“We’re not doing enough”

So … what does it feel like to take a bullet?

“Imagine a hot, metal dart-like projectile tearing through your body at supersonic speed, faster than the speed of sound,” said Lauren Bennett. “You’ll feel it burn through your skin, and you’ll likely grab whatever part of your body was hit, only to feel excessive amounts of blood draining out of you and soaking everything.”

Bennett, one of 55 wounded – seven fatally – at the Fourth of July parade in Highland Park testified Monday at a hearing for a new bill to ban assault weapons and raise the age to obtain a Firearm Owners’ ID card.

State Rep. Denyse Wang Stoneback (D-Skokie) said everybody needs to know things are not improving.

“We’re not doing enough. We’re absolutely not doing enough until we can go home and think that we’ve actually prevented, not acted reactively.”

Stoneback said for now, it’s still the latter.

Jaquie Algee, a Black woman whose son was shot to death, said the death count in Highland Park is just another day in her neighborhood, without the outpouring of support and caring enjoyed by the suburban enclave on July 4.

And State Rep. Kam Buckner (D-Chicago) read a list of mass shootings and added, a president and a pope were shot the same year, 1981, and look what’s happened since.

More hearings about the bill, which the sponsor wants to pass in the early January lame duck session, are scheduled for Thursday and next Monday.