Dear Senator ___:
I am upset. I am disgusted. I am disappointed beyond belief to see that my elected representatives in Washington are pandering to the anti-gun advocates in this country rather than doing something constructive to address problems of violence in our society.
I am a senior citizen and a Vietnam veteran. Forty-six years ago, I swore an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. You swore the same oath when you became a United States Senator on [date]. How is it that I remember and honor my oath after forty-six years, but you can’t remember your oath after a mere [___] years in office? Both the Constitution of the United States and the constitutions of a great many of the states guarantee to “the People” the right to keep and bear arms. Many state constitution, in fact, specifically state that the People have the right to keep and bear arms in defense of the state and of themselves.
Today we face a hysterical assault on that fundamental Constitutional right. The purported “trigger” for this is the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Please consider, however, that the problem is not “gun violence.” The problem is “people violence”—evil or disturbed people who set out to kill other people. Guns are not the problem. During the month of December, 2012, two people were murdered in New York City by being pushed into the path of an on-coming subway. You politicians choose to ignore this, but a statistical analysis will show that, despite the Sandy Hook massacre, it was far safer to be a school student in the United States during December than it was to stand on a subway platform in New York City.
Consider what Timothy McVeigh did with a rented truck, some fertilizer, and some diesel fuel. Consider that the worst school massacre in United States history (Bath Township, Michigan, in 1927) was carried out with dynamite, not with guns. Consider that the guns used at Columbine High School in 1999 were the contingency plan. Those two perpetrators had planted two 20-pound propane bombs. Investigators estimated that, if the bombs had detonated, the death toll would have been in the hundreds.
Consider that, with the exception of the attack on Gabby Giffords, all the mass attacks in recent memory have taken place in “gun-free zones”—places where people are not allowed to carry firearms. Clearly, this did not dissuade the assailants. The effect of all the 20,000 or so gun control laws currently in effect in these United States has been to disarm honest people and render us ever more vulnerable to those who have no intention of obeying your silly laws.
Statistics overwhelmingly support the thesis that crime and violence go down in places where more people own and carry guns. Further, an armed person on the spot minimizes the death toll in mass shootings. Look at recent shooting incidents:
• Mall, Ogden, Utah: The shooter was engaged almost immediately by an off-duty police officer from another jurisdiction, minimizing the death toll.
• Mall, Portland, Oregon: The shooter was engaged by a “civilian” carrying a personal sidearm. The shooter broke off his attack, retreated to a stairway, and committed suicide.
• Theater, San Antonio, Texas: The shooter was engaged by an off-duty policewoman who ended the threat.
• New Life Church, Colorado Springs. The shooter was engaged by an armed member of the congregation and stopped before he could open fire in the sanctuary
Since December 14, 2012, there have been at least two arrests of teenagers who were plotting to attack their schools—with bombs.
Your unreasonable and misguided focus on guns will inevitably have no constructive result, because you are overlooking the problem. As a citizen of [state] and as your constituent, I call on you to do the following:
• Support legislation to repeal “gun free” school zones, allowing teachers and all private citizens to carry firearms in schools;
• Support legislation that will require each state to recognize and honor firearm carry licenses or permits from any other state;
• Support legislation to either repeal the National Firearms Act entirely, or modify it so as to allow anyone to possess and to use suppressors (“silencers”) on firearms;
• Oppose any proposed legislation to create a so-called “Assault Weapons Ban.” There is no such thing as an “assault weapon.” That is a meaningless term that Congress made up. So-called “assault weapons” are semi-automatic firearms, just like the ones on which I learned to shoot at Holiday Hill Day Camp in Cheshire in the 1950s. FBI statistics show that far more people have been killed in the past five years with hammers than with rifles. Accordingly, since hammers are so dangerous, should hammers not be included in the list of prohibited weapons?
In closing, I will mention that it is known in the intelligence community that Al Qaeda has declared American school children to be “noble targets.” You get the briefings. You know that there are sleeper cells in the United States. Your proposed laws are going to look awfully futile if the next attack on a school is a Beslan-type terrorist assault and there’s nobody at a school who can offer any resistance.
Very truly yours,
