Episode 2270: Craig Garnett on May 24, 2022 - Uvalde's Darkest Hour
On May 24, 2022, a 18 year-old walked into Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas and shot to death 19 students and 2 teachers. In Uvalde’s Darkest Hour, the owner of the local Uvalde Leader-News, Craig Garnett tries to make sense of these tragic events. Although making sense might be the wrong words to describe either the book or Garnett himself. While this mass murder occurred more than two years ago, the stoical Garnett still appears frozen in a kind of uncomprehending grief in the face of this terrible crime. As he confesses, the writing of the book was intended as a kind of catharsis. But there’s still an intense anger there - especially toward the local police chiefs who allowed the gunman to remain in the classroom for an hour and fourteen minutes.
CRAIG GARNETT has owned the Uvalde Leader-News, the local newspaper, since 1989. He moved to Uvalde in 1982 to begin work with the Leader-News, where his weekly editorials and columns have won dozens of awards from the Texas Press Association and South Texas Press Association. Garnett received the 2023 Tom and Pat Gish Award for courage, integrity, and tenacity in rural journalism for his coverage of the 2022 Uvalde school shooting.
Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.
Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
Why Our Fear of Technology Is Nothing New—And Why That Should Give Us Hope: From Cuckoo Clocks to ChatGPT
Not Even God Can Judge Tupac Shakur: How a White Suburban Sportswriter Found the Humanity and Tragedy Behind Hip-Hop’s Most Misunderstood Star
Fighting to Tell the Truth: Why every Film about War is an Anti-War Film
Between the River and the Sea: American Jews and the Soiling of the Zionist Dream
The Vinci Code: How AI is Turning Everyone into James Bond
Huawei vs Ericsson: How Huawei Turned Sweden's "Neutral" Tech Advantage Into a Cold War Liability
How Smart is the MAGA Intelligentsia? The Professors, Philosophers, and Trolls who Transformed Rage into a Winning Political Ideology
This Is Not a Browser—Did René Magritte Really Predict the End of the Web Age?
The Panic of the Intellectuals: From Ezra Pound to the Trumpagies of Today
How to Choke Your Enemy: Why America Turned the World Economy into its Weapon of Global Domination
All Religions Are Absurd Because We Are Absurd: How the Internet is Creating the First New Form of Religious Community in 250,000 Years
Why the Real Road to Serfdom Runs Through Silicon Valley: Tim Wu on the Extractive Economics of Platform Capitalism
Are We Still Fighting the Hundred Years War? Why Joan of Arc, Agincourt, and the Black Death Aren't Quite Dead