At times it seemed to me like Hunter S. Thompson had come roaring back from the dead, to write one more chapter of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
One where a 64-year-old man holed up in a hotel room with 23 guns opens fire on a crowd below for no apparent reason.
At least 59 people are killed, and more than 500 are injured, in the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history.
Since the last deadliest mass shooting in modern American history just over a year ago.
And one where Donald Trump and his Republicans flap around like bats out of hell...
Blaming everybody but themselves.
For there was Trump looking like a mannequin in a wax museum, invoking the name of God with a wooden speech that couldn't have looked more fake or more hypocritical.
Speeches are watched as well as heard, and the viewer saw a president who wished he were somewhere else because he had been compelled to pretend something so radically false to his own nature.
For once, Trump read the speech exactly as written. Perhaps his aides talked him into it. Because Trump is not a good reader, he read the speech wrong. And because it sounded wrong, he looked bad.
A speech where he could not use the word "terrorism" because the gunman was white and not a Muslim, even though it was terrorism.
Or couldn't call it an act of madness, because Trump's made sure that being mentally ill is no obstacle to buying a weapon.
And of course, he couldn't blame it on the NRA, because they gave him $30 million to campaign against Hillary Clinton...
So he owes them bigly.
They're determined to use his presidency to flood the country with even more guns.
And they couldn't care less how many lives are lost, or how young and innocent they are...
Like the young victims of the Sandy Hook massacre.
After all, as the fallen Fox host Bill O'Reilly reminded us yesterday, that's the price of freedom.
“Public safety demands logical gun laws but the issue is so polarizing and emotional that little will be accomplished as there is no common ground,” O’Reilly wrote in the post.
“The Second Amendment is clear that Americans have a right to arm themselves for protection,” O’Reilly wrote. “Even the loons."
Or the bloody price of being an American...
Where it's never time to talk about gun control.
But please feel free to reach for more Republican thoughts and prayers...
Or listen to the religious fanatic Pat Robertson blame it all on Trump's opponents.
Oh yeah, one more thing.
There's a religious fanatic in this country who would do to us what Trump is doing to America.
Andrew Scheer deleted this minutes after he was was elected Con leader.
But I dug it up so you can see what he would do to us.
Whatever you do don't let him become Prime Minister.
Don't let that American nightmare happen here....
273 mass shooting till today in a calendar year, is there not a problem
ReplyDeletegreater than terrorism much more near.
Hi Steve....I can only imagine how Trump would have reacted if the gunman had been a Muslim, he probably would have been bombing Iran already. But the killer a white terrorist, and all Americans are going to be forced to confront what a slaughterhouse their country has become.Finally...
DeleteThe US considers 4 or more deaths as Mass Murder. They had over 370 mass murders last year and are just short of one a day this year. But don't worry there are almost three months left in the year.
ReplyDeletehi Willy...I find the level of violence almost unbelievable, and I can't imagine how any normal person can live happily in such a dangerous society. And it's not as if people are helpless to do anything about it. In 1996 a crazed gunman killed 16 children and a teacher in the Scottish town of Dunblane. But instead of just lamenting and praying the British government brought in tough gun control. And today shooting deaths are rare, and Britain is a much safer place...
DeleteCap dug this up and posted it a t Mound's site:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2013/jan/18/mark-shields/pbs-commentator-mark-shields-says-more-killed-guns/
More people have died in domestic shooting in the USA since 1968 than US soldiers in all wars including the Civl War. Freedom to kill your fellow citizens, yeah that's what it's all about.
mr perfect
hi Mr Perfect...yes, I saw that and it is an incredible statistic. You'd think Americans would be moved by such numbers. But thanks to their bloody Second Amendment, and the cult of violence, and all the wars they have been in, it seems to run off them like water, or blood, off a duck's back....
DeleteWe are coming up on three anniversaries of major gun massacres within the next few years. Sandy Hook will have its fifth anniversary this December. Another Christmas that those families will have to face without their children and loved ones. Next year marks already twenty years since Columbine. Finally, in 2019 it will have been thirty years since Polytéchnique. But only Canada has safeguards in place to ensure that another Polytéchnique never happens again. They not only have comprehensive background checks in place and doesn't let just anyone walk in off the street and buy a rifle, but gets to the root of the ideology behind why these shootings occur. In the case of Sainte-Foy, a measure was passed to build a fact-finding commission to develop ways of counteracting Islamophobia. In the case of Polytéchnique, women's rights are front and center of the PM's agenda and his personal philosophy.
ReplyDeleteJustin Trudeau was 17 years old, going on 18, living in Québec with his father and brothers and preparing to go off to university himself when that happened. No doubt it formed a lasting impression in his mind and psyche just as it did for so many Canadians of a generation -- especially in Québec. Not only because he later went on to study there for a time as an adult, but because of his willingness to self-describe as a feminist and to promote the advancement of women's careers, especially women in science. His science advisor is a woman. The Governor General is a female astronaut. His health minister is female. He himself has said, "the future is female." The execrable shooter, whose name does not deserve mentioning ever again, ought to be squirming in his rubber room in hell over this.
Which is why it's imperative that a knuckle-dragging, regressive wunderkind of the alt-right like Canadian Psycho Scheer mustn't be allowed near anything resembling a throne speech, except to read his idol Dotard Fatberg's incoherent inauguration diatribe while weeping in the little boys' parliamentary restroom as Justin celebrates another majority. This means that not only must Canadians come out in droves to keep him away by actually showing up to the ballot box, rather than staying home and pouting "they're all the same" like so many disaffected Americans did. The thorn-in-side Dippers need to put country before party and work with the Liberals as partners against the revenge-seeking cons, instead of trying to grandstand, fight the wrong "enemy" in Trudeau, and siphon off votes.
Fear and loathing, by the way, is a perfect description Simon, and one that even Trudeau brought up as well. In his statement about the Edmonton attack -- which involved no guns, saw no one killed, and had no connection to ISIS other than a disturbed individual who stuffed a jihadist flag in the back of his U-Haul -- much to Dotard's chagrin, Trudeau didn't say the magic words "Radical Islamic Terrorism" (or Kellie Leech's incantation "Barbaric Cultural Practices"). He said "fear and hatred will not divide us." Anyone with two brain cells to put together knows that he's thinking ahead and preemptively calling out the troglodytes (including the not-so-subtle dog-whistlers in the opposition party -- and, of course, Trump) who would seek to paint the entire Muslim community as "terrorists" for the actions of one disturbed individual. Sure, Justin's favorite movie is one of fantasy fiction, but popular fiction forms a modern folk mythology in our culture, and Yoda is right: fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger; anger leads to hate (loathing), and hate leads to suffering. You add weapons of war to that volatile mixture, and you're looking at a Death Star in the making.
The future is female? What is that supposed to even mean? How about the future is equality where people are judged by their skills and talents, not gender quotas and affirmative action.
DeleteUgh I can't wait til Jagmeet Singh takes Trudeau off his high horse.
Greenthumb
Nice that you took one line out of context and completely ignored the rest. Read the story of the Tortoise and the Hare so you can understand why women and visible minorities need the ones already in power to make conscious initiatives so they can catch up. We are not there YET, and we won't be as long as people keep pretending that there aren't invisible forces at work keeping the status quo.
DeleteAs for the Little Dippers, all they do is split the vote like the Bernie Sanders cult. Keep rooting for Singh and you'll get Local Milk Boy instead. I'm not even from Canada but I'm with Trudeau, just like I was with Hillary and not the other throwaway candidates like Stein and Johnson. A vote for anyone else is a vote for Scheer, just like a vote for Nader was a vote for Bush.
Oh and P.S. Greenthumb, read more about what Michelle Obama has to say about the composition of Congress being basically taxation without representation.
Deletehttps://www.rawstory.com/2017/10/michelle-obama-slams-congress-for-lack-of-diversity/
As the old saying goes, sometimes you need to walk a mile in someone else's shoes. If you can't, then step aside for someone who already has.
That's why the future needs to be female. Male allies are nice, but we need to have women in there who understand what women face every day. We need women mentors who show us that it can be done. Black women, LGBT, the disabled, etc.
And you took my comment (which was admittedly TL;DR but, that's just me, I tend to be elaborate) way out of context, because it was all about how that guy killed women for trying to become engineers (breaking into a male-dominated field), and why addressing the underlying ideology behind his motive matters in terms of Canada preventing that atrocity from ever happening again.
Just like Trudeau appointing Muslims to his cabinet is crucial to counteracting Islamophobia, if we are to prevent another Sainte-Foy. Visibility matters, and your statement about "affirmative action" and "Trudeau's high horse" is tone-deaf, to say the least.
hi anon 12:13...the Polytechnique massacre had a big effect on people growing up in Quebec. But sadly the legacy of those murdered women was despoiled by the Harper Cons, and by those who claimed that Marc Lepine was just a madman instead of a murderous misogynist. But I know better. For I have a clip from the movie Polytechnique on my YouTube channel, and it has attracted the most horrifying comments I have ever received. If you have a chance you should check them out and you'll see what I mean. I have seen what guns do to people, my heroes are healers not killers, and when I see what's happening in the U.S. it makes me physically ill...
DeleteI hate religion for diving people and keeping the truth for comming out. However I know people of many faiths and have lived for years
ReplyDeletein a couple of lands that identify as Muslim. These being Indonesia
and Malaysia. Not one day that I was there did I feel in any danger
because of my brand. These people are just like you and me.
Hi Steve...I never judge people for their race, religion, gender, sexual orientation etc, even though I am judged by many for who I am. If humans can do a better job of living together, we'll all go down together...
DeleteGreat post. I can never think of Las Vegas without thinking of Hunter Thompson even though the Johnny Depp movie was such a disappointment. I can only imagine what he would have done with Trump and freaks like Pat Robertson. When will old Patsy go to his "eternal" reward?
ReplyDeletehi anon...yes, the Depp movie was a big disappointment. I don't think it's possible to make a movie out of a book like that one. For not only is the story hilarious and hallucinogenic, Ralph Steadman's drawings are the stuff of genius. As for Pat Robertson I keep praying that he will get to see his Lord soon, but clearly his Lord doesn't want him...
DeleteI remember reading how Scheer had deleted all his policy positions as soon as he was elected. Now I see why. Can we expect the MSM so use the Vegas shooting to look at gun control in this country? Yes, when the same thing happens here, or Hell freezes over.
ReplyDeletehi anon...I have been appalled by the way the MSM has not taken a minute to look into Scheer's background. I don't know if it's because he was Speaker and was considered to be above partisan behaviour. But if so they couldn't be more wrong, because Scheer has always been a right-wing extremist, and Canadians deserve to know who might be their next Prime Minister....
DeleteThe Liberals and the NDP shoul demand that Scheer explain himself, and ask him whether he still believes in weakening gun control in Canada. I'd love to hear what that Con nut has to say.
ReplyDeleteThe Con nut already remarked on the Edmonton attack and made it all about "we need more security against terrorism." Whereas Trudeau took a more positive approach, even proactive in that he was already calling out the cons' racist acolytes who he knew were going to wage backlash against Muslims in the community.
DeleteScheer wants to turn Canada into America's dunce cap. A vote for anyone other than Trudeau is a vote for Trump with a smile.
hi anon...the Edmonton attack was a scary one and thank goodness nobody was killed. But it sickens me to see that while the Cons are making a big fuss demanding that the guy responsible be charged with terrorism, nobody is demanding the same for the guy who killed six Muslims in that mosque in Quebec City. It's a double standard, it's naked bigotry, and it couldn't be more disgusting...
Deletehi anon 8:48...I'm glad to report that the Liberals are planning to pass some gun control stuff, as they promised to do during the campaign. So Scheer won't be able to hide his views any longer, and hopefully it will cost him some votes...
ReplyDelete