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To the editor:
This is a reply to Mr. Geedey's letter in the Aug. 27 edition of The Sentinel.
There are 195 countries in the world Mr Geedey. You forgot to mention there are just three countries that give citizens the constitutional right to bear arms: the United States, Mexico and Guatemala.
Not France, not Russia. America is unique in that our citizens own more guns per capita by far than any other country.
When I was young on the first day of deer season, Pennsylvania had the third largest standing army in the world with over one million hunters in our woods.
It is unique to America that this right has been so incorporated in our culture because we have the right to defend ourselves with guns, almost any gun. Mr. Geedey is correct that many countries had revolutions. But, no other country gave its citizens the right to bear arms, except Mexico and Guatemala.
No other country has the unique problems we have either. More than 45,000 American gun deaths in 2020 versus 33,386 combat deaths in the three year Korean war. We had one revolution, one invasion in 1812, one Civil War, two World Wars and many smaller wars. We survived it all with more guns and violence than our enemies.
Today there is a constant drug and gang war raging in our major cities, killing scores of people daily. It is sad but it is in our culture. Our open southern border does not help!
Mr Geedey stated, "Most mass killings are the result of a grievance or hatred, neither of which is a mental illness. Very few mass killings are the result of mental illness."
If this is true Mr. Geedey then why are we not engaged in total civil unrest? Every person I know has had some grievance or hatred against someone or something at sometime. Almost everyone has access to a gun. What keeps them all from becoming a mass killer? I won't use the word spin here -- how about gaslight?
It seems liberals today want to spin or gaslight everything. That conversation between a doctor and a woman you talked about is about the killing of the heart beating fetus in her womb. The correlation is death and the variable is the manor of death. How detached from reality are you?
Are you saying an abortion death is merely a mutual doctor patient conversation and a gun death in the street is a criminal felony? Death is the outcome in each case. Common sense tells me the two are related via death. How can you even try to separate the two?
Some states may take the life of a criminal by execution, not all do. Some states allow abortion, some don't. Some states have strict gun laws, some don't. The federal government has no business making national laws on these or similar issues.
This separation of power is part of the Constitution to keep centralized power at bay, and liberals hate it. People in each state have the right to elect lawmakers who reflect their values. You have the right to choose where you live. I think of the difference between Idaho and Mississippi or that Vermont is not like New Mexico and neither are the people or cultures. We are Americans united by our national constitution and strong by our states' diversity.
The liberal left's mission to change biology, morals, language, economy and the Constitution itself must be challenged at every turn. Get out and vote for common sense. If you like our current economy or if you believe a man can get pregnant, vote for a liberal.
Michael C. Spahr
Lewistown