[derek fenton]

Thanks Ed.

Derek.

[John Whitworth]

And it was a woman, the murderer's mother, who had FIVE guns which she kept insecurely where her son could get at them.

[Janice D. Soderling]

Cherchez la femme, John! Shame on you.

Actually, even in cases where the guns are locked up, other household members usually know where the key is.

It's the outside perpetrators who are being guarded against.

Derek, no sweat. You are a new member. And welcome to the Sphere. It's a friendly place, this thread notwithstanding!! Your comment was a wise one. I'd be happy to see it reappear. It's only own poems that are frowned on.

[Jones Pat]

I promised myself to avoid this thread because the last time I spoke up here I was sure I would never ever do it again....but I am certain this horror has nothing to do with removing prayer from schools. The priest who christened my youngest son, John Danforth, who later became a Senator and was against most things I believe in...in that role...but he was a champion for the separation of church and state...and he stated why in a way I will never forget. He said, and I paraphrase from memory, "When we teach our children to pray, they are free to pray anywhere at any time and as often as they like wherever they are...a silent prayer is just as good as a scheduled daily organized prayer...maybe even more sincere". I hope I have not seriously mis-quoted him but his words have stayed with me for years. I will only add that having raised a child with multiple disabilities...psychiatric and medical...it is a full time job trying to get help but we don't want a return to institutions...we want the therapies, parent training, medical care, counseling, technology, education we've had to fight for, give up our careers for. Those of us who were lucky enough to adapt, make it our life's work know, have seen first hand what those kinds of services can do for a child and his or her family. Without them, we are lost, just trying to make it through another day. My 2 cents and a sincere wish to all of you and your loved ones for happy holidays and a more peaceful 2013

Pat

[John Whitworth]

But she knew her son was weird and it might have occurred to her that locking up the guns and not telling him where the key was, was quite a good idea. On the other hand, since she was pretty wll barking herself, perhaps it is not surprising. Since I am English, how Americans order their society is none of my business. but I opine it might maybe be better if guns were just a little more difficult to get hold of, and guns suited to the battlefield were not generally available at all.

I think your Constitution is a bit of a shibboleth. What a lot of eighteenth century white gents thought needs perhaps to be taken with a pinch of salt. It was not even divinely inspired. Was it? We get along without a constitution at all - just make do and mend.

[Janice D. Soderling]

Pat, just want to make it clear that I am not advocating large institutions of any kind. I don't have the first-hand experience that you have, but like you I believe in offering a variety of solutions so each family can find the solution that is best for its circumstances.

Our politicians did follow the Reagan-Thatcher agenda turning out to a life as homeless (as it transpired) many who were not seriously ill but unable to cope with life on their own. But still there are many kinds of assistance available in the welfare program (which is in constant danger these days). These range from personal assistants to help the disabled adult or child (children are integrated in ordinary schools), to group living with a reasonable number of adults living with caretakers in small homes, rooms of their own but common areas for eating and socializing, or day care facilities where excursions or training or social events make life more meaningful. It includes options such as government-sponsored revamping of the home to accomodate the type of disability and this also for victims of a stroke, car accident, etc. Also family members are entitled to financial aid for the caretaking, and can get relief when the child or adult spends a day or weekend or more at a group living home. Of course the cost of rehabilitation, training etc. is part of the welfare program. I'm not saying it works perfectly for everyone, always, but I believe it to be superior to governmental nonchalance.

One of the most parts of our child care program however, is the four-year-old checkup. From the beginning all newborns are tested in the hospital for responses, and later at regular intervals at the local health care clinic to detect health problems. (In addition of course to ordinary health care.) But the compulsory four-year-checkup is a more comprehensive one and includes both physical and mental problems, from eyesight to anxiety symptoms. I can imagine what a hissy fit people the Tea Party dregs would throw at the idea of every child getting a check-up at age four. They would scream Big Brother Indoctrination. But it can uncover mental disturbances and handicaps (ADHD etc.) as well as physical ones.

School nurses, good day care, free meals in schools have all been part of our system since I arrived in this country and it is under attack now, serious attack. For me, free meals means nutritious free meals and that isn't always the case these days.

One of the things that the US exports is right-wing advice to right-wing politicians in other coutries. Your Karl Rove has been here to influence (please keep him at home in the future), and the same tactics are introduced. One of the main rallying cries is to lower taxes. Obviously if we don't pay taxes, we will have to buy our welfare services.

Now--and I weep to say it--the politicians hve completely disrupted and sold out the citizenry. Privatized the rail service (like Ms. Thatcher) and most recently the state-controlled pharmacies have been divided into two parts, half being sold to a Russian consortium and turned into an American type drugstore (strange bedfellows indeed). I could do a whole thread on that. You don't have to be especially bright to be aware of which Russians have money and where it came from.

The housing system and the school system are both shot to hell, with affluent children now in the good schools and the immigrants, the jobless, the poor huddled masses living in segregated areas with low-quality or sect schools. That latter is the worst, IMO, whether Christian or Muslim or whatever, because in extension it splits society into segments. The result is accelerating political unrest and crime. Who is surprised at that? Not me.

Not only schools but also health care clinics, hospitals have been privatized. Not all, but enough. The EU is controlled by lobbyists and business interests and I had best stop there.

I've lived here more than fifty years and I've seen it go up and now down.

So I'm not claiming that we have a perfect society, but there was a time we were close to it and now it is still better than in most places. No, I am not calling for a return to institutions, storage places, of any kind.

Virgil, correct me if I am wrong, but this incessant call for prayers and "god bless America" is because the society is so screwed up that anyone who doesn't say it is suspected of being an enemy of the State or of God which is the same thing--or it looks like it from here.

All right, this may seem far off track where Newtown is concerned, but actually it isn't. Only a citizenry that believes less in the motto "In God we Trust" and more in "E pluribus Unum" (did I spell that right) can create a good society.

Amen.

[Janice D. Soderling]

We get along without a constitution at all - just make do and mend.

John, but you do have that thingie I've seen at Oxford, that whatchamacallit, Magna Carta Libertatum? The Great Charter of the Liberties of England?

Something like that. That put you off on a good start.

[Don Jones]

John,

Our Constitution is no more sacred than the Bible. Neither are divinely inspired. But both are nevertheless humanly inspired documents. The problem is not with the Constitution but America’s passionate love affair with ballistics, which runs very deep and is complex. It's not simply a love, it's a whole identity. Think of it, almost, as a kind of portable arms (heraldry). Guns bestow honor, power, independence, and ownership - American values that go back before the republic's founding. Guns displayed and guns carried are badges of honor, escutcheons, if you will, of distinction, even grace. But of a rugged Yankee kind no doubt.

I know the Europeans et al. are impatient with us. Reading the French papers, both right and left, I get the sense that those stupid Americans just don’t get it. But, to be fair, Americans who know better must contend with a huge lobby. It’s the same thing with the idiotic embargo on Cuba for over fifty years. You may not know that most Americans support lifting the embargo. But the Cuban American lobby prevents this from happening. Fareed Zakaria wrote about the anti-democratic nature of lobbies (from left and right). Indeed, the very will of the people can be thwarted by a lobby. Ditto the NRA, which relentlessly bribes our politicians to keep all weapons within easy access. What non-Americans need to understand is that this debate will have to become a titanic struggle to create change. I means, it’s a lot worse than trying to teach Americans the metric system. This is going to be a “bloody” struggle in more ways than one. It will cost a political will and effort that I don’t think the American electorate has. Would love to be proven wrong on that!

[Andrew Mandelbaum]

They had a little pull out section in a local paper here. Just bios of the kids shot down. It is very terrible to think about. All our parchments and ideologies are just long bits of straw over these scattered pits dug into our species by nature, nurture, and the lesser shovels.

None of my thinking out loud here was to deny I hate guns.

[Laura Heidy-Halberstein]

Originally Posted by John Whitworth

But she knew her son was weird and it might have occurred to her that locking up the guns and not telling him where the key was, was quite a good idea.

John, as far as I can tell the American papers are not saying how he got the guns, other than that they belonged to his mother. If you have a link to one of your papers where it states, without doubt, that the guns were laying out in the open or that Adam knew where the key was, please link us here.

So far there has been no information leaked or otherwise given to American reporters as to how the guns were being kept in the house. In the absence of such knowledge from the authorities, I am assuming it is still possible that the guns were safely locked up and that Adam may very well have broken into the gun case or safe.

Apparently you know differently.