Look, here's the deal - I would rather the lady not be burgled in the first
place - as anyone would. However that's trivial. Consider two options,
either neither the lady nor the burglars has a weapon or on the flip side,
they both do. Who is going to come out the better in a shoot out? The
granny? Certainly not, which is why it would be better that there were no
guns involved.

What makes you think if Reagan's ongoing War On Drugs can't shut down the meth
labs in the national forest behind my house that a War On Firearms is going to
be any more successful? We have the longest undefended borders in the world
here. You're an island. Maybe you can make it work. We can't.

Gun related deaths in the UK weighed in at 23 compared to over 10,000 in the
US for a similar time period. Granted, a large proportion of that 10,000 may
be gang related, or there may be other driving factors which are not so much
of an issue in the UK. I'm just speculating. However you look at it,
10,000's just staggering - that's Vietnam in five years.

Our population is several times yours, and it is spread over an area roughly
the size of Europe. The statistics you want, if you're to be honest with
yourself, are the numbers per. 100,000. I vaguely recall that our murder rate is
higher than yours but lower than the Baltic states. In every other sense, your
own society comes off far worse (which simply means you're passing through a
rough economic and demographic patch). Now. What does that tell you about your
prejudices -- and that's what they are -- regarding my people and *my* society?

This ethos of gun totting scares me rigid, how on earth can it be defended?
In the US the number of states permitting the concealed carriage of weapons
has risen from nine to 31 since 1986. That's just a step in the wrong
direction.

Before you get all worked up in this tearful frenzy over what the poor Americans
are inflicting upon themselves, why don't you -- if you really care -- do a bit
of research as to how many legally carried firearms were employed unlawfully
over the past few years?

And: Your understanding of American gun laws seems to be kind off off-kilter. I
can't *lawfully* wave a shotgun at some prick trying to steal my pickup truck.
That's called felony brandishment, and will earn me jail time. On the other
hand, if the sonofabitch comes inside and tries to harm me, it's reassuring to
know I can stop him cold, although I frankly can't fathom that happening in the
first place. Life here is so safe as to be boring.

You also seem to think that mere possession of a firearm makes an otherwise
ordinary human being susceptible to the equivelant of road rage. And if that
were true, Shasta County would be one of the bloodiest places on earth.

I wholeheartedly agree, but wouldn't you prefer those guys to not have ready
access to guns to facilitate those violent crimes?

How do you prevent that by the mere act of outlawing them? It didn't work for
grass or meth.

Or is it their right to
go about their criminal activities safe in the knowledge that they've a
weapon for self protection? Lunacy!

Here you are going off half-cocked again, and excuse me for calling you on it.
Please do go to the FBI's web site -- again, if you actually care -- and do some
research into how many legally-owned firearms were used in the commission of a
crime in the United States last year, or even in the last decade.

Look, I'm not laying out flame-bait for you. I'm not spewing smug rhetoric. I'm
saying, do what I did a few years ago and challenge your own assumptions. After
I got through looking at what the Centers for Disease Control and the Feds said
about gun crime in America, I felt a lot better as a gun owner. I can't recall
the exact figure off the top of my head, but the number is absurdly low. Single
digits of single digits.

I'm not desperately urging you guys to throw down your guns, shout
hallelujahs and join the British way of life.

I know. I know that.

I'm just fascinated as to why
you so readily defend your right to shoot someone where really no right
should exist.

As a mushy-squishy California LibDem who voted for Gore the last time around, I
have to honestly say that is -- to me -- a dismaying, disquieting, illiberal
sentiment, and I cannot fathom your mindset. We are just going to have to agree
to disagree on that one. Viscerally.

And now, having dispensed my Solomon-like wisdom to all and sundry, I will go
out and flop a slab of fresh tuna on the gas grill and make some fish tacos, and
I will sit on the back porch and eat them in the secure knowledge that despit
our guns and drugs and widespread poverty and petty sleazy white-trash
meannesses that Shasta County is *still* safer than Merrie Olde England.