Texas Campus Carry

Republicans in the Texas Senate added an amendment to the spending bill called the "campus carry" law that now makes it legal for college students and staff to carry concealed weapons on campus. Apparently, the republicans did the same thing in the Utah Senate. I can see permitting people to use non-lethal pepper sprays if they are being attacked. But guns, really?

So what's the deal? Is it that dangerous to send your kids to college in Texas and Utah that along with pillows and comforters you have to include a weapon on your check list? That's as far as conflict resolution and education goes, "Agree with me and don't get in my way or else?" Or is it that there are so many armed people on a rampage in Utah and Texas that everyone has to be armed now?

While some college students act responsibly not all of them do. A great many of them can also be a bunch of partying goofballs. And when they get wasted they often do some pretty ridiculous things. If this in unfamiliar territory for you just go to YouTube and type in things like frat parties or college parties and you'll get my drift. These students are learning how to stand and some times stumble on their own. Many of them are away from home for the first time in their lives. This is when they need a gun?

And carrying guns to class? This will be intimidating and distracting for students and teachers. How much free exchange of ideas and disagreements and thoughts and learning is really going to go on in the classroom when students won't know if the person sitting next to them is armed?

And what about the playing field? The games? The booze and fights?

It will be interesting to see if parents will continue to send their kids to universities in Utah and Texas.

This is the problem with adding amendments onto spending bills and holding the rest of the government and its programs hostage. An amendment should only have a direct correlation to the proposed bill. Plain and simple. It's called common sense. I wonder if this amendment had been taken to the public, would it have been passed?

Texas Campus Carry Law

Texas and Utah, you'd better make sure your votes are being counted accurately and that your elections aren't being corrupted. Unless of course, this is the true reflection of what people in Texas and Utah are all about.

To be clear I think the constitution is brilliant. I think it is important that Americans have the right to bear arms and that they have the right to protect themselves if someone breaks into their home and is threatening to kill them. And I also believe that the rationale is flawed which presumes that because people have the right to bear arms then everybody should be allowed to carry a lethal weapon with them at all times. I also think its great that those who are able can drive. That doesn't mean that for the safety of everyone on the road, there shouldn't be some rules of the road.

I think that at a time in a young person's life, when they should be focusing on learning and figuring life out, giving them permission to carry a lethal weapon with them at all times, which could escalate an impulsive decision with serious consequences into a life sentence with no parole, is using poor judgment. There are plenty of ways people can protect themselves without resorting to a lethal weapon in such close quarters. It might be different if a campus was filled with people who obeyed the laws, never got so drunk they were out of control and never got into fights, or got so jealous they wanted to hurt somebody. But that isn't reality. To add a gun to the mix just isn't wise.