Guns are dangerous? Yeah, so is electricity!

• Hundreds of people die and thousands are injured each year in electrical accidents.
• There are, on average, 500 civilian deaths and 5300 injuries related to electrical fires in and around the home.
• About 150 people are electrocuted while using consumer products each year.
• Nearly ten people are electrocuted in the United States each week.
• Electrocution is now the fifth leading cause of work-related deaths in the United States.
• Over 600 people are electrocuted on the job yearly.
• Nearly 10 people are electrocuted by their lawnmowers every year.
• 20 percent of all electrocutions result in a fatality.
• About 25 people are electrocuted in their bathtubs every year.
• Around 20 people are electrocuted while using hair dryers each year.
• Approximately 17 people are electrocuted by faulty home appliances each year.
• Property damage due to home fires caused by electrical distribution, appliances and equipment and heating and air conditioning systems amounts to nearly $1.6 billion annually.
  

THEREFORE:

• The Federal Government should enact sweeping legislation to protect its citizens from this dangerous element.
• Power Companies should be required to pay punitive damages to victims and their families who are injured or killed by their product.
• All electrical appliances and devices should have to be registered with the Government.
• One must be licensed to operate any device which is powered by electricity.
• All internal combustion engines should be cranked by hand, not by electrical power.
• Anyone who uses electricity within 500 feet of a school should be subject to criminal penalties.
• Anyone who carelessly leaves unguarded electrical devices or appliances in the presence of a minor should be sent to jail.
• All electrically powered products should have a child safety lock installed and stored unplugged.
• Children should never be educated about the proper and safe usage of electricity...only that it is dangerous and therefore evil.
• Anyone caught concealing a battery shall be subject to mandatory prison sentences.

Absurd, right? Well, this is the very mindset and logic behind gun control. One could go on and on and on drawing ridiculous parallels to the warped concept of gun control legislation. Pencils cause misspelled words. Spoons make people fat. Chairs discourage exercise. Clocks make people late. Crowbars cause car thefts. We live in an age where it is acceptable, in fact, fashionable to hold anyone and anything responsible for criminal acts, mistakes and negligence except the people who commit them. It's not the criminals fault, it was someone else's. If you hadn't have left your car there, he would not have been able to steal it. Criminals should not be punished, they should be "rehabilitated" while the people who made the gun he committed the crime with...THEY should be punished! When that drunk plows into your car and puts you in the hospital, why not sue General Motors, Ford or Chrysler? If they hadn't have made the car, then he wouldn't have been able to drive it into your mini-van. They should've installed blood alcohol testers on all of their vehicles...it's THEIR fault, not the drunk's. While you're at it, why not sue Anheuser-Busch, or the Miller Brewing Company or whoever made the products he tanked up on before driving? Because it surely cannot come down to the fault of one poor old drunk and his lack of judgment.

Society will never be able to rid itself of the irresponsible. We will never be able to legislate protection for ourselves from anyone who has made up their mind to do us harm. We can legislate away, all of our freedoms and liberties into the hands of a police state. Or we can remain true to the spirit which built this country from a bunch of King's subjects to a Superpower of Free Citizens. We are not bound to social classes and predetermined standards of living, we are free to create for ourselves our own livelihoods. We are free to build a life for ourselves, but no one owes us a living. We are free to pursue happiness but it is not guaranteed. We are free to take chances but we are responsible for what comes of them. We are given opportunity in this country. What we do with it is our business and our responsibility. We are responsible for our own successes and failures. We are responsible for our own actions. If we screw up, we are to blame. The government has forces in place to protect it's citizens from predators but they cannot be posted on every street corner. We should be responsible for the protection of our families. We should be responsible for the defense of our homes. We should be our own first responders. This is the spirit which freed us from the bonds of tyranny. Let me make my own way. Let me be responsible for myself. Let ME reap the rewards of my own work. Let ME be the King of my castle.

Government has it's place and it should be a very small and well defined place with large fences and hardened borders and it should never be able to relieve me of my own right to self preservation. It should encourage me to be self sufficient and not to consume its social resources. A free people should never have to rely solely on their government for the provision of anything, including the preservation and defense of one's own self and one's own property.