Gabbie Giffords Shooting Makes Me Think of this Explanation of Gun Control

Every time something like this shooting in Tuscon comes around in the United States--and it happens a lot--I'm reminded what how a visitor from Switzerland once explained gun control to me in her country.

She was visiting, and kept talking about her husband, Eddie, who was away in France hunting boar. It actually started getting funny hearing our friend speak in a French/Swiss accent about "Eddie" and "hunting boars."

Anyway, I started asking her questions, and it turns out not only Eddie but a whole lot of Swiss people have high-powered rifles that they keep in their homes and carry across international borders. "Really?" I said, amazed. "And what keeps you from all shooting one another?" I asked.

"I don't know," she replied. "Maybe we're more civilized."

And there, ladies and gentlemen, is a pretty good explanation of gun control.

Manchester, Ct. shooting

There was a shooting today in Manchester, Connecticut that I've been following all day. I've been updating my blog over on Gather. Not getting a lot of hits. Big news today is the solar tsunami--yep, that's what they're calling it--that may set off some Northern Lights tonight. People are writing about that, and it's clear they've never seen them or might not even know what it's about.

And there's this family the Washington Post are featuring that lived on a boat for seven years. Amazing. Amazing is the word a lot of the big hit writers bandy about because they are plagiarizing, er, I mean, writing so many stories they don't have time to pull together a cogent opinion of anything.

Anyway, the shooting. There's a black man who was caught stealing. He was brought in for a meeting. Either quit, or we'll fire you, he was told. We have a video. He was calm. Then he pulls a handgun out of a lunchbox and starts firing. Eight dead, then he kills himself.

There's a backstory that he had complained about racial harassment. No one did anything.

Anyway, I kind of latch on to certain stories and this was one. I can't write about just anything, which is my downfall on a blog that is only interested in numbers. Not quality, but the quantity of hits. So Google News will pick them up then.

Anyway, here's the report I updated throughout today when I should have been reading and working on a paper for my counterculture class.

And here's an opinion I wrote. Leave a comment if you feel like it.