Thomas Zimmer: America Is Sacrificing Its Children at the Altar of the Gun

[Nevilledog]

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/america-is-sacrificing-its-children

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Not much has changed. What else is there to say?

This, at least: Much of this is the result of deliberate political choices, much of it could be remedied by political action. There are people responsible for what we are putting our children through: The ones who are committed to preventing that political action – and the party that elevates them to positions of power and influence. It doesn’t have to be this way. It’s not like this anywhere else. This is American exceptionalism in its true, abhorrent form.

I am writing this just hours after the shooting. And you know what is so utterly depressing about this situation? That there is just no realistic expectation this might generate the type of political response that is commensurate with the problem. Should I add a disclaimer: “Who knows, maybe/hopefully this time things will be different…”? After all, theoretically, a lot is possible.

But in the reality through which we are suffering, we all have a pretty clear understanding of what’s actually coming. First, we will get the fake-outraged “How dare you politicize this?!?” nonsense - yes, how dare anyone “politicize” an issue that ranks as one of the leading safety and health concerns in the country, a uniquely American problem for which *every other comparable country* has enacted a political solution?

Next, the Republican Party will keep embracing the gun cult, will only double down on the gun-toting militancy it has made a key element of its political identity. And the same lawmakers who are constantly reveling in the imagery of using guns to fight off those insidious “Un-American” forces, who preach paranoid self-defense against all kinds of “Others,” will insult us with their “How dare you insinuate that this has anything to do with us?!?” fake-indignation.

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