GOLDTRADER COMMENTS...

As anyone who knows me will testify, I have no lack of opinions.
Until now I have been content to post articles on subjects that I thought weren't getting enough exposure. I also did not want to have to re-write what was already written repeatedly by others probably much better than I could ever do, especially without devoting all my time to such a task.

But I feel the need to inject some degree of sanity into the mix.

Almost every discussion about the elements of the Newtown CT shootings center around 'inside the box' thinking.

The current hot button issues surrounding the shootings are:

(1) controlling the possession of guns, especially those that can fire multiple rounds rapidly.

(2) The discussion of the influence of some currently prescribed medications and their influence on people who succumb to violent impulses and attack others (with or without guns!)

(3) Who should be responsible for doing anything about these first two issues...the state, or each of us individually?

My first 'outside the box' question is:
Why do humans want or need weapons?

Early man found a need for weapons either to procure food catching and killing other living animals more easily than just chasing them, and grabbed rocks and sticks for such purpose. These tools were refined until such time as gun powder was invented and the rocks (now bullets) were able to be thrown at higher velocity. Spears became less useful than high powered rocks.

But spears still came in handy when high velocity rock propelling devices weren't available for defensive needs.

Traps, bows and arrows (little spears) and running game off high places (buffalo jumps) to their death were some other means of acquiring game for food.

The high powered rock throwing devices were further refined and were often used as aggressive tools to attack other groups of peoples to either take what they had, and/or eliminate them to a point where they weren't a threat to the attacking parties.

Many weapons became tools of sport, which is really just practicing using these tools proficiently, with the idea of maybe having to use them either for defense, offense, or acquiring food. Competitions between 'practicers' became international, as in the Olympics. And the use of such tools has become fully ingrained into all societies to some degree.

My second 'outside the box' question is:
What is/are the root cause(s) of how humans become mentally unbalanced enough to become violent?

'Normal' people become violent if pushed far enough. But others are very often so abused by their families and others in their society that they turn their violence inward and become what we term 'mentally ill'. They tend to isolate themselves. We then label them further as 'different', 'weird', or 'nerds' and shun them by not including them in our societal activities, further alienating them.

If they are fortunate, they are usually treated with verbal therapies (singly or in group therapy) and, more and more, with medications which only mask the core problem which is the mental crippling of them by others.

Bi-polar people have a simple chemical imbalance of serotonin in their brains which can be remedied by taking pills (serotonin re-uptake inhibitors) which eliminate the manic and depressive episodes from which they suffer and should NEVER be labeled 'mentally ill'.

(Disclosure: GT suffered from bi-polarism from childhood and currently takes Paxil, and has taken many other similar meds for about 20 years and is NOT mentally ill...although he is highly aggravated by what is going on in this world!)

So, do we blame the meds, or the abusers?

Outside the box question three is:
Do 'the people' get to create a government to do what the people cannot do individually, and then transmit their wishes and needs to that government through representatives, or does their government, once created, get to dictate to them and become unable to be altered, replaced, or taken down as The Declaration of Independence says the have the right to do?

The United States Government (really now a corporation) was created to be a representative REPUBLIC form of democracy which means the people elect their representatives who take their wishes and needs to the debating society called Congress where those wishes and needs are decided upon and turned into law, or not acted upon.

A President is elected and given the power to veto any legislation that comes out of Congress.

Several people are appointed by the President, and approved by Congress, to be the Supreme Court of the land whose duty it is to decide what laws adhere to the Supreme Law of the Land, The Constitution of the United States of America.

Within that framework, we all decide how we treat one another and handle the multitude of issues that arise every day as we conduct business among ourselves and with the peoples of other nations and otherwise relate to one another.

Recently, our Presidents have taken it upon themselves to step outside this framework and declare that they have the 'power' (and maybe the right) to attack, incarcerate and even kill other peoples and nations, as well as the populace of their very own country...for our 'protection and national security'...all without the formal approval of the Congress. The Supreme Court has not yet been asked to decide if these actions are 'constitutional'.

These governmental institutions have become highly susceptible to being swayed by very wealthy people and corporations as well being able to influence 'elections' of the people we allow to gain access to these positions of influence and power using their great wealth.

So, given this structure...who do we allow to dictate our access to weapons for our defense (we have allowed our governments at all levels to acquire ever more sophisticated weapons to control us rather than defend us against outside aggressors).

And who do we expect to construct a viable system to FIRST, PREVENT mental abuse of our citizens, and as a back up for those who aren't protected from mental abuse, a system to effectively treat them without doing further harm to them, with the ultimate intention of re-integrating them back into society as healthy participants.

If you have the answers to these 'outside the box' questions, you should voice them LOUDLY and FREQUENTLY to all who will listen in forums, as comments on articles, and anywhere they might be heard and take hold and be accepted in the current dialogue as rational alternatives to what is currently being discussed.

Unless you have lots of money, I doubt telling your 'representatives' will have much effect, unless you can convince them that they will be defeated in the next election, impeached, or arrested and jailed for their crime of taking bribes instead of obeying the Constitutional Oath they took upon being elected to support the Constitution from threats from abroad, as well as DOMESTIC threats to it.

Unless we all do this rationally through the existing structure we have, the only two other alternatives are: (1)  a violent revolution (with no guarantee that it will result in something better) or (2) becoming captives in a tyrannical society with no say so in the direction of our lives.