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On July 4, shots were fired again at Americans. But this time, they were fired at by the Americans themselves.
At a Fourth of July parade in Highland Park in the Chicago region, a man equipped with high-powered rifle opened fire at a rooftop at the crowd. According to the latest account, six people were killed and more than 36 were wounded. Richard Kaufman, a retired doctor who was standing nearby when the shooting took place, described the following scene to Reuters: "It was pandemonium. A stampede. Babies were flying in the air. People were diving for cover. People were covered in blood tripping over each other."
Pandemonium indeed. And it's a pandemonium repeated far too often. Recent shootings in Uvalde, Texas and Buffalo, New York are still fresh in people's memory. And, in the case of Chicago, 17 people were killed and over 100 were shot during last year's Fourth of July weekend.
The fact that the shooting took place only a little more than a week after U.S. President Joe Biden signed a gun control bill into law is a slap in the face for the United States' political institutions and American politicians in Washington D.C. The U.S. capital, consumed by political infightings and power struggles, has turned into an insulated town where the decision-making at the very top of the government is detached. When gun control bill was passed, handgun law in New York was overturned. When politicians talk about human rights around the world, more than half of American women believe their lives are made worse by the Supreme Court's decision on Roe v. Wade. The Biden administration made fighting climate change a priority, but its Environmental Protection Agency's authority was trimmed.
First responders take away victims from the scene of a mass shooting at a July 4 parade in Chicago, Illinois, United States, July 4, 2022. /CFP
People may attribute these contradictions and struggles to a particular set of justices on the U.S. Supreme Court, courtesy of a particular administration. But the ideological conflict between the Supreme Court and the other two branches of the government is just a more materialized reflection of the broader conflict between the two parties. Slim margins in both houses of Congress have hardened the political fight between Democrats and Republicans for the upcoming mid-term election. A president with 39 percent approval rating made those vying for the White House more zealous in fights over principles.
And, for the past several years, the United States government as a whole focused way too much on picking fights with the world rather than fixing itself. From Donald Trump to Joe Biden, successive U.S. administration has spent much time and energy on China, Russia and other geopolitical objectives that Americans are left to suffer the government’s ignorance and callowness.
U.S.' Gini coefficient, the summary measure of income inequality, is at the highest level in 50 years. According to American newspaper Patriot Ledger, the U.S. is found to be the most unequal high-income economy in the world. Africans Americans are more than twice as likely as White people to encounter use of force during interactions with the police, according to National Urban League's annual report titled "State of Black America." U.S. Department of Justice's data shows African Americans are three times more likely to be jailed after getting arrested. And the current nearly uncontrollable upward spiral of inflation is causing energy and grocery prices to grow at breakneck speed.
These are merely snapshots of the plethora of problems the United States is facing. Staying unresolved, in some cases for years, they are leaving the United States in a deep state of division and causing the political parties to become more polarized and spend more time warring with each other rather than actually governing. Remain this way, the pandemonium in Chicago on July 4 will happen again, again and get worse. And for the American people, their lives will be spent fearing that they could get hurt by bullets on any given day – actual ones and the political ones.
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