| March comes in like a lion, as they say, and goes out | | | | power comes from the barrel of a gun," Chairman |
| like a lamb, and when I wrote this story on March 15 | | | | Mao reminded us, which may explain why, as citizens |
| I felt a little lamblike and a tad lion-ish. | | | | feel themselves more and more powerless to affect |
| "You're a liberal, so you're probably scared of guns," I | | | | the elements that control their lives, they clutch their |
| was told by an interviewee, as I was researching a | | | | guns ever closer. With prosperity, security-even a |
| story for our Nashville (TN) paper on the proposed | | | | modicum of contentment-forever slipping through |
| law to make it legal to carry guns into restaurants | | | | your fingers, a gun is something you can grasp. |
| that serve alcohol. and he was right on one count. | | | | These are weighty matters, but in the end they are, |
| Guns scare me. (Speeding cars also scare me, which | | | | largely, matters of opinion, and as far as opinions on |
| confession, combined with the other, ought to | | | | weighty matters go, no month is madder than March, |
| irrevocably disqualify me from living in Nashville, the | | | | when college basketball conducts its national |
| Manliest City in the U. S. of A., a designation recently | | | | tournament. Everyone had his bracket and his |
| awarded in a national poll). In an altercation involving | | | | opportunity to shine as a professional (jump in the |
| one (a gun), I would be as a lamb led to slaughter. | | | | pool!) prognosticator. |
| On the other hand, I am positively leonine in my | | | | Which brings me to an idea. Now that March, during |
| opposition to guns. Well, not positively. How about | | | | which all the world's a basketball court and all the |
| somewhat? I would not, for example, argue too | | | | men and women merely players, is gone, let's stage |
| vociferously with those who love them-after all, they | | | | another sort of competition, one that lets everybody |
| have all the guns. | | | | blow off some steam in a tournament with real |
| I suppose I ought to champion gun possession, it | | | | stakes. I propose that we outfit everyone with |
| being hallowed by our Bill of Rights, in a paragraph | | | | guns-every last man, woman and child-and match |
| right next to the one protecting our freedom of the | | | | neighborhood versus neighborhood in a shootout to |
| press. Freedom is precious, we're told, and perhaps | | | | the finish. There'd be starting teams, and liberal |
| our Founding Fathers were farsighted and wise | | | | substitutions allowed for injuries or fatalities. First, |
| enough to envision the age of drive-by shootings and | | | | second and third "rounds" would have piquant |
| mass murders in malls, and to decree that guns are | | | | meaning; overtime contests would be sudden-death. |
| eternally good. | | | | The general purging would solve a multitude of |
| They did see clearly that government was bad, | | | | ills-high unemployment and overcrowding among |
| incorrigibly so, and that it would be necessary from | | | | them-while allowing us to celebrate our love affair |
| time to time to take arms against a sea of troubles, | | | | with guns. |
| and by opposing have them repealed. "All political | | | | I volunteer to referee. |