Bump Fire stock by the Las Vegas shooter is about as important and the octane rating of the Nice truck attract fuel. Or the manufacturer of the barrels that McVeigh used in Oklahoma City.
The decision to commit mass murder is the problem, not the tool used to commit the crime.
Had the Vegas killer used the slingshots made for throwing water balloons on the beach to hurl improvised explosives at the crowd been less of a crime? Should he have driven a truck through the crowd?
Not to say that the weapons used are insignificant (obviously they are not) but to focus on them is a misdirection. Many times used by the less moral of us to push an agenda that has little or nothing to do with the act itself.
The idea that the shooter would have been less effective with a normal stock on his rifle is as inane an argument as his choice of ammunition or rifle manufacturer.
The politically genius, but logically foolish, idea that a person who has made the decision, planned, and equipped himself to commit the murder of as many people as possible, would have stopped at the front door due to a sign banning guns on the premises is the height of idiocy.
Evil is in the heart of man, the weapon, tool, implement used to carry out that evil is nearly irrelevant.
Every generation has had the same arguments, going back centuries like;
The cartridge case ammunition will enable soldiers to waste ammunition.
That damn yankee rifle you load on Sunday and shoot all week (lever action)
The wheel lock is made to be easily concealed.
The Roman gladius sword is a killing blade
The iron sword is an advantage over the brass sword
The chariot, the sling, not to mention the bow and arrow at the Battle of Hastings were all criticized by the weak minded and the losing side as unfair, unsporting, uncivil. I’m sure the mounted knights didn’t like the advent of firearms either.
Will we ever know the circumstance surrounding the motivations or events leading up to the Las Vegas shooting? I hope so.
Should we legislate (“we have do do something”) based on the implement used to commit the act of mass murder? No.
Is there anything that can be done? Maybe.
Perhaps not demonizing anyone who disagrees with you over any and every topic. Grandstanding and triangulating stances on political issues, not based on truth, but sound bites and polling data. Maybe we dont need politicians, but Statesman.
Could anything have prevented this crime. Probably not, but trying to say that if your particular issue had been addressed previously that the deaths would have been fewer or the crime not committed at all and must be implemented now is disingenuous and insincere.
I pray for all the victims and families that have been affected. But please don’t make it about a political party agenda.