What Now People?

Over the weekend, a man in Tennessee shot and killed four people with an AR-15 in a Waffle House restaurant.  The points covered by the media are first that the shooter was naked except for a jacket and second that a patron inside the Waffle House rushed the shooter and wrestled his weapon from him after which the shooter fled.  The reports usually say that the shooter was "known" to the police.  But here's what few reports mention:  the shooter was mentally ill.  In the past, he claimed that Taylor Swift was stalking him and hacking his various devices; he showed up at the White House and entered a restricted area and refused to leave; etc.  As a result of all this, a court ordered that all of the shooters weapons be taken from the man.  The court acted under one of the laws the supposedly prevents the mentally ill from getting weapons.  The police took the guy's guns.  So the Waffle House murders were a good example of just how the gun control legislation that has been discussed much of late is not an answer for ending all gun crimes.  The shooter got an AR-15 anyway and used it to kill four people.

This outcome is neither an argument for or against the legislation in question.  It is, however, a clear answer to those who think that simplistic marches for what they call "common sense gun safety legislation" is an answer.  It isn't.  This is a much more complex problem that deserves serious discussion, not marches and boycotts.