The massacres of schoolchildren haven’t moved Congress to control gun violence; instead, we see lawmakers with AR-15 lapel pins

By Chris Honoré

I will never forget watching then-President Barack Obama standing on a news conference dais in Newtown, Connecticut, in the aftermath of the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, trying to explain the inexplicable. Grief lined his face, and he raised a hand and wiped tears from his eyes. He knew he would never find words that would give comfort to the parents of the children who died in their classrooms, their small bodies rendered unrecognizable by high-velocity bullets from a weapon of war.

In the wrenching days that followed I was convinced that Sandy Hook and its grievous loss would cause Congress to collectively say “Enough!” And so I waited and wondered: How could this not be the moment?

Years have now passed, and yet the awfulness has continued, an unabated litany of death and damage: Parkland, Florida; Uvalde, Texas, and countless other shootings, so many that they merge one into the other. Our nation has become an armed camp and we live under the tyranny of the gun, wondering not if but when a demented individual will appear and leave behind a wake of destruction amid a swirl of the vacuous “thoughts and prayers,” followed by the hollow rationale that guns don’t kill people, people kill people.

Consider that since Jan. 1 of this year there have been some 360 mass shootings (by the time this is printed, the likelihood of that number increasing seems inevitable). How to comprehend that just over the recent July 4-5 holiday there were 22 mass shootings in 17 states?

I study a photograph of a small lime-green bicycle lying on its side on a corner in Philadelphia, abandoned by a child amid random gunfire (five people would die that day and seven would be injured).
And inevitably we see shrines of flowers and candles appear, tearful families interviewed, their agony palpable as they struggle to find words to convey their loss, and we’re told that over the last 20 years the number of guns in America has doubled, which raises the question: Why?

Have we grown increasingly fearful of one another? Do we feel more secure if we can carry a weapon and so find comfort that we can stand our ground? Are we not awash in guns and paranoia? We hear the likes of Kari Lake, who ran for governor in Arizona (she lost, but refused to concede), remind us that, “most of us are card-carrying members of the NRA.” She then points to the attendant “fake media,” echoing Trump’s now familiar, vitriolic rhetoric, promising that if he is elected in 2024 he will seek retribution against what he refers to as “the deep state,” his oft-repeated conspiratorial unicorn.

But there’s more. We’re told that the MAGA base, to include white supremacist paramilitary groups such as the Oath Keepers, the Proud Boys, the Boogaloos, the Three Percenters, and the Wolverine Watchmen believe not only in the Big Lie still, but that violence is acceptable, even inevitable, if the outcome is Trump’s restoration to the White House. We are told that school board members, judges, poll workers, government employees and those prosecutors who are investigating Trump are receiving reprehensible and dangerous threats, their home addresses and phone numbers published online. Trump, chillingly, has posted on his social media platform what he believes is the home address of Obama.

There are Republican members of Congress who wear AR-15 lapel pins, send Christmas cards depicting their families posing with long guns, despite the carnage such weapons of war have created.

And so it goes, and what we continue to hear from Congress is the sound of silence. If not Sandy Hook or Uvalde, then what?

To read American Carnage, Part 1, click here.

Email Ashland resident Chris Honoré at honore307@gmail.com.