No mental health issue in america.
 

Number 8 for school shootings in 2018, over 200 school shootings since Sandy Hook, but we don't have any issues; move along. Our kids are disconnected, desensitized with violent video games and they come home to two working parents too tired to turn off the TV and social media to listen and hear.

Put that together with easy access to weapons of mass destruction and it's no wonder we are on this pace. I won't start the AR debate, since a semi auto pistol probably could do the same damage, but this troubled teen posted he was going to be a professional school shooter and nobody questions him or his parents?

Mental health is a big issue, tied to these shootings, the opioid epidemic, but let's fund the wall first; got to take care of campaign promises.

Fund Mental and Physical health and infrastructure and you can reduce the number of people dying far more than spending Billions on terrorism.
But it's not as sexy
The Fatal Numbers:

The odds of being the victim of a shark attack are 1 in 11.5 million worldwide. Although there are 65 annual shark attacks each year, only a handful are fatal. Compared to this, a person is 3 times more likely to drown and 30 times more likely to be hit by lightning.
Compared to being killed by a dog, the likelihood of which is 1 in 18 million, a person is twice as likely to win the lottery and 5 times as likely to be struck by lightning.
One in 8 men and 1 in 24 women over the age of 40 will die from a sudden heart attack, while 1 in 4 men and 1 in 5 women will die from cancer.
Worldwide, 1 in about 2,050 people will die each year from unclean water, which carries numerous, life-threatening diseases. Each year, more people die from a lack of clean water than from wars.
The chances of being killed in a terrorist attack are about 1 in 20 million. A person is as likely to be killed by his or her own furniture, and more likely to die in a car accident, drown in a bathtub, or in a building fire than from a terrorist attack.
The chances a person will be killed by an asteroid are 1 in 200,000, which is much higher than the odds of being killed by hail, which is 1 in 734,400,000.
Each year, 1 out of 100,000 people die in a skydiving accident, which is 17 times lower than the risk of dying in a car accident.
11 out of every 100,000 women in the United States will die after giving birth, which is ranked ahead of 40 other countries in maternal mortality. Obesity and the prevalence of C-sections have contributed to the increase in maternal mortality rates.
The odds of dying in a severe storm are 1 in 68,388. A person is more likely to die slipping in his or her bathtub, which occurs at a rate of 1 in 11,469.
A person’s chances of dying in an elevator are 1 in 10,440,000. Due to successful elevator brake systems, an elevator has plunged only once—in the Empire State Building in 1945.
The lifetime probability of dying in a car accident is 1 in 100, which is 200 times higher than the probability of dying in a plane crash.
While 1 out of 5 people fear the possibility of being murdered, the odds that a person will be murdered in any given year are about 1 in 18,690. According to the FBI, violent crime is now at a near-historic low.
According to the CDC, the infant mortality rate is about 6 for every 1,000 live births, which is more than 10 times higher than the mortality rate of the county with the highest vehicle mortality rate—San Bernardino, California—in the country.
The chance of being killed by a bear while visiting Yellowstone National Park is 1 in 2.1 million. As a park visitor, a person is more likely to die from drowning or burns sustained from falling into a thermal pool.

More often than not the parents effectively give up their roles as parents and "expect" the school system to raise their kids.

When their "little angel" gets punished for breaking any of the school rules, these same parents will blame the school but never their "angel".

When their "angel" goes on a killing spree, these same parents will claim that it was "everyone else's" fault but never their own negligence that created this satan spawn.


This latest POS was expelled from said school, and when the police came he had an exit plan...join the rest of the students and walk out.
Mental issue? sure, but more diabolical because he had planned his "get away".

Does Florida have the death penalty???

The problem you have is one side doesn't want to think there's a mental Health problem, and the other side doesn't want to think there's a gun problem.

When the answer is probably in the middle....and nobody wants to look there.

"Our kids are disconnected, desensitized with violent video games and they come home to two working parents too tired to turn off the TV and social media to listen and hear. "

Exactly, exactly. Our culture is sick, our moral compass is in need of repair. Parents aren't spending enough time with their kids.

" won't start the AR debate, since a semi auto pistol probably could do the same damage"

True, but these types of weapons have a sexy look, which fuels the fantasies of a small number of very sick folks.

"nobody questions him or his parents? "

This was a deeply disturbed kid who lost both of his adopted parents by the time he was 18.

This kid was so broken, that his high school determined he could not bring a backpack to school. He could not be trusted with a backpack, but he passes a background test to get an AR15? How the hell does that happen? We aren't even TRYING to protect our kids. This kid did everything but wear a sign saying "I am a mass murderer", and no one did anything.

We need a conversation about guns, about lousy parents, about the senseless violence we bombard our kids with (TV, video games, music) about endless access to the internet, and about being proactive about locking up the mentally ill, rather than waiting until after they snap.

Fortunately my senator Chris Murphy is out there on his soap box, saying that the gun caused this all by itself. Someone should ask Mr Murphy why gun crime is so low in the Dakotas, despite the fact that everyone owns guns. Instead of mocking those people by calling them bitter clingers and deplorable, maybe there is a valuable lesson to learn about they way they live and treat each other.

Good post GS.

Maybe we should also stop electing politicians based on how pretty or popular they are, and instead elect people who can solve problems.

Bingo.

This sounds catchy but doesn't make much sense. Have democrats been ignoring the mental health aspects? Didn't Trump revoke an Obama era bill to make it harder for people to get guns?

Another tragedy and another round of there's nothing we can do.

"This sounds catchy but doesn't make much sense"

Correction, it doesn't make sense to you. Nothing makes sense to you unless it attacks conservatives and exonerates liberals.

"Have democrats been ignoring the mental health aspects?"

Liberals tend to support the idea of people being allowed to enjoy freedom unless they are a clear and imminent threat. Obviously, if we err on that side, that means we are going to make some mistakes we must live with. Always a balance between liberty and security. Also, liberals (at least liberal politicians) take a ton of money from the entertainment industry, and are thus reluctant to call on them to reduce violence.

And the conservative politicians obviously pander to the NRA, and thus are generally resistant to additional gun control.

There's all kinds of things we "can" do. But we don't, because each side is too beholden to their patrons, and too rigid in their ideology..

This will make perfect sense once the Kool-Aid buzz wears off. Its a combination that may be the answer or at least a step in the right direction. The Obama Era bill was more about who was collecting SS benefits than who is actually suffering from Mental Illnesses.

While Florida has a three-day waiting period for handgun purchases, anyone without a felony record, domestic abuse conviction or a handful of other stuff can walk into a gun store, wait a few minutes to clear a background check, and walk out with an AR-15-style rifle, magazines and ammunition.

Under federal law, you also must be 21 to buy a handgun from a firearms dealer. But 18-year-olds can buy semiautomatic rifles

I see, so where are all these Democrats trying help the mentally ill purchase firearms?

I take it the "Fortunately" part is sarcasm.
Sounds like a deranged individual to make a statement like that, even worse that he is a Senator.

Guns are no more responsible for school shootings than penises are responsible for rape.

We could go on all day with statistics, being angry about innocent people losing their lives and the evil that exists while blaming an inanimate object is counterproductive. Those murders are horrible, nothing can bring those people back, maybe vigilance can help prevent further shootings but impossible to prevent all.


The thing that bothers me most when this happens is the instant it happens , those with an agenda fall over themselves to be the first to spout off about further restricting law abiding people's rights that have been infringed upon over and over again with the same results, that is insane. These people we elect to government only want control and are willing to bankrupt the country to achieve it.

So, Is this an example of the "serious discussions" that the gun control folks want to have?
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Maybe you should refer to them as the anti senseless mass killing folks.

We need a wall (border security actually) because people that should not be here come here illegally. But we can't have that conversation because one side doesn't want to solve it - but instead wants to use it as a wedge issue.

Item two, reports are this kid was mentioned to the FBI and other LE and they did nothing or could not so anything.


^^^^ Nobody is willing to dance in the middle of the floor. 50 years ago the (very) mentally ill were locked up and now today, they and the less so are pilled up instead. Everyone sits to protect their sacred cows. You never hear the people wanting to take the guns discuss the problem with black teens being by far the highest murder rate - fix this and you fix the equivalent of a hundred schools - nor suicide, being the highest overall rate of firearms death. But people are perfectly capable of using at as wedge.

Every one of of these mass shootings have been a lost boy with problems, someone doing in the name of religion, or a lost boy doing in the name of religion. But some people want to decide what kind of weapons people, LEGALLY purchase. The significant majority of lawful gun owners do not do bad #^&#^&#^&#^& that would jeopardize their ability to exercise their constitutional rights.

No, Trump repealed an Obama exorder that made people collecting with disabilities difficult to get a gun. That rule broad brushed many people that would not be a threat from purchasing firearms.

^^^ This. But it sounded good and fits nicley in a sound bite.

And this is why we can't have debate.

Yes the fortunately was sarcastic.

The gun is an inanimate object. But certain guns like the AR-15, unfortunately, do fuel the fantasies of a small number of deranged folks. We can’t pretend that’s not true. I’m not saying the gun is the sole cause, but in some cases, it is a contributing factor. Some people are turned on by these guns.
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Only if you have shot one.
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If there was no such thing as an AR-15 type, would slick looking hand guns (which are semi-automatic and can shoot at the same rate of speed as an AR15) fuel the fantasies of the deranged folks you speak of? If those folks kill because their fantasies are fueled by AR-15s, are we to assume they would not go on killing sprees if there were no AR-15s?

I'd think that to fire at that rate and hit anything at much distance would take a lot more skill with a handgun than an AR-15. But a big issue here is simply muzzle velocity, capacity and the ability for victims to survive. The AR-15 was designed for war, not hunting or home protection. This is the opinion of so many military leaders and veteran doctors. A high velocity wound is very deadly.

Handguns certainly have their own cool factor, but it doesn't seem to be much of an influence for the worst mass shootings.

As I've said before, shooting for sport is fun, hunting (most of it) is good and home defense is a real thing. Doesn't mean we need nearly instant access to near military grade weapons.

You should probably research the number of bills proposed by democrats to address mental health as it relates to guns. I have to assume that you don't know given your statement.

I don’t know what would happen if things were different. I only know that mass killings not related to terrorism, seem to be frequently carried out by these things. He didn’t pick a handgun. I wouldn’t say the gun caused this. But I’d bet every cent I have, that in some cases, it fuels the fantasy. And I’d be right. I never took a psychology class but I know I’m right. I don’t know that this truth suggests any public policy that addresses it. Im just stating something that I don’t think can be refuted. If there were no such thing as rifles, I’d bet that this guy and Adam Lanza would have done what they did.
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This doesn't answer my question to Jim. Now, if you're saying that if there were no AR-15s there would be no mass killings, that would be closer to an answer to my question.

Before AR-15's, the guns that existed, hand or rifle, held the fascination of deranged, as well as normal, men, especially young ones. You, personally, may be sure of yourself in your opinion. I'm not sure of your opinion. I remember a fascination with six shooter pistols being almost universal among young boys who, most of them, had fancy looking cap guns they got for Christmas or birthdays. Almost all of us had them, and we played shoot-em-up games with them. Cowboy movies and comic books and heroes from Tom Mix, to Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, and several others were models which we emulated. A lot of the guys had BB guns. Some acted dangerously, malevolently with them. Later, post-cowboy era, there were some neat hand-guns wielded by movie types like Dirty Harry. Clint Eastwood had a really cool long barrel six gun in his Spaghetti Western movies. There was a kind of reverence for the .44 Magnum among young guys because it was supposedly so powerful, almost God-like among guns. Even now there are a lot of really cool looking and highly effective as well as a great variety of hand guns that owners like to proudly show off and talk about how easily they handle and how accurate they are.

I agree with you that Lanza and this guy (and others) would have done what they did if there were no AR-15s. And this guy, apparently had bombs as well as other guns. Times are different in our society from what they were when I was a kid. And I don't think AR-15s are the reason for that difference.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruger_...e:Mini14GB.jpgThe Ruger Mini 14 (pic attached below) is more accurate than most AR15s and has been around a helluva lot longer.

The AR15 is like when we used to tune out Abu 6500 series reels - we'd would simply customize them how we woulds want.




For some perhaps, but for most, the AR15 is a fine shooting, comfortable, customization rifle. Just a Swiss Army knife of a rifle for sport, fun, or even hunting

What we need to do is find a way to get the Adam Lanzas away from firearms.

I'm sorry but guns do not fuel these fantasies.

We need to stop coddling our kids, teaching them that everyone wins and that everyone is good

Too many people in this country with good intentions parent with a hands off attitude. If you let the kid dress the part, they will act the part

Too many single parent households or households where both parents are working when the kids come home from school

Too many kids are taught to accept everyone, no matter what there style, what they like how the act, how they dress

Instead we should be teaching our kids things that could be a red flag. Its called street smarts. Tell a teacher or an adult if you think someone is acting threatening,or they are making you uncomfortable.

They interviewed kids after this shooting and they all said they knew he would do this

I am sure some of his friends knew he had a gun, knew he was unstable, knew it was him that made the YouTube video, but no one of them spoke out

How does the FBI who can get FISA warrants on false information not get a warrant to find out who the kid in the YouTube video was

Why didn't the school alert the authorities as to his dangerousness

Why was he let back on school grounds especially after being expelled from 3 different schools on three different occasions

It might be time in this country for public schools to go to a dress code so everyone looks the same,ban outlandish hair styles, make everyone on the same 0laying field so know one persons feelings get hurt.

Its time to have a serious conversation a out public schools and the security they use. Why are there no shootings in private or parochial schools?


I am sick of the lefts response to every shooting get serious because guns aren't going away. There are other amendments to the constitution that prohibit the taking of legally purchased goods that are later outlawed You can ban Assault Weapons but there are enough in circulation that you will never rid the country of them, nor should you want to because they aren't the problem

That's just another rhetorical deke you're leaning towards. The "if you stop all of them you can't stop any of them" defense. It's a complex issue but to be paralyzed to any action because of political interests is really stupid.

Any so why aren't they used in mass shootings? Is it because they don't have the killing power afforded all those "cosmetic" options or perhaps as Jim says just don't have the sex appeal a killer is looking for?

Easy access to assault weapons is but part of the problem but it is part of the problem.

"For some perhaps, but for most, the AR15 is a fine shooting, comfortable, customization rifle. Just a Swiss Army knife of a rifle for sport, fun, or even hunting"

Agreed 100%. I am talking about a very small (not small enough) number of very sick people with dark and violent fantasies. When they snap, they don't usually show up with my granddad's Marlin .22.

I'm not saying we should ban them. I guess I'm just pointing out, that since many here deny that there is any connection between these "sexy" guns and the rare mass killings, it shows how impossible it is to have a productive dialogue. Both sides are too rigid in their ideology.

It's not the guns causing this. You solve a problem, ultimately, by addressing the underlying cause. and the underlying cause, is that we don't care about each other the way we used to. We can put armed guards in schools, we can ban bump stocks and high capacity magazines, and those things might reduce the body count, but they are addressing the symptom, not the underlying problem.

The underlying problem, is that our moral compass is broken. We mock traditional family values, when we should be doing everything we can to encourage them, because they work better than anything else that we know of. Secular progressivism and the internet, are exacerbating the underlying problem. Probably not causing it, but obviously making it worse. 75% of black babies are now born without a dad. Hooray! If that represents some great cultural leap forward, the benefit is sure lost on me.

"I'm sorry but guns do not fuel these fantasies. "

And you'd know this how?

These guns don't perform much differently from other, more boring-looking guns. But the AR-15 is extremely popular. It's partly because of the look.

"Too many single parent households or households where both parents are working when the kids come home from school"

Agreed 100%. A hundred percent. My wife hasn't worked in 7 years, it has been a disaster for our net worth (most of our vacations are camping and we drive old cars), but I wouldn't do it differently. I was at a cub scour trip to a local fire station last night, and you could se these out-of-control 8 year-olds, whose parents could not stop them from behaving terribly.

"Why didn't the school alert the authorities as to his dangerousness"

Bingo. The school would not let this kid have a backpack, yet he was able to get an AR-15. That is insane. If we couldn't spot the red flags this kid was putting up, we aren't doing anything to stop anybody.

Agreed 100%.

Unfortunately, every different part of the problem, has people who make a lot of money from the thing in question. The entertainment industry gets rich by glorifying violence. The NRA gets rich off the gun culture. So we are incapable of doing anything.

Someone really needs to get Chris Murphy to shut the hell up. He'll be a US senator until my kids are older than I am now. That's just great.

Honestly you have just gone full blown stupid

And then you leaned toward the deke of the straw man. I didn't apply nor even imply the "if you can't stop all you can't stop any" notion. It was stupid of you to put words or intentions in my statement that were not remotely in it. That is not an argument. That is not a reasonable discussion. And I was wrong, that is not even a leaning toward a deke. It is a deke.

Jim, you seem to lean on the 75% statistic a lot but when is the last time a black person was involved in a mass shooting? If anything is common in these instances it is they are all white for the most part. I love guns,especially the type used in these shootings but something is wrong. And it seems to be getting worse. We have lost our respect for life when these crimes are committed without relevant targets.
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My condolences to the families that lost loved ones...I hate politics and stay as far away from it as I can...everyone need to meet and "dance in the middle of the floor" if anything is to be done.. great line guy's!... but I cant help but notice one thing..

Most of these extremely sick individuals don't walk into the police station or an army barracks ( fort hood the exception) and pull this crap.. I wonder why.

Eliminating something that is considered by some to be a contributing "part" of a larger complex problem because it is easy to access is not a solution if eliminating that something imposes on the rights of everyone else.

And if the problem exists due to specific causes that don't depend on all of the reputed "parts" of the problem, not only would it be unjust to eliminate all those peripheral parts, it would not solve the specific problem.

Since the 1960's our American society and culture has become less certain and more fragmented. There has been a huge loss of confidence in the values that predominated before the mid 20th century. That confidence had been degraded by smaller degrees before that, but the slow onslaught of academic relativism slipped into hyperdrive in the 1960's. It was modeled by Post Modern Cultural Marxism which denies any certainty and sees only power as the end and aim of existence, and which fuels the romance of class warfare and the disintegration of the founding American structure.

New heroes were made of younger identity splinter groups such as the Black Panthers, Weather Underground, Symbionese Liberation Army, etc.. Anti-war pacifists railed against American military might and exposed us as imperialists and rapists of the third world. America was painted as a racist, sexual and religious oppressive force in the world. College campuses became the high court of social justice and the battlefield against American oppression. And that has progressed since then into the right to censor any thought or speech that is counter to their intellectual rules of global order. Even to the point of justifying physical attacks on those who don't agree with them.

Notions of gender, freedom of speech or religion, rights to property, individualism in general, must all to be destroyed. Individual identity is subservient to group identity, or is irrelevant altogether. We are reduced to the struggle to gain power. That struggle is armed through force and violence. Notions of "reasonable discussions" are actually occasions to eliminate opposing ideas. Language has been inverted to Orwellian opposites. Justice is force. Government is power. Equality is mandated sameness. Freedom is granted and prescribed limitation. Reason is consensus or state edict. Life is meaningless and qualified only by social construct.

What once was considered a power and source of good, America, is now an antiquated notion of white supremacy and a retrograde imposition on the progress of world justice. It is the center of capitalist domination of the world's masses, a barrier to the equality of the world's people. And it must be made to feel guilty of its past and present transgressions. And so must Europe and all white societies. Justice cries for all the oppressed non-whites to have their equal share of "white privilege." And if the means to that end requires violence--so be it.

The present Progressive model of there being no power greater than the state, facilitated by state force and coercion, is a godless model that inspires renegades to take all power to themselves. If a renegade seeks notoriety, he must do so within the norms that will recognize his power as something to be admired. In a world that sees power as the ultimate end to existence, what greater admiration can there be than gaining power over the lives of others.

A couple of things to think about and they are just statistics
School shootings are a small portion of the shootings in the US
The US has by far the highest level of gun violence in the developed world
Most shootings are of the same race, you shoot who you know
6 americans have died per year from islamic terrorists
Over 13,000 have died per year from gun violence

I'm sure you have seen this before
 

1967 – Jayne Mansfield is killed when her car runs under the rear end of a tractor trailer. Since then, all trailers have a DOT bar at the rear to keep cars from going under them.
1982 – Seven people die when Tylenol packaging was tampered with. Since then, it takes a PhD, channel locks, and a sharp object to get into a bottle of pills.
2001 – One person attempts to blow up a plane with a shoe bomb. Since then, all air travelers have to take off their shoes for scanning before being allowed to board.
Since 1968 – 1,516, 863 people die from guns on American soil. Since then, the problem apparently can’t be solved except with thoughts and prayers. AND JU$T WHY DO YOU THINK THI$ I$???

That comment and reading others after every shooting like this remind of the Onion headline a few months ago which was something like

"Mass shootings can't be stopped says the only nation to have mass shootings"

C'mon man . . . you keep trotting out small selective lists of statistics out of the millions of stats as if that was supposed to give us a hint on the easy solution to something that doesn't even meaningfully relate to other things which are not difficult to fix. making cars safer, commercial flying, making pill bottles tamper proof don't necessarily correlate to murder. What's the easy solution to stop some crazy person from driving his truck into a crowd of people? How do you stop an airplane pilot from deliberately crashing his plane? How do you stop someone from overdosing on pills?

"AND JU$T WHY DO YOU THINK THI$ I$???[/"

Because like it or not, nowhere in the constitution does it say pill bottles must be easy to open, nor does it say you cannot be asked to take your shoes off at the airport. But it does say something about the right to keep and bear arms not being infringed. We don't get to ignore the parts of the constitution we don't happen to like at the moment. If we want to change the constitution, there is a mechanism to do that. But we can't pretend that it doesn't say what it says.

The other challenge, is that regardless of what we do with gun control, there are tens of millions of guns out there, and we cannot confiscate the ones that are out there.

Politically, we are paralyzed because neither side seems willing to budge from a rigid ideological stance.