Every bullet fired into a crowd penetrates the national soul — or so it seems to me, as I continue to grapple emotionally with the Trump-rally shooting in Butler, Pa. on July 13, which left one attendee murdered, several others wounded and the shooter himself dead.

As with all such shootings, this goes beyond “motive” into a collective nethersphere of uncertainty. For God’s sake, what is life? Why is it so, shall we say, cheap? Why are we organized — politically, socially — primarily around its elimination? Why are guns so damn sacred . . . not to mention fighter jets, nuclear weapons, our annual military budget? Why do the following words make me cringe:

“We cannot — must not — go down this road in America, Violence has never been the answer.”

This is President Joe, blathering a heart-stabbing lie — also known as the thing most politicians mean the least when they say it — to clueless America in the wake of the latest mass shooting. We are deeply, deeply down this road! We have a trillion-dollar annual military budget and maintain around 750 military bases around the world. We are, under Joe’s watch, bleeding billions of dollars to Benjamin Netanyahu so Israel can inflict genocide on Palestine. Indeed, an Israeli airstrike in southern Gaza on the same day as the Trump-rally assassination attempt, killed nearly 100 Palestinians.

“We cannot — must not — go down this road in America . . .” Yeah, sure. This is the road we’ve chosen: the road to hell. The job most presidents have chosen, at least in my lifetime, has been that of public relations director in chief, softening our militarism with the platitudes of state.

As Phil Wilson writes at Common Dreams: “Until 1949, the federal agency responsible for the U.S. military was simply called The Department of War — a rather nondescript, generic title that tells us nothing about intent. But with the advent of the Cold War and the new mandate to unleash military might against leftist regimes in every corner of the globe, our military needed a brand new identity. In 1949, just in time for decades of war in Southeast Asia, we decided to call our military The Department of Defense. This made it clear that bombing, defoliating and reducing civilian populations to ash thousands of miles from U.S. borders — in Korea, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia — were acts of ‘defense.’”

Wilson also notes, cogently: “I have always suspected that the Republicans control the American narrative and the Democrats lip sync to the latest MAGA tunes.”

In other words, this is a “unified” nation, despite the anger, despite the hatred, volleying back and forth between the two primary political parties. The nation is unified in its militarism, unified in its refusal to acknowledge that war always comes home and that humanity must evolve beyond it or we will surely destroy ourselves.

America, guns — the two entities seem to be linked . . . religiously. This link very much predates our founding. Think of the Crusades. Think of the sheer emergence of empires across the planet throughout history. Our god is better than your god! The power to obliterate opposition — the power to kill — has long been sacred, both collectively and personally.

The irony of this is soul-twisting, especially as it exists in present-day America, where personal weapon use, a.k.a., self-defense, is ever more glorified, leading us into the current social structure. Guns are the essential symbol of freedom; they are increasingly available to almost everyone and legal to possess almost everywhere. Hence, the irony:

“Thanks to Wisconsin state law, guns will be allowed in the outer perimeter of the Republican National Convention even after Saturday’s assassination attempt against Donald Trump.”

Thus reports The New Republic, adding: “People can open-carry guns and conceal-carry with a permit in a less strict perimeter surrounding a ‘hard’ perimeter controlled by the Secret Service around the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee as the RNC begins tonight. A Milwaukee city ordinance, however, bans tennis balls and paintball guns in the outer perimeter. Effectively, an AR-15 can be carried within walking distance of the RNC hall, but a paintball gun can’t, and it’s all thanks to Wisconsin’s open-carry laws.”

Declaring the situation “utterly ridiculous,” Milwaukee alderman Robert Bauman put it this way to ABC News: “I mean, I could just picture this image of somebody coming up to the entry point with, you know, an AR-15 strapped over one shoulder, a long rifle over another, and two pistols in his belt, and the cops asking him, ‘You got any tennis balls?’”

Yeah, the irony! I definitely do not expect this matter to be resolved politically. Tougher and saner gun laws have been shot and killed, but it’s bigger than that anyway. The USA has adorned itself in military cammies. It has a holster and a six-gun on its belt. This is who we are, and we’re always on the lookout for enemies, which are everywhere (particularly at the southern border). The national religion is us-vs.-them — the simplest religion available.

And it’s also the most profitable.

Nonetheless, many, many Americans — many citizens of the world — are devoting their lives to the long, complex trek beyond the religion of guns and violence and militarism. Power is a matter of connection with the whole universe.

Robert Koehler is an award-winning, Chicago-based journalist and nationally syndicated writer. His newly released album of recorded poetry and art work, Soul Fragments, is available here: https://linktr.ee/bobkoehler

released album of recorded poetry and art work, Soul Fragments, is available here: https://linktr.ee/bobkoehler

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