[8]CNN.com
They just need to shut up. The bodies of more than two dozen teachers and young children were still lying in pools of blood on the classroom floors of Sandy Hook Elementary, yet the special interest flacks, pundits and psycho-babblers descended like vultures on carrion. The gun-control zealots. The pro-Second Amendment advocates. The mental health experts. The we’re-going-to-Hell-in-a-hand-basket crowd.
There will be plenty of time to debate; there will be plenty of time to navel-gaze and ask why these horrific mass murders seem to be happening with alarming frequency. Not now. Not while the presents of the dead are still sitting wrapped under their Christmas trees, never to be opened.
Families can sit around their kitchen tables and ask how and why such evil exists in the form of a previously harmless young man. The answers will never satisfy. What we can do, as members of our American family, is remain united in collective grief for the senselessness of it all and honor the memory of the victims and heroism of Principal Dawn Hochsprung, who tried in vain to stop the gunman and Victoria Soto, the brave young teacher who shielded her young students from the carnage.
No one needs to be subjected to the unseemly comments from the likes of Michael Moore, who on Twitter attacked the NRA, George Bush (yes, still) and the male gender while gleefully using the tragedy as an opportunity to push for his agenda of “free mental health care” and an “end to violence as public policy.” Have you no decency, sir?
Governor Huckabee, I’m pretty sure God’s presence in the classroom wouldn’t have saved those innocents yesterday, and although your remarks [9]were well-intentioned, they certainly are ill-timed. Geraldo Rivera’s proposal to place armed cops in schools or Rupert Murdock advocating a ban on assault weapons—gentlemen, keep it to yourselves until the families have buried their loved ones.
Violence is an unfortunate legacy that dates back to our nation’s earliest days. And although it is true that violent crime has been steadily decreasing since its peak in the early 90’s, this is cold comfort to anyone who has suffered the untimely and cruel death of somebody they love. Not unlike the brutality in Newtown, far too much blood spills on the streets of urban America—in Chicago, 36 were murdered [10] in November alone. All of these victims were either a child, sibling, mom or dad; all deserve to be mourned for being taken before their time.
There will be a day to talk about the broader issues; there will. Today, as the horror of Sandy Hook is so terribly raw, we should do only one thing: Honor, mourn and pray.
