Arm school employees

It is now obvious that the enforcement of gun-free schools is a benighted, counter-productive policy. If school employees were allowed to use guns, they could have a chance to reduce the carnage caused by insane assailants. Washington should allow school employees who have concealed-carry permits to carry and store locked guns in their place of employment.

To obtain a concealed carry permit in our state, you must be at least 21 years old and pass a background check. To further limit the responsibility of defense to those who are up to it, school principals, who are more familiar with their employees than the police background checkers, should be allowed to arbitrarily deny the in-school carry right to 50 percent of the state permit-holding applicants.

People like Spokesman-Review columnist Shawn Vestal, who suggest that grammar school children should be encouraged or allowed to carry guns to school, would not pass this additional test of sensibility. Those foolish signs in front of public schools that announce that malevolently determined intruders will not be stopped until the police arrive should be repainted to announce, “We care enough to effectively defend our pupils.”

Bodhi Densmore

Spokane

(Editor’s note: Shawn Vestal’s suggestion that children carry weapons to school was meant to be facetious.)