Thank you for writing this, Yvonne. You nailed it...especially the last sentence.

Unfortunately, an assault weapons ban will do nothing to protect people, young or old, from unbalanced individuals who would do unthinkable harm to others of any age- be it their parents or unknown targets of their madness.

You need go no further than suburban Sudbury in recent years, to see one unbalanced student "with differences" murder another middle school student, who he did not know, with a hunting knife before classes began in the boys rest room-- " to see what it would feel like".

Connecticut Governor Malloy said, " evil visited Newtown" last Thursday. Evil or madness does not need a concealed weapon  or an assault rifle-or a hunting knife, to wreak personal tragedy on families.

Personal madness will find a killing weapon.

Unbalanced evil and madness does

Madam Abraham: Guns are not the only issue here, and this is not an American problem exclusively. Guns are much harder to get in Olso, and in France and there are many other countries where a mad person has gone on a killing spree. We are all concerned for our childrens saftey but stop blaming everything on the second amendment, and making it sound as if only the guns went away there would be no more crazy men

Why do you need a tradegy to hug your children?

"We are only as sensible as the least sensible among us"?  You do "us" an injustice; we're much more discerning than to rely on simple-minded and dangerous "cures" like the ones you urge on us.  As for what to tell children; why not try the truth--there are disturbed people out there that are able to perpetrate violence largely because we have disarmed those intent on protecting (him) and "us".

I invite us all to read Professor Lott's article in Newsmax.com.  He brings credible study and solutions to the topic of gun controls.

Advice:  smell, sniff, and hold, lady, AFTER you get a firearm and learn how to use it.

I know your every feeling, Yvonnne. For me they center now on grandchildren but they are or should be universal. I knew everything I needed to know about the events in Newtown in the first minute of reporting. I have not listened or watched or read about it since. I averted my eyes from the front pages of newspapers. Albert Camus came to mind. His anguished meditation on the suffering of Algerian children in The Plague. My uncle and father-in-law who had been at Iwo Jima and who, when they met, needed only one minute to say to each other all they needed to say about that experience. Finally, a friend and colleague, an ex-marine with broad shoulders and serious mean, a pickup driving fellow with Republican tendencies and new father of a four month old boy, told me that when he heard the news he had to pull off the road and just cry.

No disrespect meant, but why tell your son anything about the Newtowne episode? Unless he asks you? Some parents tried to keep their kids away from the news, others went overboard deluging kids with loads of details and rationalizations and 'good guys' and 'bad guys'. I can recall hearing news about the Korean War and discussing China in late 1940s third grade; lo and behold I was sure hordes of Chinese soldiers were going to invade my South Shore hometown. They didn't and my version of the China Syndrome eased into the past with the ghosts and monsters I kept a nightlight on all the time to illuminate. Yes, no parent wants their child scared, but an event like the Newtowne massacre seems to be setting American parenthood off in an epidemic of mass dread that their children's schools are all going to be invaded by gun-toting madmen clad in black. And we have some municipalities considering arming some members of their teaching staffs with guns and others assigning a police officer to every school. I am truly sorry to see this, and again, there is no disrespect meant, but maybe the consoler-in-chief should say something about there being a need for some forms of gun control, but at the same time, most schools are as safe as they can be without turning them into armed fortresses. I am truly sorry to see this epidemic getting a start that is being egged on by the U.S. President and the nation's mass media.

Sorry folks, there seems to have been a decidedly unacceptable reaction to a comment that was not intended to raise ire. A coast to coast emotional reaction to anything is a very scarey scenario. I also do not care for the President's use of emotion to try and campaign on that emotion for a political objective. That is just one man's view. And to those who dislike that view, so be it. I don't know yours, or at least don't read those views. Meantime, the pols will keep up their promises to control this and control that, until enough time has gone by for them to find another issue. I have heard one writer say that 9/11/2001 stole the nation's heart, while the Newtowne massacre stole the nation's soul. Seems to me that is a major stretch... and there are others who cite women as being the gender most anxious and opposing gun owners' rights. I find that a very strange factoid to bring up right now, since it was a woman who bought the guns that the Lanza fellow used to kill so many in Newtowne. That is a very strange part of this scenario...