A Weekend of Madmen

This will be brief. I had a post ready for this morning and then El Paso happened. And then Dayton.

Two months ago, we had Virginia Beach. The mass shooting for which we had front row seats. The one that took our friends and our neighbors.

Nothing seems important today except to reflect on the grief and horror that engulfed America this weekend.

It’s hard to explain how, in a country with declining violent crime rates , we have sporadic, ghastly massacres. 

Deranged gunmen, like the one in Texas, killing babies, children and the elderly. It’s beyond belief. It’s beyond despicable. It’s pure evil.

It was clearly the work of a madman.

Then the gunman in Dayton, who reportedly shot and killed his own sister.

Insanity.

And in Virginia Beach, we had a killer shooting co-workers point blank, people he knew by name. At close range.

Whatever he was, DeWayne Craddock was mad.

Yet, while the bodies were still inside the Texas Walmart, while chaos ensued as families waited for news of their loved ones, craven politicians were hustling to score political points off of the horror, eager to blame their political opponents, especially the president. 

Within a day, others began to raise funds off of the killings.

Sickening and sad.

Let it be said without caveats that white supremacy is a vile movement. As is radical Islam, which has also been blamed for many mass killings. Both are racist to their core. There is no place for either in America.

But tossing folks who oppose illegal immigration into the fetid stew of white supremacy is wrong and borders on race baiting. Yet it is happening. By design, I believe.

It’s getting to the point where people who view the world through a political prism eagerly dig through the bio of a shooter, hoping to find that he’s on the “other” side so they can blame their opponents for his homicidal lunacy.

Sad.

This ought to be a time when we have the decency to come together to mourn. And to try to figure out how we identify these sick members of society before they shoot up bars, and Walmarts and schools.

Americans have a proud tradition of debating our differences energetically, publicly and without fear of violence.

This is a good time to stop politicking and remember that.