The gun debate is
raging among political parties. What I
find fascinating is that at the foundation of their efforts lies common
ground. Everyone wants to make the world
a safer, better place. That’s the heart
of the people. Somewhere along the line
we get wrapped up and even trapped in the bureaucratic bullshit of it all, but
I truly believe both sides want the same thing.
Safety.
How do we get there?
As I analyze the issue
I find myself perplexed. We cannot throw
away the 2nd Amendment, as we are a nation built on our freedoms,
one of which is the right to bear arms.
I believe we deserve that right.
However… worldwide, we are the nation with the highest gun-related
deaths, which means we have a problem that needs to be rectified. It’s not okay for thousands of Americans to
die every year at the hand of a trigger.
A greater issue on the
table is the fear that if we alter something in the Constitution, where does
that altering end? Could it lead to us losing more of our rights and freedoms?
Tom Clemens was
murdered on Tuesday night at his home.
He was the head of the Colorado Department of Corrections and said to be a decent, hardworking man of integrity. He was 58 years old and had a wife and two
daughters. A gunman came to his front
door and when Tom answered it, he shot and killed him. Full Story Here.
This is unacceptable.
This is unacceptable.
If you’ve read my
previous blogs, you know that I believe in an American’s right to bear
arms. I also believe in taking
responsibility to protect lives, by instating procedures that will make
purchasing a gun more difficult. That
being said, will all of these measures make our world a safer place? Probably not…because the law-abiding
citizens, the ones who will adhere to new policy, register their guns and
follow the rules are not the ones taking innocent lives.
How to you separate the good seeds from the bad seeds?
How to you separate the good seeds from the bad seeds?
I’m going to wager that when the Constitution
was written there were fewer crazy people in the world. Gang violence didn’t exist back then. A huge percentage of people weren’t on
anti-depressants and narcotics weren’t available to anyone who had the money to
buy them. Back then, Americans owned
guns so they could hunt for food or fight what they deemed to be a collective
enemy. Every once in a while a bad seed
would roll through town wreaking havoc, but for the most part people didn’t
randomly kill individuals like they do today.
We can’t fix crazy. The bigger problem is that we often can’t
even identify crazy until it’s too late.
What is the
answer? Remove guns from the public? No. Only
the law-abiding citizens would turn in their guns, leaving them defenseless
against the criminals who will still have weapons. Limit magazine size? That might cut down on the number of people
an insane shooter can kill at one time, but it won’t save the first 15
people.
The only somewhat
feasible solution I can think of is to institute the death penalty on anyone who
intentionally kills or attempts to kill another person with a gun. (Self-defense is obviously an
exception.) I'm talking about criminally insane individuals with intent, malice and premeditation to murder others. As it stands today, prison isn’t a deterrent for
the criminally insane because they have friends there…peers who understand them
like no one else.
What I mean by "insitute the death penalty" (as it is already instituted in many states) is that in cases where guilt is obvious and the person is convicted, no appeals are allowed. The day they are convicted is the day they meet with a firing squad. It needs to happen that fast. Right now, criminals don't fear the death penalty because, with all of the appeals, it literally takes years for their number to be called up; if ever.
I don't like it...in fact, thinking about it makes me sick to my stomach; but these are desperate
times and desperate times call for desperate measures.
When our forefathers
wrote the 2nd Amendment they had no idea how dark a place our world
would become. They didn’t foresee gang
violence. They didn’t fathom mass shootings of school children. How could they? They were declaring freedom from government
oppression and saw the Constitution as a means to protect the people as a
whole. They never intended it to be used
as a weapon to arm crazy people who would then terrorize the population. It is no doubt that our forefathers are
weeping at what we have become.
The violence must
end. Our children deserve to feel
safe. How do we make that happen? ~
Perhaps by this same logic we should institute removing the hand from those who steal? No appeals. You're saying we shouldn't change our Constitution about guns but you want to change it about criminal prosecution. In other words, you want it changed as long as it's changed in your favor. Violence must end, but more violence is never the answer.
ReplyDeleteOh, quite the contrary. I'm not saying what we should or should not do. I'm saying I don't have the answer. So many of the processes we put in place seem futile. I agree that violence begets more violence...still, what is the answer? Should the punishment fit the crime? I don't know. You said I wanted to "change the Constitution as long as it was changed in my favor"... this is an inaccurate statement. None of these issues are "in my favor." I, like most Americans and like most people in the world, want a safer place for my family. Period. How do we get there? That is the question. I think it begins by analyzing what works and doesn't work and brainstorming new ideas; not by lashing out at bloggers who are merely trying to pose questions.
DeleteI agree Susan!! Bring back public hangings at the court houses across America like they had back then and the crazies would think twice before creating havoc.
ReplyDelete