There was another shooting yesterday in America.
The locations and specifics differ, but the inevitability that there will be some mass shooting somewhere, sometime, in the United States never seems to change.
This time around, it was a hate crime. Some lunatic who claimed that he wanted all Jews to die walked into a synagogue, the Tree of Life Congregation, which is located in the Squirrel Hill district of Pittsburgh, on Saturday morning and opened fire, killing 11 people, execution style. Six others were injured during the shooting.
Robert Bowers, the gunman, made no secret of his motivation, telling one police officer:
"They're committing genocide to my people. I just want to kill Jews."
He used an AR-15 and three handguns during the attack that lasted 20 minutes.
President Trump also spoke of the tragedy, and suggested that if there had been an armed guard inside, things might have wound up differently.
"If there was an armed guard inside the temple, they would have been able to stop him, maybe there would have been nobody killed, except for him, frankly."
"When people do this, they should get the death penalty. And they shouldn't have to wait years and years. I think they should very much bring the death penalty into vogue."
While President Trump was quickly got busy defending his idea that an armed guard would have surely altered the outcome, he made no mention of the fact that Bowers shot and killed four armed enforcement officers during the shooting.
What does it say about our country that there is yet another shooting, and that it already is fading in the news cycle? What does it say about our country that just a day later, thousands of people went into the football stadium and cheered their team on after the obligatory "moment of silence?" What does it say that a shooting now defined as a hate crime targeting Jews seems hardly to have caused more than a blip in our news cycle, that nowadays, 11 people killed and six more wounded hardly seems enough to raise many eyebrows, other than the standard "thoughts and prayers" and the also now standard digging in the trenches of gun rights zealots and gun control advocates?
Seriously, what the hell is wrong with this country right now?
Pittsburgh synagogue shooting suspect charged with 29 counts, could face death penalty — live updates by Justin Carissimo of CBS News, October 28, 2018:
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