It needs to be said

I don't think I've held Michael this tightly since the night he was born. I hugged him and Molly in our kitchen and I prayed for those children in Connecticut. The kids in the school, the teachers, the first responders, and, yes, even the villain who took the lives of so many innocent people.
I prayed for him because one day he was a child like Michael. A child who smiled, who took a first step, who giggled at the things children giggle at.
Oh, I know he did terrible, atrocious, unforgivable things today. But his inhumane actions do not take away the fact that at one point he was a child of promise. Of hope. Of love.
I've never understood how someone could take a life. Any life, for that matter. But to take the lives of children is inconceivable.
Look, it's inevitable that this country will one day overcome its issues with gun violence. At some point, we're going to cast aside the wingnuts and dingbats, settle down at the table and have a grown-up conversation about how to solve this problem.

What makes me optimistic? I know this country and, though we have many faults, what we do best is solve problems.
Let's be honest, the gun lobby is right when it says, "Guns don't kill people, people do."
As a society in which guns and violence are so prevalent, we owe it to ourselves to take prevention and safety very seriously.
We have to make mental health care a bigger priority. So several different groups of people have to step up. We have to produce more - and better qualified - mental health professionals, make it easier to see a doctor when necessary. The stigma of mental health issues needs to be dropped. If someone has a cold, they don't feel ashamed to see a physician; so someone with bi-polar disorder, depression, whatever, shouldn't ever feel ashamed to see a psychiatrist.
Let's also ask our education system to step in more than it does. How about we put a gun-safety officer in every school? Someone who can explain the dangers of a gun, how to safely use one, and what to do when you find one.
Everyone in society needs to enter this discussion if we're going to solve the problem.
Our religious leaders need to step it up. They've failed us miserably when it comes to gun violence.
As someone who has attended church regularly for most of his life, I cannot recall any instance where gun violence was discussed from the pulpit. Sure, my pastors have spoken about everyone's favorite hot-button topics except gun violence. Sex on TV, abortion, gay marriage, the income gap, no Nativity on the courthouse lawns.
I'm not looking for your priest to give a rousing rendition of "Lock away the guns and throw away the keys." All I'm asking is that they stand at the pulpit and say, "Hey, you know how I talk about protecting that life in the womb? Well, those nine months aren't the only time when someone's life is valuable."
Nearly all religious denominations develop their rules around inference and interpretation of stories, poems and such. Yet the Old Testament has one rule that is declared in no uncertain terms.
Thou shalt not kill.
Pretty simple, right? Four words. There's no misunderstanding there.
Maybe you don't believe in God or don't buy organized religion. That's OK by me. But even if that's how you feel, you have to admit that message is much more clearly stated than most of the other rules in our religious documents.
But if we're going to ask society, medical professionals, the education system and religion to pitch in, we surely have to ask the gun lobby to help out.
Its leaders would rather not. It's easier for them to make money by frightening their followers with tales of "That guy's gonna take our guns."
They want the freedom that comes with the second amendment, but not the responsibility it requires.
Thankfully, most gun owners aren't like that.
Sadly, those gun owners aren't running the NRA, which is busy buying off politicians and framing the debate.
The responsible gun owners are people willing to say, "Yes, there's a problem here. Let's work together and solve this thing."
Remember Richard Reid? He's the idiot who tried to light his shoe on fire in an airplane shortly before Christmas of 2001. He wanted to blow people up shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks.
Well, now we have to take off our shoes before going on a plane.
Ask yourself this: If we can make that change after one attempt at killing innocent Americans, how come we can't adjust our gun laws after....
... 14 students and one teacher were killed in Littleton, Col., in 1999?
... nine people in Minnesota in 2005?
... three students at an Ohio school in February of this year?
... one student at a school in Baltimore in August of this year?
... 28 people today?



Early Friday morning, a deranged man walked into a school and attacked 23 people. He didn't have a gun, because gun ownership is prohibited in China. While people were wounded, no one died.

I've never been one to advocate taking away people's lawfully-obtained guns.
I am, however, in favor of laws that require people to notify the authorities when their firearms are missing; strict, mandatory sentences for anyone who commits a crime with a gun (even non-violent crimes); the loss of the right to own a gun for anyone who commits a felony; and the loss of the right to own a gun if you are arrested for DUI.
Now, feel free to tell my I'm a freedom-hating communist in the comment section.