FoxNews.com featured an articled today entitled, More Guns, Not Less, Would Prevent Shooting Massacres, in which John Lott once again tries to explain the reality of an armed citizenry in the face of those that are determined to kill.
…Up until the early 1970s, Israel had to deal with the cold reality of terrorists who would take machine guns into shopping malls, schools, and Synagogues and open fire. That type of attack doesn’t occur any more. Why? Israelis realized that armed citizens could stop such an attacker before he did much damage.
About 15 percent of Israelis are now licensed to carry weapons, and determined terrorists have to resort to less effective, secretive routes of attack such as bombing.
Increasing the probability that someone will be able to protect himself or herself increases deterrence. Even when any single person might have a small probability of having a concealed handgun, the probability that at least someone in the crowd will have a gun is very high…
…While right-to-carry laws– now operating in 40 states — do reduce violent crime generally, the effect is much larger for multiple-victim shootings. Normally about 2 to 6 percent of adults in any state have permits, and for most crimes that means some deterrence. But for a shooting in a public place where there might be dozens or hundreds of people, it will almost ensure that at least someone — someone who is unknown to the attacker — will be able to defend themselves and others…
…Most people understand that guns deter criminals. Suppose you or your family are being stalked by a criminal who intends to harm you. Would you feel safer putting a sign in front of your home saying “This home is a gun-free zone”? Would it frighten criminals away?
Good intentions don’t necessarily make good laws. What counts is whether the laws ultimately save lives. Unfortunately, too many gun laws primarily disarm law-abiding citizens, not criminals.
I’ve been told that the evidence for the failure of gun control in the U.K. is anecdotal at best. I wonder how long we will have to see these “anecdotes” before it moves into the realm of reality? Let’s take a look at this weeks news from the Telegraph.
It simply isn’t a matter of what feels right. The fact of the matter is we live in a world full of evil.
MORE GUNS = LESS CRIME
In what can only be seen as a record week here in the Jackson house, I received my third in a trifecta of great customer service experiences today. The first “win” being an unsolicited week of free service from Skype, the second being a direct response to a query from the author of Murach’s Java SE 6 about a missing tutorial, and the final victory today when I received a favorable response to a an exchange request from Audible.
While browsing around Audible for something new from the pen of Dickens with which to aid my slumber, I had the crazy idea that I might try to redeem some value from a book I had purchased, but which was unbearable to the ear due to the droning monotony of the narrator. Specifically, I had purchased Dickens, Our Mutual Friend, narrated by Jim Killavey some months ago, only to find that Mr. Killavey’s voice is exceedingly painful to listen to, and adds no depth to the narration whatsoever. The quality was so dreadful that I was unable to get past the first chapter, and the book has sat un-listened to for months.
As I said, I was browsing around Audible for something new. By chance I ran across the same book, but narrated by Robert Whitfield instead of Mr. Killavey. I sent an email to Audible asking if it would be possible to exchange the Killavey copy of the book for the Whitfield copy. Imagine my surprise and deslight when I recieved an email this morning not only telling me this would be possible, but that my library at Audible had already been updated to reflect the change!
Needless to say, Whitfield is a superb narrator, and has filled my head with countless hours of windmill chasing from the pen of Miguel de Cervantes, and many more hours seeking justice for Nicholas Nickleby. Now, Whitfield will continue to partner with Dickens, and Our Mutual Friend Audible, to bring many more hours of literary enjoyment into my life. Who could ask for anything more?
My brother sent me a link to an extraordinary article at Time entitled, Mother Teresa’s Crisis of Faith. The article speaks of a new book by Rev. Brian Kolodiejchuk entitled, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light, in which Kolodiejchuk compiles a lifetime of letters from Mother Teresa to her confessors in which she reveals the darkness of her soul.
I have tried to explain this situation to others, and have often been misunderstood. The tendency of those that are not experiencing a “dark night of the soul”, a term coined by St. John of the Cross in the 16th century, often mistake such an experience as a lack of faith, or proof that a person does not believe in a personal relationship with Christ. Nothing could be further from the truth. We are not guaranteed a “feelings based” relation ship with our Lord, and indeed the dark night of one may be a week, while the dark night of another may last a lifetime.
So many unanswered questions live within me afraid to uncover them — because of the blasphemy — If there be God — please forgive me — When I try to raise my thoughts to Heaven — there is such convicting emptiness that those very thoughts return like sharp knives & hurt my very soul. — I am told God loves me — and yet the reality of darkness & coldness & emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul.–Mother Teresa
You are not so much in the dark as you think … You have exterior facts enough to see that God blesses your work … Feelings are not required and often may be misleading.–Archbishop Ferdinand Périer
I can’t express in words — the gratitude I owe you for your kindness to me — for the first time in … years — I have come to love the darkness — for I believe now that it is part of a very, very small part of Jesus’ darkness & pain on earth. You have taught me to accept it [as] a ’spiritual side of your work’ as you wrote — Today really I felt a deep joy — that Jesus can’t go anymore through the agony — but that He wants to go through it in me.–Mother Teresa
I accept not in my feelings — but with my will, the Will of God — I accept His will.–Mother Teresa
The tendency in our spiritual life but also in our more general attitude toward love is that our feelings are all that is going on,…And so to us the totality of love is what we feel. But to really love someone requires commitment, fidelity and vulnerability. Mother Teresa wasn’t ‘feeling’ Christ’s love, and she could have shut down. But she was up at 4:30 every morning for Jesus, and still writing to him, ‘Your happiness is all I want.’–Rev. Brian Kolodiejchuk
