If only that Colorado theater had allowed concealed weapons…

…well, maybe. Colorado does have a concealed carry law (they’re reciprocal with Wisconsin). I read someplace, however, that the theater – a privately owned business – doesn’t allow weapons inside. If so, well…

…I guess it’s a little too easy to blame the theater for not telling people that. Surely the shooter would have abandoned his plans, had he only known.

There’s a lot of internet chatter going on about whether more gun “control” laws are the answer to mass murders like the one in Aurora, Colorado last week because, you see, the shooter (who ignored the theater’s perfectly legal banning of weapons on their own property) would have totally adhered to another law.

But you don’t need me to tell you that. Every Second Amendment supporter is telling you that. And, plus, Chicago.

But that doesn’t mean this shooting – or any like it – would have been stopped if only the theater had allowed firearms inside. Even in those states with the most liberal firearms laws, very few people actually carry. It’s a damned small chance that someone in the theater would have had a gun no matter what the local laws were.

And even if somebody was armed…there is, sometimes, a big difference between knowing what to do and actually doing it. It’s much too easy for me, sitting here at my computer, to say: “If only someone had a gun, he could’ve stopped the guy!” It’s much harder to overcome the darkness, and confusion, and fear, and the very real possibility of being shot yourself. Would I want to leave my wife and/or children alone in a dangerous situation in order to put myself in harm’s way?

I’m not so sure I would.

On the other hand, of course, at least there’d be a chance. And an even greater chance if more than one person had been armed. If two, three, a dozen trained and responsible people had been armed, then what?

Somebody would have had a shot. Which brings me to Jeff Dunetz’ idea:

I have a modest proposal for Mayor Mommy and his ilk. The way last night’s carnage could have been reduced was if someone in the audience had a gun and shot the psycho “right between the eyes.”

Therefore I would like to recommend that Congress create a bill that requires every adult American to own a gun. Anybody who doesn’t comply would pay a fine to the federal government (for Supreme Court purposes they could call it a tax). This mandate could be designated to pay down the federal debt.

Even that really isn’t enough, of course. You’d have to greatly liberalize firearms laws, remove impediments to carrying in public places. Create incentives for training, practicing. Maybe give tax credits to companies that provide firearms training the same way health insurance companies give them credit for providing wellness programs.

Make owning a firearm a lot like owning a phone. There’s an app for that! The iPhone 7 – now in .38 caliber!

And even that wouldn’t really be enough. Just because we can doesn’t mean we will. There’s still a chance that a gunman will find a nice defenseless crowd to fire into.

But he won’t know where that crowd is. The Aurora shooter wouldn’t have known whether there were one or twenty or a hundred firearms waiting for him in that theater.

Kinda hard to plan it all out then. Which is, after all, the point.