It's Time to End Gun-Free Zones

As I sit here and digest what happened to all of those children, sick doesn't even cover the feelings I have for the parents of these innocent children.  However, there is another emotion brewing in my mind as well: fear.

At home I own several firearms, and frankly, anyone forcing entry to my home would have a very short life expectancy.  However, each day I have to send my children off to a place where the only protection they have is the ideology of wishful thinking.  All it takes to take my little daughter or teenage son from me is one psychopath like the piece of evil in Newtown, or the man who used a knife on several children in China yesterday.

Earlier this year, Jessica Ridgeway, a 10-year-old, was kidnapped, murdered, and dismembered just a few miles from my house.  I can walk my kids to the bus and walk them home, secure in the thought that my wife and I are armed and able to deal with anyone trying to snatch our children.  However, as soon as they get out of my sight, I am trusting others to protect them -- others denied the ability by insane laws.  What would a teacher do if a man snatched a child off the playground?  Call the police?  File a report?  I don't want the police called or a report filed; I want my children defended.

Gun-free zones in schools are invitations to psychopaths to commit murder.  I remember my son recently showing me a satirical sign that said, "Attention Criminals, the people in this establishment have been disarmed for your convenience."  Although the satire was humorous at the time, it is deadly sad right now.

Only Texas allows teachers to carry guns.  How many tragedies have to happen before we do the same?  How many children have to die before we finally allow the law-abiding citizens charged to educate and defend our students to do the latter as well as the former?

Liberals have used this incident to demand more "gun control," which won't help.   All that will do, if successful, is deprive me of the ability to protect my children from predators intent on kidnapping them, intruders in the night, and psychos with knives and guns of their own.

I call the reader's attention to a few simple questions.  How many mass murders have been committed at a gun range or in a gun shop?  How many have been committed in a police station?  The answer is few, if any.  What is it that these locations have that our schools don't?  Simple: a plethora of armed law-abiding individuals.  If just one person had been armed in Newtown or Aurora, how many lives could have been saved?

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