Following the tragic Sandy Hook school shootings, there has been a tremendous amount of discussion on both the left and the right on what to do to curb the violence. The left immediately talks about limiting access to guns, stricter gun laws, assault weapon bans, and some, though in the minority, of taking away all the guns. The right opposes any legislation that would limit second amendment rights and encourages more people to arm themselves. Both sides lightly brush on the topic of treatment for the mentally disturbed and both talk about the need for a serious conversation in this country regarding these issues.

Then, in the midst of all this babble, an interesting idea was proposed. What if we arm the teachers and/or school administrators OR place an armed guard at every school?

Of course this was blasted and demonized by everyone on the left but it caused me to start thinking about what that would really mean. What if that brave principal who rushed the gunman and was murdered had a gun strapped to her leg? What if she had received monthly and/or quarterly training on how to use the weapon, along with training on how to protect the gun from getting into the wrong hands? Would she have been able to pull the gun and kill the assailant before he murdered all those kids? Would he have been deterred from entering the building in the first place if he knew that there were armed personnel on the premises?

I watched a pundit on MSNBC state that it is an insult to our trained military and police officers to insinuate that teachers and/or school administrators should carry guns to protect their school and of course their students. An insult? Really? Even if you can get to a phone in an emergency situation to call 911, do you really believe that they will arrive in time to stop a bullet from hitting you or your loved ones? In the 3 minutes it took the gunman to kill 26 students and teachers, did the police and/or military arrive and save anyone? In fact, during one of the press briefings, shortly after the incident occurred, the chief state trooper said the police saved a lot of lives today. I was appalled! The police didn't save anyone's life. They didn't get there in time to do anything and the gunman was already dead by the time they arrived on scene.

There are obvious potential issues that can occur with teachers carrying weapons near students, and I'm not entirely sure that I am a proponent of such a measure, but I'm not ready to rule it out and demonize those who have brought the idea to the public forum. I want our kids to be safe when they go to school. I want our teachers and faculty to be safe when they go to work. if we properly train certain staff members on how to handle a gun, deal with a situation such as this one, and keep updating their training through both target range and classroom arenas, perhaps this is the right solution. It certainly doesn't cost us any more money and it might just save a lot of lives.

Now I am on the side that says high capacity clips should be illegal. I am also in favor of closing the gun show loophole. If you want to own a gun, you need to pass a background check and a written test, just like I did when I bought my gun. I also went the extra mile and paid someone to train me on how to use the weapon. I think that too should be a mandatory item on the gun buying checklist. That being said, and when 40% of the guns purchased in this country are done so illegally, simply passing another gun law restriction that does little to nothing to protect us from the insane monsters of society isn't very comforting in my opinion.