Gun Laws Kill
 Michael Reagan
 Friday, April 20, 2007
 http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2007/4/19/165815.shtml
Thirty-two fine young men and women are dead and that is a huge tragedy.

It is also, however, a tragedy that the death toll could have been
substantially lower if it were not for an absurd law that kept the students
and faculty from exercising their constitutional right to protect themselves
and others by bearing arms on campus.

Thanks to that law, a madman was able to confront the men and women at
Virginia Tech secure in the knowledge that he was armed while his victims
were unarmed and defenseless.

One of those victims used the only weapon he had to protect his students.
Liviu Librescu, a man who survived both the Nazi Holocaust and communist
tyranny in his native Romania, used his body as a defensive weapon against
the madman's assault, putting his shoulder to the door to keep the killer
from getting into the classroom while his students fled though the windows.

Tragically, that frail body was no match for the rapid-firing Glock 19 in
the hands of a crazed Cho Seung-Hui. Librescu paid with his life for being
the "body-in-between," as the Secret Service phrases their role in
protecting the president.

"My father blocked the doorway with his body and asked the students to
flee," Joe Librescu told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from
his home outside of Tel Aviv. "Students started opening windows and jumping
out."

Those students who made it out of their classrooms owe their lives to the
courageous Liviu Librescu, but they owe nothing but contempt for the
Virginia Legislature that decided in late January to deny to anyone on a
Virginia campus the right to carry legally authorized concealed weapons on
campus.

On Jan. 31, 2007, The Roanoke Times wrote: "Most universities in Virginia
require students and employees, other than police, to check their guns with
police or campus security upon entering campus." The proposed legislation
was designed to prohibit public universities from making "rules or
regulations limiting or abridging the ability of a student who possesses a
valid concealed handgun permit . . . from lawfully carrying a concealed
handgun."

And guess who the newspaper quoted as gushing his approval of the
Legislature's lame-brained action to defeat the proposal? None other than
Virginia Tech spokesman and Vice President Larry Hincker, who told the
Times: "I'm sure the university community is appreciative of the General
Assembly's actions because this will help parents, students, faculty, and
visitors feel safe on our campus."

In the aftermath of the killings on his campus, I wonder if Mr. Hincker
still believes his students and faculty who were so cruelly slain - most had
multiple wounds - remain safe on campus thanks to the Legislature's
ill-advised action that denied them the right of self-protection.

In Virginia, adults who have a lawfully issued permit to carry concealed
weapons anywhere in the state remain prohibited from protecting themselves
while on a state campus thanks to the defeat of the proposed law that would
have allowed them the same rights they had off-campus while on-campus.

The very fact that the state considers a person capable of carrying a
concealed handgun by its very act of granting a permit should demonstrate
that the state believes that the permit holder can be trusted to use that
handgun only for self protection.

It is patently absurd to judge sane, normal people as being incompetent and
untrustworthy to bear arms while blithely ignoring the obvious truth of the
old saying that when good people are legally disarmed, only bad people will
have guns.

Had just one student or faculty member on the Virginia Tech campus under
assault by the killer been armed last Monday, the death toll would have been
much lower.

As revealed in NewsMax.com, that was proven in Pearl, Miss., in 1997, when
16-year-old Luke Woodham used a hunting rifle to kill his ex-girlfriend and
her close friend, and wound seven other students after having killed his own
mother.

His murder spree was stopped only when Assistant Principal Joel Myrick got
his handgun from his car and halted Woodham's shooting spree. He kept
Woodham at bay until the police arrived. While the shooting was widely
reported, the fact that Myrick - an armed citizen - prevented a larger
massacre with his gun was ignored by the media.

Mike Reagan, the eldest son of the late President Ronald Reagan, is heard on
more than 200 talk radio stations nationally as part of the Radio America
Network. Look for Mike's newest book, "Twice Adopted." E-mail comments to
Reagan@caglecartoons.com.

© 2007 Michael Reagan.