My good friend (Army Bob) wrote to me, “To blame a weapon for a crime is like blaming a pencil for a ransom letter.” Great analogy with which I agree!

Why do I agree – because to use the inanimate object, weapon or pencil — it takes a human being. Depending on the mental stability of the person, either object can cause harm. One can cause death if not used safely and responsibly.

After all the protests and consternation over the shooting deaths of 17 people at a Parkland, Fla., high school (Marjory Stoneman-Douglas) and consequently several times throughout the country, I hope all the students finally get back in school and learn something. Because the past few months have accomplished little of consequence in getting to the core reason people pick up a weapon and start shooting others.

We all know they have mental problems but Mr. Cruz, before he killed those in the school, was visited more than 30 times by police where he lived. And there was no flag of concern over his mental state then?

Instead of doing an internal investigation into why Nickolas Cruz was such a poor student and causing fights and tension, what was his story? We know he didn’t have a father and recently his mother died. He was living with others. He was expelled from the high school and didn’t graduate. Was he bullied by others? Was he teased and ostracized?

He was described as a loner, why was that? Evidently his anger had increased to the level where he reasoned in his sick way he had to get a weapon and take retribution on others. But the overarching question of this — WHY? Were others intimidating him, was he thinking they were the reason for his expulsion? We know little of his motives, and the school and police have been tight-lipped.

Instead of projecting all the anger and angst on the shooter for killing teachers and fellow students; students, specifically David Hogg, attacked everything and everybody but the shooter. NRA, NRA members, weapon manufacturers, anyone supporting anything attached to firearms (stock in manufacturers, advertisers of the NRA, advertisers for NRA supporters, etc.). Has the world gone mad?

Assault weapons – we must get rid of assault weapons! If you ask 100 people what an assault weapon is, you’ll probably get 100 different answers. Some will say “machine gun” (many rounds shot with one trigger pull, but automatic weapons have been outlawed for decades). Some will say anything black in color. Some will say plastic stocks. Some will say muzzle flash suppressor. Some will say big magazines (for the uninitiated in proper weapons language, they might say “big clips”).

Some will say AK-47, AR-15, M-16, and various other descriptions of specific weapons. Some might go so extreme as to say anything that has more than one round per finger pull (eliminating sporting semi-autoloading rifles and shotguns). Most people don’t know there are more people shot by handguns than any other firearm.

The stupidity of attacking the NRA and people supporting the NRA, and law-abiding citizens is misplaced. The NRA is only a supporter of Second Amendment rights and support and fund weapons safety, training of NRA endorsed instructors and teaching law-abiding citizens and young people how to safely handle and use firearms. The NRA doesn’t make laws.

The Congress makes laws, and if we leave it up to them, it will be a legislative mess, as very few in Congress use and understand firearms and their proper, legal uses. They will talk about abolishing “assault weapons” but understand nothing about what defines an “assault weapon.”

One senator or representative will say to eliminate AR-15s. OK, then what are they going to do once the killings happen again (and they will!) using a AK-47, shotgun, or pistol? Under that reasoning, nothing short of total gun confiscation will do. When that happens, only the criminals will be armed, leaving the law-abiding citizen at the mercy of the criminals.

I would recommend an FBI background check that is updated and all encompassing (if it is determined to be presently deficient). Mental health identification and treatment be reinforced with funds and personnel to help identify and address a sale of any weapon to proven mentally stable persons only. The NRA are not lawmakers; the NRA is us. Politicians make law.

Call your U. S. senator and Representative if you want action on the gun laws. If you don’t like the politicians that receive support from the NRA to protect your Second Amendment rights, don’t vote for them. If you support those senators and representative, let them know. If you don’t care one way or the other, don’t do anything.

But to accuse the NRA, law-abiding citizens, and gun manufacturers of having “blood on their hands” is misguided anger without a thought. The young Mr. Hogg had his 15 minutes of fame, “Time” and other media publications have ranted and vented their indignation and misinformation, and the regular citizen with no knowledge of weapons is roused to giving opinions – opinions usually bereft of thought and reason.

About the Nestle/bottled water dilemma:

On another note, many are disgusted with Nestle for pumping millions of gallons of water from an aquifer near Evart, MI and bottling it in plastic bottles with little given in return to the area or state in compensation for using the resource.

I say look first at local officials who allowed the plant to be approved. Then look to the county and state to not have rules or legislation in place to charge for the gallons of water being used. Then look in the mirror, you! You can get water at little or no expense from city or private wells. If you wouldn’t have provided a market for bottled water, Nestle wouldn’t have built a plant (no profit, no plant).

The American people’s perceived need to get water in a plastic bottle is out of control and filling up landfills with plastic bottles and littering the roadways is a travesty. You, the American people, are the problem! Quit buying plastic bottled water.

But that won’t happen, because like a cell phone, bottled water is a perceived need and will not be abandoned, it’s too convenient. I guess if you won’t change your wasteful habits “ya should quit yer squawkin” as a friend of mine would say. He isn’t educated in a college sense, but the smartest person I know.

The rotting of America from within continues…