What if I were to say that the killing of six Asian-American women in Atlanta had nothing to do with racism? What if I were to say that before we go running off with another anti-racist rant, that we stop for a second and try to figure out whether what we are saying about the Atlanta shooting even remotely aligns with the facts?

              The facts as we know them so far is that a 21-year old nincompoop shot up three so-called ‘spas’ in Atlanta, then got in his car and started driving to Florida where he evidently was planning to do the same thing again.

              It didn’t take long for a self-appointed representative of the AAPI (read: Asian-American, Pacific Islander) community to tell us that the attack represented “the intersections of racism, xenophobia, and gender-based violence.” Did she leave anything or anyone out?

              The spokesperson, who happens to be a Georgia State House rep, Bee Nguyen, echoed the concerns of other anti-hate advocates in the AAPI population, given the disturbing increase in hate crimes associated with the spread of Covid-19, a.k.a., the ‘Chinese flu.’

              There’s only one little problem with this rush to judgement regarding the motives of the Atlanta shooter. It may not be true. In fact, the gunman told arresting officers that he was “addicted to sex” and was trying to get rid of people and places where his addiction played out.

              So, I’m thinking, maybe this dope was on his way to the rub joint in Palm Beach where Bob Kraft, the owner of the New England Patriots, was arrested when he tried to pay for sex in 2019. The arrest occurred because Kraft was caught on a tape that the cops were watching because they were running a multi-county investigation of some of these joints whose owners were suspected of human trafficking, among other crimes, although nobody was charged.

              God forbid that Bob Kraft, a multi-billionaire and good buddy of Orange Head would just drop a couple of dimes, find a nice motel room somewhere and get it on with a sex partner without worrying that the cops might break down the front door. Maybe he just liked the ambience of the place. Who knows?

              Several years ago, a bunch of massage parlors were closed down in Hampshire County, MA where I happen to live. When the owner showed up in Court to answer various charges, including trafficking, the whole thing was postponed because he claimed not to speak a single word of English and there wasn’t a Mandarin-speaking translator on call. This guy rented space in four different commercial locations and he couldn’t speak English at all? Give me a break.

              Remember Jeffrey Epstein? He was charged with trafficking underage girls for himself and his well-heeled friends. He didn’t make it to Court either if you recall. My only regret about Epstein’s demise was that I was hoping we would see his good buddy Al Dershowitz please for leniency before Epstein was led away.

              To quote don Corleone, the way a man earns his living doesn’t bother me as long as what he does isn’t a conflict with what I do. So, I have no problem with a service industry that provides sex instead of fast food, as long as the providers are legally allowed to do what they do. But from what I know and what I hear, the ‘spa’ industry often employs kids alongside adults, and the employers happen to be members of the AAPI community as well.

              And by the way, our friend Gail Collins wrote an op-ed about the Atlanta shootings but her approach was to use the event as a reminder that the GOP defense of the filibuster rule could doom passage of the law voted by the House  to expand background checks on gun transfers to all private sales.

That’s all fine and well Gail, but the fact is that the kid who tried to cure his sex addiction by putting bullets into all those Asian-American women happened to have bought the gun legally just the other day.

Is there any chance we’ll ever get anything other than hot air when it comes to talking about crimes committed using guns?