Opinion : Brishell and Christina: Each deserve a moment of silence

     Christina Green had just joined her school’s Student Council.

     Brishell Jones was preparing to go to culinary school.

     Christina had family who loved to travel to unique and remote parts of the Caribbean. Brishell did, too – she was learning to play the steel drums in Trindad, where her father lives.

     Christina was known at her school for her brightness, her sweetness, for overcoming adversity. Brishell, too.

    There were differences, of course. They lived in different cities. Christina was 9; Brishell, 16. Christina was a healthy girl from a well-off white family. Brishell had a variety of health problems that affected her education, and was raised by a single black mother who struggled to make ends meet.

     But they died the same way: In a senseless mass shooting.

     You know, by now, the name of Christina Green. She died in Tucson, Arizona, when Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was shot on Saturday, January 8, 2011.

     But you probably have never heard of Brishell Jones. She died on Tuesday, March 30, 2010, standing next to her best friend on a corner in Washington, D.C. She was one of four people shot to death by a gunman with an AK-47 in an extended dispute that began with – believe it or not – a young man’s missing bracelet.

     Congress got quiet on Monday – as it should – in honor of Gabrielle Giffords and Christina Green and the other victims of Saturday’s senseless shooting.

     Congress has been asking lots of questions – as it should. Questions like, “Does the climate in Washington, D.C. contribute to the shooting that killed Christina?” and “What can we do to make living in America more safe?”

     But I have to wonder: Why was Congress not-so-quiet the day Brishell Jones died? Why was Congress not asking what it can do to make the climate in Washington, D.C., more favorable for people like Brishell? Where were the deep soul-searching reflections about the significance of the horrible events that resulted in the death of Brishell and three others?

     I do not believe there is a good answer to any of those questions.

     The shooting of a member of Congress is a tragic, historic, time-stopping event.

     But a shooting within earshot or walking distance of Congress is not.

     Why not?

     Since 1990, when we first sent U.S. troops to Iraq, more Americans have died of gunshot wounds within 50 miles of Capitol Hill then in Iraq and Afghanistan between 1990 and 2010. More than 4,000 people have been gunned down in the Greater Washington Area since 1990.

     And not a single one of them received a moment of silence from Congress.

     As we move forward from the horror of the shooting in Arizona that has profoundly affected Congress, we must also hope that Congress thoughtfully considers the questions raised by the death of Brishell as thoroughly as we know it will explore the issues raise by the events that caused Christina’s death.