Remembering~26 Candles

[Cha]

http://theobamadiary.com/2013/12/14/remembering-5/

http://theobamadiary.com/2013/12/14/rise-and-shine-696/



Boston.com ✔ @BostonDotCom
Follow Newtown firefighters lower a flag to half-staff to honor the anniversary of the shooting (AP) http://bo.st/18LvNtK
7:45 AM - 14 Dec 2013
51 Retweets 23 favorites ReplyRetweetFavorite

[DonViejo]

1. Thanks to our First Lady and the President for this very awesome

memorial to the 26 innocents

[Cha]

2. Yes, and thank you,

DonViejo~

[classof56]

3. Thank you, Cha, for posting these beautiful tributes.

I am so grateful our country has such a thoughtful, caring, compassionate President. May he be blessed as he has blessed us.

Okay, here come the tears again. Can't seem to hold 'em back for long.

[Cha]

4. Mahalo, classof56~ I am right there with you

on my appreciation of our kind, compassionate President and his family.

[Electric Monk]

5. Adam Lanza killed 27 other people before killing himself. Shouldn't it be 27 candles? or even 28?

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/crime/2013/12/newtown_anniversary_should_nancy_and_adam_lanza_be_mourned.html

(snip)

It’s easy to understand the reasoning behind excluding a killer. In the aftermath of a tragedy, the shooter becomes the villain. And his family members become the accomplices. The families of the Columbine victims sued the families of the shooters, claiming they should have seen it coming, and won a settlement. In Newtown, after all, it was Lanza’s mother who bought the guns he used. But she didn’t just enable her deeply disturbed son. She was his first victim, shot to death in her bed, and it’s dishonest and unhealthy to simplify the grieving process by depriving her of her proper remembrance.

The black-and-white picture of villain versus victims sells our humanity short.

Whatever blame people assign to Nancy Lanza, Adam Lanza is the one who fired the bullets: first at his mother, then at the schoolhouse, then at himself. His act, the standard narrative suggests, was one of crazed retribution, then malice, then cowardice. Lanza never deserved to live, and so of course he clearly deserved to die. And now that he is dead, the argument goes, his memory shouldn’t be commemorated: It should be cursed.

This notion has an obvious appeal. Anyone who subscribes to it has every right to do so. But as attractive as the black-and-white picture of villain versus victims may be, it sells our humanity short. Painful though it may be to acknowledge, Adam Lanza and his mother were humans, every bit as much as the other victims were. It is Newtown’s tragedy—and the world’s—that those beautiful children and devoted teachers had their humanity extinguished so soon before their time. But it helps no one to pretend that the tortured 20-year-old at the other end of the rifle—and his mother, also killed that day—was not, in some fundamental respect, every bit as much human.

more

[Cha]

7. Adding two more candles..

Thank you, Electric Monk

[Isoldeblue]

20. EM, thanks for posting this

article. It expresses exactly how I feel about omitting Mrs. Lanza. Both she and her son were victims of the tragedy.

It is tragic that in this rich country, we have ignored the mentally ill, with so few treatment programs. It's a travesty of justice and we should all be ashamed! If there had been help for him, and support for his mother, chances are high this would never have happened.

Between our love for guns and dismissal of the mentally ill, we are doomed to have this repeated in the future.

[Little Star]

6. Your breaking my heart Cha, this is so sad. :(

[Cha]

8. Mahalo for caring so much, Little Star~

[sheshe2]

9. Thank you for sharing such a beautiful tribute.

They are in our hearts forever~





The President and First Lady, such compassion for all that we lost that day.

Tears, Cha.

[Cha]

10. YOu're Welcome, she~ And, Mahalo

to you for those two poignant photos of Remembering and Never Forgetting Sandy Hook.

[freshwest]

11. ...

Too many thoughts to write.

[Cha]

13. ...

http://theobamadiary.com/2013/11/11/rise-and-shine-665/

[sheshe2]

16. ...

[Cha]

19. That's so amazing.. I was going to put that in my reply to

to you, she, Mahalo! And, so I shall~

[sheshe2]

15. ...

the sorrows of our heart.

[applegrove]

12. Vibes to those kids and their teachers. They have already changed the world.

[Cha]

17. Quite so, applegrove~ And, healing support for

all their loved ones. My heart goes out to them~

[IrishAyes]

14. Too sad, too sad. All those broken hearts.

[Cha]

18. ..

[sheshe2]

21. Cha~

[Cha]

22. Another beautiful way to light up their precious

names, sheshe~ Mahalo, dear heart~

[sheshe2]

23. The candles still burn for them Cha.