Summations Only

Disarming the citizens would make it easier for a coup to take place, right?

and yet the founders were as much sinners as you and I. There is no superior enlightenment that the founders had more than anyone else.

The pen is mightier than the sword. Unless the sword being referred to is the word of God.Personally, regarding fantasy scenarios etc...If the planet is in fact involved in a spiritual war...by this I mean if one group of people wish to oppress another group of people...guns won't solve the problem.Many of today's Christians are knowingly or unknowingly in love with the idea of blind patriotism. Some even see Christianity as patriotic and very American.The fact is, however..that Jesus never was an American...nor even of the standard Western mindset.Guns, however...are.

These statistics force us to really look at the big picture in terms of spending more money on security/bombs or spending more on education and quality of life in the US.

The semi-automatic argument is coming up again. The shooter in Vegas was apparently a successful accountant and a compulsive gambler. I'm wondering whether the focus should be on the bump stock devices found in the hotel room or on the brain disorders associated with compulsive gambling? The news interviewed the shooters brother who said he was flabbergasted that his brother was capable of anything such as this. The media will focus on the number of guns that the man owned but the red flag that caught my attention was the compulsive gambling. It really does change the brain.

Communication in a free society is encouraged. A tweet from a president has much less impact than a talk show host who uses his normally comedic platform to address the reality that we all live in and share. Props to Kimmel and others.

Colorado man killed in Las Vegas mass shooting previously gave haunting description of becoming a target of gunfire. Wow! Now his facebook post has become part of his memorial!

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It was never fear, to be honest, mass confusion. Sensory overloadfollowed by the most amount of natural adrenaline that could never be duplicated through a needle, Roybal wrote in the July 18 message that mentioned bullets pinging off metal all around him.

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These words will be stuck with me forever. I will never forgive this world from taking him away, his girlfriend Maree Elmore wrote in a Facebook post on Monday referring to Roybal’s self-answered question: What’s it like being shot at?

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How would you like your EvC posts to become part of your memorial?

I was (as usual) thinking of myself...but the question goes out to all of us. What we say today may be in the headlines timorrow...if we were a victim. Which brings up another question...wonder if the alleged shooter craved the excitement of becoming infamous? Perhaps the psychologists will eventually figure him out...but the bigger question is when society itself will collectively figure itself out?
Add by edit: A message for Congress: Edited by Phat, : No reason given.

The Forensic Panelchairman, Dr.Michael Welner who is a forensic psychiatrist, described a broad profile of Stephen Paddock, the Las Vegas mass murderer. I was surprised that he never touched on the compulsive gambling issue, but he did indicate the following:

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Dr. Welner tells us that the first place to begin building an understanding of the killer is to look at his victims. In this case, Paddock had no relationship to the victims. Paddock’s victims were also people who represented Americana and guns.

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This puts Paddock into a small category of killers who commit a stranger mass homicide. The Dr. then lists the two categories of stranger mass homicides:

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Persons trying to transcend notoriety to become famous like James Holmes (Dr. Welner worked the James Holmes case)

Persons who kill for a cause

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Dr. Welner dismisses the possibility of Paddock killing for notoriety sake because of that:
is a young man’s crime. And this is a sixty-four-year-old with no dramatic mental illness, no major decline, someone who’s intact.
Then he focuses his comments on where the evidence has brought him:

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I think if we want to understand what’s behind the crime we should look at James Hodgkinson, the shooter of Congressman Scalise because that crime was intended to be a spectacle of much bigger scope.
A spectacle is designed to either have some derivative impact or to instigate some cause discussion.
[]People who commit mass killings of folks that they don’t know have to be detached and he’s detached. He’s many floors away, he’s killing them through a scope, they’re dehumanized.
absolutely people who are gun enthusiasts and who are populists or nationalists in this country are dehumanized. They’re demonized.

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I travel all over the United States and I don’t experience hatred. I turn on the television and I see these people demonized.

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Dr. Welner then cites the CBS executive who said the concert-goers deserved what they got and added that CNN is going to have to answer for how they demonize gun enthusiasts and how CNN actually contributes to mass shooting. And, I believe that they do..

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According to the doctor it’s the constant drumbeat coming from the mainstream media that allowed Paddock to feel righteously justified in committing mass murderSo here is my take on this. Right now, the Right Wing is in control. They are backed by the vast money of the N.R.A. and in addition, are fueling a culture of paranoia that depicts America struggling against the evil in the world, such as Kim Jong Un.The Republican majority most definitely does not want to focus on the issue of gun violence or gun ownership rights. our own jar has himself stated that its not the guns...its the people. So its a cultural makeover that is needed. The right-wing ideology depicts a hostile world with many enemies. They salute and glorify police and military personnel. Our culture is authoritarian. The fear of a globalist agenda is being presented as part of the counter agenda of the nationalist right wing.Of course, the leftist ideology is in control of much of the media...though unlike Faith, I do not demonize leftist ideology as any worse than far-right authoritarian ideology. I too believe that it is the people. On a bad day, I might blame Satan, but I will agree that it is our collective responsibility to understand our national psychosis. Edited by Phat, : No reason given.Edited by Phat, : No reason given.

I suppose it was an assumption. Lemme do a bit of googling and sift through the propaganda... and while I'm at it I'll make another assumption. This whole idea of "fake news" has some validity in my mind and I dont believe that it is either a Leftist plot or a Far Right plot. These days there is so much information out there and it cannot be taken without question. When I was growing up, we had the World Book Encyclopedia as our internet, and it was usually a trusted source. These days, however, I can find ten articles on the internet and need to actively discriminate as to the best most accurate one.If I run it through my bias towards Theism, Conservativism or Liberalism, I will arrive at differing lists for the most accurate. How does one remain unbiased when choosing which sources are the closest to the truth?

Well, I saw him on a conservative news source: Fox & Friends. Evidently he is the real deal, although I agree that his answer seemed designed to strike back at liberal criticism...so his "authority" is being used to strike a blow in favor of far right ideology against leftist ideology.Were it I, I would have added two observations.1) The overwhelming majority of mass killers who use guns are male. Guns are a phallic symbol of aggression.
2) The compulsive gambling is a huge issue as to what may have triggered his obsessive, detached outburst. Also a reason why he may have been suicidal to begin with. An angry white male.Was his attack politically motivated? Was he one of Trumps base? If so, why kill country music folks? They are Trumps base too, 60% or so plus.

I disagree with the notoriety angle. I think it was more of a premeditated response to depression triggered by a losing streak.
Here is my synopsis:
He was a compulsive gambler. Politically, he was likely a conservative. He had genetic mental health issues, but these normally would not have been the predisposing factor. The factor was, as Percy suggested, that he was a compulsive/obsessive OCD brain damaged individual. We don't know what exactly he was angry at or whom, but it appears to be non-political...despite the forensic claim that the media needs to be more sensitive to gun owners.I agree totally that he had lost much of his money and felt that he was failing (losing) at life. The attack was premeditated, and the fact that it was set up at a casino seems to suggest that he was mad at having his luck run out and his money(dreams) taken from him. So he lashed out in a depersonalized way. The target in my mind was Las Vegas itself.

So what or whom do we get mad at? Everyone is reading about it. Thoughts and prayers abound. But legislation is as usual up in the air. We need consensus. Edited by Phat, : No reason given.

Well, if nothing is done after a mass shooting in conservative Texas at a church and involving innocent children as victims, nothing will ever get done.

Will it ever be possible to get rid of all of them?It's a bit like the nuclear genie. Getting rid of nuclear weapons will likely never happen. I feel that the chances are even less likely with guns.Of course, the argument is that if guns are controlled so that they cannot be easily purchased, the number of shootings and victims will inevitably decrease. The ball is in the public court. The debate is likely to drag on for years. The NRA is a powerful lobby that won't roll over quietly.And what of the black market? The old adage...that when guns are outlawed only outlaws will have guns...seems apt. The number of random deaths by mass shootigs would inevitably decrease, however. That much is likely.