It’s now clear that America’s most competent security forces cannot stop a bullet from someone determined to use a gun to make a terrible statement. This is not a mental health issue. It’s an issue of lawmakers recognizing the crisis, using common sense, and enacting laws to limit civilians’ access to high-powered weaponry.
Eileen McClure Nelson, Burke
Safety is something we all deserve
The injuries sustained by Donald Trump’s shootings, as well as the mass murders of innocent children in schools, the massacres of innocent people during worship services, and other horrific acts of violence occurring in our country, once again highlight the urgent need for strong and effective gun control laws. Sadly, some lawmakers are outraged by Trump’s shootings and repeatedly block bills that would make Americans less susceptible to random gun violence. All Americans, including Trump, have the right to be protected from gun violence.
Frances Rankin, Chevy Chase
As the nation’s Independence Day celebrations ended, a colleague reflected on the three teenagers who had been rushed to a pediatric emergency room in the middle of the night with gunshot wounds. Less than two weeks later, the former US president was confronted with a reality experienced by millions of Americans. While Donald Trump will now receive greater protection, as he rightly deserves, our children and communities will receive “thoughts and prayers.” We must do more.
As a pediatrician in training, I provide families with gun locks and safety tips at every child’s wellness check. Despite our best efforts, firearm-related injuries remain the number one cause of death among children and adolescents in the United States. While we always seem to be divided by political divides, the events of the past week show that we are united in our concern that gun violence affects the people we care about most. It is clear that without gun reform, we cannot protect our children, let alone our former president.
Maybe Childish Gambino is right when he says this is America, but it doesn’t have to be.
Laura Irvin, Philadelphia
AR-15 Stupidity
It seems to me that the focus in various media outlets on the Secret Service’s potential shortcomings misses the point. Security measures should be reviewed, but we should also take this opportunity to ask why weapons like the AR-15 are available to civilians in our country. It’s sheer insanity.
Thomas J. Jeffers, Covert, Michigan
The mass shooting at a Donald Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on Saturday is clear evidence that AR-style rifles should be banned for non-military use: the 20-year-old shooter at the rally was 130 yards from his target, longer than a football field.
Athletes shouldn’t have to stand that far from their targets, and civilians shouldn’t have to shoot someone from that far away.
I wish the Republican Party would finally acknowledge that AR-style rifles and semi-automatic rifles are not what the Founding Fathers meant by “the right of the people to keep and bear arms.” They are not weapons to defend yourself. Maybe now they are.
Jump to conclusions
As political commentators and historians scramble to identify the root causes of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, they focus on the current political discord in the country and compare it to other similar incidents. This is a mistake at this early stage, when we know very little about the perpetrator’s politics and nothing about his motives. We know that he was a 20-year-old high school graduate and that he used his father’s gun in the attack.
Ultimately, his motivations may prove to be less political than more similar to those of his predecessors, whose actions were marked by aimlessness, such as the 2022 Independence Day parade shooter in Highland Park, Illinois.
The political issue that seems most relevant to the assassination attempt on Trump is the widespread availability of guns in the U.S. Only concerted political action in Washington can stop this endless drama.
Sidney Wiseman, Highland Park, Illinois
Maybe the assassination attempt on Donald Trump was not ideologically motivated, this was simply one of a lonely, mentally unstable young man who seized the opportunity for notoriety and easy access to weapons of mass murder to fulfill his delusions. It is that simple and tragic, and may have nothing to do with politics.
If that were the case, all the blame and self-reflection in the media would be pointless nonsense. Instead, what we have here is the usual formula: mental illness + inadequate gun control = catastrophe.
Ron Scheppe, Rochester, New Hampshire
It’s interesting that everyone thinks the shooter of former President Donald Trump must have had some political motive. I don’t think this poor young man had any ideology other than to express his personal suffering and become famous. People who were interviewed about him described him as “intelligent, kind, polite, and good at calculus.” I saw an interview on a news program with someone who went to high school with him, and he said he was nerdy and smart, and “got bullied like a kid.”
Was the shooter essentially a typical school shooter — a young man seen as different and bullied for it — who chose a different target? This tragedy should remind politicians who prioritize Second Amendment rights over the safety of children that they, too, might want to consider reducing the easy access to firearms in America.
Linda Falcao, North Wales, Pennsylvania
Balancing freedom and the common good
As our political climate becomes increasingly polarized, it is time to rediscover balanced government. Our Founding Fathers recognized that a balanced government is essential to prevent tyranny and ensure liberty. But we have forgotten this important lesson, and political debate has become a zero-sum game, where the benefits of one side come at the expense of the other.
We need to recognize that individual liberty and the common good are complementary aspects of a healthy society. The pursuit of happiness is a collective, not an individual, endeavor, and requires balancing individual aspirations with the needs of the community.
To achieve this balance, we must engage in respectful dialogue, listen to opposing views, and find common ground through compromise and negotiation. And we must demand more from the media and politicians, for diverse perspectives and fact-based reporting.
Additionally, we must address systemic problems like redistricting and voter suppression, and promote education, critical thinking, and civic engagement so that we can build a society that truly reflects the wisdom of our founding ideals, where individual liberty and the common good are balanced and the dignity of every person is recognized.
Ronald Beatty, West Barnstable, Massachusetts
A bigger call to action
The July 14th editorial, “America, What Do We Want?” includes the sentence, “Americans, what do we want to be? That is not up to politicians or editorial papers. The responsibility is ours as neighbors and as citizens.”
I and many in my neighborhood have been taking on civic responsibilities for over 50 years: organizing, participating, fundraising, writing, protesting, voting, and more.
But in the face of the media’s “if it bleeds, it rises to the top” mentality, our work sometimes feels futile. Controversy sells. Clicks mean revenue. Outrage inflates ratings and supports and encourages the worst politicians. What was the point of our work? Our efforts as responsible citizens are nothing but chaff in the storm you have sown.
This pious editorial is like rubbing salt in the wound.
Hope fades in isolation, so we move forward together. We know that is what our people do. Media workers must accept their professional responsibility and play their part.
George Gates, Greensboro, North Carolina
I was nine years old when, on my way home from the movies, I heard the paperboy yell, “Breaking news! Breaking news!” Pearl Harbor had been bombed. The whole nation came together. The July 14 editorial, “What Do We Do, America?”, laid the cards on the table in an attempt to urge Americans to reset our values in the wake of this tragedy. As Walt Kelly’s cartoon Pogo once put it, “We have met the enemy, and it is ourselves.”
Paul Schoenbaum, Richmond
