Dear Connecticut...

[westen44]

[gweimer]

A burglar broke into a Quaker's home, figuring it to be an easy mark. It was the middle of the night, but the burglar still woke up the gentleman living there.  He came down the stairs, with a shotgun in hand.  He looked at the burglar calmly, and stated quietly, "Brother, I would do thee no harm, but thou standest where I am about to shoot."

[Dave W]

the N.R.A. has gone silent and removed its facebook page. i thought these guys would welcome a dust up to push their agenda. i guess not. cowards.

What could they possibly say?

The NRA Facebook page is a fan page, not a forum to debate gun laws. It was attacked by mobs of lunatics calling the NRA a "terrorist organization" and calling for the Second Amendment to be suspended.

I disagree with some of the NRA's agenda, but there's a time and a place for everything.

[Dave W]

You know, with all of this debate, has anyone asked the obvious question? 

--- Why would a woman with an unstable son have multiple weapons in the house?  ---

You know, the Mayans may be right this week, for all the wrong reasons.   

The only person responsible for this was Adam Lanza.

Still, it's a fair question. She was a member of a card playing club with a number of other women. They rotated hosting but always skipped her house; they played cards with her for years yet none of them had ever been inside the house. She never talked about the son and some didn't know she had one. She must have had serious problems with him to hide him like that. There were relatives who knew she had some kind of long term problem with him and that he was on medication. And yet she kept multiple weapons in the house including at least one assault rifle. Does make you wonder.

[Denis]

You know, with all of this debate, has anyone asked the obvious question? 
--- Why would a woman with an unstable son have multiple weapons in the house?  ---
You know, the Mayans may be right this week, for all the wrong reasons.   

For all the regurgitation of the standard statements on both sides, I'm actually hearing a decent amount of talk of dealing with the actual problem: people who have issues, regardless of the availability of firearms. Mental illness of any sort is still swept under the rug here. Lots of health insurance policies offer weak coverage when it comes to that and it really needs to be brought out in the open.

[fur85]

For all the regurgitation of the standard statements on both sides, I'm actually hearing a decent amount of talk of dealing with the actual problem: people who have issues, regardless of the availability of firearms. Mental illness of any sort is still swept under the rug here. Lots of health insurance policies offer weak coverage when it comes to that and it really needs to be brought out in the open.

Thank you for saying that. As a society we need to accept some responsibility for helping people with severe mental illness. There are effective, evidence-based treatments for even the most severe mental illnesses. And in the long run they cost less than frequent hospitalizations, nursing homes or ER visits. Sadly, private insurance generally does not pay for these treatments and most state public mental health systems are funded through Medicaid and have experienced dwindling dollars over the last several years.

I'm not saying a better mental health system will prevent all shootings. However, mental illness is a public health issue and as a society we need to deal with it.

[Denis]

Agreed. As a society we need to take some collective action and responsibility and address mental health.

It's really easy, and understandable, to say "ah, screw that guy with lung cancer, he's been smoking since he was 10 and knew it would cause cancer." That was HIS choice.

Being mentally ill is not a choice. It happens and it is not the person's fault if he has some sort of mental illness. For the good of the our friends and neighbors we can't sit around and wait until a mentally ill person does something horrible before acting.

[Dave W]

How do you do that when the person is hidden away by his mother?

We know now that there were red flags in the case of the Aurora killer that maybe could have been acted on in time because they were known by people he interacted with. Whatever red flags there might have been about Adam Lanza seem to have been carefully kept away from anyone else. That's not to say his parents knew he might be dangerous. But the mother made it a point to keep him away from anyone who might have noticed something.

[gweimer]

How do you do that when the person is hidden away by his mother?

We know now that there were red flags in the case of the Aurora killer that maybe could have been acted on in time because they were known by people he interacted with. Whatever red flags there might have been about Adam Lanza seem to have been carefully kept away from anyone else. That's not to say his parents knew he might be dangerous. But the mother made it a point to keep him away from anyone who might have noticed something.

OK...here goes.  My mother spent a lifetime of wrestling with mental illness.  She just never fit in.  From the time I was about 6 until I was 13, she was in the hospital four separate times, each for 6 months.  They called it a "nervous breakdown" back then.  My brother and I were not allowed to visit her in the hospital.  It just wasn't done.  Nobody outside the family, that I knew of, had any idea of this.  We went to school just like everyone else.  I got my first taste of public awareness and embarassment at 13, the last time she was put away.  The music teacher at my school was a member of our church, and I think they knew about my mother.  He came up and asked me how she was doing in class.  I'm sure he meant well, but I was mortified.

My mother wasn't violent, but she could turn vicious in a second.  She also picked her moments.  I don't think she planned them, but if that door was open a crack, she went for it.  My father left her alone with my daughter for less than a minute at church, and my mother decided to tell her that her mother was going to hell because she went to bars.  My mother was classified as a paranoid, schizophrenic, manic depressive.  My dad once told me that she is written up in a college textbook - "when the rules don't make sense".

I guess my point is this - mental illiness does not mean a person has no control.  In some cases, like my mother, she had more self control than a lot of people.  My father had to be with her in public at all times.  He was very aware that her behaviou could change suddenly and was prepared at all times for that.  My dad did have two guns in the house.  My greatgrandfathers shotgun, with no ammo, and a police .38, and I don't recall where the ammo was for that.  He may not have had it accessible.

[Pilgrim]

It's a good reminder that some of us only meet people with mental problems on rare occasion - others must live with them every day, and for a lifetime.  As you point out, in some cases that means constant attention and (in a kind way) surveillance.  I can't imagine how draining that must have been for your dad.

This is certainly not a problem with easy solutions - or any real solution.  Mitigation may be the most realistic goal.

[drbassman]

What If Nothing or Nobody is to Blame for Adam Lanza? Guns, Video Games, Autism or Authorities
by Ron Fournier, Editorial Director, National Journal

Updated: December 17, 2012 | 6:47 p.m.
December 17, 2012 | 6:22 a.m.

What if there is nobody or nothing to blame for Adam Lanza's heinous acts? Other than Lanza, of course.

What if school security and the school psychiatrist kept an eye on Lanza since his freshman year? The Wall Street Journal has a compelling narrative about the red flags addressed.

What if he had a form of autism that has little or no link to violent behavior? Lanza may have had Asperger's syndrome but, even so, that is not a cause.

(RELATED: How To Make Sense of America's Confusing Patchwork of Gun Control Laws)

What if it's too simple to lay the massacre at the feet of the gun lobby? Reader Larry Kelly tweets that shaming Aspies "makes about as much sense at stigmatizing the NRA. Pick an enemy ... any enemy. Let outrage and fear rule."
What if Lanza wasn't provoked by video games? David Axelrod, a close friend an adviser of President Obama, tweeted last night: "In NFL post-game: an ad for shoot 'em up video game. All for curbing weapons of war. But shouldn't we also quit marketing murder as a game."
When I asked whether he was laying groundwork for a White House initiative, Axelrod said no: "Just one man's observation." A senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said today that Axelrod was not a stalking horse for Obama on this issue.

What if Lanza's mother did everything she could, short of keeping her guns out her adult son's reach? What if he wasn't bullied?

What if there is nobody or nothing to blame? Would that make this inexplicable horror unbearable?
What if we didn't rush to judgement? What if we didn't waste our thoughts, prayers and actions on assigning blame for the sake of mere recrimination? What if we calmly and ruthlessly learned whatever lessons we can from the massacre -- and prevented the next one?

What if it wasn't one thing, but everything, that set off Lanza?

[Denis]

What if it wasn't one thing, but everything, that set off Lanza?

It's a legitimate question, and my answer to that question is, "In that case we should throw up our hands and just concede that this sort of thing will continue to happen because there's simply nothing we can do."

[the mojo hobo]

No, but there is no simple answer. It is a complex problem.

[Pilgrim]

No, but there is no simple answer. It is a complex problem.

Exactly.  And you know what?

Some people are crazy.  Some people will go crazy.  Some people are simply evil.

Some of them will hurt others. Some will try to hurt as many as they can. If they don't have guns, they will make bombs.  Or commit arson. Or something.

The great American impulse is to fix things.

I'm not sure whether this can be fixed.

[the mojo hobo]

What if Lanza wasn't provoked by video games? David Axelrod, a close friend an adviser of President Obama, tweeted last night: "In NFL post-game: an ad for shoot 'em up video game. All for curbing weapons of war. But shouldn't we also quit marketing murder as a game."

I do think children are exposed to too much graphic violence in games, movies, television and even music.

And there is no fix. We can only hope that the pendelum of public opinion swings back to peace and decency.