ZANESVILLE MASSACRE

The Zanesville, Ohio massacre of 49 beautiful, precious and completely innocent animals has me seething. What insanity is this? Let's start with the moron who collected guns and such "pets" as tigers, lions, leopards and bears. This Marlboro Man wannabe was well-known as a trouble-maker, and recently served time for illegally possessing over 100 firearms. Then he commits suicide, but only after opening the cages of all of his "pets." They escaped and local law enforcement executed all but six out of 55 exotic animals. A shocking photograph of dead tigers, lions, bears and cougars captured for posterity the carnage.

We know the world is populated by a contingent of crazies who will do anything. ANYTHING. But what is perhaps even more infuriating is that common sense did not handle this wacko appropriately before a tragedy. He was a known danger to the community. But it turns out Ohio is under the spell of a political delusion that highly regards "property rights" and disdains "regulation." Republican governor John Kasich refused to extend an emergency order by his predecessor (a Democrat) that restricted the ownership of exotic animals. That law might have prevented this debacle.

It's not a stretch to see the similarity in the carnage wreaked upon the economy by banksters, also a known danger to the community, who were likewise deregulated. This dysfunctional mindset must be cast into the cracks of doom from whence it came. The conservative mantra of "deregulation" begs for catastrophe.