Response to a tragedy

“‘I wish to God she had had an M-4 in her office, locked up so when she heard gunfire, she pulls it out and she didn’t have to lunge heroically with nothing in her hands and takes him out and takes his head off before he can kill those precious kids,'”

  Rep. Louie Gohmert  on Fox News Sunday
 

   Louie Gohmert, truly you are the last reasonable man. Of all elected officials only you had the courage to point out the truth: it’s not the abundance of guns that causes mass shootings, it’s the scarcity.

In times like these we must find the courage to ask hard questions: Why didn’t that kindergarten teacher have an assault rifle close at hand? What kind of society would task someone to shape young minds, yet deny them the necessary fire power? Why, they could keep it in a case by the blackboard and have the class name it as they would a turtle or hamster.

Yet, hero though he be, Rep. Gohmert left a few, more difficult, queries on the table.

We must ask not why Adam Lanza was armed, but why weren’t those children? What if the teacher left the room to fetch art supplies, or, proved too slow to reach the gun case in a timely fashion? Obviously I’m not suggesting that six year olds be given assault rifles; a simple two shot derringer, the sort a wild west whore might carry in her garter, would do the trick. We teach them not to talk to strangers, but do we really give them the means to end the conversation?

We cannot be safe unless each and every citizen is as well armed as any criminal could theoretically be, our children dancing free and joyful in the crossfire, like urchins round a busted fire hydrant on a hot summer’s day.

And would that were enough. Sure, gun crime can be stopped easily enough through conscientious armament, but what about the bombers? Bombers don’t fear guns, they can set their charges in the dead of night and retreat safely outside of the blast radius. That is why each able bodied adult must be rigged with an explosive vest and trained in its use, ensuring the chain reaction will extend the shock wave from shore to shore, trapping the would be bomber in its wake.  Thus deterring him.

Mind, we’d still be vulnerable to suicide bombers, so it’s not enough to simply equal their hardware, we must match their commitment. A truly patriotic citizen must be holding onto life by the slimmest of margins, willing to cast off their mortal coil at the slightest provocation. Criminals would be terrified to leave their homes, well aware of the consequences of even mildly agitating a responsible bystander. And Utopia ensues.