By Daniel Smith
Newspeople can sometimes get desensitized to even horrifying news events – after all, if you’re in the news business long enough, you’ve seen and reported about a lot of them.
Last month, when I wrote about the “numbing frequency of acts of extreme violence in this county,” in the wake of the largest mass shooting in our history at a Las Vegas county music event, I never dreamed we would see another horrific mass shooting just two weeks later at a small community church in Texas. All of the country was shocked by the insane, deliberate brutality of the attack on the congregation at the Baptist church in tiny Sutherland Springs, Texas.
Donald Trump, in expressing his own shock and sadness, still managed to bring in political controversy in commenting that the slaughter was a “mental health thing, not a gun thing.”
Fifth District Congressman Doug Lamborn posted this comment on his website:
“In stunned disbelief, we’ve learned of the loss of innocents during a community church service in Sutherland Springs, Texas. I join Colorado and the nation in mourning the tragic loss of life as we stand with the survivors, united in prayer for all families affected. From the darkness of this heinous act, we’ve also learned of one heroic citizen who took up arms to protect his community from further evil. The days ahead may shed more light on the details of this tragedy, but today, we pray, we mourn. May God bless the people of Sutherland Springs.”
So we see more photos of the victims, hear how promising, precious lives, young and old were cut short, and later learn of the troubled man with a history of yes, mental instability, and red flags and warning signs in his behavior that somehow went ignored.
