One Nation Under The NRA

“Imagine losing the Amazon and the Antarctic ice sheets. Well, it’s happening: ‘The estimated mass of particulate organic carbon held in sediments beneath the Antarctic Ice Sheet is up to an order of magnitude greater than that associated with northern hemisphere permafrost.’” Jeffrey St. Clair, Counterpunch

Maybe we’ve got it all wrong. Instead of trying to pass firearm laws, background checks, red flag warnings, all that sensible stuff, maybe we should simply pass a law mandating that every man, woman, and child in the United States own a firearm. Maybe the law should also require every American over the age of 16 to carry a loaded firearm at all times -- to school, the grocery store, the dentist, the church, synagogue and mosque, to the doctor, to weddings and funerals, to amusement parks and concerts, dance recitals and soccer games, to Dodger Stadium and Madison Square Garden. Think how happy this would make the NRA, and which of our national priorities is more vital than pleasing the NRA? Clean water? Breathable air? Safe food? Fuck all that. Forget a chicken in every pot and a car in every driveway. Let’s strive to put a firearm in the hands of every American! 

Fuck the piecemeal approach. Fuck doubling-down. Let’s triple down on the American penchant for violence and blood. It’s our birthright after all, the way we became who we are today. Let each and every American embrace his or her inner sociopath. Lock and load people. Don’t give your 7-year-old an iPad -- give her a 9mm Glock with a full magazine. “Run along now, go shoot something, or somebody. Just be home in time for lunch.”

I’m being facetious, but only just so. America is a fucking open-air insane asylum, ruled by a tyrannical minority of wealthy people and institutions, with a bloated imbecile at its head. Every time there’s a mass shooting, the wacky right pulls its tired, worn bullshit off the shelf:

“Guns don’t kill people, criminals kill people. Our focus must be on the criminals. (By the way, wink, wink, dog whistle, the criminals are all black or brown.)”

“Gun violence is the result of moral decline. If the Ten Commandments were posted in every public place, we wouldn’t see the level of carnage we’re seeing. Our moral decline must be stopped. Christian faith is the answer.” 

“The problem is that when we teach evolution in schools we disconnect our children from God. How can we then expect them to know right from wrong? If you tell a child he rose from the primordial slime rather than the blessed loins of the virgin Mary, that child will not value human life!”

“Mental illness is the problem.”

“Gun violence is caused by violent video games.”

The NRA and its cowardly enablers in Congress talk around and around, mentioning everything except guns. An overwhelming percentage of Americans want sensible, reasonable, restrictions on the purchase of firearms, particularly military-style assault weapons, but our political system is so corrupt and rotted that what the majority desires is brushed aside, ignored. 

Our dipshit president claims that Congress is working on many proposals to curb gun violence, great stuff, big ideas that will soon roll down Capitol Hill. These ideas are certain to be as fantastic, and invisible, as Trump’s health care plan, as certain as Mexico coughing up the money for Trump’s racist wall, as certain as our manufacturing base returning from China. If Congress failed to enact meaningful gun legislation after the October 2017 Las Vegas massacre, during which one gunman killed 58 people and wounded more than 400, if that slaughter couldn’t goad Congress into action, what will? How many deaths is too many?

No death threshold is too high for the NRA. 

Our political leaders can’t even be bothered to come up with better talking points. They obviously think the people are stupid, and perhaps they are right. When morally bankrupt motherfuckers like Mitch McConnell, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Steve King, and Rick Scott get elected and re-elected, and a human cesspool like Donald J. Trump ascends to the highest office in the land, maybe we -- and I mean citizens, voters, people of good will and decency -- are reaping the whirlwind of decades of silence and passivity. American oligarchs don’t fear us, they don’t believe we can channel our outrage into mass acts of civil disobedience that will bring our sick and weary society to a grinding stop. 

All the potentates understand, and the only way to force them to act, is to confront them with the potential loss of their profit, position, advantage, and privilege.