Every day I am asked what I think about the gun control efforts going on in Washington, D.C. And every day I am asked what I think about teachers carrying firearms.
What I think is: both are knee-jerk reactions, not carefully considered solutions to the problem of protecting our citizens from deranged killers who go on sprees in schools, theaters, shopping malls or anywhere else innocent people gather.
I believe those liberal legislators who don’t have to worry about support for re-election from the National Rifle Association and America’s gun owners because they didn’t have it anyway, have no problem eroding the Constitution where it suits their beliefs.
They would take away some of the Second Amendment rights of gun owners, but not all. At least not today. And tomorrow is another day.
So they’ll take away semi-automatic weapons and large-capacity magazines saying the public doesn’t need them. That, of course, is their opinion. And then what comes next? How about shotguns? Or maybe certain caliber handguns. Once semi-automatic weapons are banned, will these liberal legislators say to each other: “OK, we have that taken care of, what can we go after next?”
“If they ask gun owners to give up part of their Second Amendment rights, are these same people willing to give up some of their rights?,” asked Evan English, owner of Olde English Outfitters near Tipp City. “Would they stand for someone trying to take away part of their freedom of speech?”
It goes right back to the reasoning: guns don’t kill people. People kill people. They can do it with a gun, a knife, a rope, a bomb or even their bare hands.
Protecting against gun violence doesn’t mean disarming the populace. Reality is quite the opposite. If criminals think people don’t have guns, they are more likely to attack innocent people, including home invasions. But even the demented minds of criminals can reason they had better not confront someone who might have a gun.
It is important for those who own guns to learn how to use them safely. There are gun safety courses going on all the time. Perhaps the safest place I have ever been has been the Grand American Trapshooting Championships where thousands of people with guns are walking the grounds daily.
Putting guns in the hands of teachers, however, isn’t such a great idea. It might be if every teacher was an expert marksman, trained when, and when not, to shoot; and could absolutely insure the children would not be able to get their hands on the weapon.
Although to me it smacks of a “police state,” I think the better solution is to have only one way into each school with a metal detector manned by an armed policeman. Other doors would open only in emergency situations.
Taking away guns isn’t going to stop criminals. They will always find a way. And all banning retail sales of specific weapons – such as semi-automatics – will just create a black market for weapons made in other countries and those already hoarded by people who feared the government would ban them.
No sane person would condone the actions of those who kill others, especially the mass killing of innocent people. But that’s just it: such actions are not taken by sane people. And that’s the real problem, not what kinds of guns are available.
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