Good Morning.

Wednesday, December 14 - a date which will live in infamy - Sandy Hook Elementary School was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the Empire of the gun.


Of course, that is the Newtowne Massacre; the date that as a whole, the United States of America decided that guns were more important than children.

It is also near enough to the end of a calendar year that we can use it as a dividing line of sorts, and make it easier to do some math.

America has been at war for a very long time. In Javi's case, for his entire life. Think about that - he's turning 21 this summer. Although data is hard to come by, a source in the Army Times notes that 15,851 servicemembers have died since 2006 from all causes. That's about 1,000 per year, rounded up.

According to the Brady Campaign, 111 people are shot and killed EVERY DAY in the United States, for an annual rate of 40,620. Worked up over the same 16 years used from the military data, that is 649,920.

That is roughly the same number of deaths that we inflicted upon ourselves during the Civil War.

That comparison is deliberate. As we all know, the traditions of Memorial Day arose from several traditions after the Civil War, claimed by many origin cities as "Decoration Day". Given the propensity of Americans to memorialize everything, it is surprising that no such day of honour exists for our "Veterans of Domestic Wars".

The problem, of course, is what day do we pick? As Bob noted a few days ago, it's a rare day in America when we don't have a massacre.