I will not be sharing prayers for the people of Sutherland Springs, TX, the people who were gunned down while they were worshipping this past weekend.

No, my prayers will not bring them back nor will they help their surviving friends and family.

We’ve been directed to pray every time a mentally incompetent individual with a gun decides to commit an atrocity, killing innocent people. There are millions of well-meaning genuinely concerned Americans who do pray in these incidences. God bless them.

For elected officials, though, it’s easy, it sounds pious and it offers no politically dangerous solutions – perfect for gutless politicians who are bought and sold.

Here is what the president tweeted in response: “May God be w/ the people of Sutherland Springs, TX. The FBI & law enforcement are on the scene. I am monitoring the situation from Japan … Americans do what we do best: we pull together. We join hands. We lock arms and through the tears and the sadness, we stand strong.”

What unmitigated meaningless crap – where is his administration’s plan to attempt to address the increasing acts of violence?

What Americans should be doing is trying to arrive at a solution to a thorny problem: how do we maintain the Second Amendment, while restricting access to weapons that are clearly not designed for hunting or sport shooting?

Prayers don’t seem to be working too well, no offense to either the people who prayed or to the deity to which they prayed. Frankly I think we’re getting a strong message we should exercise some free will and figure out a solution ourselves.

The National Rifle Association (NRA) decided that just after the shooting it was time for a “vocabulary lesson” about misused terms such as “assault weapons” and “AR-15,” “clip” and “magazine.”

What arrogant, uncaring idiots.

Massachusetts Congressman Seth Mouton responded to the blog and tweet by posting the following: “Thanks, @NRA, for helping us focus on the real issues here, literally minutes after more Americans are massacred.”

Should we do what Australia did after a mass murder by eliminating a whole group of weapons? Some people think so, but you know the NRA will buy off Congress to prevent such an action.

And I doubt the president would have the backbone to potentially offend some of his base by advocating for such a ban.

What would you do? People who should not have access to military style weapons on the basis of mental illness apparently have no problem getting them in order to carry out a deranged plot.

If you characterize yourself as a Second Amendment person, what is your solution? Keep the status quo and just accept such acts of violence are the new normal for America? Seek a ban on certain weapons? Insist that everyone carry a gun and be educated to use it in times of emergency?

Yes, yes, I know many of you will say that gun control doesn’t work. You will point to the murder rate in Chicago, for instance to note that increased legislation against gun ownership doesn’t prevent violence.

I understand and that is indeed part of the problem. We must acknowledge that people who seek to use guns illegally generally find a way to do so.

I have no solutions to offer except this one:  we need to legislate away the influence the NRA uses in Congress, national political parties and state parties to open up a more honest discussion. We must note every state or local elected official who takes money from NRA members, in order to understand how their opinions may be swayed.

We must acknowledge how the NRA Super PAC gives out money in encourage votes in their favor.

Only in an environment that is as free as it could be from outside influences then perhaps we can come up with a holistic approach to this problem.