The Return

I left Chicago this morning, and the city gave a nice send-off with it starting to snow.  It was only a light dust, though seemed to be coming down a bit heavier by the time I reached O'Hare.  Several flights go cancelled -- so, obviously, it was coming down heavier... -- but mine took off reasonably on time.  We were a half-hour late, for de-icing, but surprisingly we got in about 20 minutes early.

I'd picked the right seat when making my reservation.  it was one of those rows where there's a little "table" on the middle seat.  So, only two people on your side of the aisle, with no one in between.  And plenty of storage room, too.

I was picked up at LAX by a friend, and we began talking about politics.  I got around to commenting on how craven I thought the Republican candidates were to not even talk about the shooting in Colorado at Planned Parenthood -- at which point he said, "Oh, you probably didn't hear the news today.  When you were in the air, there was a shooting at a rehab clinic in San Bernadino.  The last I heard there were 12 people dead."

I haven't had a chance to read up on it or hear much news, so I don't have a great deal to comment about this.  But then I don't think there will be all too much surprising.  We've heard this horrific broken record before.  I'm sure that the Republican candidates and and Republicans in general are all giving their "prayers" and that's it.  Nothing about how mass shootings have become an epidemic and we must take some new action to address.  And probably something about how it's not the time to talk about gun control.  (To which I always say, "You're right, the time to talk about gun control was before the mass shooting and all the people died.)  And the gun manufacturer-own NRA fringe group no doubt thinks that guns have nothing to do with this mass gun death.

I just have this feeling that when God hears the "prayers" from Republican "leaders," He is going to say, "Yeah, I get it, you're very sad and you want Me to offer comfort to the families of the victims.  I already know that's what you want, but seriously, folks, I don't need your prayers for that.  That's what I do naturally.  It's part of my job.  I'm God.  Fixing things on Earth is up to you.  Why do you like I created gun control and common sense??!!"

From what little I've been able to see about the clinic that was hit, this seems like another of those especially-horrific and sickeningly-sad situations.  I was glad to at least hear a radio news report that had what sounded like a police spokesman refer to this as "domestic terrorism."  It's time that things like this aren't so easily dismissed as a mere "senseless act" by one crazy person.  Or three crazies.  And time that people so quick to make politics out of external terrorism start to be forced to confront even greater terrorism on these shores by Americans.  And by religious extremist terrorist, as well, whether that's what occurred here today or not.

Now, I have to decompress.