The Expendables

“We have done almost all we can do.”

Van Johnson, Mayor, Savannah, Georgia

Mass shootings and gun homicides seem to be primarily an urban affliction, places where firearms are almost never used for legitimate hunting. The notion of self-defense and having a gun to ward off that “bad guy with a gun” falls hard with the statistical reality that only one-in-thirty gun deaths can be classified as justifiable. The notion of a ubiquitous right to have a gun, open carry in some states, was never part of American jurisprudence. The Second Amendment, by its own wording is only applicable to gun possession by government regulated volunteer soldiers (“militia”), was drafted in an era of flintlocks and muskets. Until a misdirected Supreme Court ruling in 2008 (Heller vs District of Columbia), that constitutional provision was never interpreted to mean a general right of any American to own guns.

We’ve prioritized gun ownership over the lives of our children, as the above map of school shootings over the last 12 years illustrates, and the coronavirus era has actually increased to the overall gun homicide rate. Red states seem to want to broaden the rights of gun owners, particularly as to carrying guns in public, including military grade assault weapons. Blue states are finding legal challenges, too often sustained by right-wing judges, to their efforts at reasonable gun control. But urban streets continue to run red with blood, all-too-often that of younger Americans.

We’ve seen how giving police more power to shut down crime seems to have backfired. Blue on black and brown killings escalated. Homicides generally escalated. More guns, exceptionally easy to procure in any major city, are showing up everywhere. Trump-following militia march openly with their guns. Gangbangers are shooting more. It is a weapons free-for-all, and it is getting worse fast, even as the Republican Party redoubles its efforts to shut down any efforts are even the most benign and overwhelmingly supported form of gun control. There are over 320 million privately owned guns in the United States.

Mass shootings at schools really became common after the 1999 Columbine Massacre. “John Cohen, a former Department of Homeland Security official who led efforts to combat mass shootings, said that Columbine ‘absolutely’ influenced subsequent shootings… ‘As law enforcement has studied the individuals who have committed school shootings and other mass casualty attacks, one of the common characteristics they’ve observed is these individuals tend to study past mass shootings,’ said Cohen…” ABC News, April 19, 2019. But blood flowed in our streets with increasingly everywhere. Homicides were on the rise.

Griff Witte and Mark Berman, writing for the June 22nd Washington Post, observe: “The killings rolled over the country like a fast-moving storm. From Savannah to Austin, from Chicago to Cleveland. In six hours one night this month, four mass-shooting attacks. And in their wake, a sober recognition from city leaders that they don’t have many options left for curbing a surge in homicides that is traumatizing communities nationwide.

“‘We have done almost all we can do,’ said Van Johnson, the mayor of Savannah, Ga… The tools for fighting back are ‘limited’ without state and federal help, said Austin Mayor Steve Adler (D)… ‘It’s going to get worse,’ Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson (D) said…

“As the homicide rate climbed through a year of pandemic-imposed shutdowns and civil unrest, officials held firm to their belief that the rise was driven by that exceptional set of circumstances. As life returned to normal, the theory went, the killings would slow.

“But even as coronavirus restrictions have been lifted and protests have quieted in recent months, the violence has not subsided. Indeed, it has continued to grow. And now, local leaders are grappling with a possibility they had long feared: that a decades-long era of declining murder rates in America’s cities may be over, and that the increased killings may be here to stay… ‘There’s nothing,’ said Jackson, ‘that’s going to bring this down in the near future.’

“Officials and criminal justice experts offer abundant reasons: A nation awash in guns, now more than ever. Deep mistrust between police departments and the communities they serve, particularly in high-poverty areas. The still-painful stresses caused or exacerbated by the pandemic. A cycle of violence that, once set in motion, is hard to break…

“Democrats almost universally say tighter gun laws are needed to curb violent crime, along with investments in education and jobs programs to reduce historic inequities… ‘Guns and poverty are the two outliers that we have compared to other [developed] countries,’ said Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer (D), whose city saw a near-doubling of homicide rates last year. ‘There are just guns everywhere.’

“But new gun restrictions are a nonstarter in Washington, where Republicans have blocked repeated efforts, and in many GOP-controlled state legislatures the laws have been loosened this year… Republicans — along with many police unions and some chiefs — say the real cause of the spike in killings has been an overzealous criminal justice reform movement that has devastated morale in departments and allowed too many criminals to go free.

“‘Nowhere do you see recognition that there are some people who cause incredible harm to the community and who unfortunately need to be in jail,’ said Bill Bratton, a former police commissioner in New York, Los Angeles and Boston…

“In the first quarter of 2021, homicides were up over the same period last year in several cities including Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Indianapolis, Orlando, Pittsburgh and Tampa, according to data collected by the Major Cities Chiefs Association, a group of law enforcement leaders… New York City police reported 462 homicides last year, up from 319 the previous year. Police in Phoenix said there were 200 homicides last year, up from 139 in 2019. In Philadelphia, there were 499 homicides last year, up from 356 a year earlier, according to police.” 

It doesn’t take a genius to recognize that the more guns there are in public, the more lethal they become, the more likely that they will be misused, and the higher the homicide tolls. Not to mention that easy access to guns in the United States has fueled the narcotics trade, the cartels, south of our border where so many US weapon find their way. Given a right-wing Supreme Court, gridlock in Congress and a red wave against any gun control sweeping red states, it is not surprising that the color we see and will continue to see in our city streets is very, very red.

I’m Peter Dekom, and until our elected officials prioritize human life, especially of our young, over an absurd position fostering greater gun ownership and ability to carry, our shameful homicide death toll will continue to produce staggering and horrific statistics.