Again?

"We have a pattern now of mass shootings in this country that has 

no parallel anywhere else in the world."

-- President Obama, 12/2/2015

As Libby and I awoke this morning in Vietnam, we see breaking news reports on our phones about yet another mass shooting in America.  You would think that we've started to grow numb to this type of thing, but we're not.  It has affected Libby and I every single time we read it while in Vietnam.  And it has happened a lot while we have been here.  Just since August we could recall three mass shootings before today.

...and here it comes, like clockwork.  People on my Facebook feed suggesting that this latest shooting in Bernardino happened because it was in a gun-free zone, that if we allow people MORE guns then things like this wouldn't have happened.  Or that in California they already had gun laws and there was still a shooting, so we don't need more gun control because it isn't working.  Huh?  What kind of twisted logic is that? We should allow more guns?  More than the 300 million already in America?  That will make us safer?

In America I thought gun control was an obvious solution -- why shouldn't we have fewer guns?  And now that I am living outside America, it is an even more obvious question.  But Nick Kristof just published an editorial called, "On Guns, We're Not Even Trying".

Let me just repeat what President Obama said today -- this pattern of mass shootings in America has no parallel anywhere else in the world.  No developed or developing nation has gun laws like America's.  And no place has a pattern of mass shootings like ours.

Vietnam has very strict laws on gun ownership.  Not permitted.  The whole country is a gun-free zone.  And we feel completely safe here (except for the motorbikes).

As an American, reading about mass shootings in America makes me worried about coming back with my family.  I know statistically we are far more likely to get hurt by the traffic in Hanoi than gun violence in America, but it is so disheartening to read about these shootings -- and the predictably asinine response from the gun lobby.

This is probably as good a time as any to provide a link to comedian Jim Jefferies' rant about guns in America.  The language is inappropriate and some of the points are as well, but it does highlight the ridiculous gun debate in America: