My gun and I are the nightmare of the home
invader, the rapist, the murderer.

Without my gun, I am the perfect victim. At 5’4″, with no muscle tone or ninja skills, I am as defenseless as girls get – when unarmed.

If a hulking intruder terrorizes my home, am I not a fool to allow him within arm’s reach as I try to ward him off with my pepper spray? What if he has a gun?

Gun control debates have flared following Jared Loughner’s assassination attempt on Gabrielle Giffords and his massacre of others. My response: that man decided to do evil and chose a gun to do it. He shot them. He, not it.

Loughner’s gun gave him power only because nobody else had one. We hand power to criminals by disarming the innocent.

Policies restricting me from owning and carrying firearms put me, the law-abiding citizen, at the mercy of the law-breaking criminal. I honor the law. The criminal does not.

Someone who violates laws about murder is not going to obey rules about the legal means of obtaining guns.

According to a Bureau of Justice Statistics study, guns prevent 550 rapes, 1,100 murders, and 5,200 other violent crimes each day. In less than 1% of these instances is a shot fired.

Gun-related accidents outrage gun control advocates. My response: don’t restrict people – educate them. Then the mystery and fear surrounding guns will dissipate and ignorant accidents will dwindle.

Inflict harsh penalties on anyone who mishandles a gun. Then careless accidents will decrease.

I have mastered my gun. I know it, I’ve practiced with it and I know when not to use it.

My gun is safe in my hands.

Guns are tools. Tools have no intrinsic morality. Guns are dangerous only in the hands of the evil, ignorant or careless.

American law shouldn’t seize freedoms causelessly. Leave me “to keep and bear arms” until I have proven untrustworthy.

Should guns exist? Moot point. They do. Taking mine simply means that evil has one and I cannot defend against it. Restrict the evil, not the gun.