I’m not a gun nut, I’m a Constitution nut

I feel like I have to respond to Dave Ross’ commentary titled, “The Wrong Way to Think about Guns.” He also called me out on MyNorthwest.

Take a listen.

First of all, you don’t need a gun. If you don’t want to have a gun, you shouldn’t have a gun. The thing that’s frustrated me about everything that I’ve been hearing for the last week or so is that most of the conversation is from Fantasyland.

I’m not a gun nut. I’m really not. I’m a gun owner. I don’t sport shoot. I go to the range to make sure that my skills are sharpened in case I ever need it. I’m not a hunter. I could never shoot an animal. They’re so cute, those animals.

Here’s what I recognize though. So much of the conversation is not rooted in reality. Here’s the fact of the matter. We have about 300 million guns in America right now and they are not going to go away.

Supportive of common sense gun laws

I’m all for common sense gun laws. I support background checks. I want to make sure that psychos don’t have guns. I want the entire country to participate — instead of only 38 states — in the federal database of who should and should not have guns. Why wouldn’t the whole country participate?

I believe that if you are a parent and you have guns in the house, you should have a safe and you should make sure that your kids or a bad guy can’t get your guns.

But the fact of the matter is, and Chicago is proof, the most restrictive gun laws in the country won’t stop people from shooting each other. In Fantasyland, maybe you could blink your eye and make all 300 million guns disappear.

The reality is that’s never going to happen. The bad guys are always going to have access to guns. And, by the way, for the people who do hunt, sport shoot, and all that, I don’t know how you take away all their guns in this Fantasyland.

Everybody is free not to arm themselves. If you don’t want to have a gun, you don’t have to have a gun. What I know is that when you call the police, it takes them several minutes to come to your house. And if you’re somebody who is armed to protect your home or family because you believe that it’s reasonable and responsible to be your own first line of defense instead of just calling the police, you can do so. If you don’t want to do that, you don’t have to.

We’re all free to not own guns.

The gun owners that I know have safes and make sure their gun is not accessible to their kids or somebody who breaks into their house. Most gun owners that I know are very reasonable and responsible. They take it incredibly seriously.

If you don’t want to have a gun, don’t have a gun.

Dave Ross misses the mark

Dave’s whole point is we’re in this escalating arms race between the bad guys and the good guys. I guess the point is to find a way to remove all the guns from the bad guys and the good guys. But that’s a fantasy. That’s never going to happen. When you have 300 million guns, we’re never going to not have guns.

I’m not a gun nut. I AM a Constitution nut. I don’t think it’s a hang-up, as Dave suggests. People ask me, “Why does anybody need an AR-15?” Well, it’s the most popular gun in America. Hunters use it. Some people target shoot with it. It is a very, very good gun.

I think it’s hard to argue that guns aren’t highly regulated. But there’s no correlation between gun laws and gun safety. Again, look at Chicago. It is a highly-regulated industry, but when law enforcement gets 39 calls to a psycho kid’s house like this Florida shooter was — they could have locked him up. The sheriff down there dropped the ball, the FBI dropped the ball. The feds dropped the ball. Our nation’s database is a mess.

Taken from the Dori Monson Show on Thursday.