Have you heard this one? “When you give up freedom in order to have security, you wind up with neither.” Nothing could be truer. We today revisit gun control.
There have been some recent killing sprees committed by nut cases. It happens now and then. It saddens me that such things occur. I do not believe however that any amount of gun control would have changed those events to any great degree. As is always the case, the villain is the killer, not the tool he chooses for the killing. Criminally insane murderers are just as dangerous whether armed with a gun, a knife, a bomb, an automobile, or a 2x4. The problem here is the killer, not the gun.
Of course the gun control advocates are (pardon the pun) up in arms over their perceived lack of any control over the presence of guns in our society. Here is some data which may be helpful to these advocates. There are as many guns in this country as there are people. No amount of attempted control by any governing agency is going to materially change this fact. When a nut case decides to go on a killing spree, no amount of gun control is going to stop him. The third fact that needs to be considered is that in most of the cases spree killings are usually stopped by a gun.
While the information above is important, the most important reason for gun ownership by citizens is for their protection. I am not just talking about protection from thugs and killers; I am also talking about protection from our own government. The second amendment was instituted by our founders for just that purpose. A brief review of history bears this out. The authors of the second amendment knew that governments traditionally grew in power until they had to take complete control. This is virtually impossible if the citizenry is armed. Our freedom as Americans is assured by the fact that we are armed and that no government can take us over; not even our own.
I know there are some who will read this who are afraid of any gun. They see guns as evil. Be assured the gun is not the problem. The gun is not the evil. In the hands of a mad man anything can be a weapon of mass destruction. The evil then is the nutcase who would kill. It matters not to the victim whether they are killed by gunfire or smacked with a sledge hammer.
Far more people are killed by automobiles than by guns in this country. Why don’t we outlaw cars? Should we outlaw chain saws?
We are fortunate to live in a free country, but random acts of violence happen. You could get struck by lightning just walking down the street. A meteorite could fall and strike you dead where you stand. Life has no guarantees. Life happens but it always ends.
In the hands of a sane law abiding person, a gun is as safe as a baby in the arms of its loving mother. To someone bent on killing and maiming, any weapon will do.
Here’s my revolutionary solution to gun violence or for any violence for that matter. Let’s control the killers and the nut jobs. Make sure that judges do what we pay them for. Many walking free in our cities today are convicted murderers who have been released from prison or never even sent. Most crime committed today is perpetrated by people previously convicted of crime. It’s possible for someone to rehabilitate himself, but that is a rare occurrence. It seems more likely they will re-offend. People make choices and we have laws to deal with those who make the wrong choices. The role of the society at large is to make sure the people we have hired to enforce our laws do their job.
There are among us those who are criminally insane. It is incumbent upon us to get them out of society. You wouldn’t allow a rabid dog to run free so why would you not require the same for a madman?
Blaming the gun is just another way some in society relieve themselves of the responsibility of law enforcement. It is a liberal cop out. Don’t fall for it. The following was true when it was originally published and it is true today. “When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns.”
From my cold dead hands,
Ron Scarbro April 8, 2009
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1 comment:
well sir, let me just tell you about Tuesday, We had the best time way down south in Mississippi. At the Post Office was a man in a cranked jeep
"asleep" for about an hour. They called the police and ambulance. Officers asked him if he wanted to call someone to drive him home. He hit a cop and was tassered and ran away. well we called all our blind and old people and told them to lock the doors and not answer unless they knew who it was. I dug through all my old keys till I found a house key and locked my door. (Last time I did this my nephew said, "Damn David I nearly broke my nose. What'dya lock the door for.) Well all the pals and buddies got on facebook and shared our latest updates. The man was in the woods beside my son's house. We all loaded our guns and shared info. A great time was had by all. My son said, this is why terrorists never come to small town Mississippi, we are armed to the teeth an waiting for excitement. He was a local yokel high on crack cocaine and by now probably hiding out at auntie's house and wondering what the hell happened. The final punchline is that he was seen by a neighbor with one handcuff and a cell phone calling for a ride...from the trampoline in my son's back yard. She did not call the police and there is a warrant out for his arrest and as far as I know he hasn't been apprehended. We moved on to other excitement at the hospital @1pm as I had a colonostopy scheduled.
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