My first thought was mental illness was at play here. I have loved ones who have suffered (and will continue to suffer) from serious emotional/mental issues. LB's post and boltonblue nailed it. These people need help and without $$ and/or very good health insurance they will not get it. Gun control is the first thought almost everyone has. Mental health assistance is always the first thought I have.

 

Unfortunately I think the issue is more complex. Keep in mind that a good number of the shooters were not diagnosed as having mental illness problems until after the shootings. Even for some who were, nothing was done, not for the lack of funding or institutions, but rather for a lack of a definite diagnosis. In addition to everything else we have to learn to detect and identify mental illness sooner, and learn to do something about it.

That I think will be the hardest problem of all to solve.

 

There's no such thing as "gun control" That's something used by politicians to promote their campaign. How can you control guns and keep them out of the hands of people who cant have them and shouldn't? You cant. Not unless you go door to door taking them from everyone and even then do you really believe the people who intend to do things with them illegally will simply hand them over or even be found to begin with? Obviously "gun free zones" don't work either all they do is leave people defenseless. The only solution in my book is for people to take the initiative to carry and defend themselves against things like that. As for the mental illness aspect of the issue that doesn't apply to every situation but there are definite things that need to be done to help patients that probably wont be done due to the lack of funding as stated above.. As I said before I doubt it will ever get better.

 

It pushed at us as a simple choice. You either destroy the Constitution which would result in tyranny or anarchy or you contain the mentally ill. I think there is another part to the equation. You remove evil. That's a continual battle but the better equipped you are when you're confronted with it the better off you are.

It's actually pretty simple but it's subjective in application and being subjective isn't PC unless they're on your side.

fltsfshr

 

I see no simple solution.

 

I strongly suspect that the signs were there for those close to the shooters.
but current laws handcuff friends, parents and police until the shooter is swinging around weapon and making overt threats.
yet to be fully verified but yesterdays shooter had an online avatar lithium_lover so I don't suspect it would have been his first brush with psychiatric treatment.
I could be wrong.

sorry grant but really??
they're not cattle that wandered off of the ranch and need to be rounded up and contained.
they are people who need to be treated for a medical condition.
Would you round up and contain folks with cancer or broken legs?

 

I think you are comparing apples and oranges. I'd put a cow with a broken leg down and have it butchered.

You can't equate the two especially with people. I can set a leg. I can't set evil. Poeple have free will cattle do not. Whatever the motivation was, it was evil and evil is a subjective thing. It's been around a long time.

fltsfshr

 

Realistically speaking it will never stop. Whenever someone feels that the world has done them wrong they can easily obtain a weapon that gives them many times the normal power they would have from something like a knife or baseball bat, etc. For some reason it seems to be a very attractive thing for desperate people to go down in a blaze of gunfire while inflicting mass casualties. It's the popular thing to do these days, the media and internet help to spread the information to all of the other nut jobs out there so there will be another one lined up to do the same thing in a few week's time somewhere.

 

Jerry, thanks for hitting the nail on the head. Gun control or concealed weapons may have some positives but neither is the answer in my opinion. We as a nation have to take a good hard look at our mental health system. Sadly as Rob suggests, it is unlikely any mental health improvements can survive in government budgets, as there’s no strong lobby for the mentally ill. Legal Bill the Mother Jones timeline should be required reading for every household in the USA! Grant, I can only surmise you’ve never had any family members, distant or close, with difficulties.

 

So why does it appear that the rate of this type of crime is so much higher in this country than in most other advanced countries in the world? Sure this happens in other countries but apparently at a much lower rate per capita.