Rolling Stone:

“This is a horrible aberration, and it makes us fear for our security,” says a visibly shaken Rep. Chuck Fleischmann, who has cuts and scrapes on his arms and knees from hitting the dugout floor to avoid the bullets. While he talks to reporters, he’s still in a dirt-covered jersey emblazoned with the word “Republican.” The morning’s tragedy is just beginning to dawn on him. “Just a horrible … experience. And actually, now thinking [about] the magnitude of the shots that were fired and the carnage that was there, I’m still in a state of shock.”

[ … ]

“It’s about the person. We have people in this country, sadly, who have just a horrific value system – somebody like this, today, who would do that, people who engage in terrorism. They will unfortunately find their weapon of choice,” Fleischmann tells Rolling Stone. “What we need to do is focus on keeping Americans safe. But I am, and will always be, a strong supporter of the Second Amendment. Put it this way: If we had had more weapons there, we’d be able to subdue the shooter more quickly. Thank God that the Capitol Police were there and were armed, because otherwise we’d have had a situation where there’d be a lot more damage.”

Party leaders also canceled other proceedings, like a hearing in a House Natural Resources subcommittee on a piece of legislation that would ease restrictions on buying silencers for guns. Currently, getting a silencer requires purchasers to submit to being fingerprinted and produce a photograph that’s kept on file, and the waiting period can last as long as nine months. The bill being proposed by Republican Rep. Jeff Duncan would do away with those restrictions.

“It’s one of the things that makes you feel more normal – the camaraderie that we have in the mornings,” Republican Rep. Pat Meehan, who wasn’t at practice Wednesday morning, says to a group of reporters before being overwhelmed with emotion and tearing up. “The camaraderie that we have in the mornings when we are there is such a change from the pressures that we all feel on a regular basis, and is kind of a return to the fun things. You know, Scalise is the Whip, but when we’re out there we kind of treat each other like we’re in high school again.”

[ … ]

Other Republicans are avoiding specifics too. Rep. Rodney Davis, who represents the shooter’s home state of Illinois, was up to bat when the shooting began. “I heard a loud noise and thought it was a construction site dropping a large piece of metal, and then the next thing I heard was, ‘Run – he’s got a gun!” he says, still in his cleats and uniform. Davis gets heated mad when I ask whether there could have been greater carnage if the shooter had employed a silencer during his rampage.

The number one most stupid thing after this shooting is asking if suppressors would have made this worse.  The second most stupid thing is acting like high schoolers playing ball.  I don’t want you to build camaraderie with anyone.  I want you to go to the mattresses and stop the drunken advance of government power.

The third most stupid thing is acting as if you alone are victims of shooting rampages.  You want guns?  Fine.  Make them available for everyone for self defense.  And don’t act as if you have PTSD when you send sons of America on every stupid foreign misadventure known to man in your quest for global imperialism.

And if you care about PTSD and young boys whom you have sent to war where the real shooting is, then fix the VA.  There.  I’ll bet you didn’t expect that from this event.  Did you, you gaggle of pricks?