Day 927: After second mass shooting in two days, Trump cowers at golf club; GOP blames everything except guns for violence

We began Day 926 by saying:

Sandy Hook, Las Vegas, Orlando, Parkland, Sutherland Springs, Pittsburgh, Charleston, Aurora, and so many more. Saturday, tragically, El Paso was added to the list of cities that have suffered mass shootings in recent years when a domestic terrorist killed at least 20 and wounded at least 26 more at a Walmart in the border town.

Day 927, sadly, began in the same way, only it was Dayton, Ohio that saw nine killed and at least 27 wounded when a white domestic terrorist opened fire outside a bar shortly after midnight Sunday.

More American bloodshed, more families broken, more tears, rinse, repeat.

Donald Trump stayed at his golf club in New Jersey, even after the El Paso shooting on Saturday. Far from solemn, he was partying with wedding guests and focused on a mixed martial arts fight.

Sunday morning he didn’t head back to the White House either, choosing to stay at his golf club late into the afternoon. (It’s unclear whether Trump played golf Sunday, but at a minimum, he was at his private club, hiding from public eyes all weekend.)

With Trump cowering and unwilling to lead in any sense of the word, Republican talking heads continued their shameful act of sticking up for the gun lobby and blaming everything except guns for the mass murder of Americans via guns.

• Texas’ Republican governor Greg Abbott blamed mental health, while asking for hugs and prayers.
• White House adviser Kellyanne Conway blamed not “understand[ing] depraved evil.”

• Rick Santorum, a former GOP senator from Pennsylvania, seemed to blame victims for going to “soft targets” without guns. He also blamed “both [political] sides” for mass murders perpetrated by white nationalists and explicitly called for less gun control.
• Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) offered prayers, while still not taking up an already-passed House bill that would expand background checks, among other common sense reforms.

• Texas’s lieutenant governor blamed video games for the murderous rampages. He also pushed to ignore the First Amendment’s free exercise clause and separation of church and state laws, as a way to prop up the Second Amendment.

• House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) also blamed video games.

• White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, ignoring legislation that has worked in other countries, said politics can’t stem the tide of violence.
• Republican Texas Senator John Cornyn went out of his way to note he wasn’t blaming guns.

• Republican Ohio Senator Rob Portman blamed “something deeper” at play, as well as “cultural problems.”

The GOP’s equation for less death and bloodshed: more thoughts, more prayers, more hugs, more guns, less video games.

With over 33,000 gun incidents, over 250 mass shootings, and nearly 9,000 people dead already in 2019, maybe it’s time for a new equation to this uniquely American problem.

927 days in, 535 to go

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