When I opened my big, fat mouth a couple weeks ago in support of Sheriff Sandra Hutchens' more restrictive concealed weapons permit policy, I knew there'd be hell to pay.
You know how it is. You say or write anything remotely suggesting we don't all have a right to pack a sidearm on Main Street, and the gun nuts will eat you alive.
You write and, to quote Capt. Sully Sullenberger, brace for impact.
So, I wrote and braced and . . . .
Talk about a smooth landing.
Make no mistake, they came out in force. Dozens of e-mails came in, basically arguing that law-abiding citizens who pass mandatory training courses ought to be allowed to carry concealed weapons.
Gun nuts?
Hardly. At least not the overwhelming majority of e-mailers I heard from. They zeroed in on the nub of the issue, which is to ask why well-intentioned citizens shouldn't be allowed to carry a concealed weapon, just in case it might someday be needed.
In arguing that people should, the letter-writers weren't vitriolic, insulting or patronizing.
I almost wish they had been. It's easier arguing with people if you dismiss them as wackos. I'm always willing to match wits with people who call me names. I sit at home at night thinking of comebacks.
But when the right-to-carry people argue their case on the merits, it disarms me.
As one e-mailer wrote: "I have carried a firearm the majority of my adult life, legally and/or otherwise when the need to protect myself arose. I neither require, nor desire, the need to obtain 'permission' from my employees (otherwise known as 'public servants'). As a retired member of the U. S. Armed Forces, a former law enforcement officer, and firearms instructor, you have no reason to fear one such as myself carrying firearms."
Then, to emphasize his point, he wrote in capital letters: "WE ARE THE GOOD GUYS."
He had me at hello.
As I suggested in the last column, I get the argument. I really do.
How can anyone dispute that if confronted on the street by a criminal intent on mayhem, it's much preferable to have a way to defend yourself?
But I and other pointy-headed people just can't extend that argument as far as the other side does. Bottom line: I wouldn't feel safer knowing that untold numbers of private citizens that I pass on the street -- yes, even salt-of-the-earth types who have been trained -- are packing guns.
