esquire.com – To those of us who are of a certain age, the psychic signposts of Thursday night in Dallas marked a vaguely remembered route to hell. Snipers in buildings. The wounded being rushed to Parkland Hospital, for pity’s sake. And when Don Lemon of CNN made the curious observation that the streets of Dallas seemed an unlikely venue for murderous gunplay, those of us who are of a certain age thought he was out of his mind.

After all, it was murderous gunplay in the streets of Dallas that was the first inkling many of us of the post-war suburban generation had that, yes, the world could go out of its mind.