Second Amendment Remedies:They can't see the connection?

During his campaign effort to unseat Giffords in November, Republican challenger Jesse Kelly held fundraisers where he urged supporters to help remove Giffords from office by joining him to shoot a fully loaded M-16 rifle. Kelly is a former Marine who served in Iraq and was pictured on his website in military gear holding his automatic weapon and promoting the event.

"I don't see the connection," between the fundraisers featuring weapons and Saturday's shooting, said John Ellinwood, Kelly's spokesman. "I don't know this person, we cannot find any records that he was associated with the campaign in any way. I just don't see the connection.

"Arizona is a state where people are firearms owners — this was just a deranged individual."

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We equate gun ownership, possession and use with our political expression and we don't see the connection when an individual picks up a gun and starts to use it against politicians? This is the most disingenuous statement that I have heard in a long time. Granted the individual shooter may not have attended a single rally for Jesse Kelly, but Kelly is the one who was equating gun use with political action when he posed with guns and encouraged their use as a part of his campaign. It is sort of like alcohol producers disavowing connection with drunk driving. We all know that not all use is abusive or wrong, but we must recognize when our behavior may influence others.

Of course Mr. Kelly is not guilty of this shooting, neither is the architect of the "second amendment remedy" Ms. Sharon Angle of Nevada. No doubt she was just looking for some good press by giving that outrageous sound bite to the media. Likewise Sarah Palin's website with cross hairs on Arizona's 8th District which Ms. Gifford represents was not "wrong", but neither was it right. Our words have consequences, our thoughts influence others, our example is a model. When we advocate violence we cannot deny the effects of that violence.

Go ahead, wear your sidearm to Starbucks. Stand up for your rights. After all you are a mature and trained individual who would never use a gun except in self defense, but can you be so sure of your neighbor whose right to bear arms may lead to disaster? Is your idea of self defense consistent with a free and healthy debate in the marketplace of ideas? Or is you side arm a chilling limiter of discussion and a source of fear for those around you?

I have carried weapons openly in the field while hunting as young man, in Vietnam while serving in the US Army. I do not do so now, neither do I hunt, there is no reason for it in my world.

My best wishes to Rep. Gifford her family, the families of other victims, the people of Arizona 8th and the people of my country. May we learn to live with our differences and as a result, live in peace.