Even more American school shootings

Parkland shooting survivors offer words to Texas families: 'We support you' (Republicans are enabling the killing of America's young people by not supporting gun regulations to prevent school shootings.)

Hours after a shooting in Santa Fe, Texas, Florida families offered condolences, advice and promises for a renewed call to action

Echo from The Guardian ~ Kudos to the grieving and brave Fred Guttenberg

“My heart breaks for you,” said Fred Guttenberg, just hours after the news of a high school shooting in Santa Fe, Texas, that claimed the lives of 10 (more) ~ young~ people.

An anguished Guttenberg went on: “Your world changes. Every day you’re going to find out how many people love you, because that’s what we found out. But be prepared. Every day you go forward with loss.”

Guttenberg was offering his advice to the newly bereaved families in Texas who will join a seemingly unending community of Americans processing the loss of loved ones in the wake of gun violence. Just three months ago, on 14 February, Guttenberg’s 14-year-old daughter Jaime was killed with 16 other pupils and teachers at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school in Parkland, Florida.

Speaking to Guardian by phone and audibly overwhelmed by the latest tragedy, Guttenberg continued: “It can happen anywhere. It is time for us to get off our asses and do something about this issue of guns. It is horrifying.”

The shooting at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas injected new life into the gun reform movement in the US, and as news of the latest tragedy in Texas broke, many Parkland families and survivors reignited their call for reform.

“I know what it feels like to think that today might be your last day,” Eden Hebron, a 15-year-old Stoneman Douglas freshman, told the Guardian by text. 

Offering her advice to survivors of the Sante Fe shooting, she continued: “But you made it. And now all you can do to help the situation is make sure that these shootings stop happening.”

Hebron saw three classmates killed back in February. “I’ve learned that speaking with other survivors and firsthand witnesses is very helpful. No one else understands what it is like to be in a room and cover your head from bullets that are shooting into your class,” she said to the Santa Fe, Texas, survivors.

Hebron predicted the shooting would lead to renewed protests around the country.

In March, (March For Our Lives) over 2 million people in the US took to the streets following the Parkland massacre. In April, a nationwide walkout saw pupils in thousands of locations – including Santa Fe High – walk out of their classrooms in another moment of impassioned national resistance.

Shortly after Friday’s massacre, 18-year-old Emma Gonzalez, who has become perhaps the most recognizable survivor of the Parkland massacre, tweeted in solidarity: “Santa Fe High, you didn’t deserve this. You deserve peace all your lives, not just after a tombstone saying that is put over you. You deserve more than Thoughts and Prayers, and after supporting us by walking out we will be there to support you by raising up your voices.”

Nineteen-year-old Ryan Deitsch, another Parkland survivor who addressed the Washington (March For Our Lives) rally in March, offered a single sentence: “Politics aside, how many more have to die before we can change?”

Other mourners in Parkland were simply too distraught to talk. John Crescitelli, whose 15-year-old daughter Sarah survived the attack cowering in her classroom, wrote in an emailed statement: “I have tears in my eyes as I write this and feel like I’m reliving that horrific day all over again. When I hear the term ‘family reunification center’ I shutter. When I hear the sirens in the background and see the overhead helicopter video of the Texas school my palms get sweaty.”

He added: “I’m sad to report that something deep inside me died today when I became aware of today’s shooting. My inner light became dim, as my hope for humanity and our children dims.”

Rebecca Schneid, a Stoneman Douglas senior and the co-editor of the high school’s news magazine, said Friday’s massacre should be something that “gets people angry again”.

“If we can do that, it will be an amazing thing,” she said. “This tragedy is likely something that wouldn’t have happened if the proper legislation had been put in place to prevent it.”

Additional reporting by Lois Beckett

Florida echo~ National Rifle Association's lobbyist pay for influence

A Pensacola Florida opinion explains how Senator Marco Rubio continues to support the agenda of the National Rifle Association (NRA), even after two mass gun violence slaughters have killed and irreparably harmed his Florida's constituents. (Pulse Nightclub in Orlando FL June 12, 2016, where 50 people were killed and 58 injured; and the February 14, 2018, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School slaughter, where 17 children were killed by a gunman.) This carnage is enabled by lobbyists who buy influence.

Opinion echo from a letter written by Patricia Edmisten and originally published in the Pensacola News Journal

Enough is Enough!

PENSACOLA, Fl ~ On Valentine’s Day, 2018, a sick young man took 17 innocent lives at Parkland High School. Surviving students plead with legislators to stand up to the NRA and do the right thing by banning assault weapons.

Femme Fatale, Marian Hammer, who ably represents the NRA in Florida, is a powerful lobbyist. She monitors legislators who depart from her talking points and the bills she helps to write on gun laws. Our legislators have sold their souls for an A-plus (MaineWriter~ but deserving of an F- public rating) NRA rating and funding from Ms. Hammer’s handlers. Florida U.S. Senator Marco Rubio, who received $3.3 million from the NRA, is also opposed to any ban on assault weapons. Nationally, the NRA just convinced Mr. Trump to reverse his gut impulse to call for a ban on assault weapons sales and a registration tax on ownership.

Article II of the Constitutional Amendments reads “…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 second clause, “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed,” qualifies the first clause, “a well regulated Militia” And so it was understood until 2008, when, in a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court established an “individual rights” interpretation. District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S 570 (2008). Like most rights, the Second Amendment is not unlimited. “It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose” (Commentary, http://www.lawschool.cornell.edu/). 

In fact, the Supreme Court stressed that the right to keep and bear arms is subject to restriction, that protected arms are those used “for lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home,” in the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons. United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939).

Before and during the American Revolution, the United States had no standing army. To win independence the colonies required militias comprised of ordinary men, many of them farmers, who knew how to use a pistol, musket, or rifle. (Muskets relied on a flintlock, spark, gunpowder, and lead. They were fired from the shoulder and could only be fired four times a minute by a trained soldier.) The militias were subject to local control.

The majority of Americans want reasonable restrictions on guns. The banning of assault weapons and the requirement of universal background checks are not the first steps in a movement to deprive citizens of the weapons they keep for legitimate purposes, such as hunting and self-defense. My husband grew up on a North Carolina farm. Guns were a normal part of family life because they were used to bring home game for the table. No one, however, used anything more powerful than a 12-gauge shotgun.

Psychological screening of individuals who pose a threat to themselves and others is not a science. While desirable, it is magical thinking to believe that mental health professionals will be able to catch every instance of aberrant, violent thinking or behavior that may or may not lead to actual violence. 

Moreover, the arming of teachers is a dangerous and ludicrous decision that will undermine students’ relationships with teachers and further endanger them. While an armed school officer might lessen the carnage, it’s likely that he or she would be among the first eliminated. And even if the FBI and every local sheriff’s department acts precisely as they should, there is only one sure way to make mass killings less likely. We must accept reasonable restrictions upon gun ownership. Let’s start by requiring universal background checks and ban assault weapons and large capacity magazines. And to those legislators who continue to carry water for the NRA, I say grow a spine.

Patricia Edmisten is retired from the University of West Florida where she taught sociological foundations of education and served as director of the office of International Education and Programs.

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Parkview Kyle Kashuv is a wrong minded apologist for common sense

#enoughisenough ~ Kyle Kashuv is wrong minded ~ needs 6 minutes 30 seconds of contemplation about guns. He needs counseling about how to understand common sense gun control regulations like registration of automatic weapons.

My advice to the student apologist Kyle Kashuv:

Practice writing #enoughisenough 100 times on a blackboard ~

Followed by the names of the children and teachers who were murdered in his school, the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, on February 14, 2018, and to do it all in 6 minutes and 30 seconds, the time it took for the murderer to kill his colleagues with a gun.

Scott Beigel, 35, geography teacher and coach

Aaron Feis, 37

It is with Great sadness that our Football Family has learned about the death of Aaron Feis. He was our Assistant Football Coach and security guard. He selflessly shielded students from the shooter when he was shot. He died a hero and he will forever be in our hearts and memories.

Alyssa Alhadeff, 14
Martin Duque Anguiano, 14

Jaime Guttenberg, 14

Nicholas Dworet, 17

Meadow Pollack, 18

Martin Duque, 14

Luke Hover, 15

Gina Montalto, 14

Joaquin Oliver, 17 ~ became a US citizen January 2017

Alaina Petty, 14

Meadow Pollack, 18

Helena Ramsey, 17

Alex Schachter, 14 ~ National Merit Scholar semi-finalist

Carmen Schentrup, 16

Peter Wong, 15 ~ student ROTC

#All_Gun_Violence_Is_Preventable

#MarchForOurLives

#NeverAgain

#NotOneMore

#SandyHookPromise