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Commentary: Cruel April prompts question: Where do we go from here?

This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon: “…Where does a fool go when there’s no one left to listen to a story without meaning that nobody wants to hear?”

--Paul Williams (“Where Do I Go From Here?”)

The poet T.S. Eliot deemed April to be “the cruelest month.” Thus far, this year’s edition has lived down to his dismal expectations.

News cycles in the early portion of the month were dominated by dire reports of nuclear proliferation on the Korean peninsula. It seems Kim Jong-un, the freshman tyrant of the communist enclave of North Korea, was determined to capture the world’s attention by threatening to blow it up.

On the domestic front, the trial of a Philadelphia abortionist, Dr. Kermit Gosnell, brought accusations of practices so gruesome that prosecutors in the City of Brotherly Love were trying to put him to death for his alleged crimes.

But the really big story, of course, concerned the debate in the U.S. Senate as to whether it was a good idea to allow the criminally insane to purchase high-capacity, rapid-fire weaponry.

All of these pressing matters, however, would soon be crowded from the national consciousness by the events of the week of April 15th.

The prospect of the income tax deadline falling on a Monday promised a double dose of drudgery for the industrious. The long workweek would begin with a penalty for being employed. That mundane annoyance was swiftly dispelled by news of a double bombing at the Boston Marathon.

Once again, a nation benumbed by carnage would witness the grim spectacle of horribly mangled fellow citizens strewn across the street like the discarded playthings of a petulant child. As is so often the case, the motives that fueled this particular atrocity were at best unclear.

While still trying to digest this latest outrage, the viewer would shortly learn of a devastating explosion at a fertilizer plant that killed 14, injured 200 more and prompted a massive evacuation in the town of West, Texas. This incident has since been classified as an industrial accident — thus demonstrating simultaneously the inadequacies of the regulatory state and the shortcomings of free-market solutions for the storage of hazardous materials.

With the unfolding drama in West momentarily replacing Boston in the headlines, a side story emerged concerning mail posted to a U.S. senator and the president containing the poison ricin.

Boston re-emerged as the week’s pre-eminent story late Thursday afternoon when the FBI released photos of the two men thought to be responsible for the mayhem there. That revelation led in short order to the murder of a campus police officer at MIT, a car-jacking/abduction in which the victim ultimately escaped unharmed and a high speed, bomb-throwing vehicular pursuit that culminated in a massive shootout in which a police officer was seriously wounded, one suspect was killed and the second was wounded but escaped.

This action sequence led to the virtual shutdown of the nation’s tenth largest metropolis on Friday as swarms of police searched door to door for the fugitive. Having failed to locate their man, the authorities eventually lifted their “shelter in place” advisory, after which a citizen went outside to smoke a cigarette and discovered the wanted subject hiding in a dry-docked boat in his backyard.

Trying to make sense of this madness is a bit like trying to unravel a plate of linguini, but certain facts have emerged. The bombing suspects were brothers whose family immigrated to this country to escape persecution of Muslims in their native Chechnya.

To demonstrate their gratitude for the asylum they were granted as children, they grew up to kill three spectators at the Patriots’ Day marathon in Boston, injure more than 170 other spectators and runners, murder one police officer and put another into the ICU. You’re welcome, guys…

At present, the same Senate that earlier elected to defer action to make it more difficult for criminals and psychopaths to purchase firearms is poised to contemplate immigration reform. As both political parties are anxious to court the emerging Latino vote, some easing of the rules was anticipated. Perhaps the latest Boston massacre will serve to alert our elected representatives that everybody who arrives at our borders is not necessarily hoping to harvest crops, landscape suburbia or do other hard labor.

Following the lead of songwriter Paul Williams, most of us were left to wonder, “Where do we go from here?” How much more freedom will we spend to purchase a tenuous grasp on security? When — if ever — will we learn from the Israelis that to defeat your enemies you must first recognize them for who they are?

In the last 20 years, 100 percent of the mass carnage incidents in this country were perpetrated by domestic head cases with high-capacity firearms or Islamic extremists. Emulating physicians, shouldn’t we attempt to reduce exposure to known risk factors?

At any rate, by Saturday, April 20, the week from hell was over. The Boston bombers had been neutralized and beleaguered residents in the vicinity of the Texas disaster were being cautiously reintroduced to their neighborhoods. An eccentric Elvis impersonator -- is there another kind? -- was in custody for the ricin mailing. Though charges against him would later be dropped, it seemed at the time that matter had been resolved as well.

It was a day full of the hope of spring, time for a collective sigh of relief. It was also the 124th anniversary of the birth of Adolf Hitler.

M.W. Guzy
M.W. (Michael William) Guzy began as a contributor to St. Louis media in 1997 with an article, “Everybody Loves a Dead Cop,” on the Post-Dispatch Commentary page. In addition to the St. Louis Beacon and now St. Louis Public Radio, his work has been featured in the St. Louis Journalism Review, the Arch City Chronicle, In the Line of Duty and on tompaine.com. He has appeared on the Today Show and Hannity & Combs, as well as numerous local radio and television newscasts and discussion programs.