Another day, another massacre.

So, it has happened again.   Another kook armed with an arsenal including tear gas grenades and assault weapons.   This time it wasn’t a Safeway store in Tucson, it wasn’t a beauty parlor in Orange County, it wasn’t a high school or a post office.  No, this time it was a movie theater near Denver where mostly young people gathered to celebrate the opening of the summer’s most anticipated film. 

The aftermath is much the same as we have seen increasingly and repeatedly in the United States.  “What a shock.”  “He was such a nice guy.”  He was so quiet.”  And for the victims’ families, a deep soul searching for answers that likely will never come … not now, not ever.

This morning, I looked back over blogs I have written during the past several years.  There have been a few on this same subject.  Sure, the places where the urban assaults took place are different, but the story is similar.   A man with a gun, usually an assault rifle, sets out to kill other innocent unsuspecting human beings. 

I am also concerned by many of the comments I read online today.   The far right is blaming President Obama for allowing a decay in the moral fiber of America to unravel to the point that such shootings are now common place.   The NRA is staunchly defending the right of the suspect to possess and use automatic assault weapons, one NRA member posting that it is too bad everyone in the theater didn’t have a similar weapon so they could have returned fire.   The NRA is a powerful force that seems to hold Washington at bay, and will go to virtually any length to allow the continued proliferation of deadly assault weapons.  Indeed, some NRA member seems to gloat whenever a shooting like today’s takes place because it affirms that they have been successful in their unyielding efforts to allow killers to own assault weapons.

We’re not talking about muskets here, where you fire buckshot in the backside of an assailant.   We are talking about military grade assault weapons that can be owned by almost anyone. 

I for one am fed up with the NRA and their argument that if all Americans owned assault rifles, we wouldn’t have this problem.  The fact is the vast majority of Americans don’t own any guns, let alone assault weapons.  And other than gang warfare, not once have I ever heard of any case where one assault gun toting American has stopped another assault gun toting American bent on murder. 

It has come time for America to stand up to the NRA bullies.  There is simply no reason whatsoever why any one other than police or military needs to have access to these types of weapons.  Until Americans wake up to that fact, Americans will continue to wake up to more gruesome news where dozens of innocent people just living their lives have fallen victim to another kook with a gun.