This is Why We Can't Have Nice Things

 

     Highland Park is a nice suburb town just outside of Chicago. To look at today's aborted parade route on Central Street, it looks like Everytown, USA. Central Street looks as if it was built for parades to celebrate days like today or Christmas or to celebrate local heroes.

     The lady you see in the inset of the video above is named Kristen Carlson and she and her 17 year-old were running late for the parade. They were coming out of an alleyway when they saw panicked people running toward them. "There's a shooter," one of them said. They ran back to Carlson's mother's home a few blocks away.

     So, Highland Park, outside of Chicago, becomes the scene of the latest mass shooting in our great nation and on the day celebrating the 246th anniversary of our independence from a nation that hardly ever sees mass shootings. I guess it's time to look up Highland Park on a map, stick a red pushpin into it to join the hundreds of others then await the next one.

     It's getting to the point where one can legitimately ask if our mass shooters are inspiring those in other countries. After all, just hours before the one in Highland Park, there was another at a mall in Copenhagen, Denmark, another nation out of nearly 200 in which mass shootings are a rarity. In fact the shooting at the Field's Mall south of Copenhagen, the capital, was their first mass shooting in seven years.

     That's because Denmark has some of the strictest gun control laws in Europe. But today, three people were killed.

     Have we become a plague for other nations to deal with?

     One observation made by Mrs. Carlson was that the older children in Highland Park were calm and composed while helping the younger children while the adults were running for their lives. That's because mass shootings weren't part of their childhood. Their kids are used to it and active shooter drills at school. This has become the new normal for them.

     But, take heart, people, for there's at least one right wing sociopath out there who still clings to normalcy and the old bromide of "thoughts and prayers". That would be Darren Bailey, who's running for Governor of Illinois. And today, Darren released a campaign video that was shot after the shooting. And Darren, who, of course, is backed by Sociopath Zero Donald Trump, said,

     "The shooter is still at large, so let's pray for justice to prevail, and now let's move on and celebrate the independence of this nation. We know the mission, we have got to get corruption and evil out of our government, and we have got to elect men and women of honor and of courage to get this country and this state back on track."

     Yes, you read that right. "Yes, there are rotting corpses that aren't even cold, yet, and dozens injured but let's forget all that unpleasantness and fire up them grills. I like mine medium rare, by the way."

     Because the real evil is in the Oval Office.