You want passion and urgency? We could actually solve this problem very rapidly—if we were willing to go there.

Here’s how we could do it in a month: 1) Ban the sale of all (or semi-automatic) weapons. Have the military go door-to-door seizing weapons; after that, mere possession of any illegal gun constitutes jail time. 2) Empower the government to use Big Data to monitor your online activity (emails, social media, and browser history), and employ algorithms to predict potential shooters; posting weird or threatening things online results in an immediate psychological evaluation. 3) Shut down message boards like 4chan and 8chan, and ban violent video games like Call Of Duty, etc., and violent films (like Taxi Driver). 4. Make it easier for family, teachers, and government officials to commit someone who poses a threat to themselves or others. 5. Turn schools into police states.

Plugging all the holes would require doing each of these things. And I have no doubt it would be effective.

But here’s the thing: There is never going to be the political will to do any of them, and even if there were, there would be too many civil rights concerns on both sides of the aisle (the right would object to gun control and online censorship, and the left would object to infringements on civil liberties regarding mental health commitments, surveillance, and different forms of online censorship).