Preventable Tragedy — By John Reed

Preventable Tragedy
Here we go again. Thirty people dead, dozens more injured when a couple of crazies open fire. A depressingly familiar event. Even more depressing:
Those seeking to make political hay out of tragedy. Even before the blood dried, presidential candidates were blaming their opponent rather than the actual shooters.
In the same 48 hours, many times that many were shot or killed in various inner cities…40 in Chicago alone…and not a peep from the news media. Apparently blacks killing other blacks isn’t important enough to report.
The usual gun control pundits were out in force. Ironically, the El Paso shootings happened in a “gun free” shopping zone. I suspect a large number of those 3,000 Texans that were in that Walmart would otherwise have had their *legal* weapons on hand and could have acted to stop the shooter.
Is there any room for a rational response? Certainly. To start, limiting magazine size would seem a good start. The Ohio shooter had magazines containing 100 rounds. Not even the most avid civilian hunter needs that much firepower.
Better communication between various levels of law enforcement and background checks might help screen out the crazies. Certainly a closer look at a person’s social media presence should be part of background checks.
Before the privacy police yell, think about how much private information you give up to buy a car or a house. It’s just common sense to get to know your beliefs and tendencies before you’re allowed to have a lethal weapon.
Before any real progress can be made, all the political posturing needs to stop. Good luck with that. Meanwhile, more preventable tragedies will occur.