New York: So this is life in America in 2019. The nation goes to bed thinking about one mass shooting, then wakes up to learn about another.

Once again, dozens of people are dead and there is no sign those in power will take even the most basic actions to prevent it happening again. One of the country's two major political parties engaged in a collective project of diversion, delay and denial.

Mourners gather for a vigil at the scene of a mass shooting, Sunday, in Dayton, Ohio. Credit:AP

Mass shootings have become so common, and meaningful responses to them so rare, that Americans have become desensitised to the issue.

A nation that prides itself on its exceptionalism is indeed a world leader when it comes to the number of innocent people it guns down annually. The shooting in El Paso, Texas, was the 250th mass shooting in the US this year, and Dayton, Ohio, the 251st.