“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Leonard Pitts, Jr., writing about the recent school shooting in South Carolina, reflects on the fundamental break with reality illustrated by the news coverage of violent death in the United States.
Perhaps the most frustrating thing is that that hierarchy has no basis in reality. Last year, PolitiFact tallied the number of Americans killed in this country by terrorism in the 10 preceding years. It came to 71. The number of us killed by guns in that same time frame? 301,797.
In a way, the phenomenon he highlights is natural. Unusual, out-of-the-ordinary events are “news.”
Death by gunnuttery is commonplace and mundane in NRA paradise.