Editor, Gazette-Journal:

The Second Amendment was premised on the Citizen Soldier being able to defend his home, family and country against a host of hazards, many (most?) of which don’t exist today. The one most often cited is protection from criminals. Certainly an argument can be made that, were the people at the San Bernardino party armed, and known to be armed, that the assassins wouldn’t even have attempted the shootings.

But imagine they did.

It becomes a shootout with bullets flying around everywhere. A view of the often-cited police shootings show that, in stressed situations, even highly-trained shooters firing 8, 10, 16 times only hit their target once or twice. Only Providence has saved people in the vicinity from the other 7, 9, 15 bullets flying who knows where. In a crowded situation with an overlay of panic, the likelihood is that “friendly fire” would account for most of the casualties.

The remedy of restricting guns to law enforcement and m...