Parkland

I was in Parkland two days after the massacre in 2018. I did some interviews with parents, educators, and students at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School, all shaken with anger and despair, feelings that in the following months would inspire the energy behind a movement for gun control. It was a movement led by the students themselves, that would sweep the nation and play a critical role in the political shift towards Democrats in the last election.

Like most of the country, I cheered on the dozens of students who boarded the buses to Tallahassee that day to offer their "reasonable" gun control proposals to the state legislature only to be ignored and insulted by state pols.

Now three years later, some of those feelings of grief and anger have returned as I watch video of gun-toting white-supremacist, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene berating anti-gun student leaders and mocking news of the massacre that killed 17 people at MSD and wounded 17 others and still no significant gun laws on the books. 

Rep. Greene is easy to hate unless you're one of the thousands of north Georgia Republicans who elected her. Or one of the MAGA cultists who make up a large chunk of the party's base and who cheer wildly as she promises to protect gun owners from the claws of encroaching "communists" (You know they're everywhere in Georgia). She even suggests that the horrifying school shootings were pre-staged events. 

But Greene isn't the real problem here. The real problem is that in the three years since the MSD massacre, and despite all the student protests, nothing has been done in the way of meaningful federal gun-control legislation and despite his campaign promise to ban assault weapons, nothing on Biden's current agenda indicates it's a priority for Democrats. 

That's because Dems fear losing their working-class base and red-state Republicans are threatening to block enforcement once a bill is passed. Same as it ever was.

This, even in the wake of gun-toting militias storming government buildings and threatening the lives of legislators. Not to mention the horrible rise in the number of shootings in cities like Chicago. 

Federal gun control, including the outlawing of military assault weapons, has been dropped to near the bottom of the Democrats' legislative agenda ever since Obama's Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel told Attorney General Eric Holder to "shut the fuck up" about the issue a decade ago.

According to Daniel Klaidman’s book, Kill or Capture, Emanuel became enraged after hearing that Holder had given a speech vowing to keep Obama's campaign promise to ban assault weapons.

"The comments roused the powerful gun lobby and its water carriers on Capitol Hill. ‘Senators to Attorney General: Stay Away from Our Guns’ read a press release issued by Senator Max Baucus of Montana -- a Democrat, no less," Klaidman wrote. "Emanuel was furious. He slammed his desk and cursed the attorney general. Holder was only repeating a position Obama had expressed during the campaign, but that was before the White House needed the backing of pro-gun Democrats from red states for their domestic agenda."

"The comments roused the powerful gun lobby and its water carriers on Capitol Hill. ‘Senators to Attorney General: Stay Away from Our Guns’ read a press release issued by Senator Max Baucus of Montana -- a Democrat, no less," Klaidman wrote. "Emanuel was furious. He slammed his desk and cursed the attorney general. Holder was only repeating a position Obama had expressed during the campaign, but that was before the White House needed the backing of pro-gun Democrats from red states for their domestic agenda."

Focusing on Taylor Greene is too easy. She's low-hanging fruit. Now that Dems have taken the White House and there's a Democratic majority in both houses, there's no excuse not to move ahead on this and finally do justice for the murdered Parkland students and the more than 240,000 students who have experienced gun violence at their schools since Columbine in 1999.  

The NRA has gone bankrupt. Public opinion (95% of Democrats) increasingly supports a ban on assault weapons and red-states aren't all that red these days. 

Gun crazy!

Gun sales are skyrocketing around the country including in the Chicago area. A mainly white racist fear/rage response to Trump's looming election loss, government's pandemic "mask-wearing tyranny," BLM protests, and threatened defunding or disbanding of police is driving long lines at gun shops around the country.

In Illinois, for example, from June 1 to June 17, there were more than 42,000 applications for cards to legally possess a firearm, compared with about 7,000 during the same time last year, a 501% increase, according to the Illinois State Police.

Sturm, Ruger stock shares are at their highest level since before Trump was elected; Smith & Wesson’s stock is at a 19-month high. 

Smith & Wesson Brands Inc.’s stock SWBI, 5.33% ran up 10.1%, to the highest close since September 2018. The firearm maker’s shares have hiked up 42.2% over the past 4 sessions and have powered up 61.5% year to date. -- Market Watch

White panic-buying is overwhelming local gun shop owners. Check out this post from this firearms dealer in the Chicago burbs. 

The image of this white couple "protecting" their wealthy gated community could well become  Trump's re-election poster.

This on top of gun threats and actual shootings of peaceful protesters could presage a new level of Trump-inspired, right-wing violence. In Louisville, Ky., a man opened fire from the edge of a Breonna Taylor killing protest area in a park Saturday night, and a 27-year-old photographer was killed. Some bystanders in the park fired back, injuring the shooter, according to a police report.

Armed vigilantes opened fire on statue protesters two weeks ago in New Mexico.

In the past month, at least seven people with ties to far-right extremist group boogaloo have been arrested for attempting or carrying out violence at recent protests.

Emma Gonzalez, a survivor of the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, speaks a rally 

It was just two years ago, following the school shootings in Parkland, FL that the youth-led movement for gun control had gun manufacturers and the NRA on the ropes. Chicago was the jump-off point for anti-gun rallies across the country. The Parkland students “Road to Change” tour was launched at the annual “Rally for Peace” at St. Sabina’s Church. Those students jarred the national consciousness when they were able to swiftly organize a massive “March for our Lives” rally in Washington and related marches in other cities. It was a youth movement, much like the current one but not as diverse, that many believed had the potential to derail Trump and his MAGAs.

My how things have changed. Now, with guns continuing to flood Chicago neighborhoods, gun violence has reached predictable record highs. The terrible brew of pandemic, poverty, youth joblessness, school closures, and readily available guns, has created more free-fire zone in cities like Chicago. 

After 65 people were shot, 17 fatally in Chicago last weekend, including a 1-year-old and 10-year-old Lena Nunez, in our Logan Square neighborhood, blocks from Mayor Lightfoot's home, the Mayor made a powerful statement that caught my attention. 

She said:

Everyone needs to wrap their arms around their children, not just the ones who are victims but the shooters as well, Lightfoot said.

There's a growing recognition that in many cases, but for fortune, the shooters and their victims could be interchangeable. Both they and their families are victims in their own way.

The mayor's statement stood in stark contrast to the Trumplike one made by CPD Supt. David Brown who targeted those he called, "these evil murdering bastards."

He's either got to get straightened out by the mayor or follow his failed predecessors Eddie Johnson and Garry McCarthy out the door.

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

People celebrate the Office Van Dyke guilty verdict at 71st Street and Jeffery Boulevard on Oct. 5, 2018. (Tribune)

Former Yale Law School Dean Robert Post

"For as long as Kavanaugh sits on the court, he will remain a symbol of partisan anger, a haunting reminder that behind the smiling face of judicial benevolence lies the force of an urgent will to power." -- The Hill

Lone black woman on the Van Dyke jury

“We didn’t come here because of race. We came here for right or wrong.” -- Bock Club Chicago

Emma González

Going up against the country’s largest gun lobby organization was obviously something that needed to be done, but it means that the people we’re arguing against are the ones with the guns. -- New York Times

Taylor Swift

 I believe that the systemic racism we still see in this country towards people of color is terrifying, sickening and prevalent. I cannot vote for someone who will not be willing to fight for dignity for ALL Americans, no matter their skin color, gender or who they love." -- ABC News

Sen. Chuck Grassley

Asked why women don't serve on the Judiciary Committee, he responded: “It’s a lot of work — maybe they don’t want to do it." -- The Hill 

Hawaii Senator Mazie Hirono 

Hawaii Senator Mazie Hirono has been quietly continuing her practice of asking every federal judiciary nominee whether they have ever been accused of sexual misconduct for months now. And to anyone who would criticize her for it, or for her other pointed questions about their commitment to civil rights, Hirono has just two words: "F*** them!"  -- Newsweek

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Laura Washington

The whole world is still watching. -Sun-Times

 Martin Ritter, CTU organizer

Three Chicago Teachers Union members have asked to stop paying dues that average about $1,000 annually. That’s out of about 25,000 members — a group that includes some recently added members who teach at charter schools, which are privately managed but publicly funded, including some recently added privately managed charter school teachers. -- Two months after Janus

Jack Torres, a junior at Somerville high school

“There’s times where we’ve thought this is too tiring,” he said. “We’ve all got sore feet. But we keep reminding each other that if we walk, if we stay strong, if we keep sending our message, we won’t know who or where or when, but we might save a life. That’s enough to keep us going.” -- This isn't just Parkland

Prison striker, Kevin Rashid Johnson

Kevin Rashid Johnson, serving a life sentence 

In the past three decades I have been endured every level of abuse they have to offer: I have been starved, beaten, dehydrated, put in freezing cold cells, attacked with attack dogs, rendered unconscious, chained to a wall for weeks. There’s nothing left to fear. -- Guardian

 Tamar Manasseh, founder of Mothers/Men Against Senseless Killings

“When you put cops into areas they aren’t familiar with, where it’s not their regular beat, they don’t know the rhythm of the neighborhood, they don’t know the people, they don’t know the players, they don’t know anything." -- Sun-Times

DeVos and Duncan both bought into gun culture

Sec. of Education Betsy DeVos and her predecessor Arne Duncan, each wanted to buy guns with federal education funds meant for schools. The difference being, DeVos prefered teachers packing guns in their classroom. Duncan spent lots of ed dollars on expensive military hardware for his own DOE team.

A firestorm erupted when news got out this week that DeVos was considering letting school districts use federal Title 1 money to y guns, putting the issue back at the center of the debate over school safety.

This was mainly in response to the Parkland school shootings. But it also raised fundamental questions about the nature of public schools. Parkland students have been calling for tighter gun control while DeVos and Republican politicians, many on the NRA take, argued that a proliferation of guns in schools would discourage shooters and make schools safer. There's not a lick of evidence to support that theory.

Since he left his post as Pres. Obama's education chief, Duncan has been an advocate of gun control, to the point where, for a few days, he was urging parents to keep their children home from public schools until gun laws were passed. As you might expect, he pleas fell on deaf ears.

For one thing, Duncan's standing with parents has been lower than dirt since he attacked those "white, suburban" opt-out parents. For another, Democrats had a chance to push for gun control during the Obama/Duncan era when they controlled both houses. They didn't and Duncan was silent on the issue back then. Now, with Republicans controlling the legislature and White House, the chances of passing even the minimum gun safety laws are slim-to-none, making a long-term school boycott a ridiculous tactic. Finally, Duncan sends his own kids to private school and therefore has no skin in the boycott game he's playing.

Back in 2010, Duncan himself was a free spender when it came to buying military hardware for his department's own squad of student-loan chasers. He spent thousands on deadly new assault weapons, including these 27 shotguns:

 twenty-seven (27) REMINGTON BRAND MODEL 870 POLICE 12/14P MOD GRWC XS4 KXCS SF. RAMAC #24587 GAUGE: 12 BARREL: 14" - PARKERIZED CHOKE: MODIFIED SIGHTS: GHOST RING REAR WILSON COMBAT; FRONT - XS CONTOUR BEAD SIGHT STOCK: KNOXX REDUCE RECOIL ADJUSTABLE STOCK FORE-END: SPEEDFEED SPORT-SOLID - 14" LOP are designated as the only shotguns authorized for ED based on compatibility with ED existing shotgun inventory, certified armor and combat training and protocol, maintenance, and parts.

The were meant to replace 27 that were "worn out". I'm still waiting to hear how exactly they were worn out.

A year later, armed with their new hardware, Arne's troops went out hunting for student-loan late-payers. They mistakenly thought they found one out in Stockton, CA where Arne's army kicked in the door in the early morning hours to collect on the overdue loans and dragged Kenneth Wright out of his home, terrifying his small children. It was actually his estranged wife they were looking for.

Wright's neighbors, who did not want to disclose their last names, said they saw the raid unfold.

"They surrounded the house; it was like a task force or S.W.A.T team," across the street neighbor Becky said. "They all had guns. They dragged him out in his boxer shorts, threw him to the ground and handcuffed him."

According to Becky and her two children, the raid started at 6 a.m. with agents ramming down Wright's front door.

 "I watched until I went to work at 10:45 and they were still out there," Becky said.

Her young daughter, Valerie, said she counted 13 agents and one Stockton police officer outside Wright's home.

"I felt really bad for those kids," said Becky about agents when they brought out Wright's three children. "They were crying really loud."

Let's put an end to this gun madness. Keep schools and the DOE gun-free. 

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

If elected, Lightfoot would become the city’s first openly gay mayor, and the first African-American woman to hold the job. She joins an increasingly crowded field of challengers looking to unseat Emanuel in the February 2019 election. She is the ninth challenger to announce a run.

Lori Lightfoot

“We have seen example after example of top-down dictates that do not reflect any interest in true partnership with parents, teachers and principals. How do we chart a new progressive course? How do we make sure we take our city on a new, different direction? I will start with listening to the needs of the people.” -- Tribune

Joanna Klonsky, Chicago political strategist

“There’s a misconception that you need to out-raise [Rahm Emanuel] to beat him." -- WBEZ

Sen. Elizabeth Warren

“Secretary DeVos has filled the department with for-profit college hacks who only care about making sham schools rich and shutting down investigations into fraud." --New York Times

CPS Parent Lawrence White

“We have to repair or try to regain those losses,” said White, who wasn’t even aware CPS had implemented a secret overhaul of special education until it was revealed in the WBEZ report. -- WBEZ

Eden Hebron, 15-year-old freshman at Stoneman Douglas H.S.

But since the March for Our Lives protest on March 24th,  the media attention to the issue of gun violence has also changed. “It’s starting to die down, a little, all the news and stuff,” she said. “When I see people moving on, it’s like, How can you?” -- Guardian

Dick Cheney

“I think the techniques we used were not torture. A lot of people try to call it that, but it wasn’t deemed torture at the time,” he told Maria Bartiromo. “People want to go back and try to rewrite history, but if it were my call, I’d do it again.” -- Crooks & Liars

Happy Mothers Day from D.T. 

“I moved on her like a bitch. But I couldn’t get there. And she was married...

...I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything.” ~Trump https://t.co/mqcoEj5IKh

— Alyssa Milano (@Alyssa_Milano) May 13, 2018

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

What Emma Gonzalez said without words.

Editorial

SPRING IS traditionally a time when schoolchildren come to the nation’s capital to learn about their government. But on Saturday it was the students — tens of thousands of them from all across the country — who did the schooling. --Washington Post

Republican pollster 

Jim Hobart, a Republican pollster, said the marches illustrated the enormous energy of the Democratic base and revealed generational changes in the electorate that Republicans will have to grapple with.

“As we have seen in special elections, Democratic enthusiasm is already very high and the gun issue just adds to that,” Mr. Hobart said, noting that students in his hometown Atlanta had traveled by bus for 10 hours to join the march in Washington. “These same students are much more likely to not just vote, but volunteer.”

Sen. Patty Murray (WA)

The top Senate Democrat for education, praised the Omnibus Bill as a "bipartisan agreement" to dismiss the "extreme ideas [from Betsy DeVos] to privatize our nation's public schools and dismantle the Department of Education". -- Washington Post

Political strategist, Joanna Klonsky

"There is a reckoning going on in Illinois, just like everywhere else. Many of the preconceived notions of the unshakeability of the power structures as it existed are breaking down. It's become top of mind for anyone who operates in politics right now. They know it's a ticking time bomb that can go off at any moment." -- The Hill

Cynthia Nixon

 “When I announced yesterday that I’m running for gov, one of Cuomo’s top surrogates dismissed me as an 'unqualified lesbian'. It’s true that I never received my certificate from the Department of Lesbian Affairs, though in my defense there’s a lot of paperwork required.” -- Twitter

Stormy Daniels

Trump told her: “Wow, you are special. You remind me of my daughter.” -- The Hill

Since Trump decided to get tough with China, the Dow has fallen about 1300 points

That’ll show 'em pic.twitter.com/17eMHkTzjH

— Daniel Lin (@danwlin) March 23, 2018

So glad to see all these black and brown kids given an opportunity to speak up too! Much respect to the Parkland students for using their privilege to give others space to speak and get some spotlight. #Hope #BlackLivesMatter  #MarchForOurLives  #VoteThemOut2018

— JJ Odelle (@JJOdelle) March 24, 2018

Back from Parkland. A new student movement is born.

I'm back from Parkland where I got a chance to talk with some Marjory Stoneman Douglas students, parents and educators in the aftermath of another catastrophic mass school shooting.

Like most of the country, I shared grief with the mourners and cheered on the dozens of MSD students who boarded the buses to Tallahassee to offer their reasonable gun control proposals to the state legislature only to be ignored and insulted by state pols.

Florida happens to be the state most averse to gun control legislation with a majority of state legislators receiving big campaign donations from the NRA. In FL, for example, if municipal officials pass a firearms-related law, they must pay a $5,000 fine and lose their jobs. They can also be forced to pay up to $100,000 in damages to any “person or an organization whose membership is adversely affected by any ordinance” —such as, say, the NRA.

To show how deep the divide is, the old, white male Republicans who rule the state, after refusing to meet with Parkland students to consider a ban on assault rifles, passed a resolution declaring that pornography endangers teenage health.

Refusing to be demoralized or turned around, not even by death threats from the right, the students are turning their grief and anger into militancy, organizing an NRA boycott, two national student walkouts against gun violence and lobbying for a ban on assault weapons. The shootings have sparked a new national movement with students taking the lead.

Students have traditionally been the igniters of larger and broader progressive social movements. That was true of the Civil Rights Movement (SNCC) anti-war and anti-imperialist youth revolt (SDS) of the '60s and the student uprisings here and in Europe 50 years ago.

The power of the youth movement rests in its embodiment of a vision that transcends the immediate demands and aims at reshaping the world in which the next generation will live, work, and lead.

But the emerging militant student movement alone, even with liberal supporters cheering them on and donating money, is incapable of carrying this struggle through to the end. But as it was in Paris, Berkeley, and Columbia University in '68, there is a basis for united action between students, communities of color (who are feeling the brunt of gun violence), and organized labor, now fighting the Janus decision for its very existence.

The current student protests may never approach the scope or depth of the '60s protest movement. It's impossible to predict. But hopefully, a unifying strategy will emerge from this new vital movement so that the students won't have to go it alone. 

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Mourning through militancy

Columnist Steven Thrasher

But when death has come through great injustice, mourning through a militancy aimed at stopping similarly unjust deaths is not just healthy, but righteous and ethical. Mourning through militancy is one of the more noble sides of America’s history. -- Guardian 

 West side Chicagoan Eric Smith

“It’s sad out here. There was so much blood.” -- Tribune

AFSCME Pres. Lee Saunders on Janus case

“This is the place, sisters and brothers, where we make a stand today.” -- At rally Saturday in New York City.

Claremont Prof. Charles Taylor Kerchner

"Could [Janus] put teachers' unions out of business? No. Not close. Unions can go to grass roots and get back to constant organizing fairly quickly. It might drive unions to get closer to their core, to get closer to their members, and to be sort of more in touch with what's going on." -- EdWeek 

Republican Congressman Brian Mast

 I have fired tens of thousands of rounds through that rifle, many in combat... We used it because it was the most lethal — the best for killing our enemies. And I know that my community, our schools and public gathering places are not made safer by any person having access to the best killing tool the Army could put in my hands. -- New York Times 

Arturo Sarukhan Former Mexican Ambassador to U.S.

“Even from the get-go, the idea of Mexico paying for the wall was never going to fly... It could end up with the U.S. asking itself, ‘Who lost Mexico?’ ” -- Washington Post

#VetsForGunReform

I also renounce my @NRA endowment membership as it is clear that their idea of “responsible gun ownership” means only to line their pockets and sow persistent fear. We went to combat. Combat does not need to come to us.

cc: @iAmTheWarax

— Space Cowboy (@Strike_Williams) February 18, 2018

Another look at school size and the Parkland shooting

A year ago, after taking $30M from NRA, Trump signed order loosening Obama-era gun sale restrictions.

Broward County, FL -- School's back in session here today and it will be interesting to see if the student protests continue to gain strength and capture prime media space. National anti-gun school walkouts are being planned for March 14 and again on April 20th, the anniversary of the Columbine shooting.

One thing I've learned is that my original comparison of Marjory Stoneman Douglas with Columbine doesn't hold up across the board. It's true that both were large schools -- Columbine had about 2,000 students while Douglas has more than 3,000 -- and that large school size correlates with increased incidents of violence and often breeds the kind of anonymity that prevents intervention before a Parkland-type event can take place.

A closer look makes me think that school size wasn't the big problem at MSD. While the FBI may have botched handling the tips they received about shooter Nikolas Cruz, the school's teachers and administrators didn't. Despite the size of their school, they were in touch with students well enough to anticipate Cruz as a potential violent actor and intervened in his case as best they could. Interventions took place going back to his middle-school days. Cruz faced a long string of escalating disciplinary measures throughout his academic career for insubordination, profanity, disruption, fighting and assault. Those attempts ended with Cruz's expulsion from high.

Washington Post reports:

The real problems started at least as early as middle school and quickly intensified. There were the vocal outbursts, disturbing drawings of stick figures with guns, constant disciplinary issues. There were threatening statements written on his homework and scrap paper, including a reference to killing President Barack Obama, saying he should be “burned alive and eaten.”

His middle school and high school teachers referred him to individual and family counseling, the records show. They held parent conferences and called social workers. They sent him to in-school suspension, and they sent him off campus. For a time, they sent him to a school for emotionally disturbed youth. Finally, after he was disciplined for an assault at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, they asked for an assessment of the threat he posed to his school, and ultimately he was expelled, about a year before he returned with a gun.

Up until the time of the attack, teachers were actively engaged with Cruz and acted professionally. During the attack, many acted heroically and were instrumental in saving student lives. This included football coach Aaron Feis who gave up his own life while shielding students from the gunfire.

Even if the FBI had properly followed up on tips they received about Cruz, it's unclear what actions might have been taken. The point here is that nothing the 19-year-old Cruz did up until the time of the shooting, including his purchasing of an assault rifle at local gun store, was illegal. Keeping an automatic weapon out of his hands would have been the only way to prevent the massacre in Parkland.

Pres. Trump's attempt to blame the FBI and even the student victims themselves is indicative of his own sociopathy. It was Trump who one year ago, after accepting more than $30 million from the NRA, signed an order loosening gun sale restrictions.

In a vapid response to the mounting student protests both parties are offering up meaningless bills which, even if passed (doubtful) will do nothing to prevent more massacres of this type, let alone the daily deaths from gun violence in cities like Chicago. The GOP bill simply tweaks existing state rules on gun registration.

Sen. Diane Feinstein and the Dems want to raise the legal age for buying AR-15s from 18 to 21. Democrats once again seem willing to snuggle up close, but slightly to the left of Trump and the GOP.  Nothing they could do could breed more cynicism among the protesting students and potential young voters. It seems the Dems have once again come up with a recipe for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory in 2018.

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Emma Gonzalez, a senior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School

“If the president wants to come up to me and tell me to my face that it was a terrible tragedy and how it should never have happened and maintain telling us how nothing is going to be done about it, I’m going to happily ask him how much money he received from the National Rifle Association."  -- Student protest rally in Ft. Lauderdale

Flint Taylor, Hampton family attorney

“When I told him I needed a recess to come to Bill’s funeral, the judge sent his respects." -- Village Free Press

Maria Thorne, 5th-grade Florida teacher to Paul Ryan

 She then told [Ryan] she was a teacher and a resident of the area, to which he responded, “Nice.” That set Thorne off. “Nice? You’re here celebrating the death of 17 children,” she admonished.Ryan weakly replied that he “didn’t want to talk politics” — an odd statement to make at a political fundraiser. Thorne persisted in her critique, and was escorted out of the event as she chanted “no more guns!” -- Ryan caught raising campaign cash in Florida

Arlie Hochschild

...if the Democratic party is to pose a magnetically attractive alternative to Donald Trump, it must address the grievances, the life experiences, the sense of losing ground, of people like those I met and describe in my book, Strangers in Their Own Land. Millions of Trump voters saw the Democrats as beholden to corporate interests as the Republicans, and I believe they are right. -- Guardian

From Littleton to Parkland, lots of hand wringing... [Updated]

I've been closely following the wave of school shootings like the one in Parkland, Florida since my days as a member of Pres. Clinton's Advisory Commission on Youth Violence, following the 1999 mass shootings at Columbine H.S. in Littleton, Colorado.

The Parkland shooting is reportedly, the 208th since Columbine. An ongoing Washington Post analysis has found that more than 150,000 students attending at least 170 primary or secondary schools have experienced a shooting on campus since then.

The similarities between Littleton and Parkland are striking. Both mass school shootings took place in large high schools. Columbine had 2,000 students. Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, 3,000.

I'm in no way blaming the school size or the educators inside the buildings, many of whom acted heroically and saved many lives during the assaults. Just noting that large high schools have a high degree of anonymity. That is, students are rarely known well by adults in the building, unless they are super-high achievers or "trouble makers". The result is, on average, large high schools have nearly ten times the violent incidents as smaller ones.

Whether it was shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold at Columbine or Nikolas Cruz at Parkland, their fellow students were more aware of their potentially dangerous environs and threats of violence within their schools than were school administrators. In both cases and in the many cases in between, school leaders may have missed opportunities to intervene before the fact.

Pres. Trump wasted no time in blaming the Douglas students themselves for the killings. Trump has been in bed with the NRA in opposing any and all gun legislation and it is unclear what if anything he or law enforcement officials would or could have done, even if fellow students and neighbors of Cruz would have reported him to officials or if the FBI had followed up on the many tips they are reported to have received. Everything Cruz did, up until the time of the shootings, was perfectly legal.

In this case, some Parkland school officials were aware of Cruz's violence issues. They even expelled him from Douglas after a fight he had with a fellow student. But this didn't raise any flags when Cruz walked into a local gun shop and bought an assault rifle. By law, it couldn't.

The shooters at both Columbine and Stoneman Douglas were reported to have contacts with neo-fascist or white supremacist groups. Klebold and Harris were white supremacists who carried out their horrific act intentionally on Hitler's birthday. Following the Parkland shootings, a local white supremacist group Republic of Florida (ROF) claimed to have ties to Cruz.

In both cases, the shooters had serious mental problems, mainly severe depression. Klebold and Harris were each heavily medicated and had suicidal tendencies.  After the Columbine massacre, a team of psychiatrists and psychologists determined they were psychopaths, in touch with reality but filled with hate and bent on mass devastation that would outdo even that caused by the Oklahoma City bomber(s).

In a society where guns and bomb weren't so readily available, the pair's names may have ended up on a list of patients receiving treatment for their mental problems, rather than on a list of mass murderers.

We don't know enough about Cruz's mental condition yet. He reportedly also suffered from depression. The point here is not about people suffering from mental illness. But rather, the conditions that enabled them to caused such horrific destruction.

In both cases, the shooters had easy access to guns (including semi-automatic weapons) despite their troubled histories. Thank gutless politicians, often the beneficiaries of huge donations from the NRA, who are afraid to pass reasonable gun control legislation, for that.

News of the Parkland shootings, which left 17 students dead, was met with prayers and lots of hand-ringing by Florida politicians like Sen. Rubio and Gov. Scott, each of whom received A+ ratings from the NRA. Rubio has received more than $3million in NRA campaign donations.

The Republican ‘Thoughts and Prayers’ cliche is so empty of meaning, it mocks the dead. #ParklandShooting

— Charles Fulwood (@Brown_Woofer) February 15, 2018

Gov. Scott signed 5 Pro-gun bills in 2014 making Nicolas Cruz fully able to purchase a gas mask, smoke grenade and an AK-47 with extra magazines. All while under the age of 21 and still in high school. He was too young to by beer but old enough to purchase an assault weapon.

In the rest of the world, there have been 18 school shootings in the last twenty years. In the U.S., there have been 18 school shootings since January 1--35 days.

Marco Rubio and Rick Scott—both of whom carry A+ ratings and endorsements from the N.R.A—leaned on similar, though less elegant talking points. 

 “I think it’s important to know all of [the facts] before you jump to conclusions that there’s some law we could have passed that could have prevented it,” Rubio said in an interview with Fox News in the shooting’s aftermath. He added that lawmakers “can always have that debate, but . . . you should know the facts of that incident before you run out and prescribe [legislation].” 

Over the course of his career, Rubio has received $3.3 million from the N.R.A. Scott has also bucked calls for gun control. After the 2016 Pulse nightclub massacre in Orlando, the Florida governor infamously declared, “Let’s remember, the Second Amendment has been around for over 200 years. . . . That’s not what killed innocent people; evil killed innocent people.”

Rubio: We shouldn't "jump to conclusions" that gun control laws would've prevented Florida school shooting https://t.co/y23qCMTMaU pic.twitter.com/jMnweZ5d6f

— The Hill (@thehill) February 15, 2018

While they happened nearly two decades apart, the school shootings at Littleton and Parkland and the hundreds of others in between offer valuable lessons for creating safer schools for our children. Unfortunately, we still have a system where the NRA and other big corporate campaign donors rule congress. Until that changes radically, our children will continue to be at risk in their classrooms and on the streets.

Look for more "prayers and thoughts" coming from the politicians, but no action. Nothing from them, that is, unless Parkland turns out to be the straw that breaks the camel's back and mass protests forces some change.