Editor’s Note: This week, the federal administration, much like China and North Korea do, tried to bag and remove people from the streets with no one noticing. The Supreme Court, backed into a corner by law firms and the ACLU fighting for principles of democracy (which includes due process), acted. This is good because they must now address Trumpist-Russian tactics head-on. Contempt of Court is coming. Stay tuned.

As it tends to happen, my chosen piece was near completion when another event occurred that is worth commenting on. It was too close to home to ignore. I’ve moved the original piece to next week so I can respond to this unfortunate but avoidable event.

At the moment I write this, we are dealing with yet another shooting in an American city on a university campus. I do not know how we arrived at such a time where this has become just another day in America. This case is particularly deplorable as the shooter appears to be a college student with a history of questionable social behavior brought up in a culture of law enforcement.

This one is also a bit more personal.

Our youngest son was there.

Notice the time.

He finished buying his food in the student union food court. He texts his girlfriend as he and his friend leave the building. They are carrying their food, chatting about nothing in particular.

It’s now two minutes later, 11:56 AM, and the shooter enters the area of the student union.

He opens fire.

Our son and his friend heard three shots. They look at each other, thinking it is from construction, perhaps nail guns, but it’s loud. There are always some building or remodeling going on. Surely not….

Within a matter of seconds, there is a long burst of gunfire, several shots this time, and both boys recognize the obvious.

They run.

It’s awkward. They are carrying their food and running. Students are heading in the wrong direction, oblivious to the noise, plugged off with their earbuds and headphones and smartphones. One young woman jogs by and my son stops her and says, “There’s a shooter! Turn around!”

She looks incredulous, scans the situation, and realizes, yes, something is wrong. Students are fleeing now in all directions.

Alarms sound across the campus.

Our son runs from the student union to the football stadium, a good distance but it feels quick.

They breathe heavily. There are others in a state of panic. He calls his girlfriend. He texts me.

Students across campus hide behind locked and barricaded doors. His girlfriend, on the other side of campus, is locked with others in a bathroom.

Then they wait.

The shooter appears to have done his damage in a matter of minutes. There is a short 16-second video of the shooter casually walking away from a fatality. Roughly twenty yards to his left, beyond a row of hedges, is another sidewalk. There are students still moving, oblivious and unaware of what is happening.

The shooter stops, turns, and fires several times at them. I can’t tell whether the student who appears most targeted is shot but he soon realizes a danger and runs.

The shooter continues on. He encounters law enforcement, and is shot.

For hours, thousands of students text and share info. There are snapshots and videos and all kinds of information, some true and some not, floating in the ether. They form bonds and share food and words of encouragement. My son is in an office with others, locked behind closed doors. Some have to go to the bathroom. Our son offered someone the large cup he was drinking from. Others used potted plants.

Time passes. Rooms are cleared, and the shooter is identified. My son realizes he knows the kid. Tallahassee is a small town for a capital. He has shared the same classroom with the shooter at a previous school. An image of a right-wing, conspiracy-espousing, socially inept kid emerges.

Which brings me to my point of pain.

The freedoms we entrust to each other in a shared democracy are being abused by nuts.

Not only has social media made it easier for the nuts to find each other, but the algorithms profitably promote their associations. Our gun culture has also made it easier for the nuts to get a gun. There are approximately 120 guns for every 100 residents in the United States.

This has turned public spaces into shooting galleries.

The shooter had been kicked out of social clubs, yet picked up by nut groups such as Turning Point. He freely espoused cringeworthy theories as facts in class.

I am left befuddled that nothing seems to have signaled that maybe this kid need not be around guns. Maybe the education in the classroom never sunk in. Just another kid going through the motions, no direction, filled quickly by nutso soup. I grow even more perplexed with the news that this kid grew up in a law enforcement culture, and was involved in local law enforcement activities.

Did that involvement persuade or dissuade some of the radical views of this dumb kid? Was there not one deputy, one officer, who said, “You know, I’m not sure Phoenix is mature enough to handle guns,” or “Hey, he’s saying some crazy stuff. Is everything ok at home? At college?”

It would appear this young man needed more time to develop his social skills before his shooting skills. Getting a girlfriend instead of a gun would have been a more advisable plan. There’s no mention of a father being around, but there are plenty of red flags, and now it's too late. Two fathers have been murdered; their misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time with this dumb kid.

Deflecting from the need for more gun control, the thoughts and prayers begin.

These mini-cultures within society; my God, my guns, my group, are corroding the glue that binds us together.

I do not want our kids to go anywhere, attend any college, that feels like a prison. Nor do I want my son and his young adult friends to be armed up to go to class.

That is the insane type of thinking we are being victimized by, and we are paying for it, psychologically and financially.

We are never going to stop every nut that wants to do harm, nor should we create society that caters to every insecurity, but we can make it a lot damn harder to get and keep a gun.

There is some indication that the existing gun laws put into place after the Parkland high school shooting did help things from being much worse, but those, too, are under attack. We now have young Americans who have had to dodge bullets twice to get an education.

Have we no shame? No pride?

For decades now, we have given in to this idiocy. Instead of having universal access to affordable healthcare we have placated the fringe with complete access to guns. To preserve this byzantine situation, we spend billions yearly on security at almost every public venue since we never know when a homegrown nut will show up. Money down the drain for a “right” that is not supported by the majority of Americans.

And it has only made us more vulnerable.

I don’t want more cops or checkpoints, nor more armed citizens with a low IQ. I’m a father. I’m tired of this mockery of democracy that forces everyone to live in fear of words, of facts, and of armed nuts.

Had my son been a victim here, I wouldn’t be writing this. I would burn the ships at sea and torch the ground to ensure we didn’t turn away from this embarrassment.

Thoughts and prayers?

You’ve got to be shitting me.

God is tired of this invocation.

So am I.

So should you be.

What a great piece. There’s a historical parallel I hadn’t thought of. As the Nazis began consolidating power in Germany, many of their leading scientists emigrated. That’s one reason America ended up with Einstein. In the current attack on education, and specifically universities, we are pushing away a crop of the best and brightest from around the world. There is also discussion on the buyer’s remorse for Brexit in England, something to consider in our so far forced “Trexit” from the world economy. Your brain will like this one.

Charlie Chaplin, one of the most influential figures in early cinema, used his immense popularity and creative talents to bring global attention to the dangers of fascism at a time when many in the West preferred to look away (sound familiar?). His 1940 film The Great Dictator was a bold satire that directly targeted Adolf Hitler and the rise of Nazism, making Chaplin one of the first major artists to confront fascism on screen.

To deliver a message he felt was urgently needed, he risked his career and reputation.

If you have never watched, I strongly encourage you to see where Chaplin broke his famous on-screen silence in the film’s final speech, stepping out of character to directly address audiences with a passionate plea for democracy, compassion, and resistance to tyranny.

He used his art as a weapon.

I am reminded of the leadership that Charlie Chaplin showed before all others. Its occurring again. Be aware of the threats to freedom and the historical parallels.

In Issue 73, I wrote about the language being used by the current administration. This is a nice little piece that talks about the importance of what we say. For lovers of freedom, liberty, and justice, we need to think about the terms we use and up our game. The other side has used manipulative language for years, redefining simple terms like freedom. We need to counter with truth and authenticity, using language that gets remembered. This is an excellent piece.

Because of the purposeful chaos, we get mixed news from other countries on principles that we used to hold dear in the United States. I’ve written about the loss of the leader for a free Russia, Alexei Navalny. Putin, continuing to seek revenge on anyone that dares fight for freedom, has now imprisoned journalists that had ties to Navalny.

A reminder that our president has treated this thug as a kindred spirit in the White House and put him on a pedestal higher than our fellow democrats in Europe. Last week, bombing in Ukraine killed these young beauties, medical students and the next generation of believers in freedom.

This cozying up to evil is an absolute threat to democracy. When this administration leaves, a mess will remain.

Can we get to a mind-bending discovery quickly?

Each week’s worth of Earthly idiocy makes me think more and more of what a universal wake-up call might look like. So much of what we spend our time on in anger or threat or in attempts to control is simply miniscule to understanding and deeply appreciating our limited time here and now. I continue to believe that the vast universe will hold some future surprises that will change the course of human history, hopefully for the better.

I’m including this piece so you understand the change that is occurring. AI is so huge, so immense, that the very detailed almost-human like aspect of the responses, comes at an enormous cost of energy.

I think this could be a good thing in the long term.

While the regulation of AI needs to quickly catch up, corporations are going to be working to find the most efficient methods possible to create the energy it needs. That could create new alternative sources for all kinds of industry and continue to advance us forward where we need to be.