Off the cuff thoughts on the recent murders in Ohio and Texas

It sickens me that more people like the shooters in the recent Ohio and Texas murders are on the loose. All the talk about "thoughts and prayers" coming from the GOP is as worthless as used toilet paper. Nothing of value comes from the GOP or the gun lobby, save additional business for the undertaker.

Yet, the leftist argument that banning guns can not solve the problems that America has. We are a violent society which does a poor job of assimilating the "alienated" into the larger whole. These socially isolated people become ever more angry, as they are caught in a vicious cycle: People look for answers, find answers in extreme positions, extreme positions cause people to become isolated, isolated people look for even more extreme positions. Eventualy, they give up hope on the larger society, and either as an individual or part of an extremist group, lash out in a violent, destructive rage.

All too many people look for simplistic solutions. And the current president spouted simplistic sound bites which sounded like solutions to these people. Like religious zealots, these extremists felt they had the right to take the law into their own hands, restoring the purity of a white America.

America was never pure, and it was never an "Aryan" nation. Our first settlements, as well as our westward expansion, depended on the intermixing of peoples. Whether it was Dutch settlers developing relationships with the native Iroquois, southern whites raping their black slaves, Anglos mixing with Mexicans along our southern border, or everyone mixing with native Hawaiians, none of us are pure. And it is about time that we break the back of violent white supremacist culture.

Not having a homogenous culture has been both a great asset and a great liability for America. As an asset, we mix the best of ideas from all cultures to produce something greater than any of the originals. As a liability, the lack of consistant cultural shorthands leads us to conflicts which can escalate into violence. If our founding fathers knew then what we know now, I'm not sure if the 2nd amendment would have been ratified. But I'm sure that they would have considered it, as then, like today, many people depend on their guns for food and protection.

Is there a single definite answer to stopping gun violence - NO!   We can institute programs which cause people of different backgrounds, Rural and Urban, Black and White, Anglo and Latino, etc. to mix and develop connections with each other.  Our military does that in the field. But what about civilian life?  Might it be possible to look at our past and use FDR's employment programs (CCC, WPA, etc.) as models for ways to mix people of different backgrounds AND to give them employment when they need it most?

But first, we can start by teaching people that the last resort of the incompetent is the initial use of violence. Teach people how to communicate and assimilate into the larger society, and to gain value from that society. That might be a good start to reduce the number of these unwanted killing sprees....

Happiness is a warm gun.

It is a little ironic that the title of one Beatles' tune is "Happiness is a warm gun" when one of the Beatles died because of a crazy man with a gun.  Obviously, we need to make sure that crazy people do not get or have guns. But how do we do that when one of our fundamental rights would be impinged?

Unlike many pro gun people, I am willing to listen to arguments that might affect my right to keep and bear arms.  I am not afraid of my neighbors, nor do I think that I need a gun for self defense. I do not have any intention of walking into stores with my guns on display, as this would be a shout for attention and not have anything about my right to keep and bear arms. But I do worry now and then that there is a slow erosion of our right to keep and bear arms as a check and balance against the power of an over reaching government.

Using guns as a tool of revolution is an important right.  Yet, it's not a right that our founding fathers felt would be exercised often.  They felt that the inefficient structure of our government, with multiple sovereigns would provide a check and balance against tyranny. 
Sadly, there was one big problem.  America chose "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness" above "Peace, Order, and Good Government".  

The American myth would have us believe in the rugged individual, someone who needs no help from his friends.  The myth is embodied in the idea of the American Cowboy, someone who rides alone on the range, and only comes into town when delivering cattle to the railroad's stockyards.  If you look at the same Cowboy from Japanese eyes, they see a group forming to take care of a task, and focus on the function of the group and not the individual.  The truth lies somewhere in the middle of these positions.

I used the phrase "Peace, Order, and Good Government" in an earlier paragraph.  And this is what a lot of people think when they think of Canada.  They are just as prosperous as America, and yet, few people fear extreme poverty.  They have avoided warehousing their poor, and they treat their poor more humanely than we do.  No Canadian fears going broke because of medical bills, nor do Canadians worry about a Military Industrial complex starving the civilian economy of the funds needed for government to serve the people.

Canadians do not have a bill of rights that has the same force as those in the United States' Constitution. They have gradually traded freedom for security - but have done so, knowing what they have traded for. Two hundred and forty years ago, Americans would call them kin. But that was before the war of 1812. Now, we call them kindred folk - a very big difference, one that acknowledges the different evolution paths of our nations.

Am I advocating that we sacrifice our right to own guns for safety?  Definitely not!  But I feel that we should look at our neighbor to the North and learn from the things they are doing right - and then try to do them better.  One thing I can say, we'd never see bombastic windbags like Trump, Cruz, Santorum and others running the country.  Instead, we'd see a more middle of the road (albeit a little too far to the left for most Americans' tastes) leadership that focuses on the needs of the 95% instead of the 5%.

Reflections - Post San Bernardino

As much as I disagree with the NRA, I'll agree with them in regards to mass killings - it's not a gun problem, but a people problem. Gun free zones are meaningless in the same way that Drug free zones are meaningless. They are only a public statement that guns (or drugs) are not welcome, and not a reflection of reality - because those unwelcome items are already there.

Even if we were to take the NRA's stance that we have a mental health problem (in the case of the Connecticut school massacre in Sandy Hook), how do we change the mental health and legal systems (as well as provide adequate funding) to deal with such issues? If we focus on terrorism, how many freedoms do we want to sacrifice in the name of security? Can we trust our governments, with the history of corruption we have in this country (from both parties)?

We need intelligent regulation that crosses state lines, and has few (if any) loopholes. Population density and homogeneity is important. In areas of low population density, where people tend to be from a single ethnic group, we find a very low level of gun crime. In areas of high population density and a heterogeneous population base (such as in most urban areas), we find a high level of gun crime.

So, what do we do?

In the case of potential non-terrorist gun crime, we can work on providing better mental health treatment to people at a low cost. We can look for people who are alienated from society in general, and find ways to better integrate them into society - jobs, friends, social networks, etc. - so that they feel they have something to lose from going on violent rampages.

In the case of potential terrorist gun crime, we can allow the government to use a limited amount of spying tools (with appropriate warrants and vetted public monitoring to help protect us from becoming a police state) that analyze content and traffic on the internet (and associated social networks) to detect these terrorists (such as could have been done for the San Bernardino killings) and stop them.

Federal regulation based on population density and population heterogeneity must be enacted to supersede that existing on state levels, and must reflect the reality of metropolitan areas that cross state lines, as well as trafficking materials from areas with lenient regulation to those areas with restrictive regulation.   

Will this end all gun crime?

Certainly not!  America is a nation in love with its guns, and we have a constitution that protects our gun rights, in part, to insure that we can overthrow a tyrannical government. But, if we can cut this crime by a significant amount, we can start focusing on other problems that are just as important - such as seeing that ALL Americans who want a job can get a job (or have one provided to them that supplies them with a reasonable income).  I am tired of hearing Americans shout past each other, not listening to the valid points their opposition brings up. We have it in ourselves to make this nation a greater nation than it already is - Let's find a way to make it so.....