I too often hear the media and even blogosphere entering discussions about gun control, antidepressants, parenting, school-involvement debates, etc… and it seems to me that rather than asking with true sincerity, seeking answers through genuine soul-searching introspect asking a simple question; “what’s causing these horrific events?” those who debate this issue seem more interested in providing their opinions and their points of view.

First of all this is NOT an issue unique to the U.S. We “Americans” suffer greatly from a serious case of egocentricity. I don’t mean this in a snarky fashion, but through a simple perspective of responses to these and many, many other issues, e.g. “the U.S. is the best country on Earth;” the U.S. is the only REAL democracy;” “the U.S. has the best education in the world;” “the U.S. is God’s country,” the U.S. has an ungodly volume of mass murders and they’re all related to our obsession with guns” and the egocentric statements can be quite lengthy.

For better or for worse, NONE of these statements are even remotely true, in fact quite fallacious most of the time. While we do seem to have an increase in crimes against masses of people using guns in this nation, this increase is not even remotely drastic enough to call them unique to the U.S.

I haven’t verified this information, but Wikipedia contains a listing of mass murders that clearly indicates that this is a world-wide concern and NOT uniquely American in any way. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers

One that is sharing the news right now is the horrific events in Norway in which the perpetrator, Anders Breivik is on trial for the mass murder of 77 people, including children at a summer camp; his weapons of choice; a Ruger Mini-14 Carbine, a Glock 34 semi-automatic and a car bomb.

You can see that the list of mass murders listed on Wikipedia is rather lengthy and is in no way unique to the U.S. and until we stop opting for instantaneous blame in this country and begin seeking the reality of what the root cause of these heinous acts is, we are never going to find the answer.

Underlying these acts are true social problems and they can’t be blamed on one media-fed fantasy. Blaming these on guns, fertilizer manufacturers (most homemade bombs are made with fertilizer), parenting, etc. is analogous to blaming drunk-driving deaths on Chevrolet or Ford and fails miserably in fixing the real problem.

You are absolutely right in your post – knee-jerk responses and deflecting the question; “why?” with “this is not the time to discuss, for we are still mourning the victims” will do nothing but buy time to console our egos until the next time it happens and the next and the next.

As a “Boomer Child” I witnessed all this in its progress in virtually every way you listed.

The downtown streets of the small town I grew up in, once a thriving and very REAL community in every sense of the word, is but a collection of defunct businesses and ramshackle, old, dilapidated, buildings now, IF the buildings are even still standing. Literally named “Main Street,” where business was, as you pointed out, a thriving store to store experience, is now nothing more than a hollow shell.

I watched the mom and pops go out of business when the K-marts and Walmarts rolled them over like an 18-wheeler rolls over an errant armadillo. In a matter of a few very short years, the small town of Shawnee, Oklahoma no longer resembled a community as we all became the pawns of the oligarchical corporate rulers. My father’s corner grocery store he bought with his retirement from the USPS is now just an empty lot on the corner where it once stood, much like a grave-marker for the community in which it served.

In an almost ironic twist, I later began a career in health care, working in hospitals and watched in horror as precisely the same thing happened again; beginning in the late 1970s/early 1980s the insurance industry began what is now referred to as the Diagnostic Related Group (DRGs) which in short time ruled the roost in the world of health care payments. Virtually all the one-time independent hospitals began joining the corporate bandwagon in an effort to deal with lost revenue as a result of insurance dictating what was going to be paid and what was not. We no longer have in existence community, independent hospitals in this country, amywhere; rather we now have massive corporate health care with little to no interest in patient care as they’ve changed the focus from patients to shareholder returns. In every sense of the word, patients are now nothing more than an inconvenient and even problematic side-show related to the real business of corporate health care. If you’ve had the unfortunate experience of visiting a hospital ER, you’ve witnessed this in action as you wait for hours upon hours to be treated as the corporations trim business expenses by reducing their number one expense – employees.

The very frightening thing about all this is that it happened as we watch, all under the auspices of “good business.”

Like Nazi Germany, it all seemed so benign until it was too late then too. Fascism is alive and doing very well indeed.

The stalemate in DC is the best example possible against arguing for any of the established systems. Yet they can’t see that for their blind ambition towards the vehemently stubborn pursuit of a false conclusion using circular argument; beginning with the very premise that; “A” is the best economy, therefore the conclusion is; “A” is the best economy.

I personally am opposed to the stupidity of politicians; therefore I am against the stupidity of politicians. While it is most certainly true, it is a logical fallacy and neither proves nor supports the assumption that politicians are stupid; but man can those DC slugs argue for the sake of argument.

And sadly, that’s precisely what we elect them to do.

When I left Oklahoma in 1971 at the age of 19, I moved to California where I met my wife. Her mom was in the real estate business and of course at the time, buying and selling California homes was an extremely lucrative business, but where I grew up one bought a home, lived in it until death or tornadoes blew it away, so I had a bit of culture shock to see people buying homes and moving five years later to a new one; it was a very foreign concept to me.

The intrinsic value of homes also includes an all but dead concept of community, wherein people knew one another, cared about one another and socialized without e-mail, cell phones and in many cases where I lived, even land lines. People saw people face to face and made a human connection to one another.

Until corporations entered the picture! I can still remember when K-Mart, then WalMart first appeared in the landscape and how within a few very short years, the small, mom and pop businesses began to rapidly disappear.

The corporatization of America, from education, healthcare and real estate investment was the death knell of America’s communities. Maybe good things do change with small steps and just maybe, we can undo the horrific harm Wall Street has done to the now clichéd Main Street.

But thanks for opening my eyes to the radical left. You’ve been such a good example. I’ll be sure to spread this to as many people as I know.

These are important notes to be sure, but anyone in college right now who isn’t aware of this is idiotic.