candle2 ani

Most of us have shed  tears today.  I cannot imagine sending my children or grandchildren  to school to have them killed.  That is what many people in Newtown, Connecticut did today.  I have no idea how to even absorb what has really happened.  I have no idea what those people are feeling/thinking.  Can you think after losing your child in this senseless manner?

Principals and teachers are also dead.  No one signed on for a combat job.  There is no combat pay.  These were babies, for God’s sake.  Kindergartners. First graders.   They had done nothing but live their little lives.

The entire nation mourns.  There will be some serious questions needing serious answers in a few days.

57 Thoughts to “The Newtown, Connecticut Tragedy: Sandy Hook Elementary”

  1. punchak

    Let me be cynical, before I go to bed, remembering a crying President.

    Serious questions and serious answers / two months from now this incident will be remembered by the general population as much as to Oregon shopping mall and Virginia Tech is remembered today. Remembered by those touched by the tragedies. but
    what has changed in the land since then?

    It’s with a heavy heart I put my old head on the pillow tonight.

    1. Try to sleep well, Punchak.

      I am so haunted by VA Tech. Still. As a state and as a nation we simply have not taken the necessary corrective measures. We are just as vulnerable today as we were april 15, 2007, the day before the massacre.

  2. Emma

    These were babies that should be excited about Santa Claus coming. Now their families are planning their funerals. It’s beyond heartbreaking.

    1. Totally agree, Emma. Just little children gettin gready for Christmas and wiped out by some crazed idiot.

  3. Starry flights

    Act now or get used to these kinds of incidents.

  4. Emma

    Yes, act now. We need to stop stigmatizing mental health issues, stop dancing around privacy issues and make sure mentally ill people get the interventions they need before things like this happen. It turns out the shooter also had a form of autism (I’m speculating Aspergers) which suggests that he may have had odd mannerisms that singled him out and isolated him from others, which may have caused mental health issues and provoked him to violence. One article in today’s Post suggests he was prone to “tantrums” growing up. That says a lot.

    And he got the guns from mom. You have a kid with social issues, prone to tantrums, with possible mental health issues, and your guns aren’t locked up tight? Really? I’ve been blessed with happy, healthy kids, but our guns have never seen the light of day unless they are directly on their way to and from the range, even though all of my kids can shoot well and handle firearms safely.

  5. BSinVA

    I can see a time when we will have security fences around schools, churches, shopping malls, theaters, fast food restaurants, and public buildings and an armed security guard at all entrances with metal detectors. If we can’t control guns in this country then we can enact area specific gun control to keep the nation’s children safe. We can allow the armed gun enthusiasts and the armed mental patients have all the gunfights they want AND keep our children out of the line of fire.

    1. That is a scary thought. BS Very scary. Going to the mall or movies will be like having to go through airport security.

  6. @Emma

    Thanks for the info Emma. You put out some important reminders. I have heard so many people say, instead of your light of day remarks, that their children have been taught the proper use of guns and that they feel comfortable leaving their guns in bedside tables etc. etc.

    We haven’t done jack with mental illness since VA Tech other that cut back services at the first hint of budget cut backs. I have friends right now with an adult mentally ill son who can’t get him into a group home or get that many services for him. Mental illness is still shrouded in the same secrecy and agencies, schools, are still bound by the same privacy issues.

    We still have people going on rampages, attacking in the most crowded places where people are the most vulnerable: malls, schools, churches, jobs.

    Airports seem to be fairly safe now but look what you have to go through for all that.

    Emma, I am actually agreeing with you and piling on some more.

  7. Elena

    STANDING OVATION for Emma!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  8. Elena

    We treat mental health treatment like its a luxury and not a necessity.

  9. I don’t think it is too soon to talk about it. What are we going to do …pussy foot around and not discuss it until the next mass shooting takes place?

    There are two critical issues coming together in all these cases: mental illness and guns.

    20 kindergartners couldn’t have been slain with box cutters or knives yesterday. Guns are on the table and they will continue to be on the table on this blog. Mental illness is on the table and how it is treated in America will be discussed on this blog. There is no more political correctness on either subject here.

    We see the perfect storm time and time again. We have to discuss it or have the same thing keep repeating itself monthly.

  10. @Elena

    Agree. Standing ovation for Emma.

  11. kelly_3406

    I agree that mental health and its treatment are the key issues here.

    Not sure how gun control is all that relevant in this case. This tragedy took place in a state with some of the strictest gun control laws in the country. The media reported that the guns were bought legally and registered by the mother of the gunman. So it is not really a matter of the mentally ill being able to buy weapons.

    1. Let’s call it gun safety. I am tired of the words “gun control.”

      There are dual issues at play here: gun safety and mental health safety issues. When the 2 combine, we have a deadly duo.

      We don’t know what happened with the guns yet. All “facts” are preliminary.

      What I do know is that too many innocent people are being killed during rampages with guns.

      they aren’t being killed en mass with box cutters or knives. They are being killed with guns.

      Frankly, I will no longer tolerate the pat NRA answers.

      I don’t believe for once second that ameendment means unlimited rights. it was left ambiguous as it is so it could change as needed.

  12. Starry flights

    Is the 2nd Amendment so sacrosanct that it’s worth the lives of 20 children?

  13. Lyssa

    Emma :
    These were babies that should be excited about Santa Claus coming. Now their families are planning their funerals. It’s beyond heartbreaking.

    Exactly. Exactly.

  14. Lyssa

    Thank you Emma for that articulate statement – firm and companionate. Now how do we put a you in place? PWC and the Cities should take this on.

    As a lowly citizen, I’d place this above my local tax dollar support for roads in PWC. That’s a tidy sum.

  15. Survivor

    Moon and Emma have hit the nail on the head that the problem is one of gun safety, combined with a new approach to mental illness. I would likely not be alive writing this post if I had kept guns in my home at one point.

    Many years ago, my ex-wife was diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic and tried to kill me at least twice with knifes, and other times attacked me unarmed. The police would haul her off to the psychiatric hospital where they would pump her full of meds and after a few days pronounce her well enough to leave and send her home. She, as most mentally ill people, didn’t admit that she had a problem and quit taking the meds. The cycle then repeated over and over.

    I’m a gun owner but at that time took all of the guns out of my house and left them at my parent’s home. She used knives. I am larger and stronger than she was and was able to wrestle her to ground once to get a large chef’s knife from her that she was trying to stab me with and hold her down until the police got there. If she had had a gun she would have used it and I wouldn’t be here.

    Drugging the mentally ill and sending them home is not working. People who keep guns accessible to mentally ill people or who sell guns to the mentally ill are flat out stupid and dangerous.

    My ex-wife died in her 50s from heart failure brought on by alcoholism, heavy smoking and abuse of prescription drugs. Obviously, before I married her she did not exhibit these extreme symptoms. There were more subtle signs that had I known what I know now I would have picked up on. The problem is that people like me who had never experienced mental illness in their family don’t know what to look for. To those inexperienced in these matters, what later turns out to be a sign of a serious problem is easily dismissed as a tolerable personal quirk, such as we all have.

    Emma – I’m happily remarried with healthy kids looking forward to Santa coming. Those murdered kids and their families in Connecticut will never know Christmas and Santa again. I appreciate your comments. You are exactly right. The challenge is to figure out what to do to prevent this from happening again, and educating people to know signs to be aware of in those close to them without having to go through an experience like I did.

    1. Welcome, Survivor. I am glad you made it through your ordeal. Thank you for sharing with us.

  16. Morris Davis

    Is the problem that we have a disproportionate amount of mental illness or is it easy access to a disproportionate number of guns? In other countries we consider our peers — England, Canada, Australia, etc — they have far fewer gun related deaths (our rate is 7x greater). Is that because they are in better mental health than us? (They do have universal health care.) Al Qaeda killed 3,000 Americans more than a decade ago and we’ve spent $1T to stop them. In the same period guns killed more than 300,000 Americans (about 100,000 murders). Are we focused on the wrong threat?

    1. If this shooter in Connecticut had been named Abdula Mohammad instead of whatever the hell he was named, angelo, I guarantee you there would be some new laws being enacted today.

      We have a more open gun policy and we are dumber about mental illness and restricting people who are mentally ill.

      I don’t want to hear much more about the rights of either group.

  17. Elena

    You make an interesting point Moe, I think it is both actually. Easy access to guns AND mental health issues.

  18. We here in PWC are fairly unique. We have dodged the bullet twice. We had a narrow escape out at bull Run Middle School when a student had weapons at school. Jamie Addington saved the day because he heard the sound of lock and load coming from the boys room. In that case, the boys parent had made some very critical errors in judgement. Again, nice family, parent was employeed at the school.

    The other case was at NOVA campus in Woodbridge. That one could have been another VA Tech.

    Only 2 or 3 othe rjurisdictions in the United States have had more than one incident of campus shooter. We are very lucky. Preparedness and smart individiduals were both critical.

  19. Has anyone determined how the shooter got the guns from his mother? Stolen? Did she leave him access?

    Anyway…. I second Emma.

    1. Maybe that is why she got her face blown off.

  20. First I’ve heard of this…and yes. Its from that evil Gateway Pundit, but its the only place reporting the lack of mental health care in CT.

    I’m not reporting this to point fingers at who did what, but to point out what the situation in CT is.

    Being the “on site 2nd Amend. activist, I thought that I would mention that I am not going to argue for or against 2nd Amendment rights in this case until I see some actual dangers to the 2nd Amendment.

    1. Good. I appreciate that.

      I think we need to look at a Venn Diagram that has a union of guns and mental illness. That union is where the problem lies. It creates a perfect storm. That is what all the mass killings have had in common…mental illness and guns.

  21. Starryflights

    China attack illustrates U.S. gun law divide
    By Kevin Voigt, CNN

    Hong Kong (CNN) — On Friday morning, a man walked through the entrance of an elementary school and, without warning, began ruthlessly cutting down children at the school. Before he was subdued, nearly two dozen were hit.

    While it sounds like the horrific massacre in Connecticut, this attack took place about 8,000 miles away in central China. And while several of the victims were reported in critical condition, none of the 22 children were killed. The 36-year-old suspect in China — which has strict gun control laws — attacked the children with a knife, according to local reports.

    “The huge difference between this case and the U.S. is not the suspect, nor the situation, but the simple fact he did not have an effective weapon,” said Dr. Ding Xueliang, a Harvard-educated sociologist at the University of Science and Technology in Hong Kong.

    http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/15/world/asia/china-us-school-attack/index.html?imw=Y

    This story demonstrates that had the shooter not had such easy gun access, a lot of those victims would still be alive

  22. @Starryflights
    Starry,

    So…what’s your solution?

  23. Steve Randolph

    http://ideas.time.com/2012/12/15/sandy-hook-shooting-why-did-lanza-target-a-school

    Something to think about as we try to learn from this horrible tragedy.

  24. Starryflights

    Renewing the assault weapons ban would be a good start. Apparently the semiautomatic rifle he used did most of the carnage. @Cargosquid

    1. I dont think renewing the assault weapons ban would have stopped this massacre. I would be all in favor of it, however. I don’t see a reason for civilians to own assault weapons.

  25. @Starryflights
    And that would have prevented him exactly how…since he stole the weapons..and had pistols.

    @Moon-howler
    Moon,

    The definition of “assault weapon” is a political definition. What is your understanding of the term, so that we don’t talk at cross purposes?

    1. I only quoted the post. I have no emotional investment in their findings.

  26. Starryflights

    Had the assault weapons ban been in place, the shooter’s mom would not have have been able to purchase the rifle that the kid stole from her to shoot all those kids.

    1. Which one are you considering the assault weapon, Starry?

  27. Elena

    I am very concerned about the access to a weapon that are likened to a military m-16. I am a gun advocate to a degree, I even like shooting them, but I draw the line at weapons of mass destruction, i.e. guns that can mow down an entire classroom of kindergardners in merely minutes.

    1. That’s pretty much WMD.

      I am pretty much ready to tell the NRA to STFU.

  28. Emma

    When in American history has any sort of ban saved lives? The drug war? Prohibition? All bans seem to accomplish is to make the banned item more valuable, and make criminals willing to take even more risks to obtain those items and to trade on them. Although a gun ban would be a dream come true for some folks, it wouldn’t have prevented this tragedy.

    I don’t know the answer here. I know we have to start somewhere. Sadly, we’ll never rid the world of evildoers.

    1. I dont think the average person is suggesting a ban on guns. On the other hand, should there be some limitations? Should we restrict who gets to own what?

      We either have to tighten up gun access or tighten up on the mentally ill or both. This simply cannot continue. The American people are fed up. Just how this state of being fed up will manefest itself is another story.

      I am not even sure that having a uniformed officer in every building would have stopped Friday’s massacre.

      Arming teachers is not the answer.

  29. Steve Randolph

    “This is not supposed to happen here, in civilized
    Connecticut, with its strict gun laws, good schools
    and churches on the green.”
    Hartford Courant

    This horror isn’t suppose to happen anywhere.

  30. Emma

    Over 2,000 Americans were killed on 9/11 without a single shot fired. Tim McVeigh killed 168, including almost 20 children in daycare, without firing a shot. Ted Bundy killed at least 30 women, and never used a firearm.

  31. Cato the Elder

    Elena :
    I am very concerned about the access to a weapon that are likened to a military m-16. I am a gun advocate to a degree, I even like shooting them, but I draw the line at weapons of mass destruction, i.e. guns that can mow down an entire classroom of kindergardners in merely minutes.

    That covers pretty much every semi-automatic handgun on the market.

    The shooter had four of these, according to reports he left the M-4 in the car. I guess you can’t be very stealthy crossing the parking lot with an assault rifle.

    There’s not a shred of evidence that the previous assault weapons ban had any positive effects. Short of banning all firearms, there isn’t a single gun control measure that would have stopped this.

    Moon had it right in her comment in another thread. We have a music industry that glorifies thuggery and advocates for violence and degradation of various classes of people. We have a movie industry that manufactures filth and glorifies killing. One of the most popular mini-series on pay TV is about a serial killer. I hate to sound like someone’s father here, but can anyone deny the cultural rot over the past 20 years?

    And we ask ourselves why these things happen?

  32. Starryflights

    By your standard, we should legalize heroin, crystal meth, and every other illegal drug as well since the laws are not 100 percent effective.and somebody would get hold of some.@Emma

    Latest reports are that the shooter used the Bushmaster, which is basically a modified M16 developed for the army, to kill those kids. He also had several 30 round magazines. Banning both the weapon and the high volume magazines would have averted at least some of the carnage. That is just common sense.

  33. Emma

    I submit that if the shooter had two 15-round mags, he could have done just as much damage as a 30-round mag. Reloading is not that big a deal–even this suburban mom can do it very quickly. I think if we’re going to have an intelligent discussion about some sort of gun control, that it needs to be based on fact, not on some emotional response to words like “semiautomatic weapons” and “assault rifle”, which evoke entirely inaccurate impressions on the uninformed. Otherwise, we will get nowhere, and we’ll all be here wringing our hands the next time this happens, because nothing will change. Let’s talk instead, for example, about gun-show loopholes. I know a lot of gun owners who think those should be closed. Facts and reason, not emotion, should guide our laws.

    1. Emma, I am not saying you are wrong. But…its real difficult not to be emotional right now. Those of us who aren’t enthusiasts don’t know the right terms so we go with what we know. I am a gun owner but my guns are simple. You could have bought them 50 years ago. In fact, someone probably did. If the enthusiasts want us to cut the emotion, guide us with some common sense. If you don’t offer up some sort of compromise we can all sink our teeth into and wrap our heads around, then you are going to have us non-enthusiasts defining the issue.

      We are very fed up. This massacre was the last straw. 3 magic numbers- 20, 6, 7. I thought VA Tech would start the discussion. That ended in a fizzle. I have heard people here disregard and vilify Tech survivor, Colin Goddard. He was there. He took the bullets and yet people make fun of him. That’s offensive. That’s over now.

      This problem is 2 fold. How we handle guns and mental illness are on the table and won’t go away until we deal with these problems. After that we can start talking about the frigging video games.

  34. @Emma
    Gun show loophole? There is no gun show loophole.

    You mean, the ability to sell your private property without going through a licensed dealer?
    To enforce a law that forbids transfer of a firearm without a dealer’s involvement, the firearms will have to be registered. Registration only empowers anti-gun politicians. and does nothing to prevent crimes.

    Now, one way to alleviate worries about private sales…which, according to the FBI, is actually a very small source of “crime” guns, is to open up access to the federal background check system (NICS) to everyone, so that a private citizen can use it. That way there is no third party involved. That idea has been submitted and yet…the gun control groups like Brady fight it. Funny how they don’t want all transfers to be easily checked…only those that must use a dealer.

    Also, Emma, since you brought it up, how would doing this have stopped any of the recent shootings? None used weapons bought in a private sale.

    1. Cargo, you know, this might be time for you to just listen. Emma is no body’s wuss on 2A laws and rights.

      I get the feeling that Emma can have a conversation. I still feel you aren’t ready. You are going to be too busy telling us what’s right with what we have now.

      Obviously something isn’t effen right or we wouldn’t have 20 dead little children right here at Christmas. Their parents should be getting last minute gifts, not burying their babies.

      At what point do we start the Mantra: Never Again!

  35. @Moon-howler
    We already restrict weapon ownership. What did you have in mind that is different?

  36. Censored bybvbl

    Why does anyone need to own a gun other than a simple handgun or a simple one that could be used for hunting (shotgun or rifle)? The ones frequently used in these mass killings are those designed to kill people (originally enemies in war).

    1. Deer, Censored, Deer. They shoot back.

  37. Steve Randolph

    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036789/ns/msnbc-morning_joe/#50222624

    Change must come, and responsible conservatives will play a major
    part in it happening.

  38. @Steve Randolph
    Really? Change MUST come? In what way are you thinking?

    @Censored bybvbl
    a) “Need” is not necessary.
    b) For those of us that have had to use one in defense….. they are necessary. Many have needed to use multiple rounds. I know of at least 3 people, personally.
    c) All of the weapons used by civilians have been used in war.
    d) Just because YOU don’t feel a “need” for them does not mean that the rest of the citizenry should be deprived of modern weaponry.

    I’m trying to have a conversation. No one that is calling for more restrictions seems to be answering my questions, though. How do the rules that are being discussed actually do anything without restricting rights? And if you mean to restrict rights, how much? And how do those restrictions actually prevent criminals from still committing crimes while the protecting the law abiding?

    Btw…Connecticut already has an “assault weapons” ban and registration.

  39. Censored bybvbl

    @Cargosquid

    How much of your gun philosophy has been influenced by your military experience? I think people who have been in combat have a hyper awareness of danger. (I’ve an acquaintance whose son served in Iraq and was wounded. He never slept without being fully clothed and with his shoes on. He was ready to split on a moment’s notice. However, he was unlikely to encounter any danger at her suburban home. His was a reaction to having once been in danger. )It’s a reaction to what they’ve experienced and might not be easily turned off – just as a fondness for firearms may develop from having used them in the military, police, security fields. I think people who haven’t used them don’t feel that heightened danger and don’t feel the need to acquire many of them – maybe a shotgun for hunting only.

  40. I’ve never been in combat.
    The most danger that I’ve been in, other than inherently dangerous work related dangers, has been a) working as an armored car messenger b) just happening to have a gun available when some conditions and people turned dangerous.

    My gun philosophy grew from the fact that I see it as a tool, no more, no less, like a fire extinguisher, my belief that we are free citizens whose rights are inalienable and protected by the Constitution, that free men have access to arms, and that liberty is the best order, and that politicians…ALL politicians will eventually seek too much power.
    It comes from a realization that when seconds matter, the cops are only minutes away.
    It comes from the realization that the best intentions, when made into law, WILL mutate into oppression, eventually, unless there are active checks and balances.

    Everyone says that there are no “unlimited” rights. But no one has a consistent meaning for that statement.
    I believe that rights ARE unlimited as they are written in the Constitution.

    Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

    Congress shall make NO law. How is that NOT unlimited? Congress cannot prohibit the free exercise of religion or abridge the freedom of speech or the press or the right to peaceably assemble or petition te gov’t. That is an unlimited right. Congress cannot do these things. Abuses resulting from said actions that abuse another’s rights, such as the everyready canard of “what if human sacrifice is the religion?” are just that…abuse of another’s rights. One can SAY anything at all. One HAS to accept the consequences of said actions.

    A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
    The right of the people to keep AND bear arms shall not be infringed. Of course, the gov’t HAS to restrict that one…right? A well regulated militia…. means well trained organized body. That was changed over the years to mean that the militia was the National Guard, which completely changes the nature of a militia. The National Guard is now part of the Army. It is not a militia. The gov’t has forgone the use of the militia, substituting gov’t employees…police. A well trained body of citizens, being necessary to keep their state free, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. If the state controlled the militia…or issued its arms/restricted them to armories, then the militia could not defend the nation from a tyrannical gov’t. Shall not be infringed…is pretty clear and unlimited.

    No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
    Pretty clear… comes in handy if the gov’t decided to do so….and you notice that the Founders DID leave themselves an out…they decide the manner.
    That one is a limited right.

    The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
    This one is abused daily. When we travel, when we email, when you walk in public in New York, when no-knock raids are conducted..especially on flimsy warrants that weren’t read.

    No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
    Actually, in most cases, the gov’t is pretty good, but it has recently gotten worse, since Obama decided that he can hold Americans indefinitely and/or assassinate them without trial. And the seizing of private property by LEO during drug busts/suspected drug busts have corrupted our forces and law makers.

    In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.
    I think Morris would agree that this one has been abused. Is it unlimited…how could you limit this right?

    Or these?
    In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.
    Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

    The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
    The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

    The last two are especially important in being “unlimited,” that is, not limited by gov’t control.

    If the rights of a citizen are limited by other than it being subject to the rights of others, than it is NOT a right. My right to keep and bear arms on my body does not infringe on the rights of others. Nor does my speech, unless I compel or incite others to violence against you. Or if I attack you without legal cause.

    My philosophy is that the individual is sovereign and free, while hewing to ordered liberty as agreed to by society, which is constrained by the limits of the Constitution. Said Constitution can be amended. If amended, there can be other consequences.

    One constitutional question that has been discussed elsewhere, and I don’t know the answer to, is: The Bill of Rights had to be ratified and accepted for the original states to form a union. If one of those original amendments is removed….is the union still valid?

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