I have to admit that I knew it was coming.
There are three topics guaranteed to spark an intense debate.
Race and Religion are two of them.
Guns is the third.
I went after guns in Sunday's editorial. You can read it here.
It was a plea for something more than the requisite calls for "thoughts and prayers" after the latest mass shooting, this time costing 17 lives in Parkland, Fla.
The editorial is the newspaper's position.
Here's mine.
Save your breath arguing that this is the first move toward taking away your Second Amendment rights - or your guns.
It's not going to happen - nor should it.
Yes, that right is guaranteed by the Constitution.
But that does not mean it cannot be limited.
Even one of the staunches conservatives ever to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court, Justice Antonin Scalia, admitted as much.
Here's where I'm at.
The AR-15 semi-automatic weapon, the same one used in Florida, has to go.
It has no reasonable purpose, outside the battle field. Other than to kill people.
What this mentally troubled kid was doing with one is almost beyond comprehension. Right after you come to grips that while he could not legally buy a drink in a lot of states, he could - and did - buy an AR-15.
Would he have gotten another kind of gun or perhaps made a bomb and went to the school anyhow? Possibly. But he would not have killed with anywhere near the ease he did in firing off 150 shots in a matter of minutes.
We have limitations on lots of privileges, the ability to drive a car for one. It's time for some reasonable limitations on gun ownership.
Sunday's editorial set off a huge response online. I kind of figured it would. Most of the responses were reasonable. A few, naturally, could not resist stooping to the lowest common denominator. It goes with the territory. A few readers asked why I do not block such comments. That's not where I'm at. You'll wait a long time before you see me become a censor. These people's comments speak for themselves.
But I did find one suggestion - one that I have long opposed - begin to take on new meaning.
That was a call to have armed kids in schools.
That does not mean arming all teachers. But perhaps it's time for an armed security force patrolling schools.
Is that my wish? No. But that is reality.
That or we continue to bury our children.
I guess this blog item will kick off a whole new round of debate today.
Well, let's have at it.
As I said in the editorial, "thoughts and prayers" are nice, but they do not stop bullets.
And right now, I'm not sure anything else matters.
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