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Ben Stein's Diary
God Help Us
A massacre that has turned the world upside down.
Sunday
I learned about the massacre at
Sandy Hook elementary school while we were setting up at Fox News
to tape Cavuto on Business. The news was so horrible that
we all felt as if we had lost our legs and could no longer stand.
It was such horrible news that it simply turned the world upside
down.
It still is that kind of news, and it’s incredibly depressing about the nature of humanity. And my wife and I pray all day for the souls of those dear children and for the peace, if there ever will be peace, of their families… and for the souls of the adults and the peace of those who knew and loved them.
As usual, the smartest comment about the whole subject came from John R. Coyne, Jr. “There is evil in the world. It’s beyond mental illness, beyond gun control. It is evil.”
The killer got his weapons from his mother, who apparently had bought them legally and registered them. That tells us something about what anti-gun laws would do, although maybe the mother should not have had them either. In this world, a killer devil can kill his mother and steal her guns to kill six year olds. That’s what some humans are and I am not sure what laws will stop them.
Second, I read that the killer was socially awkward (putting it mildly) and “reserved.” I know what that often means. He spent much of his miserable life playing shoot ’em up video games on line or on machines. I see a troubled young man doing that often.
Up close and personal.
In these games, the “player” just spends his whole day attempting to exercise and exorcize his loneliness and low self-esteem by shooting imaginary creatures and creating damage all day long.
At a certain point, just “killing” on the console blurs into doing it in real life. “Killing” is just what the kid does all his life. How much of a stretch is it for him to shoot into a movie theater or a political gathering or a kindergarten in “real life” if his life is so pitiful that he does not know what’s real and what is not? If you are looking for a villain, try shoot ’em up games.
Third, what motivates “great” deeds? So that a man’s name will not be forgotten and he will be sung about even after his death, goes the ancient saying. That’s what you get if you slaughter 26 totally innocent people at a grade school. If you want another villain, try the media itself, which has now given Adam Lanza fame beyond what he could have dreamt of. It is impossible to blame the media, but evil men like Adam Lanza have gamed the system to perfection.
Fifth, why are these killers always men? What is it that we teach our young men in this world that makes them think it’s a mark of manliness to kill the unarmed and innocent? Whatever it is, it’s disgusting. It’s not manly to kill any unarmed human. It’s miserable, crawling cowardice.
Finally, a comment that will enrage the beautiful people. The whole world is rightly overwrought and crazed with grief over the murder of twenty totally innocent and blameless souls last Friday in Newtown. It was and is a catastrophe for the ages.
But Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promises to kill every Jew in Israel and then in the whole world, including babies… and he had his defenders, even at the Democratic National Convention. And it was daily life in Nazi-occupied Europe from 1939 to 1941 to kill thousands of Jewish children every day. But powerful, intelligent men and women in this country defended Hitler, spoke up for him and for keeping America from even sending arms to Britain when England stood alone. What are we to make of that? No one even mentions, no one even knows about the horrendous Armenian genocide by the Turks in 1915, when well over a million of the most talented people on the planet were wantonly murdered — and the world has still not officially called it genocide — and Hitler explicitly said it was a model for him. Who today even talks of the purposeful mass starvation of millions of beautiful Ukrainian children by Stalin? The U.S. did not say one word about it as a government. The U.S. still will not confront Turkey seriously about the Armenian children.
Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge killed roughly one third of all of its people, including children, from 1974 to about 1977 — and it was U.S. policy to avoid doing anything to stop them — because they were opposed to the North Vietnamese Communists and Communist Vietnam, which had just taken over South Vietnam — our ally. What can we say to that? We cheered the deposing of the President — Richard Nixon — who would have stopped the Khmer Rouge from taking power. There is plenty of Cambodian blood on our hands. There is plenty of blood of all kinds on our hands, especially of the most innocent and blameless among us… real babies, truly innocent.
God help us. Man is made of such crooked stuff that it is impossible to set him straight, said a famous philosopher. God help us.
About the Author
Ben Stein is a writer, actor, economist, and lawyer living in Beverly Hills and Malibu. He writes “Ben Stein’s Diary” for every issue of The American Spectator.
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Cobalt| 12.17.12 @ 6:23AM
We can't legislate evil and mental illness.
Cobalt| 12.17.12 @ 6:27AM
Speaking of babies, According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) , since 1973 there have been approximately 50 million legal abortions in the United States.
Jack in Wi| 12.17.12 @ 8:14AM
Bennnie here wants to bomb Iran and kill lots more innocents then were killed on Friday. Quit with the lies Bennie. Almadinajad said Israel should vanish from the face of the earth just like other places like the Soviet Union and Hitler's Germany. He didn't say kill all Jews in the world. The Jewish community in Iran isthe largest left in the Muslim world, about 25000. They have full freedom of religion and full civil rights. They could leave at any time for Israel and anywhere else but choose to stay in their homeland in which Jews have lived for thousands of years. The emperor Cyrus the Great allowed the Jews to return to Jerusalem and gave money to help raise the Second Temple. Now you want to bomb Iran, based on lies, as a thank you. In Israel almost every Jew has a gun and every Arab does not. That is what gun controllers want Control. So they can oppress without opposition. Free people own weapons to defend themselves. Slaves don't have weapons. Lanza could have killed just as many people with an automobile or can of gas. There are weapons all around that you can't ban.
CJW| 12.17.12 @ 10:36AM
Jack
So you equate Israel with the USSR and Nazi Germany as countries that should vanish? How do you accomplish that without killing the Israeli Jews?
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.17.12 @ 11:04AM
Yes CJW, Jack is our resident anti-semite.
capelady| 12.17.12 @ 9:50PM
Sound like a Ron Paul Believer to me!
Jack in Wi| 12.18.12 @ 1:02AM
I believe in telling the truth. Some of the people here don't like it, others do. I believe in the equality and worth of all humans no matter what their race or religion. Some people here don't like that.
spike59| 12.18.12 @ 5:51AM
"I believe in the equality and worth of all humans no matter what their race or religion. "
------------------------------------------------
unless they're Jews, of course...
Jack in Wi| 12.18.12 @ 6:10AM
I said equality before the law, not superiority and racism like your gang does.
Lin| 12.18.12 @ 7:26AM
The jews in Iran are dhimmis - permanent second class citizens under islamic law. They must exist in a state of visible submission to islam at all times. They are considered ritually unclean and are effectively barred from high level employment in most professions, particularly the government/police/courts, the military, schools, etc. Their word is worth less in court and no muslim can be executed for killing one - Oh, and jewish families may not travel outside the country as a group- some must always be left behind as hostage for the return of the others. They live at the sufferance of their muslim masters and are subject to community retaliation if they violate the covenant of dhimma in any way. That is what islamic law says and that is what islamic law is. A boot on the neck of non-muslims forever. (And the jews are the lucky ones, since they are considered "people of the book." The Bahai, on the other hand, are not considered people of the book. They fall completely outside ANY legal or societal protection under islam. They can be killed and their property confiscated with impunity. That is also permanent government policy under islamic law.
Lin| 12.18.12 @ 7:49AM
Oh, and just to clarify, Jack. It is the existence of the jewish state itself, as an autonomous entity of non-muslims who are NOT in a visible state of submission to islamic law that constitutes Israel's REAL crime. For islamic supremacists like those ruling in Iran, the existence of a dhimmi population in a state of prosperity, power and autonomy is an up ending of the natural order and an insult to islam itself. The Quran and hadith determine how the jews should live according to the men who rule Iran, and everything they do is designed to align the jews with their proper position under islam (i.e. they must become dhimmis again in relation to islam, period, full stop). This is why they consider Israel an unnatural "entity" and an abomination. It is an insult and an unnatural aberration of the islamic order.
Frank Drackman| 12.17.12 @ 8:45AM
Sources please, last time I checked it was closer to 70 million.
And everyone always forgets that 1/2(actually a little more) of the Aborted are females, most of which would have already had their 2.3 Chill'un, 1/2 of which will have their 2.3 Chill'un, and so on.
the one good thing Nixon did.
OK, I know Nixon didn't write Roe V Wade, but he appointed Burger, Blackmun, Powell, who all voted for it, so in effect, Nixon WAS the one responsible for delaying Global Warning (70 million people make alot of CO2)
Frank
Jack in Wi| 12.18.12 @ 1:05AM
Frank: I totally agree with you. You are right on the Republican elites giving us Roe Vs Wade. By doing that they destroyed the Party as 70 million aborted babies have been replaced by mostly 3rd world immigrants.
PolishKnight| 12.19.12 @ 10:16AM
Guys, RvW is irrelevant. The real damage by Nixon was, of course, watergate and undermining credibility of conservatives (while Clinton and Obama have been able to exercise "executive privilege" without limit) and passing the marriage penalty which killed two parent families along rewarding unwed motherhood with head of household status. In addition, he also amazingly wrote an executive order for "affirmative action" to discriminate against and deny civil rights to white males, the Republican parties core electorate. It would be like the left today signing a new Jim Crow law against blacks.
If Romney had taken care of his primary electorate, he would have won. While he was going through "binders full of women", PA and OH whites males either bought into nonsense from the TV ads against Bain capital or just stayed home and why should they have cared? Did Romney have binders full of them?
Seek| 12.17.12 @ 11:09AM
And there probably were at least that number performed illegally prior to that point, never mind that nearly two dozen states already had legalized abortion on some level by then.
Jack in Wi| 12.17.12 @ 8:19AM
Cobalt: Obama never met an Abortion he didn't love. There are 20,000 partial birth abortions in this country every year. As long as that is going on how can Obama complain about anyone else? Murder begets more murder. People who push abortion and wars have no right to complan about other murderers. Hitler, Pol Pot, Mao, and Stalin all had gun control, that didn't stop them from murdering tens of millions.
LES1| 12.21.12 @ 4:57AM
Why do people always try to blame Stalin, rather than the Kremlin. The Genocide/extermination of people, language, religion and culture has been the standard policy procedure or practice of the Kremlin - for centuries.
Mr. Ben Stein mentioned The Genocide called Holodomor - when millions of of Ukrainian children were murdered by forced starvation - by the kremlin {AKA - Muscovy].
What he failed to mention is that the Holodomor [and the mass murders of Ukrainians by the Kremlin's paid serial killers - and the deportations of millions (1,000,000's) of Ukrainians to the Gulags/Siberia] also created millions (1,000,000's) of orphans; and, all of the orphans that were over eleven (11) years old were ordered to be murdered by the Kremlin's paid serial killers [it was easier to Russify the younger ones].
Soviet Story - film fragment
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....1356079892
Von Mises Jr| 12.17.12 @ 8:24AM
Ben Stein got this one 100% spot on. Leftist have told us for 250 years that they can take the "Noble Savage" (Rousseau) or any newborn infant and through socializing them with only the good and discarding the bad traditions and culture (Descartes) with the help of a guy like Obama (Nietzsche's "Superman) that we can create perfect little "Brave New World" subjects (Huxley).
But our education and medical system had a freaking nut on their hands for 20 years and could do nothing with him. They could not even identify the problem well enough to predict he was a danger.
But yet Obama tells us that he wants to put people in "prolonged detention" based on crimes we may commit in the future since we conservatives or Constitutionalist don't think right: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....e=youtu.be
Apparently this will be done by people whom refuse to let truly insane people be removed from the streets since THEY have Constitutional Rights.
The danger is not from an occasional lunatic that shoots a Congresswoman or some innocent children. The danger is from a regime that wishes to use tragedy and crisis to disarm its population.
Alan| 12.17.12 @ 8:37AM
No, the danger comes from a populace that will ALLOW itself to be disarmed regardless of what the regime wants.
Jackie| 12.18.12 @ 1:28AM
This post is 100% spot on. Did this kid see a physician? Who gave him his meds? Are people on psych meds required to see a psychiatrist on a regular basis? Are parents who put their kids on psych meds warned of the danger of stopping meds? Has HIPAA made it impossible for a mother to contact a psychiatrist regarding concerns she has about her 20 year old son? WHERE WAS THE FATHER?
drudge ette obama| 12.18.12 @ 6:14AM
You forgot King Samir Shabazz, Natonal Field Marhsall of the New Black Panther Party, who promised to go ito nusies and kill white babies and mrder white people in the street.
http://www.breitbart.com/Breit.....ople-Alive
JohnD| 12.17.12 @ 7:03AM
The answer to evil men with guns is not to disarm the good. It is to arm the good, so they can protect the innocent.
We have raised a generation of children with no respect for human life. Our schools allow killers to enter, but keep God and prayer out. Our government tells us creating life is an illness (pregnancy) that must be prevented (contraception) or cured (abortion). Lastly, as a society we are more concerned with the privacy of insane people than public safety. We need to identify the mentally ill, and make sure THEY do not have access to guns. A National database of the mentally ill could be checked when attempting to purchase a gun.
TLP| 12.17.12 @ 9:11AM
The homeless have a Right to Die on a Sidewalk, in the middle of January in New York. Did you know that? It's Illegal to Kill Yourself. Did you know that?
A 12 year old girl can not have he Ears Pierced, unless she has a Parent or Guardian with her, at the time. She cannot get an Aspirin from the School Nurse, or an Ankle wrapped in an Ace Bandage.
She can, however, go to her School Nurse if she finds herself Pregnant, and that Nurse will go through a Judge, and take her to get an ABORTION, without her Parents even being told. No-one ever explains what the procedure becomes, if the Girl DIES on the Abortionist's Table. Or, does everyone involved - EXCEPT THE PARENTS - just get a Mulligan. Do over. Move along. Nothing to see here.
Any woman can KILL the Unborn Baby in her Womb, right up to the last day. In fact, even if the Live Birth should occur? The "Mother" still reserves the right to have her child MURDERED, and thrown in the Garbage.
What a Country.
You can walk around NAKED in most Liberal Bastions of Unlimited Freedom.
Think about that: You have a RIGHT to walk around Bareass, but you don't have a Right To Work.
Again: What a Country.
All these Rights that we have. Who says so? Why, the Left. Is it in The Constitution? That depends on which Constitution you're talking about. The One given to us by our Founding Fathers? Or the Living and Breathing one that Fundamentally Changes everytime the Liberals get a Majority in the Apellate, and Supreme Courts.
TLP| 12.17.12 @ 9:31AM
Bed and Breakfast Ben laments about what happened in Cambodia. Did they have a 2nd Amendment?
Did the Hundreds of Millions of Chinese, killed by Mao Tse Tung? He, of Obama's "Forward" Campaign Slogan.
What about the Millions who were Put to Death - without any kind of Due Process, under the Iron Fist Rulers in The Left's Ideological Shangrala - The Soviet Union.
Did any of them have a Right to Bear Arms?
And yet, in this Country, every Tradgedy is seen as One More Example of the need to Disarm a Free People. We have a Century of Hard Evidence pertaining to What Happens when the People's Arms are Confiscated by a presumed Benevolent Central Beurocracy, but they don't care.
What happened last week is a reminder that Evil is as much a threat to all of us, as it has ever been. And, it needs to be addressed. But the Last Thing we need, is for all of us to be made Defenseless, and hung out to dry.
Those who would give up a little Liberty, for a little Security, deserve Neither, and will inevitabley Lose Both.
A Republic, Madame. If you can keep it.
They are Coming.
Burlington| 12.27.12 @ 5:05PM
Today, Feinstein comes out with a gun bill, much to complex to have been authored by her or her minions since the Newtown massacre. It obviously was in a desk drawer waiting for a "big one" that they knew was coming. I hate these elite politicians. I fear them more than a loose psycho. Lanza's father is a General Electric V.P. and could have had access to the best psychiatric treatment in the world.
SALLYFARRAR| 12.19.12 @ 3:36AM
http://www.wnd.com/2012/12/how.....innocents/
Appleby| 12.17.12 @ 7:09AM
I read the shoulder-shrugging dismissals of the shooter's schoolmates, rife with name-calling: "weirdo", "nerd", "geek", the condescending look they get when calling people "smart", all those words that students use to shove classmates to the fringes and dismiss them as Not One Of Us. Then I thought to myself that sounds a lot like me in high school. I was fortunate that my Dad told me (and I have passed along the thought) that high school is like jail, and your mission is to keep your head down and some day you'd be released for good behaviour when you could go to college and meet regular people. He apparently didn't have this support, and he doesn't seem to have had any friends. Maybe if he'd had any friends, those friends might have spoken to somebody about their fears in time to get him stopped. Just a thought.
Denver Todd| 12.17.12 @ 11:02AM
Appleby, from what I have read, his classmates were pretty respectful of him and his quirks during high school, but it was Adam himself who was so socially awkward that he refused to have anything to do with anyone. I don't think the bully meme is going to work here.
The real problem is the the mainstreaming of the mentally ill. We have passed laws in the past to make that happen. It is not Adam's lack of friends which promoted his behavior, but it could be his inappropriate educational environment that contributed to it. That, and an overwhelmed mother with a father enjoying the good life with his new wife.
Seek| 12.18.12 @ 5:07PM
It's a sad and common pattern: Almost every one of these murderous nerds have the same profile: "skinny," "nerdy," "dweeb," "shy," "awkward," "picked on," etc. This kid was an extreme version of that. I went through a good deal of that myself in my young years. It's a mark of coming of age that one transcends peer rejection rather than seeks revenge.
Remember, the bully doesn't hate you nearly as much as he hates himself. When he picks on a nerd, he's trying to exorcise the weakness and helplessness he sees in himself. The nerd is his reflection in the mirror -- a living reminder of what bully doesn't want to see.
Adam Lanza wound up a loathsome human being who did something unspeakable. He had become a version of his tormentors, only far worse.
Bob K| 12.17.12 @ 7:10AM
The major difference between Ahmadinejad, Pol Pot, Hitler, Castro et al and the Sandy Hook killer is that they controlled who got the guns.
Dodd2| 12.17.12 @ 8:02AM
"There is plenty of blood of all kinds on our hands, especially of the most innocent and blameless among us… real babies, truly innocent."
Why not use the A-word Ben. It's what you mean, isn't it????
R Martin| 12.17.12 @ 8:05AM
The atrocity in CT has certainly not turned the world upside down. Throughout human history awful things have happened and the planet has remained stable. Anyone with the slightest trace of compassion is moved by the slaughter in Newtown, and our hearts ache for those touched by the killings. Apart from prayer, there is little more we can do.
However, the hand wringing by Mr. Stein and others is going to prompt some sort of legislative action by the same people who brought fiscal responsibility to government. They will certainly get it wrong and not much will change.
Denver Todd| 12.17.12 @ 11:06AM
The event happened on Friday, and already today, Monday, it is not on the front page (online) of the local paper. The world has moved on, but not Obama, whose tears baffled me. Were they tears of sadness, that the killings distracted citizens away from his fiscal cliff theater, or tears of joy that he now has a crisis to give traction to gun control?
Simon Templar| 12.17.12 @ 8:22AM
The same people who brought fiscal responsibility to government? What? IT will NOT be these people but those that object to fiscal responsibility that will bring new attacks against our constitutional rights, the LEFT! What did you not get about the limited government thing that those "same people" always are talking about as well?
Joellen| 12.17.12 @ 8:54AM
We've murdered over 50 million babies, and yet the left will tell us that's choice. The fact that we can so coldly destroy an innocent in the womb, leads one to grow up with the mentality that life is just not to be valued.
We medicate young boys to control them; four states have legalized pot, we are on the slippery slope to legalize all drugs. And when that occurs, we have opened a new pandoras box of more crimes because of drup dependecy. And of course these crimes will have guns involved, and of course, we wont blame the drug user, the blame will be on the law abiding gun owner.
Lets not forget our ignoble media/hollywood sellout. The vile, senseless movies, videos, music, etc., they make billions on; yet, will be right there with the bloviating politicians spewing the "anti gun" mantra. All will demand guns be removed from our society, just like they demanded GOD be removed. No more GOD in our schools, or in our public venues. No more teaching of good and decent morals, do not mention JESUS CHRIST, for then you are offending someone.
And speaking of offensive, when they speak of our Christian GOD it is always in a blasphemous way, but thats OK, cause that's ART!
The left spews that every thing is relative, and yet we vote; watch and give creedence to these people over and over, and still America cant understand why evil abounds us!
GOD please help us.
SUBVET| 12.17.12 @ 10:16AM
Jollen.....it's in their play book.......and the end result is CONTROL.
Order is comming...................
Seek| 12.17.12 @ 11:12AM
This punk did not kill because he saw "violent movies" starring Clint Eastwood, Nicolas Cage or Liam Neeson. He killed because he was clearly disturbed, had terrible social skills and had Asperger's Syndrome. He bears sole responsibility for his atrocity, not "society" or "the culture."
I detest it when the Right exploits tragedies like this to push their anti-Hollywood, anti-rock hobby horse. I detest it as much as when the Left uses such occasions to call for outlawing guns.
Frank Drackman| 12.17.12 @ 9:14AM
Can I be Frank?
All of these shootings took place in Pubic Schools, even the College ones. WE NEED TO BAN THESE PUBIC SCHOOLS.
And its America, we cried(you know you did) when Old Yeller got shot, and laughed(You know you did) in "Full Metal Jacket" when the door gunner said how he could shoot women & children(You don't lead em as much(it's true!))
and you threw popcorn at the screen(You Know You Did You know you Did you know you diddddd)when 007 nailed Solitaire in "Live and Let Die"
And because I didn't want my daughters to be around Black People, I mean, I wanted them to get a "World Class"(thats Liberal Code for "Lots of Asians")ed-jew-ma-cation I've spent some..
Umm lets see, 30 grand x 20.....wow, thats some real cache...
Which is why my youngest is in a Pubic School...
Frank "Do as I say, not as I do" Drackman
SUBVET| 12.17.12 @ 10:21AM
Mr. D......can I be frank.... and say what were the parents invlovment in this childs life. I bet if it were known not much.
WhiteBikerTrash| 12.17.12 @ 2:44PM
Frank, you stole my idea. Thank You!
Let's use the logical progression the left is using in the call to ban guns.
First it is the object not the persons that are the real problem remove the object and the problem goes away.
There are only 99,000 public schools in the US. But there are over 280 million guns.
Shootings have happened at .183% of public schools by the lefts pronouncement.
If five guns were used at every one of those shootings (extremely high number) .032 % of accessible guns have been used in these crimes. the real thing that is being overwhelmingly misused in these incidents are Public Schools!
So the answer is the ban or control of public schools!
When they point out the foolishness of this, you can use their same arguments against them. It's fun!!
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.17.12 @ 9:23AM
"miserable life playing shoot ’em up video games on line or on machines."
Pure speculation. We have no idea how "miserable" this monster's life was, nor do we know whether he was an obsessive game player. In fact, plenty of people play first-person shoot-em-up games without going out and killing people.
Evil does not need a trigger.
Look rather at the Darwinism, nihilism and relativism taught in our public schools and found everywhere in our media and Hollywood culture. That is not the sufficient condition for this twenty year old monster's evil acts, but it provides a capacious garden where evil can be cultivated and nurtured, until it is ready to strike.
RandyH| 12.17.12 @ 9:53AM
There is evil in the world. It’s beyond mental illness, beyond gun control. It is evil.” then Ben gets to blaming video games, I guess they are inherantly evil. When God is removed, what is left? Evil
Seek| 12.17.12 @ 11:14AM
Darwin caused this? Get real. The fact that species evolve -- something even most Christian clergy now acknowledge -- did not cause a disturbed nerd to pick up guns and murder children.
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.18.12 @ 12:28AM
You need to read more carefully.
suffolkva| 12.17.12 @ 9:41AM
We ask as individuals and as a nation what could possibly motivate anyone to commit an act of this degree of evil.
The answer is, Nothing.
The important part is where the nothing is. A vacuum doesn’t prompt. It demands being filled by anything. The nothing is at our centers as individual human beings, and at our center as a culture. It lies where reason does not apply, explain, or operate. It’s where our souls used to be... should be. We are very busily rooting out any little part of our being as humans, individually and culturally, that allows us anything to believe in... anything unexplainable by reason, or so we think.
These events will go on until we realize this and actually refill that center with that which belongs there. It really can’t be explained. Reason cannot explain anything of this class of reality. It can only know of its existence if it is applied properly.
There will always be things like this carried out by the most volatile of those among us, usually young males. But we can limit the occurrences of them to some extent by understanding the above. We must regain our souls and our belief in that which goes beyond reason.
God help us.
holmegm| 12.17.12 @ 9:51AM
"We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and then bid the geldings to be fruitful."
C.S. Lewis
Cuffs| 12.17.12 @ 9:54AM
"If they bring a knife to the fight, we will bring
a gun." Barry Obama
"There will be blood in the streets." Jimmy Hoffa, Jr.
Wisconsin and Michigan union violence, black panther intimidation at the poles.
Let's all follow our leaders(?), shall we?
Seek| 12.18.12 @ 5:12PM
If you are implying that Obama and Hoffa have blood on their hands, that's a cheap shot. I didn't vote for Obama, but this is ridiculous. Tens of millions of people did vote for Obama and I didn't notice them committing mass murder.
Adam Lanza was a disturbed Asperger's nerd, a shy and awkward misfit. His horrible act had nothing to do with politics.
ChuckL| 12.27.12 @ 5:14PM
Sorry SEEK, but Obama does have blood on his hands. As an Illinois state senator, he was instrumental in the passage of a law requiring any doctor who delivered a living baby during what was supposed to be an abortion to KILL the baby.
xavier | 12.17.12 @ 10:04AM
God Help Us,god can see everything
scotchieguy| 12.17.12 @ 11:06AM
Funny how all of these shootings occur in places where guns are not allowed and the shooter is typically loaded to the gills on FDA approved meds. Back in the good old days, millions of male teens brought their hunting rifles to school to hunt before or after school and this mayhem just never occurred.
Libs insist they "must do something." This is typical. They will go after lawful citizens who legally and responsibly know how to deal with firearms. Soon the only people who have guns will be the cops and the bad guys. Thank a lib for that.
jeanrenoir| 12.18.12 @ 12:23AM
But let's face it, Ben, Israel's no bargain on the evil scale itself. It's policy of Palestinian apartheid is regarded with appropriate contempt by decent people around the world, Jews and gentiles alike.
JimmyUSA| 12.18.12 @ 12:00PM
What apartheid? Arabs rejected an independent state at least 6 times in the last 100 years or so. They don't want a state. They first want Israel destroyed, then they'll take all the land and create a state.
ChuckL| 12.27.12 @ 5:16PM
Israel is the only nation in the area which actually has freedom of religion.
Occam's Tool| 12.18.12 @ 12:36AM
Maybe you should check out the beautiful buildings in Ramallah, renoir. It is not apartheid, when Supreme Court judges and Knesset Members are Arabs.
But I'm not a big fan of having baby beheaders next door to me, Froggie.
Occam's Tool| 12.18.12 @ 12:37AM
Ben, maybe the shooters should have been on "Psychiatric Medications" eh?
Danny K| 12.18.12 @ 12:49AM
Ben - You are a Hanukkah and Christmas gift.
MA| 12.18.12 @ 1:39AM
Mr Stein I watch and hear you often and think you are so very smart but reading this makes me know with out a doubt your intelligence. Thank you for your courage to say the truth for those of us that have no voice. Thank you!
WCCowboy| 12.18.12 @ 1:52AM
Thank you Ben,,,,,We are so desensitized to any evil or mayhem . We also forget ALL the unborn who never get to see the light of day.That is a travesty we all share in and will answer for someday. Great work thanks again!!
KenE | 12.18.12 @ 2:01AM
Ben, you've completely omitted the most obvious and probably most influential common characteristic of gun suicidal-murderers -- SSRI antidepressants given to children or youths. There is plenty of documentation on this topic, even though it took the FDA 13 years to put the suicide black box warning on SSRI's... There is a war on boys though, have a look at http://www.theatlantic.com/mag.....ys/304659/
as far as video games goes -- it doesn't support your argument that it is a significant cause because you haven't really proven a correlation: most boys are already playing video games, and of course, most boys don't crack up like this. All of the school shooters were on SSRI's or were withdrawing from them. Also look up http://ssristories.com, there are thousands of incidents documented. Let's quit acting like possessing firearms for the purpose of opposition to tyranny isn't important anymore just because we've forgotten. We need that deterrant, today more than ever. I think you got a lot of the economic things wrong, and you're on record saying some embarrassing stuff, but by now surely you can see that we are on a death spiral, economically. These are the conditions that always precede political and national turmoil throughout history. I think all of the gun buyers can see that we are not headed in a good direction, and that is why they are buying. Sane, rational people are not the ones you need to worry about.
KenE | 12.18.12 @ 2:03AM
the only thing that has really changed in the last 30 years, when these started happening, is the widespread prescription of antidepressants. The video game shooters are barely 13-14 years old.
KenE | 12.18.12 @ 2:04AM
(when I say video game shooters I don't mean people, I mean the games that are called "shooters")
SaludoVencedores| 12.18.12 @ 2:11AM
Amen.
Garibaldi| 12.18.12 @ 4:54AM
I wonder what the ghosts of Bosnia would say. The ones who only ten years ago in a European country had to go quietly into the night because their fellow citizens, educated people, thought it would be quite alright to exterminate them...10 years ago...in Europe.
drudge ette obama| 12.18.12 @ 6:13AM
You forgot King Samir Shabazz, Natonal Field Marhsall of the New Black Panther Party, who promised to go ito nusies and kill white babies and mrder white people in the street.
http://www.breitbart.com/Breit.....ople-Alive
twan jim| 12.18.12 @ 6:47AM
Gun rights are to protect us from the government and criminals.
gladysb| 12.18.12 @ 9:45AM
What is this "G-d help us" stuff. It isn't "us" that is doing the killing. it is the goyim. the Muslims, the Christians. They are the ones doing the killing. You want to blame US for this? Feh. We should be so powerful. Look, the goyim have been trying to kill us for 2000 years. You KNOW that.
The fact that they slaughter each other and even their own little babies has nothing to do with us.
We cannot stop them.
All we can do is look out for ourselves, and have our bags packed and ready to leave at a moment's notice.
This is a nice country for now, but I am ready to make aliyah if the natives get restless.
JimmyUSA| 12.18.12 @ 12:03PM
"If you want another villain, try the media itself, which has now given Adam Lanza fame beyond what he could have dreamt of."
Why did you fall into your own trap and name the killer?
Ronsch| 12.18.12 @ 3:03PM
Well, Ben, once again (as of late it seems) you miss the mark...I have been playing video games since their inception (yes, I am that old) and most of them are combat/shooting/action games..I dare say I rather enjoy the Call of Duty series.
Back in the day, I played Galaga, Tank Battle, some archaic gunfighting game in the arcade with a laser light pistol.
I used to own multiple firearms until they all fell out of my canoe in a tragic boating accident, including the so-called "assault" weapons, and I have performed many experiments of leaving my sidearm on a table and carefully watching it to ensure that it did not jump up and begin shooting people, or cause me to do so...So far, so good.
My point...guns are not the problem, and I do not think video games are the problem...Evil is.
ExpelledFan| 12.18.12 @ 3:06PM
Ben Stein,
Your examples are great and are the kind of stuff I have been pondering for decades.
I was totally perplexed by the US attitude/policy toward Vietnam when those commies essentially stopped the carnage in Cambodia. Yet, we could never change "policy" regardless of the moral context.
For many, their own evil is well-hidden from them, covered by "concern" and "care". They ignore all the same stuff when done by the people the centrists and conservatives abhor such as communists, but are quick to denigrate those who want a solution without sacrificing gun rights wholesale when it comes to abominations closer to home.
Thanks.
ginger5010| 12.19.12 @ 4:43AM
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Pete L.| 12.23.12 @ 7:14PM
While I agree with much of what my esteemed colleague in the law has to say, I imagine that no one could fault the U.S. with the genocide that the Khmer Rouge was responsible for against its own people. We, as a nation, were battle weary. Tired of the resolve that as cost too many American lives. Truman Doctrine, Domino Theory, communist containment... call it what you will; the fact of the matter is that Nixon and Kissinger both should have been tried as war criminals for the surreptitious bombing of Cambodia that enabled the overthrow of Prince Sihanouk and empowered the Khmer Rouge to continue the slaughter. Yes, we cheered the deposing of Nixon, but I assure you that it wasn't because of Watergate. We, the people, have all too many problems, and I can say with all sincerity that they will not begin to be resolved until we hold our leaders accountable... and by our OWN standards.
Jimbobogie| 12.23.12 @ 10:43PM
Ben-thank you for having the guts to mention the period between 1939 and Pearl Harbour. Far too many Americans believe that WW II started at Pearl Harbour and ended at Hiroshima. Point of clarification-Britain wasn't standing alone-the allied forces included non-Nazi Europe, India, China, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and (I know you may not want to hear it) Russia.
Big D| 12.27.12 @ 4:43PM
Ben,
I really wish you hadn't mentioned that name. It does not deserve to be mentioned.
ChuckL| 12.27.12 @ 5:09PM
Ben, You ignored the obvious cause. It has been proclaimed by super liberal movie mogul Michael Moore, and the president and founder of Front Sight Firearms Training Institute, Ignatius Piazza.
The only common denominator in all of these mass murders including those done with automobiles, ball bats, and knives is psychiatric drugs.
Is the drug lobby going to support eliminating killer drugs, or will they continue to kill our children.
DonF48| 12.27.12 @ 5:18PM
In typical fashion, we dance around the real issue here and get all hung up on distractions. Distractions that are merely symptoms of the real problem with laws in America.
We want to find a law that is specific to only one abberation of our society when we need an all-encompassing one. And I think I have it.
Wouldn't it make sense to pass a law that criminals MUST obey the law? Think of the beauty of that. We pass laws that tell us what we can do in society. Why do we need laws to address the violations of other individual laws?
Just wrap it all in one law, and be done with it.
Well, that makes more sense than banning guns from law abiding citizens and then winking at the criminals who can easily get black market guns any time they wish. If you are not going to fix the supply, let trained, stable, law abiding citizens arm themselves in every situation.
I am not afraid of being in a room with a number of people carrying weapons legally. I am afraid of being in a room where only a criminal has one.
Baltimore48 | 12.27.12 @ 6:15PM
Thank you for having the courage to speak the truth when others are cowering behind political correctness. Political correctness will result in the national suicide of the U.S. as we have known it.
Mary L| 12.27.12 @ 7:06PM
And PLEASE, what about the THOUSANDS of aborted BABIES who die every day at the hands of their mothers???? Who mourns for them? How do we teach the younger generation that life has value if we kill our innocents in the womb, our elderly who are at the end of their paths and the handicapped who "have no purpose"?
Bob From District 9| 12.28.12 @ 5:30AM
Abortion is not what is teaching the killing of elderly and handicapped, it's the killing of elderly and handicapped that brought about Abortion.
The elderly and handicapped were killed by denying them medical care. The poor are killed by being denied decent nutrition as well as medical care.
Medicare and Medicaid provided care for the elderly and handicapped and poor, but now the right in America want's to end that.
No wonder it's impossible to end abortion. They want to let those they can see die, why would anyone protect those we can't see?
Douglas | 12.27.12 @ 8:05PM
As you say, it is all about evil. Thank you for saying it.
Sadly, it reminded me of our people's stand regarding abortion.
757-560-0461| 12.27.12 @ 8:29PM
God help me! I disagree with Ben Stein!
Ben: Second, I read that the killer was socially awkward (putting it mildly) and “reserved.” I know what that often means. He spent much of his miserable life playing shoot ’em up video games on line or on machines. I see a troubled young man doing that often.
Me: My son has played for years shoot ‘em up games, beginning in the 1980s with Hogan’s Alley, Duck Hunt, Spy Hunter and the like. He’s perfectly normal. It ain’t video games.
Ben: Third, what motivates “great” deeds? ...a man’s name will not be forgotten and he will be sung about even after his death, goes the ancient saying. That’s what you get if you slaughter 26 totally innocent people at a grade school.
Me: More sing about Jesus than any of the World’s “great” villains. Lighten up; the World is not all evil.
Ben: Fifth, why are these killers always men?...It’s not manly to kill any unarmed human. It’s miserable, crawling cowardice.
Me: They’re not always men. Look up Lavinia Fisher, Aileen Wuornos, Belle Gunness, Jane Toppan, Velma Barfield, Amelia Dyer, Nannie Doss, Bertha Gifford, Jeanne Weber, Dorothea Puente.
Ben: But Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promises to kill every Jew in Israel and...the whole…and he had his defenders, even at the DNC.
Me: Well, it was the DNC. Do we expect much from them?
Bob From District 9| 12.28.12 @ 5:27AM
"But Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promises to kill every Jew in Israel and then in the whole world, including babies… and he had his defenders, even at the Democratic National Convention."
And just when did he make that promise?
Bob From District 9| 12.28.12 @ 5:35AM
"Second, I read that the killer was socially awkward (putting it mildly) and “reserved.” I know what that often means. He spent much of his miserable life playing shoot ’em up video games on line or on machines. I see a troubled young man doing that often."
It means his parents were too busy getting richer and spending more and more to give their child the love and care he needed.
Bob From District 9| 12.28.12 @ 5:38AM
"Fifth, why are these killers always men? What is it that we teach our young men in this world that makes them think it’s a mark of manliness to kill the unarmed and innocent?"
We taught them that in Iraq, and in Afghanistan. In Iraq this country killed with no justification at all. In Afghanistan this country killed innocents along with the guilty.
" Whatever it is, it’s disgusting. It’s not manly to kill any unarmed human. It’s miserable, crawling cowardice."
It is disgusting, miserable, crawling cowardice to kill any innocent person, whether armed or not. Yet people like you, Ben Stein, defend those who do.
Bob From District 9| 12.28.12 @ 5:40AM
"Who today even talks of the purposeful mass starvation of millions of beautiful Ukrainian children by Stalin? The U.S. did not say one word about it as a government. The U.S. still will not confront Turkey seriously about the Armenian children."
And when will you mention the Palestinian children dying even now?
Bob From District 9| 12.28.12 @ 5:42AM
"There is plenty of Cambodian blood on our hands. There is plenty of blood of all kinds on our hands, especially of the most innocent and blameless among us… real babies, truly innocent."
When does your world apology tour start? You have condemned this country more strongly than Rev Wright did, far more than the mild mention of American misconduct Obama mentioned in his travels.
When will the right wingers condemn you for your damnation of America?
Bob From District 9| 12.28.12 @ 5:43AM
"God help us. Man is made of such crooked stuff that it is impossible to set him straight, said a famous philosopher. God help us. "
Perhaps when you start to speak straight and truthfully you will have room to comment on that.
DJ Fisher| 12.28.12 @ 6:27AM
Ben 1) No laws will stop them period. Only one thing stops evil and that is Good (not the PC good, King David Good). 2) If it were video games that caused this it would be millions of times worse because millions of people play these games. 3) Our system of picking heroes sucks. There are millions of men and women doing Good things everyday, however nobody will ever hear their names or see their faces. 5) (Where's 4th?) Boys need manly examples. Many boys grow up without fathers because of our lack of morals and nanny government. Women might not like to admit it but they truly are wired a tad different. Not saying that they are weaker because women do things daily that men couldn't stand. But we need heroes in the media like the John Wayne type of characters. My bottom line is this. I don't believe that this was the random act of a boy. In the beginning of the article you mentioned evil. Well it is here and always has been, though not this strong. There are people who worship evil. They have been controlling this nation since Lincoln was assassinated. They will stop at nothing for power; they already have all the money. When all the BS is swept aside we will all find out that this was an act of pure evil arranged by and executed by people who are pure evil. We are so busy with their puppets we never identify the puppet masters. This is why most decent people are just waiting for Christ to return. However we are to "be about our Fathers business" and that means resisting evil.
LindaKaye| 12.28.12 @ 9:47AM
I want to personally thank Mr. Stein for changing the drawing at the top of his article. Really appreciate it and am hoping the former one is permanently gone. It wasn't worthy of him.
This is a very good article, which I have posted on Facebook, which I promised to do when and if he changed the drawing. Thank you, Mr. Stein!
Vance P. Frickey| 12.29.12 @ 11:46PM
Obama wants his people in the US Senate to apply the term "assault weapon" to many guns owned by Americans today, and to unleash the same people who gave us the Waco and Ruby Ridge massacres, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and FBI, on those of us who own them.
Denying 330 million Americans their civil rights under the Second Amendment to the Constitution for the acts of less than 10 crazed individuals is insanity far beyond the bounds of "cruel and unusual punishment."
The Feinstein gun control bill, enforced in the way that George H. W. Bush's assault weapons ban was enforced in Waco and Ruby Ridge, will inevitably give us more massacres.
Before Waco, the then BATF (it hadn't yet added "explosives" to its name) embarked on a spree of criminal midnight assaults on legal gun dealers in which BATF and IRS agents helped themselves to cash in those dealers' homes, assaulted infirm gun dealers and destroyed their medications - abuses of power we can count on in an administration, which has still not yet disclosed the details of the BATFE's distribution of assault weapons to Mexican drug gangs (resulting in the death of an American law-enforcement agent) to Congress.
Since Obama is more lawless than George H.W. Bush ever was, consider the potential for a reign of terror against Americans guilty of nothing but owning guns which are now legal.