I see the possibility of something I hadn't considered until today. And everyone should be against this, regardless of your political views.
Kirk wasn't a politician. He was a celebrity, maybe an activist depending on how you define that these days. He was on a college campus for a speaking engagement. Don't know if he was paid to be there or if he was there to make money on his appearance. It looks from the early reporting like the shot was fired from a good distance away, i.e. not someone in the crowd that got close to him. So, no way anything other than major security presence inhibits this. Like secret service kind of stuff where they scout the area in advance, post guard snipers around and clear the area for a good distance around where he was going to be speaking.
The bottom line here is... not being Secret Service protected like Trump was (and Trump got shot at anyway even with Secret Service)... this stuff costs money that either the University would have to pay OR Kirk's staff would have to pay. It isn't cheap for that level of protection.
So... IF the mentality of the general populace doesn't change... and the rhetoric by people in power or fame doesn't change... and we don't change any gun laws to hopefully curb this sort of thing... what may very well happen is this...
The only people who will be able to do public speaking engagements will be people already in power OR wealthy people. Average Joes who want to spread a message can't afford it. Average Joes are next on the list to be targeted, because they will be easier to get at.
What does this mean?
It means that we will severely limit the amount of people who can speak to large groups in public. We will limit to people with wealth and power, logistically... and as such the window of opportunity for new ideas, changes to our country, etc. really shrinks.
Regardless of which side you are on... regardless of who you want to hear and don't... and regardless of how you feel about "eliminating" your "enemies"... if this kind of violence keeps up, we're going to end up in a default dictatorship because even if we still have elections, the only people we will be able to vote for will be those pre-selected by wealthy and people in power to protect so that they can speak... and these will not always be the best people. They will just be the people who can protect themselves.
We need to talk about gun violence and civil discourse, though we pretty much never do... but we also need to talk about what happens if you keep ignoring this stuff and allowing crazy hateful folks to shoot at people and guide where our future leaders and influencers come from.
It's stupid if you are a Democrat to kill a Republican-leaning man like this and have him be a martyr. It's stupid if Republicans do the same to Democrat-leaning people. And even for those who don't value human life enough to hate this even when it happens to your "enemy"... realize that ultimately this shit is going to hurt all of the people in the long run as our access to people at the top is going to shrink because they have the power to protect themselves if they choose to do so.
www.bbc.com
