A mass killer in Washington

The NRA preaches that the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is with a good guy with a gun. This is patent nonsense, but is repeated so often and with such conviction that millions of Americans wind up nodding their heads.

These honey-coated words hide a great lie. There is no way to stop a bad guy with a gun, except to keep him from getting it. Today, in the nation's capital, Washington DC, a guy with an assault rifle used it to kill 12 people. If that guy couldn't get an assault rifle, all those people would still be alive.

The site of the killing was the Washington Naval yard. This is an area that requires security clearance to enter. If this secure site could not stop a man with a gun from entering and killing people, then no place can. Schools, churches, movie theaters--all are vulnerable so long as violent men are able to obtain high-powered weapons and the ammunition they use.

There is no way to measure the amount of damage this fact does to our society. People are scared, and justly so. Frightened people can be convinced to do stupid things, like failing to control the number of guns in our society, but even worse, voting to elect people to office who are incompetent and corrupt because those candidates promise to protect us and our loved ones from harm.

No more. No more cowards elected to public office. No more guns. No more excuses.