Sarah Proud and Tall just caught my frame of mind exactly. I’m in no state to write about guns and the American pathology that transforms a “well regulated militia” into dead a dead six year old and seventy more dead and wounded whose crimes were that of seeking a good time in the dark on a Friday night. I’ll get there, just not now. (I’ve got some book threading to do to, so I’m dealing with the very odd thought that at least for a moment, SPT and I are the same person in two bodies. Perhaps I shouldn’t have had that last bourbon…)
Sarah P&T and Ed Kilgore both respond to the news from Aurora with music, and that’s my reflex too. Here, it’s Ed that got me thinking. Once he heard the news if the shooting, he switched out some earlier choice in one of his regular music slots (I didn’t catch it) for this. A good choice; great music. He followed that up at day’s end with another track along similar lines.
Me? I’m not as nice a man as Kilgore, I guess. I certainly don’t have his musical sense of the possibility of comfort at such a time. I rage at the state of our nation that John can so precisely lay out the wholly inadequate — or worse, much worse — reaction to the fact that 70 people got shot this morning.
So here’s where I go for musical balm — if that’s the right word:
<div align=”center”></div><iframe width=”420″ height=”315″ src=”http://www.youtube.com/embed/7YqppQ9neU4″ frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe></div>
My heart goes out to those in pain. In the words of my tradition, may they be comforted among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.
My rage to those who “think” the solution to the ongoing pathology of American gun culture is the zombie lurch of undead John Waynes.
jurassicpork
Louis Gohmert said the shootings were because we’ve been attacking Judeo-Christian beliefs (which have always had a cozy relationship with guns). But what did other conservatives have to say abut the Aurora shooting? Pottersville has the scoop.
Uncle Glenny
Underplayed: Schubert Der Tot und Das Mädchen
Especially the first movement. (Chamber, not Lieder)
Finale St. Matthew Passion.
Valdivia
Tom been meaning to say I listened to that podcast of yours at The Story Collider. It was great, wonderful story.
Tom Levenson
@Uncle Glenny: Great stuff indeed.
@Valdivia: Thanks! (Blushes.)
Valdivia
@Tom Levenson:
I particularly loved the ending about Newton. I was picking fruit in the farmers market and it made me stop mid movement and smile. :)
Marcellus Shale, Public Dick
gg allin
he may not be no motzart but at least he gets to the point.
Raven
The Braves were down 9-0 and are going to the bottom of the 9th with a 10-9 lead!
Jewish Steel
The original is more mournful and captures my feelings on the matter.
Dies Irae
NotMax
An unleavened toaster pastry?
Mike in NC
You can bet the fucking NRA will use this tragedy as a fundraising opportunity. I own exactly one pistol and one rifle that haven’t been fired in 20+ years.
Raven
@Raven: Ack! The Nats tied it!
maya
This has been been sung by Sarah Brightman and Charlotte Church, but this is an extraordinary rendition of my favorite salve for personal loss.
Mnemosyne
@Mike in NC:
Some people here have said they’ve already received robocalls from Wayne LaPierre. Assholes.
NotMax
@Raven
How’s your tussle with Morpheus going?
Getting sleep?
EnfantTerrible
In my abjectly opinion, it is far healthier to think about the departed and the loved ones left behind, than about rage-nuts and their splutterings.
http://youtu.be/p7q1VRiwZF0
“May flights of angels of sing thee to thy rest”.
Raven
@NotMax: Nope and the old lady went out with a bunch of other womens and I refuse to let her drink and drive so I’m watchin the game and posting pictures on Anne’s last post till she calls!
eta I think I left both extra batteries and chargers for my camera in the condo. They are checking with housekeeping but I don’t hold much hope.
e.a.f.
I awoke to the news on CNN regarding the shootings. no amount of music is going to work for me. Living in Canada, with a few less guns than the U.S.A. I have never been able to understand the need for guns. I suspect is has something to do with the NRA. They have moved north & making inroads in Canada. Not a healthy thing. I now people say people kill people not guns. Well Japan doesn’t have guns & their national murder rate is less than one American cities.
Canada’s murder rate is much lower because we have far less guns. There has been an increase in gun violence because Americans are trading our pot for guns.
It is a very sorry situation. People went out to have fun & died because of a nut bar & too many guns. I feel so sorry for all of those involved.
jl
This came to mind after hearing about the tragedy, and then later when I heard the crazy reactions.
Purcell Hear my prayer, O Lord
http://youtu.be/y2D67ybXGz0
e.a.f.
@Mike in NC:
what do you even need one gun for. A rifle for hunting is about all any one needs. If you’re not going hunting then why have a gun or rifle around.
piratedan
I think I need to start a business up that employs elderly old women who go out and publicly shame these douchebag Republicans for all of the stupid shit that they say. Because I think there’s a market out there for us to pool our resources to pay some sweet little old biddy to walk up and tell an asshat like Gohmert that he’s an idiot and he should simply shut up and pray for the survivors.
lamh35
Lord knows I’m not a Piers Morgan fan, but I did happen to see him take this idjit who tried to throw shade on the discussion about gun control. Piers really did give him the whats to. Even I was like “good on you Piers Morgan, good on you”.
Here’s video:
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/bestoftv/2012/07/21/pmt-david-kopel.cnn
Wazmo
For the decesaed, injured and those affected.
hope
If the right to bear arms is predicated upon the “well regulated militia” clause, why don’t gun owners have to enlist in the military or national guard, and meet the requirements – physical, actual service, et al? FYI – in the past I had a federal firearms license and a concealed carry permit.
NotMax
@Raven
Might give a ring to the rental car people too, in case they found anything.
Ya never know.
jl
@hope:
Because the the second amendment rights groups have been captured by callous ruthless front groups for the US guns and ammo industry that why.
They do not give a rat’s ass about the second amendment and what it was for, they just want to sell as much arms and ammo as possible.
Whenever the Founder’s supposedly sacred and wise intentions conflict with what money and power wants to do today, that all goes out the window and into the trash. Just look at the reactionary wing of the Supreme Court.
NotMax
hope
I’m not an originalist, but one reason is that it hearkens back to the concept of militia historically.
Able-bodied males above a certain age were deemed on call to be mustered as a militia to fortify any already standing troops at the order of a jurisdictional government.
That government (state, local, propertied noble, whatever) would be spared the cost of caching and providing arms if those called brought their own (which, in a principally agrarian society or settlements in the wilderness, they would have familiarity with).
Note that the above does not address the concept of “well-regulated” and whether or not that applies to the people, the armaments, or both.
Me in VA
@lamh35: Yes he was very good shutting down the NRA guy.
Sarah, Proud and Tall
@Mr Levenson:
It’s slightly terrifying that there could be two of either of us, so I’ll have another drink for both of us.
MobiusKlein
Negativeland: guns
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtyZMRJbLq8
Omnes Omnibus
@Sarah, Proud and Tall: Well, I am scared.
Cassidy
@e.a.f.: Yeah, but your Canadian and put gravy on your Freedom Fries!
Seriously, though, I love poutine.
Second seriously, some people just enjoy shooting. It is a relaxing hobby. That being said, I didn’t keep anything locked and loaded in the house and have never carried a concealed weapon or ever intend to.
Steeplejack
This thread screwy for anyone else? “Recent Posts” and “Recent Comments” are below the last comment, and the comments are extremely wide.
Other thread seem normal. Mistermix’s “14 Dead in Denver” was screwy this morning, but in a different way (no time stamp or Reply button for comments).
pseudonymous in nc
@Mnemosyne:
I imagine they have a template all ready for Wayne Pebble: “We mourn the [INSERT NUMBER] victims of the tragic events in [INSERT PLACE], but this must not be used to take away our Second Amendment rights…” and a computer-generated voice fills in the blanks.
I just want to see a bit of honesty from the NRA, its gun-peddling corporate buddies, and its gun fetishist supporters. They need to be out there celebrating every gun massacre as proof that they’ve won the debate, and if their argument is that they haven’t won yet because MOAR GUNZ are needed to deal with gun massacres, well, they’ve got a fuckload of money and a fuckload of guns. Get Gary Gunner and his pals to drop off their spare pistols and ammo at people’s doorsteps, especially in urban areas.
Confutatis maledictis, flammis acribus addictis, etc.
Omnes Omnibus
@Cassidy: I own three guns (two shotguns and a rifle) that were either given to me or inherited. I occasionally hunt, shoot skeet, or target shoot with them. I also have never kept ammo in my home. I buy what I need and use it up. Keeps the place reasonably safe, but not in the gun nut sense.
@Steeplejack: Same here.
Mnemosyne
BTW, anyone who has never seen Peter Bogdanovich’s Targets really should get it from Netflix. It’s loosely based on the Charles Whitman case (I know, who? so hard to keep them all straight) and is just as chilling today as it was when it came out 40 years ago.
We just keep running the same cycle of shock/horror/outrage/inaction over and over and over and over again — literally since before I was born (the movie came out one year prior to my birth).
freelancer
@Steeplejack:
Yes. All the columns are gone now.
cosima
Drove to the Denver Int’l Airport listening to the update from the Aurora PD & Gov Hickenlooper. Utter rage at the thought that there is nothing in place to track someone who purchases 4 guns in 2 months, two of them guns that were not available to civilians until 2004, and thousands of rounds over the internet. Tears in my eyes several times at the thought of the 10 bodies left in situ while they conducted their investigation & the families waited for confirmation of the worst possible news that a family can receive & listening to the police officer (commander?) choke up.
Picked up my husband (who would have wanted to see it at an imax theatre, as we did The Avengers, but not at midnight on opening night) and my 7-yr-old daughter. They were returning from visiting family in Washington. My husband said his sister (who lives north of Seattle) received a fucking robocall today from one of her reps saying this tragedy does not indicate a need for stricter gun control laws.
Any BJers get one of those from their rep?
We give a lot of money to different causes, not just persons, but SPLC, Planned Parenthood, local public radio, etc., and just yesterday I threw a note in the recycling from Sarah Brady, wife of James Brady, asking for money to fight for stricter gun control laws & that people contact their legislators. Then today happened. WTF world? How do I choose which causes to support financially when it’s one cause after another trying to stem the tide of corporate & governmental regulation (or lack thereof) evil?
How about this song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4N3N1MlvVc4
Mad World seems to fit today.
Omnes Omnibus
@freelancer: No, they are at the bottom of the page.
Cassidy
@Omnes Omnibus: Pretty much the same for me. I had handguns, but i didn’t keep them locked and loaded. I did keep a magazine loaded for my .45, but that wasn’t exactly my go to choice for protection.
Nina-the-first
A short work that begins with scored silence, then a tolling bell…Cantus in memory of Benjamin Britten.
Maybe as #18 e.a.f. said, no amount of music (or words) will do, but I guess all we can do is try to understand someone else’s pain right now…
dance around in your bones
@Steeplejack: Second time today that a whole thread has gone screwy.
I’m glad that you point it out, because often I think it’s just me and my old eyeballs. Or my mental status.
Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: My mobile site went wonky during the workday. I wonder if it is all related.
dance around in your bones
@Omnes Omnibus:
Everything is
illuminatedrelated.Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: Explain. In detail. Now. Please.
Richard
Come on, people. “Sportsmen” would be lost if they didn’t have access to assault rifles with 100 round drum magazines.
Part of the insanity is that I suspect many if not most of the folks who buy this kind of shit have fantasies of playing out the plot of the movie “Red Dawn”. Yeah, those “weekend warriors” are really going to be the ones who save ‘Merica when the Muslim-commie-liberals come to take over.
dance around in your bones
@Omnes Omnibus:
I’m sorry, at the moment I am trying to explain the multiple facets of the term ‘Bloody Mary’ to a 6 yr old.
But really, everything IS related. Even Bloody Fucking Mary. With a celery stick.
Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: Interesting. I just finished reading (well, re-reading) Alison Weir’s The Children of Henry VIII and the drink was not the first thing that came to my mind when I saw Bloody Mary.
dance around in your bones
@Omnes Omnibus:
Well, this kid goes to a Christian daycare center and heard the term from another kid. The first thing I thought about was Bloody Mary 1 but the second and third things I thought about were “stand in front of a mirror and say Bloody Mary three times” and/or the drink with a celery stick (which I lied to the kid about and said it was GROSS!)
Talking to kids is weird.
Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: A dill pickle spear instead of the celery stick would make it much less gross.
BigD
Realistically, the guy was probabaly distraught over student loan payments.
dance around in your bones
@Omnes Omnibus:
I’m so sorry, but that sounds much MORE gross! And I LOVE dill pickles.
OK. I’ve never actually tried it, so I may be full of shit. Wouldn’t be the first time.
Gin & Tonic
Weird formatting.
Anyway, for balm I reach for the Credo from Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis.
Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: Trust me on this. Have I ever steered you wrong? Give it a try.
dance around in your bones
Has this site just died?
I am stuck watching Phineas and Ferb with the aforesaid 6 yr old until his mom can get the 2 yr old to go the fuck to sleep.
ETA: 6 yr old just told me it’s “Fanboy and Chum-Chum” , not Phineas and etc. My bad.
ETA2: Omnes, you have never steered me wrong. Next up – dill pickle spear in a godamned Bloody Mary at Shoreline Cafe!
Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: Does this song help?
El Cid
From the news conference shown on Rachel Maddow’s show (guest host MHP), it was reported that the killer had bought 4 firearms in the past month (maybe two, didn’t replay) from local gunshops, and 6,000 rounds of ammunition, locally and online.
Poicephalus
Dear Tom,
Bach is Teh Roxxor
Mozart is Teh Suxxor
As it was in the beginning…
Peace to all
El Cid
Washington Post follows up further.
dance around in your bones
@Omnes Omnibus:
Well, it was mildly amusing. I remember doing those hand games in school.
Bizarre Love Triangle? WTF, over?
Kids are being karate-chopped into bed as I type, Enshallah!
Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: I could never do the hand games. I was in a boys choir and I played violin and viola, but try rhythmic handgames (or jumping rope) and I was lost.
dance around in your bones
@Omnes Omnibus:
I was in a girls and boys mixed choir (Episcopalian), fully capable of reading music AND doing hand games.
Shit, we used to do those games with sticks in New Mexico. I do not know if that was common around these United States.
Maybe I am a Commie.
Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: Well, I am going to bed. I intend to do a 21.5 mile bike ride tomorrow morning – my longest ride since getting the bike – so some sleep might just be in order. Cheers.
dance around in your bones
@Omnes Omnibus:
Slaap hout. Nice chatting wit ya.
Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: Slaap hout? Dutch?
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: Sounds tasty. Or painful.
dance around in your bones
@Omnes Omnibus
Yup. Lived in A’dam for a while. Had my first kid there while living on a houseboat. On the Prinsengracht. Waaaaay back in the 70’s. Damn, I am oldish.
Lotsa fun, though.
Hidden Heart
Some more music.
For the grieving, John Rutter’s “Requiem” – I listened to this so many times in the weeks after my father died, and it gave me comfort. I don’t believe in celestial choirs, but if they existed, they’d sound like the chorus coming in about 1:50 into this track. For me, this is the sound of the emotional strengths can endure past and through crises.
For our monstrous society, Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem, the Offertorium.
So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,
And took the fire with him, and a knife.
And as they sojourned, both of them together,
Isaac the first-born spake, and said, My Father,
Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?
Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
And builded parapets the trenches there,
And stretched forth the knife to slay his son.
When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,
Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,
Neither do anything to him. Behold,
A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;
Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.
But the old man would not so, but slew his son,
And half the seed of Europe, one by one.
Omnes Omnibus
@dance around in your bones: I love that city. I stayed there with friends, one of whom was a native and was able to show me the real city. So beautiful and so liveable. And now to bed….
Mnemosyne
@Omnes Omnibus:
D’oh! I think I missed you, but if you like Weir’s books, her latest Anne Boleyn book, The Lady in the Tower, is very good. I didn’t think there was much more to be said, but Weir does a good job of unravelling Boleyn’s last days and the political and personal machinations that caused her downfall.
Weir’s fiction sucks, unfortunately. I got through about half a chapter of her Jane Grey novel and never went back.
opie_jeanne
I love Mozart, and his “Dixit Dominus” seems to fit my mood recently.
http://youtu.be/N4J2AWHD510
The Lord God said, “Come sit by my right side and I will make footstools of your enemies.”
I think that’s right. I haven’t performed that since I was in college in the mid 70s.
opie_jeanne
@El Cid: Any idea what the value of all that hardware would be? My 94-year-old father was guessing about $2000, couldn’t understand where a student would lay his hands on that kind of money. I figured he used part of a grant.
Mnemosyne
@opie_jeanne:
Either that, or he put it on a credit card he had no intention of paying back. It’s very, very easy to get a credit card as a student and even easier to rack up ridiculous debt on it.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
@NotMax:
You’re also forgetting that the idea of a State militia was also a response to the threat that THOSE people – you know, the 3/5s people – might rebel. Widespread gun ownership (for the full 5/5s people) was a way to deal with this fear.
opie_jeanne
@Mnemosyne: Thanks, I hadn’t even thought of that. I was very annoyed when we took our middle child to college as a freshman at UCI and there were credit card reps with tables set up all over the place. They weren’t the only predators, there were gyms and phone companies too, but they were the worst.
Her roommate couldn’t resist the credit cards and in four years she managed to rack up $10k in debt on a card that was only good for about a grand when it was issued to her, but she paid the bill so they kept upping the limit. and she spent it on clothing and shoes and eating out, when she had prepaid meals as well as access to a nice kitchen.
Dennis SGMM
Am I the only one who finds it strange that you can catch hell for trying to bring a thermos full of lemonade on a plane yet you can purchase four firearms and several thousand rounds of ammunition within eight weeks and no one will even bother to ask what you might be up to?
DecidedFenceSitter
@opie_jeanne: I’m just getting back into shooting. I figured a fair bit over $2000 depending on the ammo and flak/protective vest. The glocks themselves are 500ish each, the AR-15s I haven’t seen for less than a grand, pump action shotgun is probably 400-500. Plus ammo, which I haven’t priced, but 9mm is cheaper than all of those, and at the range runs about $15 per 50 rounds. And 6000 rounds would be about 1800 dollars. So 5k + protective gear + accessories (like the 100 round drum).
AHH onna Droid
Given that symptoms of schizophrenia emerge in early adulthood, wouldnt it make sense to interview first time gun purchases under 30 and refer them to mental health services if required?
Also, too, NRA trolls say “enforce existing laws”. Given disproportinate rates of felony convictions and stricter urban gun laws, is this not yet another dog whistle, guns are only scary if nears are carrying them?
AHH onna Droid
Given that symptoms of schizophrenia emerge in early adulthood, wouldnt it make sense to interview first time gun purchases under 30 and refer them to mental health services if required?
Also, too, NRA trolls say “enforce existing laws”. Given disproportinate rates of felony convictions and stricter urban gun laws, is this not yet another dog whistle, guns are only scary if nears are carrying them?
Jeff(the other one)
@NotMax: The Swiss have a national militia, and all adults over 21 have to either spend several years in the militia, or other national service. They are given an assault rifle, and have to maintain it and maintain there ability to use it, under penalty of law. This is well-regulated.