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efore you get started I
have to warn you that you’ve read this column be- fore. It may have been six years ago after James Holmes killed 12 people in- side of a movie theater in Au- rora, Colorado or five months later when Adam Lanza killed 20 children at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Con- necticut.
Then again it could have been three years ago after Dylan Roof murdered 9 worshipers during a prayer service at Emmanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston, South Carolina. If you don’t recall reading a column in this paper about mass shootings following any of those inci- dents then it would have had to have been after either Omar Mateen’s massacre at the Pulse Night Club in Orlando in 2016, the slaugh- ter in Las Vegas in 2017 or just earlier this year after the bloody incident at Marjorie Stoneman-Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
The point is that you’ve heard a version of this story before. And, unfortunately, after yet another tragic oc-
currence at a high school in Santa Fe, Texas, where 10 people were killed and an- other 10 were severely wounded by 17-year-old Dimitirios Pagourtzis, we can add one more horrific ac- count to the list.
While an official motive hasn’t been established to ex- plain what caused this young man to lash out so violently at his peers, I think I can sum up his reasoning in one word.... Hate. Not only for those around him, but for himself as well.
That appears to be the common denominator in all of these cases. Whether it was Roof’s hatred of Black people, Mateen’s hatred of gays or Pagourtzis who, judging by the NAZI insignia on the clothing he was wear- ing on the day of the shoot- ing, is believed to have been inspired by white suprema- cist ideology, all of their minds seemed to have been poisoned by fruit born from the same tree of intolerance. And, because that tree is so deeply rooted in this coun- try’s soil, it continues to pro- duce a rancorous harvest that’s capable of infecting the
thinking of each new genera- tion.
Whenever these things happen there’s always the rush to blame the easily availability of guns as the sole culprit responsible for the bloodshed. But the fact of the matter is that a gun is nothing more than a tool ca- pable of causing mass de- struction. Take away the guns and that hate-filled per- son, hell-bent on creating chaos, will simply use what- ever else he has at his dis- posal to achieve his goal whether it be a car, truck, knife or bomb.
The uncomfortable truth we must face is that there’s nowaywecanwinawar, that appears to be psycholog- ical in nature, by focusing on how these acts are being committed rather why a per- son would want to commit them in the first place.
And, until the energy cur- rently being used to combat the ownership of firearms is re-directed into figuring that out, and somehow changing the environment that nur- tures the mental develop- ment of this type of barbaric behavior, I suggest we make wearing all black a normal routine because there’s no doubt that the mourning won’t stop anytime soon.
Reality On Ice is © by the Florida Sentinel Bul- letin Publishing Com- pany. You can contact Mr. Barr at: cbar- ronice@gmail.com.
All Because Of Hate
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HUD Planning Major Changes To Subsidized Housing
magine you are a single mother or father earning
$10 per hour or $1,600 per month. Or suppose you live on Social Security monthly payments of $800 per month. I
If you live in subsidized housing, a new policy is being discussed to tax 30 percent of your income towards your monthly rent, which would be $480 and $240 re- spectively.
Let’s get real, this new policy wouldn’t leave much money to buy food, pay your light bill, buy shoes, and clothing, school supplies, afford bus fare, or gas.
Planned reforms for subsidized housing by Dr. Ben Carson, Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) will pull another rug from under America’s most vulnerable citizens – the elderly, working poor, minimum wage earners, and the unem- ployed.
The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities esti- mated that the rent increase could be raised as high as 44 percent.
HUD’s plan is to raise the minimum rent of $50 up to $150, to eliminate deductions for medical care and child care before rent, and to increase the 30 percent of salary requirement.
By the way, renters must report not only income, but must also report pay raises, and monetary gifts. Es- sentially, that means that getting out of subsidized housing becomes a challenge because saving enough money to move out becomes more difficult as your salary increases.
There is no doubt, that persons living in subsidized housing should be registered voters and vote on Elec- tion Day.
Indeed, the squeaky wheel gets the grease . . . unless the sound of complaint is coldly misrepresented as a sigh of compromise.
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TUESDAY, MAY 22, 2018 FLORIDA SENTINEL BULLETIN PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY AND FRIDAY PAGE 5