This kind of government employee incompetence with horrific consequences is by no means limited to the Parkland killings. Instead, it is endemic to U.S. government at all levels, with consequences big and small. For example, my colleague Rachel Stoltzfoos reports that government incompetence failed to prevent a slew of recent high-profile mass killings:
Similarly, paperwork and communication fumbles between the FBI and local law enforcement resulted in a background check error that allowed Dylann Roof to buy a gun in South Carolina, which he later used to massacre congregants at a Charleston church.
If government agencies can’t follow existing violence-prevention laws and procedures, how can they be trusted to effectively implement additional rules that wild-eyed partisans insist will “do something” to prevent mass murder?
This point contains two related threads: U.S. government forces citizens to support a layer of incompetent fat that impedes our best interests; and government failures force us into a burdened mode of self-government. We have to both pay for government to not perform basic functions like protect citizens from criminals and carry out justice, and accomplish those same ends ourselves if we want them done at all.
Parkland Underscores How Americans Pay For Garbage Government While Doing Its Job Ourselves
Law enforcement protocols already in place also might have stopped the Texas church shooting in 2017, and the Charleston church shooting in 2015. The gunman who carried out the Texas massacre had a history of domestic violence that should have prevented him from legally buying a gun. But the Air Force conceded after the shooting it had failed to enter his name into the federal database that would have prevented his gun purchase.
Similarly, paperwork and communication fumbles between the FBI and local law enforcement resulted in a background check error that allowed Dylann Roof to buy a gun in South Carolina, which he later used to massacre congregants at a Charleston church.
If government agencies can’t follow existing violence-prevention laws and procedures, how can they be trusted to effectively implement additional rules that wild-eyed partisans insist will “do something” to prevent mass murder?
This point contains two related threads: U.S. government forces citizens to support a layer of incompetent fat that impedes our best interests; and government failures force us into a burdened mode of self-government. We have to both pay for government to not perform basic functions like protect citizens from criminals and carry out justice, and accomplish those same ends ourselves if we want them done at all.
Parkland Underscores How Americans Pay For Garbage Government While Doing Its Job Ourselves