This week

I have had other, typical and trivial thoughts this week, but it seems somehow wrong to write anything without chiming in about the shooting deaths in Louisiana, Minnesota, and Dallas. It's not that I have anything particularly deep or novel to say, it just feels wrong to let them pass in silence.

First off, I should note that the most common thread seems to be guns. Alton Sterling and Philando Castile had them. Micah Johnson had some particularly high-powered and nice ones. Even a couple of guys who were participating in the "peaceful" march in Dallas, one of whom (Mark Hughes) was wrongfully pegged as a suspect and had his name and picture flashed around the world as such, was carrying a rifle.

Now, certainly if everybody can have guns of all sorts, that right extends to black people. Sure. There are just too many damned guns around. It's crazy.

I should note the exception that Micah Johnson, of course, wasn't killed by a gun but by a "robot-delivered bomb." Which is only natural. If everybody has guns, cops of course need better stuff. We should soon see cops using drone-delivered bombs, if not drones with assault rifle type stuff in them. I mean, why not, right?  We need it to protect ourselves from all those guns.

And then to the question of white privilege and segregation.  Where to begin. It's all true. I live in a house that feels like a fortress shielded well away from all strife. My office is even worse. In the course of my everyday life I see people of color on Facebook, in stores (mostly in poorly paid service roles), in AA meetings, and very rarely elsewhere.

It's a big freaking problem. What to say right now. I need to try to organize a Bulls game outing and invite more black guys we grew up going to school and playing basketball with.