Perhaps crude but we need to fish or cut bait.

The phrase, "Cut the bullshit," is a crude way of saying stop beating around the bush saying things that are not true or unimportant and get to the point and or solution. In my old neighborhood you might hear that comment in ordinary conversation frequently; those people had a knack calling out crap.

Well, if you don't mind, I'll suggest that's what we Americans need to do to straighten out some of the messes we've made over the years. I recall on the heels of the Sandyhook massacre of twenty grade school children, we had liberals clamoring for stiffer gun controls and conservatives suggesting we needed a conversation about mental illness. When congresswoman, Gabby Gifford was shot the same cries from the same groups were heard. The Aurora, Colorado theater gunman had the NRA calling for every citizen to arm themselves so they can shoot back at these mad gunmen and interrupt the victims' count. Those calls were again offered in the aftermath of the Gay-night club massacre. With the on-going, difficult to explain, killings of Blacks by law enforcement and the heinous sniper shootings of policemen, we hear the plea by politicians, clergy and others to 'have a National race conversation.'

I say 'cut through the crap.' This Nation can have a conversation about mental health but before you waste time with such gibberish-jabber, read a history timeline on America's attention to mental health care and you will discover things began 'going -to-hell-in-a-hand-basket' in 1981 when the federal government's budget began cutting mental institutions' funding and grants. Today the hundreds of thousands of America's mentally ill are either in prison or living in half-way houses and walking the streets mostly under medicated. You wanna take care of the mental illness problem? Re-establish institutions and open up your wallets to pay for it.

I say 'cut through the crap.' Ninety percent of Americans want greater gun control legislation and yet we have a growing number of citizens with guns in their auto glove compartment and our police officers are routinely confronting assault weapons. Wanna fix it? After the government enacts tougher gun laws then Americans need to open wallets and pay for two officers per squad cars in high crime rate cities. Let's have enhanced police academy training and equip every officer with taser guns and have those tasers drawn when officers approach any vehicle. And one more thing..."If" Black Lives Matter then dammit ALL Black Lives Matter! 2,000 Black lives killed on the Chicogo streets this year at the hands of other Blacks should matter big time...so protest THAT. Seventy-two percent of Black babies born to unwed mothers find their 'lives' compromised from the beginning...where's the protest on that injustice to Black children? We can have race conversations from sea to shinning sea. The conversation won't hurt but know it will not end in resolutions because most conversations have strong talkers and weak listeners and most Americans want 'something for nothing!' Let's cut through the crap and do some common sense stuff to protect our people, people of all colors because all colors matter.