The Everyday Crisis of Gun Violence

I am going to go way out on a limb here and make a prediction: Over the next several months, more people will be killed in this country by the easy availability of guns than by North Korean missiles.

But which problem is considered a crisis? And which is considered everyday life? (Or, to put it more accurately, everyday death.)

And which got the most response from our government recently? And which do we even remember?

Gun violence is so common in America — and I am talking about shootings in which there are multiple victims — that we barely notice it anymore. Besides, there are more important things to occupy our time.

Try this little test: What present did Barack Obama recently give the queen of England?

I am guessing most of you got it right. He gave her an iPod.

Here is another question: Who is Jiverly Wong?

Drawing a blank? OK, try this one then: Who is Richard Poplawski?

I don't blame you. Those are tough questions.

On Friday, Jiverly Wong, 31, wearing body armor and carrying two handguns, entered the headquarters of the American Civic Association in Binghamton, N.Y., and killed 13 people before committing suicide.

Wong, a gun enthusiast who often spent weekends at a local firing range, used to joke about shooting people. When asked before the last presidential election for whom he was going to vote, Wong told a co-worker, "I don't really care, I'd shoot both of them."

According to The New York Times, Wong had been licensed to carry handguns in New York since 1996.

Wong's shooting rampage was the worst in America since the Virginia Tech slayings on April 16, 2007, in which 32 people were killed. But mass murder is not really unusual in this country.

This year, March was a particularly busy month. On March 10, 11 people were killed in a shooting spree in Alabama.

On March 21, four police officers were shot to death in two separate incidents in Oakland, Calif. And on March 29, a gunman killed eight people in a North Carolina nursing home, and six people were fatally shot in Santa Clara, Calif.

April has also started off badly. First, there were the shootings in Binghamton on Friday. Then, on Saturday, James Harrison shot and killed his four children, ages 7 to 16, in Washington state before killing himself. On the same day, Richard Poplawski, 23, allegedly shot and killed three Pittsburgh police officers and wounded a fourth.

According to Poplawski's mother, he had been "stockpiling guns and ammunition, buying and selling the weapons online because he believed that as a result of economic collapse the police were no longer able to protect society."

She also said her son "only liked police when they were not curtailing his constitutional rights, which he was determined to protect."

Poplawski's aunt, Marianne Klimczyk, told reporters: "He has a few weapons. I know he has a machine gun, I know he has a couple rifles, and I know he has a couple handguns. … They're recreational, and for deer hunting and for everything. I mean, he's not a bad kid."

According to his childhood friend, Edward Percovic, Poplawski feared "the Obama gun ban that's on the way" and "didn't like our rights being infringed upon."

"Nobody ever expected something like this from him," Percovic said.

Right.

"We have a gun crisis in America," says Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. "It is time for leaders in Washington to drop empty platitudes after each horrific shooting and instead do what they're paid to do: show backbone, and enact reasonable laws to keep dangerous weapons out of the hands of dangerous people."

I agree with Helmke. Except about gun violence in America being a "crisis." How can you have a crisis when hardly anybody seems to care?

To find out more about Roger Simon, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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