After last night’s horrific tragedy in Las Vegas, one might ask the question about what makes America exceptional.
I saw an article in Vox this morning that attempted to answer that question. “America is an exceptional country when it comes to guns,” the article noted. “It’s one of the few countries in which the right to bear arms is constitutionally protected. But America’s relationship with guns is unique in another crucial way: Among developed nations, the US is far and away the most violent — in large part due to the easy access many Americans have to firearms.”
This graphic below appeared in the article under the subhead pointing out that “America has six times as many firearm homicides as Canada, and nearly 16 times as many as Germany.”
And yet, as I pointed out in this post yesterday, House Republicans are planning to introduce legislation this week that would roll back decades-old restrictions on gun silencers. And the GOP would never consider adopting better, more reasonable and common sense gun control legislation.
Homicide statistics bear out that it’s easy access to firearms in this country that enable people like the Las Vegas shooter to obtain all the guns he needed to cause the death and devastation that could have happened only by firearms.
Still, the NRA insists that it’s not guns that kill people, it’s people that kill people.
No doubt that will make the families of the gunshot victims of yesterday’s mass shooting in Las Vegas feel so much better.
This, That, and the Other 
The NRA is interested in money ..they receive massive funding from the firearms industry.
The GOP is interested in money…..they receive massive funding from the NRA and gun Lobbies (ie. gun industry)
Neither group gives a damn about human life once that human is born.
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That’s all true and very, very sad.
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It’s all about greed. The NRA is owned and operated by gun manufacturers who in turn pay legislators to make sure there is NO gun control. I see NO likelihood of things getting any better.
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Not until Republicans in Congress grow a spine, and that seems very unlikely.
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Gun owners – protecting themselves from each other…
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As a European, I am always interested in discussing with Americans I meet the notion of American Exceptionalism and whether they truly believe it can still be applied today. I am avid lover of American history and the noble idea of its inception as a land devoid of monarchy and authoritarianism, but I truly don’t know what one could point to today to suggest that the US is more exceptional than say, France or Germany in the contemporary world. (Sorry for the rambling post)
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No worries about the length of your comment. I think you’re right. In today’s America, the only thing that is exceptional is how misguided, ignorant, and ill-suited for the position our president is.
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When do you think the decline of American exceptionalism became apparent? Vietnam? Earlier or later?
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I can only answer for myself, but for me it was when the Supreme Court have the 2000 presidential election to Bush in a highly partisan decision.
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Korea…..that was the beginning of the lack of ethics in government, and the lack of pride in America.
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Interesting, and do you think American exceptionalism is a process that ebbs and flows, or that it has been damaged irrevocably?
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In the past, it has definitely ebbed and flowed. But in my opinion, it started sinking badly in 2000 and throughout the Bush years. It improved somewhat under Obama, but now, under Trump, it may, in fact, be, as you say, damaged irrevocably.
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