At a human level for a small community of innocents, going about their day in the Arizona sunshine in that bustling family atmosphere typical of a Saturday morning, the carnage at the grocery store can hardly be imagined worse. Among the dead is an eight year old girl. This makes a bad thing truly dreadful. The thoughts and prayers of a good deal of the world cascade upon the afflicted and their families. One does not have to be American to feel sympathy, shock and, in some measure, the force of this assault. Because this was not just a murderous attack upon innocent people going about their day. It was an attack upon democracy in the country which proclaims itself to be the best above all the other countries, which enjoy political freedom.
Moreover this was not an attack upon extremists by frightened moderates. It was an attack on political moderates by enraged extremists. Why? Many Americans are now tweeting that the angry rhetoric of the Tea Party and Sarah Palin are to blame for whipping up emotion and prejudice in the only civilised country where the citizens have a right to bear arms, which all too often they use upon each other. In Arizona the gun laws are especially relaxed.
It all runs much deeper than that. This is a disaster for America, for it exposes in the blood of innocents, even a child, that age old schism in the American psyche. Big government versus free people. State versus Union. Sometimes dormant, once as a fire engulfing the nation, this issue, which will not go away, is rising once more. To a foreign observer who has studied American history and politics for over half a century, especially the dynamics of the Civil War, it is evident in the manner in which the country speaks of itself. The federal government talks always of the United States. The people talk of America. The ideals of the one are incompatible with objectives of the other.
The world must pray that a way is found to fuse the two. History shows that in this cause, blood spilled is blood wasted. The answers lie not in the sanction of death, but in the celebration of life.