WHEN WE WERE STILL SANE...

    Predictably, within 48 hours of the Orlando Massacre, outraged Ameroboobs are out and about looking for scalps. The same cheerful crowds who break up political rallies with bullhorns and rotten eggs; the same folk who throw Molotov Cocktails at police cars, are already storming around demanding gun control laws. Most of them have no idea what they even mean by gun control but we aren't talking reason here. This whole "debate" is being fueled by nothing but blind rage---like most so-called national dialogues in the Prozac Nation---and Action For the Sake of Action is what is really being demanded. And the media is whipping up as much hysteria as possible, like they always do:  public outrage is always good for ratings and advertising dollars.

       It never occurs to these types of people that things like premeditated murder, taking hostages, and assaults with deadly weapons are already illegal. It doesn't occur to them either that all previous attempts at legislating-to-outrage have either been complete disasters or resulted in serious curtailments of our civil liberties. Mandatory seat-belt and helmet laws, the national 21 drinking age, the War on Drugs, sexual harassment laws, paedohysteria laws, anti-smoking laws, the Omnibus Crime Bill, the Patriot Act---has even one of these things resulted in a positive advance of civilization?

       Civilized societies do not respond to tragedies by organizing mobs and looking for human sacrifices. Those are the activities of savages and barbarians. Civilized societies rise above a crisis by demonstrating they are superior to it and can master it. As an example of that, let's turn the clock back almost 90 years ago, when the US was a sane and civilized culture.

        On May 18th, 1927 a madman named Andrew Kehoe bombed an elementary school in Bath Township, Michigan. Kehoe committed suicide at the scene in a rather dramatic fashion. The attack resulted in 44 deaths and 58 wounded---almost all of them children.

        How did the American public react in 1927? The Governor of Michigan sent the National Guard to the scene to set up field hospitals, kitchens, and shelters; and to clear the area of explosives. He then ordered an official inquest.

         President Calvin Coolidge ordered a national day of mourning and prayer; and offered federal resources at Michigan's disposal.

          Senator James Cozzens, a multimillionaire, started a relief fund with his own money and raised enough to fly in international medical specialists to treat the injured, and by September, the school was rebuilt and open again.

            In other words, people in 1927 were faced with a crisis; met it; and overcame it. That's how civilized people behave. In 1927, outrage and temper-tantrums were no substitute for actually doing positive things. People put a higher priority on the welfare of their fellowman than on reaping political capital, media ratings, and making a profit off tragedies.

            But that was 1927, this is 2016. Calvin Coolidge and James Cozzens are nothing but Dead White Males to us. Today's Ameroboobs see such men as nothing but chumps; how could they let such a golden opportunity for power and profit slip through their fingers?

          But they did manage to solve a crisis without shredding the Constitution or inciting public riots. Then again, they were working with a populace who expected them to uphold the laws, not bend them for private advantage.

            Will this latest round of Ritalin-fueled rage result in curtailing the 2nd Amendment? Possibly. A nation that tolerates being scanned in the nude at airports for the right of travelling is capable of anything. The one thing of which we can be certain is that somebody will pay, though it won't help the Orlando victims one bit.