WHO IS TO BLAME?

Before those involved could have a chance to mourn or deal with the horror of the shootings, so-called experts were spewing opinions on who (or, usually, what) is to blame.

The most common is to blame the guns. Sure, the NRA is not my favorite, they are pretty radical and have strayed from their roots of teaching gun safety and so on. Lots of other culprits, like the parents. Or the school system.

The New York Times took the opportunity to blame society saying in an opinion piece that the shootings are because young men are not given the tools by society to deal with (whatever, it gets too murky for me at this point). Ya mean they're crazy? Yep, got that.

In typical fashion, NYT will lead you to believe that all members of society should stop, abandon all normal behavior and stand on their heads in deference to some extremely small minority of misfits behaving in an aberrant, dangerous manner. Hugs all around, folks.

As you can tell, I reject that view. But in a conversation with one of my oldest friends (Jimmy) last night, I think we agreed on one thing--society has not found an effective way to protect our school children from this. Grandpa Joe Biden decided that the way to do it was to ban guns from schools. Apparently, the shooters didn't read the signs. But it made it impossible for anyone to shoot back. Thanks Joe.

How can the society protect our school children? Well, banks choose to hire armed guards, because history proved that if they didn't, guys with guns would come and take the money. Old time bank robber Willie Sutton was asked why he robs banks, and his answer was "That's where the money is." One strategy would be to hire guards. Another, to arm teachers. An argument by my liberal friend was that there isn't enough money to hire teachers, let alone guards. I reject that argument. The stakes are too high.

Besides, pouring lots of money at education doesn't provide more successful outcomes for students. Take Kansas City Public Schools--several years ago, their records showed that they spent $19,000 per student per year, and the results are appalling.

So, blame guns, society, parents, Republicans (you have to blame Republicans, don't you?). But the fact is that we as adults and "normal" citizens have failed to protect our school children. That is a task that we should not allow to be accomplished 98% of the time--it needs to be all the time.