Shoot straight on guns

Letter writer Arthur Houk (“Employ trained marksmen,” Oct. 30) has endorsed a sure-fire solution to tragic mass shootings such as the recent incident at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon.

Just have a “good person,” a custodian, maybe, or a teacher or secretary, with a gun, ready to snuff out the threat.

How scary. Study after study shows that law enforcement officers, highly trained as they are, are notoriously inaccurate when gunplay breaks out. The RAND Corporation examined New York City Police officers’ “average hit rate” in such situations from 1998 to 2006 and reported that only 18 bullets out of 100 hit the target. One has to wonder where the other 72 landed.

Houk, however, has absolute confidence in his hypothetical good person who, had one been on hand in Roseburg, “quickly could have taken down the evil, wicked person with his ready gun.” I repeat: how scary.

Doug Floyd

Spokane