Today we have nothing unique or special to add to what we’ve previously said about this peculiarly American cult.  That it is religious in nature was observed well before us.  “It was [54] years ago today Sgt. Pepper taught the band” and us that in the USA “Happiness is a warm gun, momma.”[1]

The thing of it is that there’s nothing new to say, only the new totals and names of humans newly sacrificed by and absolutely essential to maintenance of gun cult solidarity.  In the same way that the “King Must Die” and the Ainu of the Japanese Islands in the Sea of Okhotsk must eat the bear they worship, the gun cult needs these human sacrifices.

After thinking on this for decades, dealing with it while in government and teaching about the Second Amendment in our civil liberties course, we periodically wrote:

On February 17, 2011, we addressed the gun hugging portion of the citizenry in Chatham, New York, our second home, with a comparison of their town to Chatham, New South Wales, Australia.  We pointed to the pervasive similarities, including love of guns and its identical genesis (escaping King George’s tyrannical rule) but the massive change in Australian gun regulation enacted after the mass shooting of 1996 in Port Arthur, Tasmania.  We learn daily how many mass shootings Americans have experienced since each and every last mass shooting.  Here is that 2011 “Report From Chatham, Australia.”

Trayvon Martin

On June 7, 2012, our Times Union “Stand Your Ground Needs To Go” called for “a killer on the road” to be removed.  Laws in 20 states that encourage packing and vigilantism and in Florida was a major contributor to the Trayvon Martin killing.  After that, our op-ed and HL by name were spotlighted in a gun cult publication called “The Truth About Guns.”

On October 18, 2012, we wrote that upstate New York had learned “All The Wrong Lessons” from two then recent killings.  One of a 12-year old boy by another with the shooter’s father’s gun and a second killing of one 13-year old boy by another with a rifle gifted the shooter by his father on his birthday.  The lesson that the dead 13-year old’s father learned was reported: “This is an unfortunate accident.  We don’t blame the kid.  We don’t blame anybody.”

On February 26, 2013, in “Assault On The Constitution” we simplified for Times Union readers the civil liberties class on the Second Amendment where we teach that when the framers wrote:

“A well-regulated Militia,[2] being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

Antonin Scalia

They clearly meant what they clearly and unequivocally said – not what the hypocritical fake strict constructionist Antonin Scalia wrote while opining that the Militia clause was independent of the bearing Arms clause – and also disregarding the fact that “bear Arms” was a military term of the era.

On July 20, 2013, in “Voters Need To Return Fire Against NRA” we proposed a new scorecard for ranking legislators, the reverse of the one used by the National Rifle Association.  A+ ratings, etc. would be awarded to lawmakers on what they sponsored and how they voted on meaningful gun control.

And finally, HL 50 of May 25, 2018, “The Gun Cult Descends Into Shirley Jackson’s Lottery Land” says as we repeat today, that human and especially child sacrifice is as necessary for maintenance of gun cult fidelity and cohesion as human sacrifices were and still are to other cults.

Please listen to the chants and incants of the cult leaders and flock as the bodies in Buffalo and Uvalde are named and buried.

[1]  The song is not from Sgt. Pepper but the White Album.

[2]  The capitalization of “Militia” is in the original.