In America, we have mass shootings

What do you think the government should stop, drag queen story time at the public library or mass shootings?

You better not have answered mass shootings, because you got no shot at ending those.

None.

In this country, we eat a lot of chicken wings, and we shoot a lot of grade school kids. In this country, we like frozen pizza and being shot to death in the grocery store.

It’s a good thing more states are legalizing marijuana because weed is the perfect drug for these times. For one thing, weed makes serious things seem hysterically funny. Donald Trump. The Uvalde Police Department. And weed slows things down, too. If you get on a good, steady regimen of weed at all hours, the mass shootings seem far apart, and that’s comforting.

Of course, they’re not far apart. They’re closer together, and that’s a blessing for the sober, overly sensitive person. Constant repetition of horrors makes them easier to endure.

It’s like The Holocaust. If you have to push the poison gas button on Jews and a bunch of other undesirables, it probably makes you think the first dozen or so times. After that, it’s just a job, and if you’re sick of any part of it, it’s either the hours or the pay or that boss who won’t stop riding you.

That’s a damn ugly way to look at it, but remember back in the early days, back when we thought school shootings were damn ugly?

Thoughts and prayers. Remember when we used to post that on Facebook?

“12 dead in school shooting.”

“Thoughts and prayers.” Thoughts and prayers went away, which was good because both are of use only to the dead.

Oh sure, the teary-eyed parents are sad as hell, but there’s a new weeping mother every week or so, and that helps you forget. The candlelight vigils are always dopey, as are the homemade signs reading “OUR TOWN STRONG.”

And “Not One More,” and the cunning-eyed governor or mayor saying we can’t let this happen again while being very careful not to anger voters who own 17 rifles.

In my lifetime, America has successfully put an end to smoking cigarettes in the office, and we’re close to stamping out marriage, in-wedlock birth, drive-in movies and bars that serve short beers, but we haven’t made even a little tiny ding dent in getting your head blown off in a public place.

No one has any plans to, either, no matter what Gov. Fligl tells you at the press conference after someone paints the walls of a grade with the blood of kids. Fligl’s got plans to get reelected, is what she’s got. No politician is going to lose an election keeping your kids alive. You may think your elected representatives are stupid, but every single one of them can count. Oh, sure, some 45-year-old state rep might be worried that his 17-yearold side chick might die if they shoot up her school, but he can get another one. If anything, grief makes a man more attractive to underage girls.

So, no. We’re not going to stop mass shootings. We’re not trying, and we don’t know how, and people need to get reelected. This is just going to keep happening. Gov. Fligl knows it. The cops know it. I know it. You know it. Roger the jolly maniac who just bought his 14th legal gun knows it’s going to happen, just as soon as he finishes writing his “manifesto.”

My advice? If you’re one of those people who prays before you go to sleep, pray for the victims of the NEXT school shooting. This way, you’ll always be one horror ahead.

Dion’s latest book, a collection of his best columns, is called “Devil’s Elbow: Dancing in the Ashes of America.” It is available in paperback from Amazon.com, and for Nook, Kindle, and iBooks.