Opinion : Letter to the Editor: Do you have the right to live? Or a duty to die??

Honest question.  Do you have the right to live?  If an evil and violent person picks you as their next victim – do you have the right to live?  Or is it your duty to our society to simply open your arms and allow yourself to be beaten, stabbed, choked or shot to death?  Do you have a duty to surrender – with the responsibility for your defense fully ensconced in whoever answers your 911 call?

The response to my frustrated post on the Texas school killings has been illustrative.  Many people understand that our society is “frayed” at the very least or perhaps it is simply lying in tatters on our nation’s “floor”.  The truth is probably somewhere in between.  And in the halls of Congress – with an election in the offing – our President has decided that 9mm handguns – that can “blow your lung out” – along with all ARs need to be banned as the final solution to our nation’s violence.  Now!!  Today!!  This moment!!!  Leaving folks, in many cases, defenseless in their homes or as they conduct their daily business.  Making me wonder does the President and “Da Left” see it as your duty as an American to simply surrender to your attacker and die peacefully?  Without fuss??

I had one respondent indicate that if attacked in a parking lot at night by evil doers with machetes – and affirming that she would never be found to have a gun on her – she would simply call 911 and call the store that owned the parking lot to inform them that they had evil malcontents getting ready to do her harm in their parking lot.  I assume she believes in her heart of heart that da cops will arrive in time to save her – perhaps forgetting that the single slash of a machete is all it takes to – well – kill her.  Dead.  Dead, dead, dead.  In fact, in a popular shooting drill, it is demonstrated that a person with a knife can attack from around 7 yards away in about 2 seconds.  So even an armed individual only has 2 seconds to draw their defensive firearm and engage their lethal threat.  Just what is the response time to a 911 call in today’s world?  Where I live, should the deputy be in the south end of the county, that may be as long as 30-45 minutes.  Do you see a problem here?

In the news today – drilling down on the whole “call 911 for help” theme – a county in Michigan announced that they would NOT BE RESPONDING to all 911 calls because they were – wait for it . . . wait for it . . . out of money to buy gas so they were rationing it for only the “most urgent” calls.  I suspect anyone calling 911 for a violent attack would view that as “urgent” . . . .but perhaps not so much with the 911 operator.

So, this brings me back to my original question – do you, as a citizen, have a “duty to die” to reduce the number of firearms in our nation?  I assume you are a law-abiding citizen.  And if the guns are banned that far too many of you will simply surrender them leaving all the firearms in the hands of actual criminals.  If – when – that happens . . . will you “go willingly into the dark” and surrender to your attackers?  If two or three break into your home with baseball bats, knives, or guns will you simply spread your arms and accept your fate?  When the Declaration speaks of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” and the Constitution speaks of “establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity” do you think our Founders meant “unless you’re under attack by a criminal – then you have a duty to die!!”?

During very recent hearings on gun rights and the individual Constitutional rights of citizens, Democrat Representative David Cicilline of Rhode Island said “So spare me the bulls*** about constitutional rights” – Seems pretty clear – at least to that member of congress that we, as citizens, simply have no protection under the Constitution.

I find it very illustrative that rather than enforcing the over 20,000+ gun laws that are already on the books, rather than finding and correcting the mistakes that were made in Texas and fixing them in the schools across the nation, rather than taking the “broken window” approach to begin bending the trend on rising crime in the US, rather than putting real effort in reconstituting the mental health care system of our country . . . the automatic solution is to disarm law abiding citizens – and leave the arms in the hands of our nation’s criminals.  How does that old saying go???  “What does a country do to its citizens if they are fully disarmed??  Anything it wants.”

To me it is obvious – “they” – “the left” – the Democrat party of our nation would much rather you die – than to be armed in such a way that you can mount a strong defense of yourself, your family or your neighbors should the need arise.

This simply is wrong and should be fought against in the strongest possible means!

Sincerely,

Bill Keller