Standing firm on Second Amendment's intent

I'm grateful to the Bee for publishing my letter to the editor regarding my thoughts on the Second Amendment and "muskets." Some people have chosen to focus their attention on me instead of my words. I’d like to address some assumptions made.

I, too, care about kids having to do active shooter drills in schools. It concerns me equally, if not more, as I soon will have two kids in school. My concern is the society that produces such a person. Banning the gun(s) he used leaves us with the same sick society and does not address the root cause of the problem — a public desensitized to violence. It also opens the door for bigger issues. In Australia, there are fewer guns and mass shootings. But the entire population were locked down by their government for almost two years for a virus the CDC now says is to be treated like seasonal flu. Is there a connection?

"Shall not be infringed." The Founding Fathers never talked about "guns," they talked about "arms." Arms are implements for the defense of liberty. National armies do not defend individual "liberty." In America, citizens do. Armies defend borders. Our Founding Fathers also did not believe in standing armies. So how could they have intended the Second Amendment to be for "militias" or "armies?"

Globally, possessing "arms" is a unique right belonging only to Americans. In banning them we will only admit to lacking the maturity, as a people, to own them.

DEAN CANNON

Sandpoint