AMAZON

Sunday, May 21, 2006

A War in our Streets

War on Terrorism? We have a war going on in the streets and homes of Louisville and I feel like going on a crusade. Six more people where shot in Louisville today. I’m not sure what that brings the total up to over the past couple of weeks. Whatever it is, it is too many.

Yesterday, a 22-year-old man was shot to death in an apartment house parking lot. No information on the reason for the shooting or on the shooter.

Last Thursday a 42-year-old woman was shot to death in her own home and her 2-year-old daughter was also shot. The child's condition was critical when police arrived and, not wanting to wait for an ambulance, officers placed the child in a police car and sped to Children’s Hospital. The little girl remains in critical condition. There is no information on whoever shot her and murdered her mother.

Early on the morning of the same day a bank down the street was robbed by an armed bandit.

The night before, on the same street, an elderly man was shot several times while standing on his front porch. Again, there are no suspects.

Today’s shootings took place at two locations. The first was a motorcyclist who evidently got into an argument with some people in an automobile, who then shot him twice. He remains in critical condition.

The second shooting took place in a funeral home while folks were gathered for the wake of an elderly man. Two men entered the funeral home and began shooting: one person was shot to death and four others wounded. The shooters ran away. Again, no motive has been discovered and there are no leads on the murders.

All of these shootings are getting to me. Talking heads on TV and radio are coming up with all sorts of theories. None really make sense. And I realize that what I am talking about is just Louisville!

There are similar stories throughout the United States, including five people who were shot to death during a worship service in a Louisiana church this morning.

Perhaps we should seriously consider some form of gun control, no mater how much money the National Rifle Association gives to our representatives in Washington.

6 comments:

  1. Well all i can say is gun control works down under. In 2003 and 2004 Oz had a grand total of 288 murders. Our population is 22 million :o)
    Sure the NRA try and voice, but they aint got aleg to stand on! The figures speak for themselves.

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  2. Either gun control works, or Americans are inherently the most violent people on earth.

    Really, I could go either way with this one.

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  3. I don't own a gun and don't want to. Most of the people I know don't belong to the NRA, but they believe that gun control isn't necessary. I think that guns are a big business. The US is greedy, oh sorry, I mean capitalistic. We're never going to do anything to cut the number of guns here. Not in the near future anyway.

    I didn't know there were that many shootings in Louisvile???

    My word verification is rxjew. I don't even want to speculate...

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  4. Thats alot of shooting in a short period. My goodness. I thought Detroit and Flint Michigan were bad.

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  5. MICHELLE: I think gun control of some form works many places. Still, my real concern is that there are so many guns floating around the U.S. that it would take a few years before there were any noticeable results. I got rid of my own guns several years ago, even though some of my buddies keep telling me that I really did a weapon to protect myself in my home. I hope they aren’t right. (I know they are “right” politically)


    THOMAS: I rather fear that the latter is true. At the very least we are the most warlike nation that ever existed. I read some stats over the weekend from a U.S. Navy study that reported that “200 years the United States has used its armed forces abroad in situations of conflict or potential conflict or for other than normal peacetime purposes 241 times”. Add to that the wars against Native Americans and other “homeland” uses of military force and we average more than a war a year. History also tells me that that there no generation in U.S. history that has not been involved in a war. In my own lifetime, I can count at least 7 wars, including Granada and that short invasion of Panama. With so violent a government, how can we expect out culture to be peaceful?


    SQUIRL: I think you hit the nail on the head when you wrote than capitalistic = greedy. Remember what Plato wrote in The Republic about the three primary classes of people and the body parts that ruled them?

    Philosophers are ruled by the head: give them a problem to solve and they will be content.

    Solders are ruled by the heart: give them a piece of land and a family to protect and they will be content.

    Merchants are ruled by the genitals: their greed is so great that they are only content when they have everything; therefore, society may as well give everything to them—if society doesn’t, they’ll just find a way to steal it.


    LAWBRAT: The violence in Louisville has been steadily increasing over the past few years. I can’t find any accurate statistics for this year, but I believe that there have been at least 30 murders. The number of shooting is, of course, much greater. Most of them—all of the ones I wrote about that happened in the last few days—take place in the West End of the city—i.e., the ghetto. That’s where I lived for the first ten years of my life and I still like to visit the “old neighborhood.” In recent years I haven’t been there, for obvious reasons.

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  6. Whenever I hear about someone being murdered, I think about the waste of human life. I feel the same about war and terrorism. I even feel the same about people who are executed for murder. Such a waste!

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