In the aftermath of sniper murder in Dallas Texas, public reactions have been what we’ve come to expect:
- Conservatives, largely silent about street weapons of mass destruction
- Governor and Mayor pass out pabulum band-aide as soothing, consoling patch for a horrific wound to those drowning in grief before funerals and moving on, without
- Police shootings of black men in Baton Rouge and Minnesota largely pushed to back burners to simmer while the main Media course Terror in Dallas is brought to boil, repeatedly
- MIA, Wayne LaPierre’s madness, Only Way To Stop A Bad Guy With A Gun Is With A Good Guy With A Gun -- all five Dallas police officers were good men with guns, protecting good Americans in Peaceful Assembly
The commonality of sniper fire, mass shootings, gang bangers, foreign wars, police brutality, community fear and NRA bottom-line, lining political pockets is: guns. The cure: hope, trust, faith voting political backbone to overcome special interests.
In unity, we party then weep; play then pray – longing to wash away the epidemic violence of a ranting few with the generous voting common sense of the many.
It’s not just Dallas, Minnesota and Louisiana; not just police killing African-Americans; not just African-Americans shooting police. It’s a constitutional mind-set derived by agendas addicted to profiting from destructive human behavior. It’s not just Conservatism’s Dark Side, but programmed biases ingested into our Hedonic Hot Spots – from handheld devices.
It’s not just about the Bush/Cheney Wall Street induced Great Recession, it’s about defining ourselves by the number of dollars at our disposal.
It’s not just about bigger, better, faster, for what value is being the most advanced country technologically, if our global communications fail to embrace different cultures and points of view.
It’s about getting beyond being statistics:
- More white people killed the twenty-six police who died in the line of duty in 2016, while 136 black people were shot by police in the same 191 days
- More black people were killed by US police in 2015 than were lynched in the worst year of Jim Crow
America is not just about statistics for media hype, The Census for Gerrymandering, Madison Ave analysis for addictive ads that hook us on over consumerism – and while elections are not just about exit polling, exit polling is about our Media trampling over, those who are first will be last.
It’s not just about Texas Open Carry and Paul Ryan’s GOP tap dancing to an oldie but baddie NRA refrain.
It’s about political leaders being elected for solutions, but too many, like Congress and retrograde Roberts & Alito justice, are offering up a pittance of lowering the flag, moments of silence and condolence clichés, while gutting the Voting Rights Act, voting for Citizens United and ignoring this truth: the shared commonality between Newtown’s Sandy Hook, Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, Richmond Virginia’s TV reporters, Alton Sterling, Philando Castile and Terror in Dallas is: guns.
It’s not just violence of any kind is more than political opportunity to huddle and scramble for the perfect words, because for multiple death from gun violence, there are no words.
It’s either about being color blind, preserving the mental health, economic stability and individual security of all human life, or being accomplices after the fact to numeric few attempting a takeover of The Land still trying to breathe Free.
It’s not about the size of our arsenal defining our manhood. It’s about needing cold water in our faces to warm our hearts and awaken our brains: Zika Virus, ISIS, and Climate Change denial are the real potential pandemics.
The fear of being left behind, oppressed and forgotten, can only be defeated by our collective spirit of reason, denying denial of truth and dismissing from power, the powers who need foreign wars and seed domestic violence.
Solutions:
- Instead of allowing 24/7 Media to program us into believing America is a polarized nation, attend meetings of diverse local groups, and listen
- Know that bullets will never defeat the powers that steal our hope – but ballots can
- In peaceful assembly, start walking in city streets; silently, allows the non-violent presence of your numbers to be the message
- Make certain all races, ages, ethnicities and sexual preferences are encouraged to walk with you