Certainly there needs to be some control over violent games and guns that are available to irresponsible people but legislation is not the real answer and never will be. “More legislation” has always been the safe political way to skirt the re7al problem and soothe the simpletons. Another law is but a bandaid on a dying, festered, gangrenous limb.
Many will say we kicked prayer and the Bible out of schools; perhaps that is part of the problem.
Others could point to the four major arms companies in Connecticut that provide tax money to the State, salaries to residents, guns and ammunition for assault type arms, and say “the chickens have come home to roost.”
Yet another could insist that armed guards be at every door and window of every church, school, theater and shopping mall as though more guards would do it.
Some would argue the few cases of home violations where the intruder was shot to justify everybody having a gun; those instances are few and not many have the grit or rationale to handle a gun in those cases. Most are crying for more “laws” when we can not read, understand or keep those we have.
What if a drunken school bus driver overturns a bus and 30 children die as the result?
Would there be a cry from all to ban alcohol? Of course not. The event has not happened–all dead at once—but it happens when drunken drivers kill them one by one or a few at a time, in cars, trucks, and buses in small numbers. The coverage on one at a time deaths is local and the grief is local but hearts are broken and children are dead just the same.
Hundreds of child fatalities each year are alcohol related yet there is no call for alcohol to be banned; the major reason? Could it be ABC tax revenue that provides jobs for bureaucrats? No doubt one reason, as prohibition proved, laws simply will not keep alcohol from those who want it. Likewise, a law will not keep a gun out of a killer’s hand, deranged or sane.
Careless, uneducated drivers and speed also are involved in highway deaths; should we insist that only professional drivers drive, and manufacture cars that are capable of a maximum of 40 miles per hour?
Prescription and OTC drugs also cripple and kill children by the hundreds, are we to ban those also?
The real cause will never be removed by present laws or more legislation. The children and adults are murdered by criminals or carelessness, a lack of character, mis-guided judgment, and no common sense. Those qualities or the lack of them, will never be instilled or removed by law.
The decision to make available a weapon such as a gun to an immature or mentally disturbed child or adult, teach him how to use it, allow him (or her) exposure to the violent entertainment in our society, can not be legislated away.
A better use of time and money, (as pertaining to the recent events) instead of more gun laws, would be to provide sincere, meaningful and comprehensive help to the many who struggle with caring for those with mental problems. Instead of pouring millions of dollars into the hands of foreign fanatics and extremists to produce more of the same, we should direct those funds to improve our own health problems.
The larger picture is that, as a nation, we wring our hands and claim to desire a social consciousness that cares for others and puts self last. Without a righteous standard higher than ourselves along with a desire to achieve it, we will not have it. A nation’s character rises no higher than that of its citizens.
History has proven that only a nation led by a tempered, non-fanatical, selfless, believing view of the Bible can do that. Even with our halting and stammering and half-heartedness toward the Bible, we have been blessed. A remnant of that higher moral fiber continues yet to influence our society. Let the critic produce a higher example elsewhere. To whom shall we go? Where shall we look for such better national example outside our borders? There are none, nor has there ever been one. All of the other nations’ fame and glory lie in the filthy trampled dust of history, gone forever. And, it appears many among us are determined to follow.
What we need is more of God and less of self, we need more conscientious Bible practice and less kooky preachers of man’s guesswork, we need more prayer and less talk, we need more guts to protect our liberties at home and freedom from tyrants abroad.
The United States of America yet stands as the light of real promise among all other nations but our light is getting dimmer with each succeeding generation. Men are ripping the threads from the fabric of our banner of right, truth, and morality away; and unless we change the course we are on, that flag will no longer fly over the land of the free and home of the brave or anywhere else.
Here is the law set above all men and their feeble institutions and it does not say the time it applies is only after death. In many places today and at certain times, it appears as “hell on earth” is not just a figure used in literature (as is seen in Revelation 4-18). When your loved ones have been killed by maniacs, all around you is burning and no hope is in sight, it is an appropriate description of your nation.
The USA is not excluded:
“The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.”