Compromise is not a dirty word

Columbine.  Gabrielle Giffords.  Aurora, Colorado.

We have to do better than this.

I spent a good portion of my growing up years in the rural South.  People had and have guns.  When there are rattlesnakes and water moccasins, rabid raccoons, even alligators on the doorstep, they are useful tools.

But we have to do better than this.

I’ve heard most, if not all, of the arguments on both sides of the gun control issue.  The Second Amendment constitutionally protects the right to bear arms.  ‘Guns don’t kill people.  People kill people.’

Please understand that I am not trying to pry your precious hunting rifle out of your hands when I say that you can have no reasonable response that refutes the following statement:

People without guns kill far fewer people.

When did the “well regulated” part of the Second Amendment fall by the wayside?

The shootings in Aurora will bring this debate back to the top of the political wrangling.

And they should.

I don’t know the answer, but we have to find a better one than we’ve got now.

Compromise is not a dirty word.

Back in the Wild West–or, at least, in the literature and cinematic depictions thereof–the marshal, intent on civilizing a town and making it a fit place for families to live, would begin by requiring the cowpokes to take off their gun belts when they came to town.

A little regulation.  Not confiscation.

Turn ’em in when you ride into town.  Pick ’em up when you ride out.

Where’s Gary Cooper when you need him?  Can’t we apply a little common sense here?

I went to grad school in Denver.  I’ve driven through Aurora.  I’ve been to the mall.  I may even have been to the movie theater.  I’m just going to sit here for a while and wonder when–and if–I will be going to any movie theater again.

While I’m doing that, Roger Ebert’s column in the New York Times is worth reading.  You can find it here.